Recipe Review: Lighter Brownies

The Cooking Channel has a new healthy living show out called Good Housekeeping Drop 5 Pounds. I watched the first episode, didn't hate it, and set the DVR to record it. It's got cooking, exercise & general healthy living tips, from a few different hosts. The recipes are generally the kinds I like--easy and healthy, without many Franken-food ingredients (Hungry Girl, I'm looking at you!).

The Lighter Brownie recipe looked especially good, so I copied it and tried it yesterday.

Holy cow, I need to buy more cocoa powder. They were really good. I did change things a little bit, but only out of necessity. I don't have "trans fat free vegetable oil spread," but I do have butter, so I used that. And I (sadly) don't have an 8x8 baking pan, so I used my old 7x9 pan. I also cut them in 12 instead of 16. So the calories are a little higher than the 95 listed on the website. Mine came out to 129. Yes, that's about a third higher, but it's still pretty good for a brownie.

Now, these are not massive, thick cakey brownies. These are fairly thin, chewy, fudgy brownies with pretty intense flavor. There was barely enough cocoa powder in the can, so I added the last of it, and it might have been just a hair too much. But they're goooooooooooood. They definitely have that "oomph" that I'm looking for, the "I'm done" signal.

I looked in my Cook's Illustrated Best Light Recipe as well, and there is also a brownie recipe there, for 130 calories. I'm wondering how it'll stack up, so I might give that a try as well in the future. But for now, this recipe is my go-to for brownies, and I'll be making it frequently.