Friday 4 June 2010

Reprise - Chocolate Peanut Buddy Bars


We're having very unseasonable weather here. From day to day it can change from hot and sunny, with temperatures much higher than normal, to days when it is cold, dreary and wet. On the hot days, I don't even want to be in the kitchen. On the cold days I want to cook winter food!

I cooked these Chocolate Peanut Buddy Bars again on one of the hot days, as it's probably one of the quickest recipes to put together that I know, so minimising the time spent in my hot south facing kitchen. It took me longer to chop the chocolate than it took to mix the dough! As I've said in a previous post, I make these with plain chocolate. This time I used 250g chocolate with 85% cocoa solids in the dough mix, and 100g of 70% chocolate on top. The topping was a bit on the mean side - in future I will use 150g.


These make a really good bar cookie - soft and crumbly, tasting quite strongly of peanut butter and with lovely large chunks of dark, bitter chocolate inside. They are one of my favourite bars when made this way, but I think they would be too sweet for my taste with milk chocolate.

On one of the recent cold days I found a small pack of gooseberries in the freezer; not enough on their own to do anything with, but they needed using before the start of the new season. On impulse I added some fresh pineapple cut into chunks the same size as the gooseberries, and made a fruit crumble, which we ate hot with natural Greek yogurt. It was a surprisingly successful combination, as both fruits have a degree of tartness, but pineapple also has some natural sweetness too. Here, neither flavour dominated, but complimented each other well.

6 comments:

Choclette said...

I remember liking the sound of these the first time I saw them here. I really must get around to making some. Weird weather indeed - who knows what is coming next!

Mary Bergfeld said...

These sound wonderful and they were a great way to become acquainted with your blog. This is my first visit and I found your blog by chance. The plan was to say hello and then move on. I, instead began to page through your earlier posts and stayed much longer than I intended. I really like your recipes and will return as often as I can to see what you have been baking. I hope you are having a wonderful day. Blessings...Mary

Suelle said...

Welcome, Mary. I've found a lot of the blogs on my reading list by chance, too. I'm going to take a peek at yours now!

Celia @ Fig Jam and Lime Cordial said...

Bars look great, and the crumble sounds fascinating! We always use boring apples and berries, sometimes rhubarb, but never gooseberries and pineapples! How did the fruit hold up in the oven, Suelle?

Suelle said...

Hi Celia - the pineapple was fine - I think it's the first time I've eaten a hot pineapple dessert; the gooseberries, as usual, burst when heated and release a lot of juice. I think it's difficult to stop this happening - I've only ever seen whole cooked gooseberries in very cheffy dishes on TV, where they've been cooked sous vide.

Alicia Foodycat said...

I think you are right - milk chocolate would just be too sweet for these! They look lovely as they are.