Almond Butter Blondies
Kelly over at Celiac Chicks does a fabulous job covering the latest in gluten-free news. On top of that, she is a lovely person. It has been great getting to know her through our email conversations these past few months.
I recently spent some time looking through the recipe section of Kelly’s site and was most intrigued by these delicious looking peanut butter bars. She traces the original recipe back to one from 2003 in Family Circle magazine. Of course, she made her own adaptations to the bars, which I then edited as well. Since I don’t actually eat peanut butter, I substituted the main ingredient with high protein almond butter and made a couple of other changes along the way.
The most challenging part of this recipe has been naming it. My husband and I sat in the kitchen last night throwing ideas back and forth. Blondies? Chocolate Chip Blondies? No, I said, blondies have chocolate chips in them –Chocolate Chip Blondies would be rather redundant.
Nevertheless, with a mere 6 ingredients, these bars are super easy to prepare. Although made with almond butter, you would never know it, as they taste quite cakey. I have cooked up this recipe at least a dozen times. Even the batches I considered “failures” were devoured by my testers –that would be my little league team, in this instance. Let’s not forget, I coach a bunch of 10 year old blue gatorade drinking boys. Although these bars are not that sweet, my team absolutely loved ‘em. They inhaled even the first experimental batches that were a horribly underdone, delicious goo –which ended up as much on their faces as in their mouths.
So here, expedited, due to a request from Courtney (one of my favorite readers) are my version of Kelly’s Peanut Butter Bars. Hope these go over well at your mother’s day celebration, Courtney and best of luck as head chef!
1 (16) ounce jar roasted almond butter
1 cup agave nectar
2 eggs
½ teaspoon celtic sea salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 cup dagoba chocodrops
- In a large bowl, with a hand blender, mix almond butter until creamy
- Mix in agave and eggs
- Add salt and baking soda
- Mix well with hand blender until all ingredients are thoroughly combined
- Mix half of the chocodrops into the batter
- Pour batter into a well greased 9 x 12 inch pyrex baking dish
- Scatter the other half of the chocodrops on top of the batter
- Bake at 325 degrees for 35 minutes
- Serve
Many thanks to my mom, for making our food with your own hands after long days at work. Happy Mother’s Day!
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Subscribe by Email to elanaspantry.com:Posted on May 9, 2008 in desserts by Elana
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Hi Elana!
Now that I am done with my last.final.ever, I am all about the baking! This looks delicious and healthy! But, first, a few questions about almond butter:
1) What size jar of almond butter do you use?
2) How oily is the almond butter? I usually make my own almond butter in the Cuisinart and process it with almond oil until smooth and creamy.
Also, do you think steps 1-4 could work in the Cuisinart instead of using an electric hand mixer? I try to get dirty as few bowls as possible…
Best!
~M
May 9th, 2008 11:56 am
My goodness Elana. This will be an absolute all-time favourite in my house. We are huge almond butter fans.
Pretty confident these will be made at our house tomorrow.
May 9th, 2008 7:12 pm
Those look so good!!
May 9th, 2008 10:12 pm
Hi Elana!
I love that these don’t include any butter in them!
Looks very tasty!
May 10th, 2008 2:27 am
They look fabulous, very very yummy. A must bake.
May 10th, 2008 2:27 am
I can’t wait to make these today. They look awesome. What recipe do you have for making almond butter? I like to make things from scratch if I can.
Also, just wanted everyone to know that General Mills is now making Rice Chex gluten-free. It will be nice to make Chex mix again!!
May 10th, 2008 8:37 am
Hooray! I am so thankful for this recipe. This completes my menu for Mother’s Day… Our Menu includes Baked Coconut Shrimp (I’m going to use almond flour and unsweetened shredded coconut), Fresh Grouper Baked in parchment, Spinach Salad with Strawberries and Pecans and ALMOND BUTTER BLONDIES. I will let you all know how it goes. To all of the mothers out there, Happy Mother’s Day.
May 10th, 2008 9:19 am
Nancy: I don’t know Elana’s recipe for homemade almond butter, but I follow Gluten-free Girl’s recipe, except that I use almond oil instead of canola (I bet grapeseed would be fine too), and raspberry honey instead of chestnut (agave would work too), and I think less salt then GFG does. Here it is: http://glutenfreegirl.blogspot.com/2005/09/finding-flourless-torte-by-pool.html
Courtney, your menu sound delicious!! I really like the idea of “breading” with almond flour and shredded coconut! I’ve used shredded coconut mixed with flours/cereals, but I can’t wait to try this great idea! I have successfully used almond meal (no coconut) in salmon patties - and they rocked!
May 10th, 2008 10:48 am
~M -Thanks for pointing out my omission re: the size of the jar of almond butter. I am not sure how jarred almond butter would compare to diy…I think you could use the cuisinart to mix up the ingredients, would be worth the experiment, though not sure how it would turn out since I haven’t tried it. I might though if I make my own almond butter, I think it would be a lot less expensive than the jarred. Thanks for your great comments and questions.
Robin -I hope everyone likes them in your house as much as they do in mine; this is my husband’s current favorite.
Tarah -Thanks!
Ya’ara -Yes, isn’t it great that this is dairy-free?!
Kitchen Goddess -Thanks, let me know how they turn out when you make ‘em.
Nancy -Did you see that ~M was kind enough to link us to a great recipe for homemade almond butter? I think I may try it myself.
Courtney -Love your menu, when you are all done, please report back and let us know how the day went. xo
~M -You don’t know my recipe for homemade almond butter, because I don’t have one :-) Thanks for providing the link above and CONGRATS on your last law school exam!!!!!!!
May 11th, 2008 10:20 am
Just wanted you to know that i gave the BBQ sauce a try, and it turned out great!
May 11th, 2008 11:07 am
Elana - I am a total novice in the kitchen, and even I made the most delicious Almond Butter Blondies yesterday! Thank you for the easy recipe - they were a hit at our Mother’s day brunch!
May 12th, 2008 9:44 am
Hello everyone-
I just wanted to let you know I showcased these Almond Butter Blondies in our Mother’s Day Celebration Dinner (for my in-laws) and it was a huge success! Most “celebrations” in my area include biscuits and gravy so I have to spearhead an event if it is going to be celebrative and healthy at the same time. As we were all finishing up with our blondies, I communicated… “and they’re good for you too!” The reply from the table came back… “of course they are!” I’m always trying to upgrade the southern traditions here in Tennessee :)
May 12th, 2008 2:30 pm
Hi Elana. I just wanted to let you know that we ate these today after dinner. I don’t like to use Agave so I substituted organic maple syrup and I added in some vanilla (just because). They were sooo yummy! My family devoured them. Thank you for the great recipe!
May 13th, 2008 4:41 pm
Katie -Thanks for the report. It is so great to have extra recipe and taste testers; you never can have too many!
ERH -I am glad these were a success for you and a hit at your Mother’s Day Brunch.
Courntey -So great to hear about your upgrades and success! Congratulations.
Tara -Yes, sometimes I add vanilla when I make these and it is a great addition; haven’t tried it with the maple syrup, though imagine it’s delicious. You are very welcome.
May 13th, 2008 9:52 pm