This Chocolatey Ingredient Might Be The Secret To Brownies With A Shiny Crust

There is a reason brownies are a timeless treat. They come together quickly, don't require a ton of ingredients, smell heavenly as they bake, and their glossy, crackly top yields to reveal the fudgy goodness that lies underneath. But sometimes, a homemade batch of brownies emerges from the oven with a dull, somewhat dimpled appearance on top. Sadly, no tantalizing crust. They still taste good, but they definitely do not have the same visual and textural appeal.

The cause of this lack of crust? It all comes down to the amount of sugar and the time that sugar has to fully dissolve within the batter. Essentially, if you have enough sugar and it is completely dissolved in the liquid contained in the batter, a shiny brownie top will be yours. Many bakers have spent inordinate amounts of time isolating variables that affect brownie top results, including the amount of air in the batter, resting time, fat content, and ingredient temperature. But, here's a cheat code — simply add chocolate chips.

Adding chocolate chips to the brownie batter is sort of an auto-correct for optimum sugar levels. The extra sugar from the bits of chocolate allows the water and sugar to interact to their full extent and puff up in the oven, forming a barrier of sorts as the mixture bakes. This thin crust becomes pliable enough to lift slightly from the batter, trapping the air that is trying to escape from the mixture during cooking and containing it. The result is an enviable paper-thin top layer that will make your brownies look like they came straight from a specialty bakery. Even better, the chocolate chips stud the brownies with sweet, slightly melty morsels in every bite. If you'd like to venture into more nuanced taste and texture territory, try adding peanut butter or Nutella to your brownies.

To really take your brownie skin game over the top, consider chef Alton Brown's hack for the baking portion of the process. Known for embracing the science behind cooking to explain and improve results, Brown advocates cooking brownies twice. This method capitalizes on the same principles as adding the chocolate chips, as it is all about the sugar, in this case giving it enough time to fully dissolve in the mixture. As the brownies bake, keep an eye on the oven and look for cracks in that hard-earned crust which will be your immediate signal they are ready to be taken out.