Chewy Brigadeiro Pecan Bars

These wonderfully chewy cookie bars are made with melted chocolate and dulce de leche, sandwiched between layers of oat/pecan cookie dough and baked to golden perfection. Toasted pecans, melted chocolate, rolled oats and dulce de leche (caramelized condensed milk) make a chewy cookie bar that remind me of one of our favorite candies, Brazilian brigadeiros.

Chewy Brigadeiro Pecan Bars

I first saw this recipe on The Spiced Life, written by my friend, Laura, creator of the Creative Cookie Exchange group.  It sounded fabulous just as it was but I wanted to try a couple small modifications, exchanging the condensed milk for dulce de leche and toasting the pecans first.

Ingredients for four dozen squares
For the bottom/top dough:
2 1/2 cups or 315g flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup or 225g unsalted butter plus more for buttering the pan
2 cups, packed, or 400g brown sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 eggs
3 cups or 285g old fashioned rolled oats
7 oz or 200g pecans (Half for dough, half for sprinkling on before baking)

For the chocolate filling:
14 (or 15) oz or 397-510g can dulce de leche (store-bought or homemade - very easy!)
13 3/4 oz or almost 290g semi sweet chocolate
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
Pinch of salt
1 teaspoon vanilla

Optional: 1 teaspoon sea salt flakes for sprinkling on top of the bars before baking

Method
Preheat your oven to 350°F or 180°C.  Prepare your baking pan (Mine is about 11x16in or 28x40cm.) by lining it with foil and rubbing it with some butter.

Put your pecans in a separate pan large enough to hold them all in a single layer.  Pop them in the oven while it preheats.  Set a timer for five minutes at a time and keep checking on them and giving them a shake until they smell like roasted nuts, warm and fragrant.  Depending on how quickly your oven preheats, this could take from as little as 10 minutes to as many as 20 minutes.  Just be careful not to let them scorch.  Remove from the oven and allow the pecans to cool.

When the pecans are cool enough to handle, chop them roughly.

In a medium-sized bowl, combine your flour, baking soda and salt. Set aside.

Using an electric mixer, cream the butter and brown sugar together until fluffy.  Add in the vanilla and then beat the eggs in one at a time, scraping down the sides of the bowl between each addition.

This is the addition of the second egg. 

Add in the flour mixture in two lots and mix on the lowest speed until well mixed each time.

After the flour is all added. 

Add the oats and mix on low until mostly incorporated. Scrape the sides and bottom of the bowl.

It's pretty stiff after the oats have been added.  You'll want to scrape the beater as well.  

Add half of the pecans and mix until everything is completely incorporated.

Remove two cups or 600g of this dough and set aside.

Dump the remaining dough into your foil-lined pan.  Divide it into smaller chunks spread around the bottom of the pan and then press it down until it covers the entire bottom.  Set aside.

To make the filling, put your chocolate in a microwaveable bowl and zap for 30 seconds at a time, stirring in between, until the chocolate is completely melted.

Add in the dulce de leche, vanilla, butter and the pinch of salt and stir well. The butter should melt in the heat of the chocolate but if it doesn't you can give the whole bowl another quick zap.

Pour this warm chocolate mixture over the dough pressed into the pan.

Use your fingers to break up the reserved two cups of the dough and sprinkle in over the chocolate. It won’t and shouldn’t cover all of the chocolate.

Now sprinkle the remaining toasted chopped pecans over the whole thing.

Finish by sprinkling 1 teaspoon sea salt flakes over that, if desired. I love the sweet and salty mix myself.

Bake for 25 minutes, or until the top is golden brown.

Allow to cool for about 15 minutes on a cooling rack before removing the foil and the whole cookie bar from the pan. Cool completely before cutting into small squares.

Store in a well-sealed container with waxed paper or parchment dividing the layers. If you live in a very warm climate, store this in the refrigerator. These cookie bars also freeze nicely and will keep for several weeks.

Enjoy!

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Chewy Cocoa Fudge Cookies #CookieWeek

Using coconut oil instead of butter or canola gives these fudgy cookies a wonderful rich flavor. The jury’s still out on whether they are healthier but I can tell you they are delicious.

This is day three of #CookieWeek and we have a whole other group of beautiful cookies for you.  In fact, many of my fellow cookie bakers posted recipes yesterday as well, bring our total cookie recipes to date to 44!  And we’ll be here all week, friends!

If you’ve just joined us you should know that Susan of The Girl In The Little Red Kitchen and Kim of Cravings of a Lunatic have joined together this week with 23 of their blog friends (including me!) with a week of cookie treats for you! We have every type of cookie you can imagine listed this week, including something for our furry friends! Now is the time to bookmark these recipes for the upcoming holidays and cookie swaps or simply follow our Pinterest board!

Credit for this great recipe goes to Soni at Soni’s Food.   I shifted the sugar amounts and added mini M&Ms but the rest is all her.    

Ingredients

2 cups or 250g flour

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon salt

6 tablespoons or 90ml coconut oil

2/3 cup or 53g unsweetened cocoa

1 cup or 225g granulated sugar

1/2 cup packed or 100g brown sugar

2/3 cup or 160g plain low-fat yogurt

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

1/4 cup or 60g mini M&Ms

Method

Preheat oven to 350°F or 180°C.  Prepare your cookie sheet by greasing it with non-stick spray or lining it with parchment paper.

In a medium-sized mixing bowl, combine your flour, soda, and salt.  Set aside.

In a microwaveable measuring cup, warm your coconut oil for about 20 seconds in the microwave.  This step might be unnecessary if you are in a warm climate.  My coconut oil was already quite liquid straight out of the bottle.

Put your sugars in a large mixing bowl, add the coconut oil and stir well.

Add in the cocoa powder and stir again.

Now add in the yogurt and vanilla and stir again until well combined.

Dark and chocolately! 

Add your flour mixture and your baking M&Ms, stirring until all the flour has been incorporated.

Scoop balls of dough or drop by level tablespoons onto your prepared baking sheet.   

You can either leave them in balls which will give you round even chewier cookies, or press down gently to flatten the dough before baking.   I made one batch round and one batch flat.

Bake in the preheated over for 10 -14 minutes or until almost set.

Allow to cool on pan for a few minutes or until firm then remove with a spatula and cool completely on a wire rack.  

Enjoy! 

Check out all the beautiful recipes my fellow bakers have for you today:

• Black Forest Sandwich Cookies by Cravings of a Lunatic
• Chewy Cocoa Fudge Cookies by Food Lust People Love
• Lemon Cream Cheese Cookies by i heart eating
• Macadamia and White Chocolate Chip Cookies by In The Kitchen With KP
• Maple Brown Butter Snickerdoodle Cups by Beyond Frosting
• Maple Cookies by Total Noms
• kitchen-sink-cookies by Texana’s Kitchen
• Nutella Cookies by NinjaBaking.com
• Nutmeg Logs by Love and Confections
• Oatmeal Raisin by Frugal Antics of a Harried Homemaker
• Peanut Butter Blossoms by Like Mother Like Daughter
• Pumpkin and Apple Dog Cookies by The Girl In The Little Red Kitchen
• Raspberry Streusel Bars by That Skinny Chick Can Bake
• Soft Pumpkin Sugar Cookies with Cinnamon Frosting by Chocolate Moosey
• Spicy Ginger Chews by Crumb
• Vodka Cookies by Masala Herb

Snickers Muffins

Got leftover Halloween candy?  Make muffins!  This simple muffin batter is happy to accommodate a wide variety of candy and turn it into a delicious snack or breakfast treat.  Candy for breakfast?  Anybody?

Happy Muffin Tuesday, lovely people! It doesn’t have quite the same ring to it, does it? But yesterday was the launch of CookieWeek so Muffin Monday had to be moved along to make room for it. Have you seen the first CookieWeek post?  We have 22 wonderful cookie recipes plus great giveaways from KitchenAid, OXO, King Arthur Flour, Silpat and Zulka Pure Cane Sugar.  Make sure you enter!  And check back all week for more cookies.

But meanwhile, make these muffins with Snickers or whatever leftover Halloween candy you’ve got going.

Ingredients
2 cups or 250g all purpose flour
1/2 cup or 115g sugar
1 tablespoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup or 240ml milk (or 1/2 cup whipping cream and 1/2 cup water)
1/2 cup canola oil
2 large eggs
8 mini Snickers candy bars (about 5 oz or 145g altogether)

Method
Preheat oven to 350°F or 180°C.

Generously grease cups and top of 12-cup muffin tin or line with paper muffin cups.

Cut your mini Snickers into small chunks.  I cut mine lengthwise and then sliced the two long halves into five pieces each.  Separate the chunks into two piles, one about two Snickers big for adding to the top of the batter before baking, the rest for mixing into the batter.

In a large mixing bowl, combine flour, sugar, baking powder and salt together.

In another smaller bowl, whisk together milk, oil and eggs.  (I did indeed substitute the cream and water because I didn’t have any milk and it worked beautifully.)

Add the wet mixture to the flour mixture.

Gently stir just until dry ingredients are moistened.   Now fold in the larger pile of Snickers pieces.

Divide your batter relatively evenly between the 12 muffin cups.

Add a couple of pieces of Snickers to the batter in each cup and bake 20-25 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.

Remove from oven and let cool for a few minutes.

If any Snickers bits have melted out on to the muffin pan, push them back on the muffin with a spoon while they are still warm.  Remove the muffins from the pan and cool on a wire rack.

Enjoy!