Tuesdays with Dorie: Caramel Crunch Bars

      This week's Tuesday's with Dorie recipe, from the cookbook Baking:  From My Home to Yours by Dorie Greenspan is Caramel Crunch Bars, can be found on pages 112-113, and was chosen by Whitney of What's Left on the Table.

  If you would like to try the recipe before buying the book, click on Whitney's site above and she will have it posted today. 

      This week's recipe was really easy...basically a shortbread crust with a chocolate and toffee bits topping.   

      The only difficult part being chopping up all the chocolate.  Ten minutes of standing there chop, chop, chopping the chocolate into little slivers...not my favorite by a long shot.  Do you suppose there is anyone that sells chocolate already chopped/slivered?  You know, like you can buy chopped nuts?  I would definitely be in line for a package of that, so let me know.  I know, you all love chopping chocolate so you can sneak a bit or two here and there, right?  The only thing that happens here is that it flies everywhere and I am forever rounding it back up to the center of the cutting board.   

      Actually, I cheated a little on the second round of chopped chocolate...it was supposed to be sprinkled on the hot crust and would melt nicely that way.  I figured as the goal was melted chocolate, I could just melt it, spread it over the top, and sprinkle on the toffee bits, no one would be the wiser, and no chopping any more chocolate for me.  (Except now I confessed, so you all know.)  I just could not see me chopping another round of chocolate.   

      Did the guys like the cookie bars?  What do you think...it's a cookie, it's chocolate, it's got toffee sprinkled on top, it's food, and they are pretty much gone.  Next question?  They were a big hit.

      Next week's recipe was chosen by Lyb of And Then I do the Dishes and is Chocolate Armagnac Cake:  The Cake That Got Me Fired, and can be found on pages 279-281.

    

Click here  and then click on individual bakers' blogs at the site if you would like to see more of this week's recipe and the various ways people interpreted their quest.  It is too late to join the online TWD baking blog, but you can always join us in spirit as the recipes for upcoming weeks are posted on the site and you can bake along in your own kitchen.  See you there!