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Thank you for this! One of fav chocolate things to make, share, and eat. Fabulous as they are but also amenable to endless adaptions and variations.

As a person originally from Boston, I can say New Englanders firmly believe brownies are ours - but who knows. It would be interesting who/when/ how molasses was swapped out for chocolate - genius! But probably lost in the mists of time. Just thank goodness it caught on.

Brownies in the UK have moved on since the 1980s, when I first came here: they were dry chocolate cake squares with no soul :( They are so much better now - but I still prefer making them fresh - you get the whole house smelling chocolatey! No bad thing that.

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Yes, I agree freshly made brownies are always better. As for the molasses & chocolate swap I can only assume it occurred around the turn of the century. I guess someone figured that chocolate was tastier (and by this point more affordable for baking) than molasses. Not that the latter variety tastes bad. They are a bit like gingerbread in texture minus the spices.

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