TWD | Baking Chez Moi | Crispy-Topped Brown Sugar Bars

Tuesdays with Dorie baking through Baking Chez Moi
by Dorie Greenspan

The delicious caramelized Rice Krispies topping.

Ha! This piece looks like a fish!

Before you begin baking the bars, you make a crispy topping made from (my childhood cereal), Rice Krispies; not much to it really. You just melt a bit of butter and oil, add the cereal and stir until all the grains are evenly coated as possible, and stirred some more until the cereal turns a nice golden brown.

The base of these tasty treats are basically a shortbread cookie crust with the addition of brown sugar. Dorie states to show the dough "who's the boss" to get it spread evenly over the pan. This tells me there may be a bit of a struggle ahead. I found wetting my hands helped to spread the dough into the pan, with little sticking to the fingers. I'm sure using a piece of buttered parchment would work just as well.

Once the base is baked to a lovely golden brown (the instructions say to bake the crust for about twenty-two minutes; mine was ready at thirteen minutes), the top is scattered with chopped chocolate and returned to the oven for a minute or so, just until the chocolate has melted.

The melted chocolate is spread evenly over the shortbread base.

Then topped with the caramelized Rice Krispies.

I originally cut the bars as suggested in the book, about a two-inch square. However, when I tasted these little gems, I found them to be overly sweet.

So I cut the squares in half, which I thought were the perfect size, especially if they are served as party fair.

I sent the lot (minus one) with my husband for him to share with the boys. Of course, I had to have at least one with my morning coffee, and I found that the sweetness dissipated somewhat after sitting overnight. Good thing I sent these away! I probably would have eaten them all! 

The following morning, I received a text from the Mr., everybody liked them. :)

Tuesdays with Dorie is an online baking group. We are making our way through Baking with Julia and Baking Chez Moi, both by Dorie Greenspan. 

We have been asked not to post the recipes. You can find this recipe on page 324 of Baking Chez Moi.

You can check out my fellow bakers results by clicking here for a list of their links.