Ina Garten's Viral Brownie Pudding Features One Boozy Ingredient

If you spend any time on social media, you've probably seen countless videos of people making Ina Garten's brownie pudding. Essentially, it's an ultra gooey brownie — so gooey that it's basically a pudding — with a crunchy topping that you satisfyingly break into to reveal the pudding portion of the dessert.

Garten's brownie pudding recipe features plenty of the ingredients that you would use for a regular batch of homemade brownies — cocoa powder, sugar, butter, and so on — but there's one key, boozy ingredient that makes it stand out: framboise liqueur. For anyone unfamiliar, framboise liqueur is a raspberry-flavored liqueur that has a deep red hue and a very fruity flavor. (If you want to read more about liqueurs, in general, check out our guide on liqueurs versus spirits.)

In a Food Network video, Garten makes the brownie pudding and explains the inclusion of framboise liqueur. She says, "There's always one ingredient in a dish that you can't quite taste, but it makes everything taste better. And in this one, it's one tablespoon of framboise." Overall, it helps bring out the cocoa powder's fruity notes, creating depth of flavor. While it can technically be left out when making brownie pudding (since it's an ingredient home cooks may not already have on hand), you'll want to make sure to include it to get the full experience of Garten's recipe, exactly as she makes it.

If you buy a bottle of framboise liqueur to make Ina Garten's brownie pudding exactly as the chef does, you'll need other ways to use it (beyond making more batches of brownie pudding). The perfect use for it? Make one of Garten's cocktails from her Barefoot Contessa website, the Raspberry Royale, which also calls for raspberry liqueur.

In fact, the easy-to-make drink calls for just three ingredients and just as many steps: One teaspoon of framboise liqueur, a handful of fresh raspberries, and the rest of the glass filled with champagne. Just make sure to catch yourself up on these common mistakes made when drinking champagne — so that you can avoid them and have the best possible Raspberry Royale.

This is an incredibly easy cocktail to make — so you can easily whip up a couple while your brownie pudding is cooling from the oven. You can even use the raspberries that you bought for the drink as a topping for the brownie pudding, utilizing all your fresh ingredients for one delectable combination.