Prepare and grease an oven tray or an ovenproof dish (I used a 28cm round glass one). Grease it and preheat the oven to 150°C if fan assisted and 170°C if it is not.
Melt the brown butter or brown it now if you don’t have any and set it aside.
In a medium-sized bowl, combine the sugar, vanilla and cacao powder and salt. Mix these slightly while dry and then add the butter slowly whisking gently.
Add the eggs which should be at room temperature, one by one and beat in between. Beat this for a minute or two.
Add the flour gently and incorporate this in nicely, then add the nuts (roughly chopped and toasted) and stir them in a little more equally spread them within the mixture.
Spoon the mixture into the prepared oven dish and bake for 20 mins. The mixture should be around 1 cm thick.
While the brownie bakes, start preparing the strawberries by washing and slicing the top from each strawberry to leave a flat base.
When the brownie is ready, take it out of the oven and if you used parchment paper you can take the brownie out on a wire rack for it to cool faster. If no parchment was used just allow it to cool in the actual dish. It is important that you allow it to cool before starting to cut into it.
When the brownie has cooled, using a cookie cutter (any desired shape - I used a flower shape with 6 petals) begin to cut your little Santa hats base. Place the cut ones on a plate. It can be the actual serving plate.
Using a piping bag with a small nozzle, pipe a dot of the thick cream into the centre of each cooled brownie and top with a strawberry. Pipe around the base of each strawberry a few more dots and finish with a small dot of cream on the pointed top to make a tiny cute little bobble for Santa’s hat.
Serve and enjoy these attractive little cute Santa hats.