Happy Thanksgiving to my friends and fellow bloggers. Thanksgiving dinner means turkey, sweet potato and pumpkin dishes. Since I had to make some dessert for Thanksgiving dinner, I thought to make something different which can be eaten with a cup of coffee after all the heavy meals – where we can sit and relax and have fun with family. This cookie bar is perfect for that, a sweet toffee-caramel base that is topped with a soft and puffy meringue layer with some walnuts sprinkled on the top. This will go well with black coffee or coffee with cream but omitting any sweetener/sugar.
On a side note, the cookie base layer is quite sticky like a caramel toffee. So make sure to place a parchment paper to the baking pan and grease with butter well. Before cutting into pieces, ensure it is completely cool, or even pop it into the refrigerator for a few hours.
Ingredients:
For the base:
- 2 oz/4 tablespoon butter/margarine
- 1 ¼ cup dark brown sugar
- 1 egg at room temperature
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 2 ½ oz all-purpose flour
- ¼ teaspoon salt (only if you are using sweet button/unsalted butter)
For the topping:
- 1 large egg white
- 1/8 teaspoon salt
- 1 tablespoon maple syrup
- 1/3 cup castor sugar
- ½ cup walnuts finely chopped
- ½ teaspoon vanilla extract
Method:
To make base:
- Line parchment paper to a baking pan and generously grease with butter.
- Pre-heat oven to 350 F.
- Add butter and brown sugar to a small saucepan and heat until bubbly. Let cool.
- Beat egg into the butter mixture with vanilla. Sift flour with salt and add to the butter mixture
- Pour batter into the prepared pan.
To make the topping:
- Add egg white to a dry bowl and beat until stiff and frothy.
- Add vanilla, maple syrup, sugar and salt and beat until smooth and glossy
- Set aside 1 tablespoon walnuts. Add the rest of the walnuts to the egg mixture and mix well.
- Pour egg mixture to the prepared base and sprinkle with walnuts
Bake for about 25 to 30 minutes. Completely cool to room temperature and cut into bars or squares.
Yields: about 16 square bars.
Looks so yummy! I could feel the lovely flavors from here. 🙂
Thank you Megala