White Chocolate Walnut Blondies with Maple Butter Sauce

Happy September!

Oh, yes, you know what this means.  It's time for another fangirl session.

But this time it's about the Bourne Legacy.

Now, some people absolutely detest anything to do with Bourne that isn't Matt Damon.  And I love Matt Damon, I really do.  The first three Bourne films were awesome.  I was insane about them.

And then there's Jeremy Renner.

You might recognize him from the Hurt Locker, Mission Impossible 4, or, my favorite, the Avengers.  Like over here.

Unfortunately, as cool as Blackhawk sounds, it isn't a thing.  It's Clintasha, guys.  And it's awesome.

But that'll come later.  This is the Bourne Legacy rant here.

First of all, it has pretty much nothing to do with Bourne.  But you have to have seen all three Bourne movies beforehand, because Legacy runs pretty much parallel to Ultimatum.  (If you don't know what I'm talking about, either scroll down to the food part or watch the movies right now.  I recommend the second option! :D)

We follow a guy called Aaron Cross, who is awesome and strong and unbelievably sweet.  It's really strange.  He's getting hunted by the CIA, is nearly killed on a regular basis, and is doing his own killing quite efficiently.  It's almost scary; he's really good at breaking necks.  And yet, the first thing he does after knocking out/killing two cops is ask if his lady friend is okay.

Collective sigh.

He gives Rachel Weisz's character these little smiles, and looks her in the eyes and says "thank you" and everything, and gets all sentimental and stuff.  He's so unbelievably adorable.

Just watching the movie (I've seen it twice but I'm definitely going to see it more!) makes my day.  Actually, it makes my whole week.

Anyway, there's my rant.  Which happened because I didn't have finished pictures of this because I gave the blondies away to my grandmother for her birthday.

You might recognize the name - yes, it is an Applebee's dessert, and yes, I did get the recipe from Bakerella.  Like always.

But let me tell you something - this tastes way better than the dessert at Applebee's.  So much better.

How could I possibly know that?  I tasted the dough and it rocked, and I tasted the sauce and it rocked even harder.  It blew me away because it was just so nummy.

I thought the Applebee's dish was actually sort of bad.  I mean, the blondie was okay and all, but it was a generic restaurant blondie.  And the sauce was sizzling - which is cool, kind of - but it made me want to puke.  Because it was cream cheese.

It was not maple butter sauce.  It was like maple cream cheese sauce.

Which is totally gross if you're me.

Now, maybe you're one of those people who loves sweet cream cheese and is all over Philadelphia's new products where it's chocolate-flavored and you're supposed to spread it on things for dessert.

I'm not.

Now, you should try this recipe out for yourself.  I'm pretty certain you'll find this blondie better than Applebee's.  No offense to the friendly neighborhood restaurant.

White Chocolate Walnut Blondies with Maple Butter Sauce

1 cup flour

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1/8 teaspoon baking soda

1/8 teaspoon salt

1/4 cup walnuts, chopped

1/3 cup unsalted butter, melted

1 cup brown sugar, packed

1 egg, beaten

1 tablespoon vanilla

1/2 cup white chocolate chips

3/4 cup maple syrup

1 stick unsalted butter

3/4 cup brown sugar

1/4 cup walnuts, chopped

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.  Grease a 9-inch square pan.
2. Combine flour, baking powder, and baking soda in a large bowl.  Stir in walnuts.
3. Mix together melted butter and brown sugar.  Add egg and vanilla and combine thoroughly.
4. Add flour mixture a little at a time, stirring well after each addition.
5. Stir in white chocolate chips.
6. Spread into prepared pan and bake 20-25 minutes.  Test with toothpick to see if it's baked in the center.  Remove from oven.
7. While blondies are baking, melt butter with maple syrup in a large saucepan over medium heat.  Once butter has melted, stir in brown sugar until dissolved.  Stir in walnuts.
8. Cut blondies into either 9 or 4 squares and place on serving dish or individual plates.  Pour maple butter sauce over blondies.  Suggestion: serve with vanilla ice cream.

Breaking it down:

Combine dry ingredients and walnuts...

In a separate bowl, stir together the brown sugar and the butter...

Add vanilla and egg and mix well.  Stir in the dry ingredients a little at a time...

And then stir in those luscious white chocolate chips.

Yum!

Spread into your prepared pan and bake 20-25 minutes at 350 degrees.

Melt your butter with your maple syrup...

Add brown sugar and walnuts and heat.

Your blondies will look gorgeous.

And since I couldn't prepare each blondie separately, I poured the maple butter sauce over the top of the whole thing.  Then I cut them and gave them to my grandmother.

If you have extras, try pouring it onto a plate covered in wax paper and make candy out of it by freezing it!

Bon appétit!

-JJ

Coffee-Walnut Cake

Remember all that coffee frosting leftover from the coffee cake pops I made?  Well, this is what I did with it:

BUT FIRST...

A quick description of what exactly happened with that crazy frosting.

The frosting that went into the cake pops had cream cheese added to it, along with the powdered sugar and coffee and butter.  It was thick and frosting-like.

The leftovers... not so much.

Without cream cheese and with wayyy too much coffee (because I was trying to get a more coffee-like taste) wayyy too little powdered sugar (because I used it all XP), it was... almost soupy.

SOUP IS NOT FROSTING.

But.

It can be called a glaze.

Sophistication for the win.

But a glaze without anything for it to go on is useless, worthless, pointless.  And the bowl it was in was taking up valuable space in the fridge.

It had to go.

...on a walnut cake.

Cake and walnuts and an adapted Martha Stewart cupcake recipe and leftover coffee glaze = mishmash original recipe.

Walnut Cake with Coffee Glaze
REQUIRES SOFTENED BUTTER

Cake:
2 3/4 cups flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
2 sticks unsalted butter, softened
1 1/2 cups sugar
3 large eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 cup milk
1 1/2 cups chopped walnuts

Glaze:
1 stick unsalted butter, softened
4 cups powdered sugar
1 tablespoon milk
a mug/cup/glass/thing of strong coffee
extra powdered sugar

Optional:
chopped walnuts
semisweet chocolate chips, melted

For the cake:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Grease/Pam 9x13 inch pan.
2. In large bowl, stir flour, baking powder, salt, and cinnamon with a fork.  Set aside.
3. In another large bowl, beat butter and sugar until creamy.  Add eggs and vanilla; beat until combined.
4. Add 1/2 flour mixture, 1 cup of milk, then rest of flour mixture to butter mixture in that order.
5. Stir in walnuts.
6. Spread batter in prepared pan and bake 30-40 minutes or until a toothpick inserted near center comes out clean.
7. Let cool in pan slightly before topping with glaze.

For the glaze:

1. Beat butter in large bowl.  Add powdered sugar a cup at a time, beating well after each addition.
2. Add milk and mix well.
3. Add in enough coffee for a strong taste.  Add it powdered sugar until it's slightly less soupy.  Do this by taste and eyeball the consistency.

Assembly:

1. Spread glaze on cake.
2. If desired, sprinkle with extra chopped walnuts.
3. If desired, melt semisweet chocolate chips and allow to cool 5 minutes.  Place in plastic bag and snip off the very tip of the corner of the bag - or use a pastry bag.  Drizzle melted chocolate in a criss-cross pattern.

Breaking it down:

Combine flour, baking powder, salt, and cinnamon...

Beat butter and sugar...

Add eggs...

Add vanilla and mix well.  Add in half of the flour, all the milk, and the rest of the flour...

Combine well.  Stir in the walnuts...

...and spread in your greased pan.

Bake at 350 degrees for 30-40 minutes, and then allow to cool slightly.  Whip up that glaze and spread it on the cake.  I used melted semisweet chips for this decorative pattern and I sprinkled the cake with walnuts, too.  PUT INTO REFRIGERATOR - trust me on this, otherwise the glaze will always be soup - and then cut into pieces.  Yum!

I thought this was a really great cake.  I got the glaze a little too sweet, so that wasn't awesomesauce, but otherwise it tasted very good! :D

Go out there and be delicious!
-JJ