Top Times recipes of 2008: Midnight chocolate brownie bites

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Former L.A. Times test kitchen director Donna Deane, who retired this year, was one of the best bakers we’ve ever known. Pies with flaky crusts, cakes with delicate crumb, she could do it all.

Few recipes have better demonstrated that than these fabulous chocolate brownies, which she developed for a story about classic summer picnic food.

Start with a deliciously dense combination of bittersweet chocolate, dark cocoa and mini chocolate chips, and add a bright flash of citrus from orange liqueur and peel.

Simply amazing, whether you eat them indoors or out. That’s why they’re on our short list of the top L.A. Times recipes of the year. Here’s where the rest of the list stands.