I've never used a water bath when baking, but I know that people use it for baking cheese cakes (i.e., placing the cheese-cake form in a container with water), so I was wondering if the same concept could be used for brownies.
Whenever I bake brownies, all the edges become a bit too hard from overcooking. This is not a huge problem because it's only about a centimetre from the edge, and I just cut it off, but I was wondering if a water bath could help.
My main concern is whether the water evaporating would make the environment in the oven too humid and interfere with the batter. I would think the same thing about cheese cakes, but the fact that many people are doing that means it's OK in that case.
Edit for clarification: the rest of the brownie is cooked just right, so I'm less keen to change other variables like temperature and time. I've also started wondering about this because I'm aware of the ability of water to distribute and soften the effect of heat. For example, if I try to defrost meat in the microwave, it will start cooking on the outside before it defrosts in the centre; but if I microwave it in a bowl of water, it defrosts evenly.
Best Answer
For cheese cakes water bath makes more sense cause you want to avoid burning of the batter by keeping the heat contact directly from the tray.
For brownies the contact of the hot plate is required, and that is how you get a little solid outer part.
When you try to water bath brownies, they would have more or less like cheese cake texture, I actually tried it.