“Future Brownies” from “Start Here”

Kirstin: Last night Tom and I went to see The Taste of Things , a film by Tran Anh Hung featuring Juliette Binoche and her ex-partner Benoît Magimel. Filmed over six weeks, this is a lavish film, set in France sometime in the mid-19th century, ostensibly about food and love. Never have I seen a film where the images and accompanying sound effects were so powerful that the audience audibly groaned as various dishes were prepared. It really was a beautiful film, with an opening scene like a ballet set in a kitchen, and it joins others in its foodie genre such as Big Night (1996), Julie and Julia (2009) and In the Mood For Love (2000). And it is a hymn to the magic of cooking, which is where I am going with this recipe: Future brownies. I have to admit that I wasn’t sure this recipe was going to work. It had such an unusual combination of ingredients (instant coffee! sweet rice flour!), prepared in such a different way from usual (the batter was so liquid I feared I had missed out an ingredient) but I trusted in the process, and in the magic of cooking. And it came out beautifully and we all experienced the wonder of the result. Because food and cooking really are magical. And, in keeping with the name, I suspect these brownies really will be in our future.