Cupboard staples, flour, cocoa powder, sugar, salt and milk combine over heat into a luscious chocolate pudding.
My father, Ivor, is from a small town in the center of South Africa and, although his family’s background is English and Eastern European, he was raised with strong Dutch influences. One Dutch passion he passed down to me is his love of black licorice, specifically the salty, chewy sort—not the soft, sweet kind. Whenever we visited family in South Africa, my dad would bring home bags of what we knew as dubbel zout (double salt)—coins of salted black licorice about the size of a quarter. I devoured them every chance I got, relishing the savory, saline exterior before it gave way to the barely sweet, chewy center. Dad’s other sweet vice, which I also inherited, is chocolate. Not white. Not milk. Simply pure and dark. So, it was in honor of him, and our shared love of these two confections, that I concocted this deep, dark chocolaty cake, which gets a touch of sophisticated salt flavor, plus notes of molasses and anise, from what might seem to be an unlikely partner: black licorice. Paired together, the two confections make for a brilliant duo that is both delicious and not-too-sweet.
In order to achieve the perfect balance of cakey and gooey—that sweet spot that all brownies should hit—the cooking time is crucial. It will vary by a minute or so depending on where the pan is sitting in the oven, so keep a close eye on them.
Rich and decadent, the recipe for these luxurious cookies was the result of a visit to Café Ilio, an artisan chocolatier in northern Tehran, run by husband and wife team Sahar Hossein-Najari and Mehrdad Aghameeri. The pair spent six years travelling around Belgium, France and Italy, honing their craft, before introducing Iranians to the wonders of fine chocolate, incorporating traditional ingredients – like saffron, pistachio and cardamom – into a whole new world of truffles, macaroons, jams and cakes. Thanks to their winning combination of dark chocolate and sour cherries, these cookies are loved by adults and children alike.
English chef Gill Meyer's love of rye flour shows up all over his book Gather, but this recipe, paired with chocolate and fresh bay leaves is deliciously haunting.