Eggless Caramel Swirl Millet Brownies

Caramel Swirl Millet Brownies are eggless with many healthy benefits. These form a good snack or dessert option. Millets are drought resistant crops and gluten free grain. Millets are rich in fibre, protein, phosphorus, magnesium, other minerals, vitamin B and low in glycemic index. They help lower blood pressure and cholesterol. Millets in moderate use is good for health as reports have shown that they have thyroid suppressive effect in the body.

This recipe is part of my entry to online millet recipe contest. My first thought of millets baking…. something I was not sure, I can’t do it. But believe me the way it raised in the baking tin made me so happy and I was on cloud nine. The second thought was compromising on taste of brownies and giving it to my dear ones, again I was just not sure. So made it chocolatey, flavorful and by roasting until just warm to remove raw smell. It was a late night bake, I was just dreaming of how it will taste, and the millet brownies didn’t let me down. They tasted good with chocolate sauce and ice cream.

Here is the simple recipe, do try and share your feedbacks on how these healthy brownies turned out.

Course: Bake

Cuisine: America

Preparation time: 5 mins

Cooking time: 40 mins

No of pieces: 9

Ingredients:

Mixed Millet flour – ¾ cup (As told by vendor this mixed millet flour is made of little millet, kodo millet, jowar, bajra, proso millet, foxtail millet and ragi)

Powdered sugar- ½ cup

Coconut palm sugar- ¼ cup (Spriggourmet)

Apple sauce- ¼ cup + 1 tbsp

Baking soda- ½ tsp

Vanilla essence -1 tsp

Yogurt-2 tbsp

Cocoa powder – ¼ cup

Grated dark chocolate- ¼ cup

Salted Caramel- 1½ tbsp (Spriggourmet)

Salt a pinch

For half cup applesauce

Apple-1 big

Water- ½ cup

Cinnamon powder-1 tsp

Vinegar-1 tbsp

Brown sugar-1 tbsp

Method:

1. Preheat the oven at 180℃ for 10 minutes.
2. Prepare 7″ baking tin by greasing with oil and lining with parchment paper.
3. Preparation of applesauce: Take a thick bottom kadai, add peeled, cubed apple pieces, water, cinnamon powder, brown sugar and vinegar. Close and cook on medium flame until apple becomes soft as the water evaporates. Cool this and mash or grind into smooth paste. Keep this aside for further use.
4. Dry roast millet flour for few seconds on low flame until the raw smell vanishes. Cool the flour. Care to be taken not to burn the flour.
5. Sieve together mixed millet flour, salt, baking soda, powdered sugar, cocoa powder for 8 to 10 times. Keep this aside.
6. Take a bowl, add coconut palm sugar, applesauce, mix it well until the sugar dissolves.
7. Add vanilla essence, curd and mix well.
8. Add the sieved flour mixture, mix it well so that no lumps are seen but do not overmix the batter. (Usually the batter is thick and not so thin as the other flours)
9. Add the grated chocolate, mix once.
10. Pour the batter into prepared tin, add the salted caramel at four corners, take a tooth pick and make swirls. Tap the baking tin once on the platform to release any air bubbles.
11. Bake in preheated oven at 170℃ for 25 to 30 minutes.
12. After the baking time, check if it’s done by tooth pick method, keep in oven for few seconds, then take out, cool completely. Cut them and serve. Store in airtight containers with pieces of butter paper in between.
13. Serving options: can be served with vanilla ice cream, chocolate sauce or salted caramel.

My Notes:

Millet flour absorbs more water compared to other flours. So liquid to flour ratio should be worked out.

Flour should be dry roasted to remove the raw smell.

My feeling is millet flour requires more sugar content compared to other flours.

To mask the raw taste of millet, it is better to mix and match with dominating ingredients like chocolate, cinnamon, nutmeg, salted caramel, flavored sugar.

It should be baked at low temperature for uniform rising.

Adding applesauce will give a nice texture to eggless millet brownies.

Applesauce is used as egg or fat replacement in bakes. That is 1 egg is equally replaced with ¼ cup of applesauce. In millet baking, slightly more of applesauce is required.

Milk can also be added but I felt curd to some extent will help in giving fat content and texture for brownies.

Place a parchment paper at the bottom of tin for easy removal.

Salted caramel can be replaced with nutella or can be skipped.

Do not bake for long time, it will dry the brownies.

Baking temperature settings depend on individual oven.