Chocolate Malted Shortbread

I love trying new things.

Well, not really. I don't love trying new foods. I've never had beets and I've never tasted mustard and I'm not going to, thankyouverymuch.

I love when I find new products at the grocery store. Especially when they are my kind of product, like cereal. Or candy. Or something I can bake with.

When I was in high school I had a friend whose mom had this same sort of love for new food products. And she wasn't on a budget so they always had the newest cereals and cookies and all sorts of great snack foods. Rice Krispie Treats Cereal, anyone? I think I *may* have eaten the majority of their box, because my mom wouldn't buy new things unless she knew I liked them. (She'd just send me to my friends' house for that.)

So when Melt Organic contacted me about trying their rich and creamy spread, of course I said yes. New product? For cooking and baking? Of course I want some!

Melt Organic is a new buttery spread that is soy, gluten, and trans-fat free. It's organic. It has 50% of the saturated fat that butter has. It has fewer calories than butter and has no hydrogenated or partially hydrogenated oils. And it's and excellent source of "good fat" (fats that our bodies burn as energy instead of storing as fat). It's a healthy form of butter!

Melt Organic is made with virgin coconut oil, flax seed oil, palm fruit oil, canola oil, and hi-oleic sunflower oil. I've been hearing so much about coconut oil lately, so I was especially excited to try a product containing it. And guess what? The coconut oil gives Melt Organic the tiniest coconut flavor. Which is a huge score in my book.

I knew I was going to bake with it. I mean, I'm me, right? The question was, what to make? And would it turn out okay?

I decided to give these Chocolate Malted Shortbread bars another go. I tried making them at Christmas and they were good, but didn't turn out quite right. I was determined to make them perfect!

 

I baked my shortbread in a 9" tart pan. The chocolate shortbread dough has Ovaltine in it. I know there was a malted baking craze awhile back, with everything calling for Malted Milk Powder, which my grocery store doesn't have. They do, however, carry Ovaltine, my favorite drink from childhood.

I cut the slices small, to be more like cookie wedges. But believe you me, after I was done with these photos I cut myself a nice large slice and at it like a wedge of pie. Because these are that good.

The Melt Organic performed exactly like butter. Maybe even better. The shortbread is soft and chewy and delicious. But, of course, if you can't find Melt Organic in your store (they don't sell it near me, but if you live in the Los Angeles area, you can find it there or you can buy it online) you can use actual butter. But it won't be as good for you and you'll feel guilty eating the entire tart. So, just warning you. :)

So try these bars. And, if you can, try Melt Organic. It's good. I can't wait to make cookies with it. And frosting. Jordan even likes it on her sandwiches, and if you've been reading long enough to know how she is, that's an amazing compliment.

Oh, and who can say no to Ovaltine and Whoppers? Not I.

Enjoy!

Chocolate Malted Shortbread

by Crazy for Crust (Adapted from Land o' Lakes...and yes I see the irony.)

Ingredients

• 2/3 cup Melt Organic Spread (or butter)
• ½ cup firmly packed brown sugar
• 2 ounces (2 squares) semi-sweet baking chocolate, melted
• ¼ cup Ovaltine powder
• 1 ¼ cups flour
• 5 oz box Whoppers (movie theatre size)
• ½ cup Chocolate Chips

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 350°.
2. Mix butter and brown sugar on medium speed until creamy, about 1-2 minutes. Add the 2 ounces of melted chocolate and Ovaltine and beat until well mixed. Add flour and mix on low speed until the dough comes together; stir in chocolate chips.
3. Press mixture evenly into a 9-inch tart pan with a removable bottom. Press Whoppers randomly around the top of the dough. (You won’t use the whole box…do what you will with the leftovers…)
4. Place on a cookie sheet (in case of leakage) and bake about 20 minutes until the top starts to look a little cracked. Cool 10 minutes and then remove sides of pan. Cool completely on a cooling rack and then cut into wedges.

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Legal mumbo-jumbo: Melt Organic sent me two tubs of product to try for free. The info on the fats and benefits of Melt Organic came from their website and the Dr. Oz show. All opinions of the results I got with baking and how I liked Melt Organic are all my own, of course! For more info, check out their Facebook page or tweet them @meltspread #atlastgoodfat!




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Tea Party Tuesdays at Sweetology, Talent Show Tuesday at Chef in Training, Trick or Treat Tuesday at Inside BruCrew Life, Cast Party Wednesday at Lady Behind the Curtain, Sweet Treats Thursday at Something Swanky, Chic-and-Crafty at the Frugal Girls, Tastetastic Thursday at A Little Nosh, Sweet Tooth Friday at Alli-n-sons, I'm Lovin' it Fridays at TidyMom, Sweets for a Saturday at Sweet as Sugar Cookies, A Well-Seasoned Life, Strut your Stuff Saturday at Six Sisters' Stuff, and all of these too!

Almond Toffee Bars

As a food blogger I rarely make the same thing more than once. Am I alone in this?

I can't post chocolate chip cookies over and over, can I? Unless it's a new version of a chocolate chip cookie...but then that wouldn't be making the same thing, would it?

It would be like breaking some sort of blogger law. At least that's what I tell myself anyway, so I can be okay with making new things and not repeating recipes.

There are very few things I make over and over again. These bars are one of them.

I make them every year for Christmas. They have a crust, need I say more? And not just any crust...a shortbread crust. And almonds, my favorite nut. And toffee. And sweetened condensed milk.

Are you drooling yet? I am.

Unfortunately I made these for a potluck at school. Which means I didn't eat any. So maybe I'll have to make them again.

They are good straight from the freezer, not that I'd know anything about that.

And they're good if you try to thaw them in the microwave. (Shhhh....please keep my secret.)

Wow, okay. I need to stop looking at these pictures. This coffee and pack of pop tarts next to me is so not doing it for me right now. See what I go through for you people? :)

Only one week left in the 12 weeks of cookies...

Almond Toffee Bars

Recipe adapted from Land o’ Lakes

Ingredients:

1 ½ cups flour

½ cup powdered sugar

6 ounces sliced almonds (1 package)

1 cup cold butter

1 (14-ounce) can sweetened condensed milk

1 (8-ounce) package milk chocolate toffee bits

1 egg

1 teaspoon vanilla

Instructions:

1.       Preheat oven to 350°. Combine flour, sugar, and ¼ cup of almonds in a medium bowl. Cut in butter (I use a pastry cutter) until mixture resembles coarse crumbs. Line a 9x13” baking pan with foil and spray with cooking spray. Press butter mixture into the bottom of the pan. Bake for 15 minutes.

2.       Stir sweetened condensed milk, toffee bits, egg, and vanilla in a medium bowl. Pour over hot, partially baked crust. Top with remaining almonds and continue baking 23-27 minutes until golden brown. Cool completely and cut into squares.

Yield: 36 bars

This recipe may be linked with:

Monday: Mingle Monday (Add a Pinch), Joy of Desserts. Tuesday: 2 Maids a Baking (2 Maids a Milking), Tea Party Tuesdays (Sweetology), Mushki Loves My Stuff (Mushki Loves), Totally Tasty Tuesdays (Mandy's Recipe Box), Talent Show Tuesday (Chef in Training). Wednesday: Mrs. Fox's Sweet Party (Mrs. Fox's Sweets) Made It On Monday (Lark's Country Heart), This Chick Cooks.  Thursday: Sweet Treats Thursday (Something Swanky), Chic-and-Crafty (Frugal Girls), Turning the Table Thursdays (Around My Family Table), Tasty Thursday (The How-To Mommy), Tastetastic Thursday (A little nosh), Sweet Temptations (Talking Dollars and Cents). Friday: Sweet Tooth Friday (Alli-n-son), I'm Lovin' it Fridays (TidyMom), Friday Favorites (Simply Sweet Home), Latest & Greatest Friday (Days of Chalk and Chocolate). Saturday: Sweets for a Saturday (Sweet as Sugar Cookies), Seasonal Inspiration (Crumbs and Chaos). Sunday: A Well-Seasoned Life,Sharing Sundays (Everyday Sisters), Strut your Stuff Saturday (Six Sisters' Stuff), Moms Crazy Cooking

It's a Pie! It's a Cookie!

It's a Piookie!

I have an obsession with cookies. All kinds: chocolate chip, sugar, peanut butter, mixed flavors, kid flavors. I love them. And I can NEVER eat just one.

I know. A crust obsession AND a cookie obsession. It's why I go to the gym everyday.

This is one of my favorite go-to cookie recipes. It's from the Mrs. Field's Cookie Book.

Now here's the thing. I love cutout cookies, but I hate rolling them out. It makes a huge mess. Flour, flour, everywhere. So making them into piookies seemed a natural alternative. Sure, it takes time to press them in the pans, but not as much time as it would take to roll them all out and clean up that mess.

So, naturally, these piookies start with what makes all cookies great:

Butter. Lots of it. 3 sticks to be exact.

Other than that, its a super simple recipe. Butter, powdered sugar, vanilla, and flour.  Mix and then chill for about 15 minutes.

 

This gives you an idea of the consistency. I used my mini-ice cream scoop to measure out balls of dough, about 1 tablespoon per mini muffin cup. I sprayed mine with cooking spray, just in case.

  

 I used my fingers to press the dough into the cup.  My index fingernail was short that day, luckily. You can also use the back of a wooden spoon, or anything that shape (even something thicker, like a wine stopper) to help you press the dough in.

 

When they came out of the oven, the dough had risen and it didn't look like a crust. While they were still hot I used the back of a wooden spoon to press the cooked piookies back into a crust shape, so the filling would fit.

  

Mmmmm...can you taste them? Buttery sweet crumbly goodness. It was all I could do to NOT eat them at this point.  They still needed a filling: chocolate ganache.

The word ganache makes it seem like it would be difficult to make. But it's not! All you need is heavy cream and good chocolate. I love Guittard's chocolate chips or melt n' molds. They are smooth and taste SO good.

  

Heat the cream in a saucepan until it's just hot but not boiling. Watch it carefully!

 

Add in your chocolate chips and stir. Let sit for 15 minutes and stir some more. Then cool completely.  This ganache recipe creates a looser mixture than a regular ganache.

The filling has cooled and now we can fill our piookies! Whenever I am filling something I use a disposable pastry bag. Or you can use a ziploc bag.

If you want the filling to set, chill for an hour or so before serving. This recipe made about 40 piookies. I made them for a family gathering and assumed I'd have lots of leftovers to get rid of (or eat under the dark of night in front of the TV). I was wrong! They were all gone after our party. They are that good!

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