I’ve made banana bread twice during shelter-in-place the last four months: vegan buckwheat banana bread and sourdough walnut banana bread. The problem, though, is that although we enjoyed both, it was just too much for the two of us. We cannot share with friends, neighbors, or colleagues given everyone is under lockdown, and sharing food may be questionable despite evidence showing that food is not a common way to spread the virus. So we end up having to eat everything, and everything, even the most delicious things, have diminishing marginal utility. The bites just get worse the more you eat them.

So I was intrigued when one of the food blogs I follow posted a recipe for small batch fudge brownies. While brownies are typically baked in an 8 inch-by-8-inch pan, that’s… quite a large number of brownies, and can be quite tiresome to eat between two people. This blogger created a fudge brownie using 80 grams of dark chocolate in a loaf pan, so about half the size as usual. I immediately jumped on the idea, especially after I found exactly 80 grams of 75 percent chocolate in our fridge remaining from our Colombia trip last May. This would be a delicious way to finally use the last Colombian chocolate we brought back from that delicious trip.

The brownies came together quite quickly and baked in just 15 minutes. After allowing them to cool, I admired their shiny, glossy sheen. I took a bite and WOW — this is dark fudgey chocolate brownies at their darkest and fudgiest. I had Chris try one, and he was… a bit blown away by the intensity of the chocolate. I mean, it IS 75 percent cacao from Colombia, and that is all the chocolate that is in there — no fillers, no fluff.

It seems like a cocoa-powder brownie might be better for my chocolate and brownie loving husband — a little less intense but still chocolatey.