One of the best things about cooking is that once you master a recipe, you’re free to play. This is a version of my cranberry brownie tart, a favorite holiday dessert. For this version, I swapped dried cherries for the cranberries, then tossed in a handful of chopped walnuts and baked it in a heart-shaped baking dish. What could be easier for a little Valentine’s Day indulgence?

Cherry walnut brownie tart

¼ cup brown sugar

¾ cup granulated sugar

½ cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened

2 eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla

½ cup cocoa powder

½ cup all purpose flour

½ cup dried cherries

¼ cup walnut pieces, chopped

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Butter 10-inch round baking dish (or hear-shaped dish).

In large mixing bowl, beat sugars with butter. Add eggs and vanilla and stir to combine, then add cocoa powder and beat until well blended. Switch to wooden spoon and stir in flour just until combined. Do not overmix. Stir in cherries and pour batter into baking dish.

Bake until brownies pull away from the edge of the dish and a skewer inserted into the center comes out with fluffy crumbs, about 20 - 25 minutes. Cut into wedges and serve with creme fraiche or strained yogurt. Serves eight.

Recipe courtesy of Janine MacLachlan, The Rustic Kitchen. www.RusticKitchen.com. All rights reserved.

This entry was posted on Sunday, February 10th, 2008 at 4:17 pm and is filed under Recipe posts. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.