So last week was my brother's birthday, and I wanted to make him something that I knew he would love. And he loves chocolate and caramel. At first I thought I should try to make salted caramel brownies, they are delicious and everyone loves them, but I didn't have any fancy flaky salt to put on them. I didn't just want to make regular caramel brownies, I wanted them to have an extra depth of flavor to them. I searched my cabinets and found a package of pretzel sticks, and realized they would be a perfect salty crunchy addition to my brownies.
This brownie recipe is pretty easy. The brownie batter itself comes together in one bowl. The batter is very thick, and I think that makes the brownies extra thick and delicious. These brownies are chocolaty, salty, crunchy, sweet, and so very gooey.
For the caramel layer you just have to melt caramel candies and mix it with sweetened condensed milk. If you have a different caramel recipe you could definitely use that and not have to unwrap all the caramels. I used pretzel sticks that I chopped up, but any pretzels chopped up or crushed will work!
Caramel Pretzel Brownies
- Prep Time: 15 minutes
- Cook Time: 40 minutes
- Total Time: 55 minutes
- Yield: 15 1x
- Category: Dessert
Ingredients
- 4 oz Dark Chocolate (chopped)
- ¾ cup butter
- 1 ½ cups granulated sugar
- 3 eggs
- 2 tsp vanilla extract
- ½ cup unsweetened or dutch process cocoa
- 1 cup flour
- 1 14oz bag of individually wrapped caramels (unwrapped)
- ⅓ cup sweetened condensed milk
- 1 cup chopped pretzels
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350°F. Grease a 9″ x 9″ pan and set aside.
- In a large microwave safe bowl, melt the butter in the microwave in 30 second intervals. While butter is hot, mix in the chopped chocolate and stir until chocolate is melted. Whisk in the sugar until combined, then whisk in the eggs and vanilla extract.
- Stir in the cocoa powder, flour and salt and mix until combined. Spoon the batter into the prepared pan. Bake for 35-40 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out with just a few moist crumbs on it.
- In a medium saucepan over low heat melt the caramels together with condensed milk. Remove from heat. Stir the pretzels into the caramel mixture, they pour caramel pretzel mixture over the baked brownies and spread evenly. Let caramel layer set, then cut brownies and serve.