Cakey Vs Fudgy Vs Chewy: How To Bake Brownies To Your Perfect Texture

A proper dessert should be able to lift your spirits on bad days and provide sweet celebration on good ones, and that's exactly what you get with brownies. Decadent and delicious, these treats are a chocolate lover's dream and are wonderful served solo or à la mode. Most brownie recipes call for some combination of butter, sugar, eggs, flour, and chocolate, but subtle changes in the formula can lead to vastly different results. This is why you'll often hear brownies described by their texture. Whether it's made from scratch or from a box, brownies will generally sit somewhere on the spectrum between cakey, chewy, and fudgy.

You can infer a lot about these different styles of brownie based solely on their names. Cakey brownies have a light, airy crumb, as opposed to fudgy brownies that are dense and especially moist. Chewy brownies fall in the middle between cakey and fudgy. By adjusting the ratio of brownie ingredients, you can explore the different iterations of brownie until you find your perfect texture. And regardless of how tough you like them to be, make sure to add some of these ingredients to completely upgrade your brownies.

Similar to a piece of rich, moist cake, cakey brownies have a slightly crumbly texture that's delightfully more delicate than a traditional brownie. If you're the type of person who prefers the well-baked edges and corners of a pan of brownies rather than the ooey-gooey center, cakey brownies might be for you. Or, if you prefer your brownies as crisp as possible, check out our recipe for incredible chocolatey brownie brittle.

Cakey brownies contain less butter and more flour than other recipes, but what really makes them unique is baking powder. This extra ingredient helps the brownies rise like a cake would, which is what helps make them tall and pillowy.

On the other hand, fudgy brownies are for those who want the center of their baked goods to only be a few shades away from a pudding. As you can assume, to make good fudgy brownies you'll have to make the opposite recipe adjustments that you did when making cakey brownies. In this case, that means more butter, more chocolate, and less flour.

You can make some decent fudgy brownies using box mix, but with just a few tweaks you can make them even more luxuriously moist. For example, if the recipe on the box says to add oil, add the same amount of melted butter instead. Also, don't forget this simple swap to make your boxed brownies taste bakery-made.

The debate between cakey and fudgy brownies can get rather heated, so the best way to appease a clamouring crowd with clashing opinions is by serving a tray of chewy brownies. Chewy brownies toe the line between the two extremes of brownie-kind. They're moist enough for fudgy fans, yet airy enough to please the cakey crowd.

There's no exact middle between fudgy and cakey brownies, but you can find your perfect texture by experimenting with different amounts of ingredients. Just remember that more dry ingredients will make the brownies cakier, while more wet ingredients will make it fudgier. You can also alter the doneness of your brownies by using different pans. A smaller pan where the batter ends up being thicker will lead to perfectly underdone, fudgier brownies; likewise, a larger pan will lead to the brownies being thin and crispy. The great thing about brownies is that no matter the texture, you're in for a good time.