The thing I seemed to miss most during Veganuary was chocolate. There is an amazing vegan chocolate from Aldi with a hint of sea salt but because it isn’t my usual supermarket I would often forget to grab some. I missed walking into the freshly baked or snack aisle of my local supermarket and grab a chocolate treat. I searched the web and found a Jamie Oliver vegan brownie recipe that I adapted to suit my own cravings. It is delicious and really keeps the chocolate cravings at bay. Everyone at work loves them too, they go down… well… a treat!

Ingredients

5 tablespoons sunflower oil , plus extra for greasing

200 g dairy-free dark chocolate

100 g vegan chocolate drops

170 g self-raising flour

3 heaped teaspoons cocoa powder

180 g golden caster sugar

sea salt

1 tsp vanilla extract

4 heaped tbsp peanut butter

230 ml unsweetened organic soya milk

Method

Preheat the oven to 180ºC/350ºF/gas 4. Grease a square baking tin (roughly 20cm) with a little oil, then line with greaseproof paper.

Place a heatproof bowl over a pan of simmering water, making sure the base doesn’t touch the water. Break 200g of chocolate into the bowl and allow it to melt, then set aside to cool slightly.

Sieve the flour and cocoa powder into a large bowl, then stir in the sugar and a pinch of salt. Add in vanilla extract, the oil, soya milk and melted chocolate until combined.

Swirl in the peanut butter.

Stir in half the chocolate drops. Pour the mixture into the prepared tin, spreading it out evenly. Top with the remaining chocolate drops.

Place into the hot oven for 20 to 25 minutes, or until cooked on the outside, but still gooey in the middle.

Leave to cool for around 5 minutes, turn out onto a wire cooling rack, then cut into 16 equal pieces.