In American cooking, a chocolate brownie, also known as a brownie or a Boston brownie, is a small, rich, chocolate, baked cake-slice, named after its brown color. Brownies are sometimes covered with fudge and may contain nuts or chips (chocolate, butterscotch, peanut butter, etc.). The first known mention of a brownie is believed to be in the 1897 Sears catalog.[1] Brownies often have an icing, popular flavors being chocolate icing or a sugar based icing flavored with either vanilla or mint extract.