Honey Blondies

I remembered that I have a hoard of cooking magazines stowed away when almost I am on my last leg of this bakeathon journey.  I used to subscribe them until a year ago and they could have been a great resource for recipes this month, I realized late. Better late than never. These blondies come from Martha Stewart's Living magazine; published a few years ago. These were supposedly created to improvise the buttery flavored blondies with the addition of sweet, floral taste of honey. Any flavored honey can be used in the recipe and in lieu of it, even maple syrup works as I have learnt. Bittersweet chocolate takes the place of traditional semisweet chips here, to add an interesting factor. 1/2 cup of any toasted and chopped nuts can be stirred in along with the chocolate.

Ingredients:
1/2 cup / 1 stick unsalted butter + extra for pan
1 and 1/4 cup all purpose flour + extra for pan
1/3 cup honey 
3/4 cup packed light brown sugar
1 flax egg
2 tsp. pure vanilla extract
1 tsp. coarse salt
4 oz. bittersweet chocolate, cut into chunks

Directions:
* Combine 1 tbsp. ground flaxmeal with 3 tbsp. water in a bowl and keep aside for about 5 minutes. 
* Melt butter and honey in a sauce pan and stir in brown sugar. Let it dissolve and turn off the stove. Transfer the mixture to the flax egg bowl. Add vanilla, flour and salt as well. Stir until just combined and let the mixture cool for about 30 minutes. Stir in chocolate chunks.
* Ten minutes before the cooling period ends, preheat the oven to 350 deg F. Butter an 8 inch square baking pan. Line with parchment, leaving an overhang on two sides. Then butter the parchment and flour pan, tapping out excess.
(I used an 7x5x1.5 inch glass baking dish for half the recipe and did not line it with a parchment. I just greased and floured the pan.)
* Pour batter into the prepared pan and and spread batter evenly with a greased knife if needed.
* Bake until browned on edges and set, about 28 minutes.
* Remove the pan and let cool completely on a wire rack. Lift blondies out of pan using the overhang, if parchment was used. Remove parchment and cut into squares. I cut blondies into squares directly in my glass pan after cooling.


This cake goes to Bakeathon and Blogging Marathon #95 under the theme 'Bookmarked recipes' events.


Comments