Walnut brownies are a cocoa-powder brownie with chopped walnuts folded through the batter. The walnuts do two things: they break up the density of a fudgy brownie, and their slight bitterness works against the sugar in a way that plain chocolate does not.
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Recipe
Deliciously Walnut Brownies Recipe: A Chocolate Lover's Dream
Ingredients
Method
- Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).
- Grease a 9×13-inch (23×33 cm) baking pan and line it with parchment, leaving an overhang on two sides so the brownies can be lifted out once cooled.
- Sift the flour, cocoa powder, salt and baking powder together into a medium bowl.
- In a large bowl, whisk the melted butter, sugar, eggs and vanilla extract together until smooth.
- Add the sifted dry ingredients to the wet mixture and fold them in gently with a spatula, stopping as soon as the streaks of flour disappear. A few small lumps are fine – they dissolve during baking, and overmixing is what turns brownies cakey.
- Chop the walnuts into small, bite-sized pieces – finer for an even distribution through every mouthful, coarser for a more pronounced crunch.
- Fold the chopped walnuts through the batter with a spatula until they are evenly distributed, without overworking the batter.
- Pour the batter into the prepared pan and level the top.
- Bake for 25-30 minutes. Start checking at the lower end – the exact time varies with your oven and with how fudgy you want them.
- Test with a toothpick or a thin knife pushed into the centre: it should come out with a few moist crumbs clinging to it, not clean. Let the brownies cool completely before cutting and serving.
Step by step, in pictures
Six moves, from the sieve to the toothpick test.
Sift the dry ingredients.- Whisk the wet ingredients smooth.
- Fold the dry into the wet.
- Chop the walnuts and fold them in.
- Pour into the lined pan and level it.
- Test with a toothpick, then cool.
Preparing and folding in the walnuts
Chop them to bite-sized pieces. Finer chopping spreads the nuttiness evenly through every mouthful; coarser pieces give you a more obvious crunch in some bites and not others. Either is fine – it changes the character of the brownie, not its success.
Fold them in once the batter is mixed and smooth, using a spatula, and stop as soon as they are evenly distributed. Working the batter at this stage is what turns a fudgy brownie cakey.
Toast the walnuts first
Worth the five minutes. Raw walnuts in a brownie taste mostly of texture; toasted ones taste of walnut, and the difference is obvious side by side.
Spread them on a dry tray and give them a few minutes in the oven while it comes up to temperature, or move them around a dry pan over medium heat. Take them out as soon as they smell nutty – walnuts carry a lot of oil and they go from toasted to acrid quickly, and bitter nuts will carry through the whole tray. Let them cool before they go into the batter, or they will soften it.
Why this uses cocoa powder rather than melted chocolate
The chocolate here comes from half a cup of unsweetened cocoa powder and a cup of melted butter – there is no bar chocolate in the ingredient list at all. That gives a drier, chewier, more bitter crumb, which is what stands up to a cup of walnuts; a brownie built on melted chocolate is richer and softer, and the nuts get lost in it.
It is also the more forgiving option. Cocoa powder is a cupboard ingredient and it cannot seize the way melted chocolate can, so there is one less thing to go wrong. Swapping to bar chocolate is not a straight substitution – the fat and sugar balance shifts – so it is better to start from a recipe written for it.
Mixing for a fudgy texture
Fold rather than beat once the flour is in, and stop when the streaks disappear. Brownie batter beaten smooth traps air and bakes lighter and more cake-like, which is the opposite of what a brownie is for.
A few small lumps in the batter are not a problem – they go during baking. Chasing them out is how the batter gets overworked.
Baking them, and knowing when to stop
350 °F / 175 °C for about 25-30 minutes. Ovens vary, so start checking at the lower end rather than trusting the clock.
Test with a toothpick or a thin knife in the centre. It should come out with a few moist crumbs clinging to it, not clean – a clean toothpick means they are past fudgy and heading for cakey. Brownies carry on setting as they cool, so slightly under in the middle is the right place to stop.
Lining the pan, and cutting them cleanly
Grease the pan and then line it with parchment, leaving the paper hanging over two opposite sides. That overhang is a handle: once the brownies are cool you lift the whole slab straight out and cut it on a board, instead of digging the first square out of a corner and wrecking it.
Cut them cold. A warm brownie drags and tears because the centre is still soft, which is also why the recipe says to cool them completely before cutting rather than treating that as optional. Use a large knife, wipe it between cuts, and press straight down rather than sawing.
Serving them
Warm, if you can – they are gooier straight from the tin, and the chocolate reads stronger before it cools and firms up. A scoop of vanilla ice cream against a warm brownie is the obvious pairing, and it works for the obvious reason.
Beyond that: a drizzle of chocolate sauce or caramel over the top, or a dusting of powdered sugar once they are completely cool – on a warm brownie it melts into the surface and disappears.
One of these is not a serving idea at all. Pressing a few whole or halved walnuts into the surface for the look of it has to happen before the pan goes into the oven, not after.
Storing and freezing them
Cool them completely first, then keep them in an airtight container with parchment between the layers so the cut faces do not stick together. Warm brownies put into a sealed container steam themselves and the crust goes soft.
They freeze well, and brownies are a good candidate because the high fat and sugar content means they thaw without going grainy. Wrap them individually or pack them flat with parchment between the layers. Food held at -18 °C (0 °F) stays safe indefinitely under USDA guidance – the three-month figure usually quoted for baked goods is about quality, not safety. Thaw them at room temperature.
More from the site
For a different brownie there is salted caramel brownies, or ube brownies, which swaps the chocolate for purple yam. For another traybake with nuts in it, there is banana bread.
Walnut brownies FAQ
Can I use other nuts instead of walnuts? Yes. Pecans are the closest swap and behave the same way. Almonds and hazelnuts are firmer and stay more distinct in the crumb. Toasting any of them first sharpens the flavour.
Can I use gluten-free flour? A cup-for-cup gluten-free blend is the straightforward substitution here, because a brownie relies far less on flour structure than a cake does. Expect a slightly softer set.
Can I use Dutch-processed cocoa? Yes, and it gives a darker colour and a mellower, less acidic chocolate flavour. This recipe already uses baking powder rather than relying on cocoa acidity, so the swap does not change the rise.
Can I add other mix-ins? Chocolate chunks, chopped dried cherries or a swirl of peanut butter all work. Keep the total to roughly a cupful so the batter still sets, and add them at the same point as the walnuts.
