Blondies vs. Brownies

Have spent a lovely time making blondies for the first time today! A lot of people think that blondies are white chocolate brownies, but traditionally they have no chocolate in it all and get a lot of their flavour from the brown sugar in them. The recipe I had a go at was Martha Stewart's Hazelnut Blondies as they are yummy! Her recipe is all in cups (American measuring cups in the picture to the right) but I have worked out the weights in imperial/metric for you if you don't own a set of cups (aren't I lovely!)

This recipe calls for chopped hazelnuts which you can either buy or whizz up yourself. When I was weaning my little boy I bought the Philips Hand Blender. Not only is it fab to whizzing up all sorts of food for your baby, the mini food processor is brilliant for quickly crushing up nuts, biscuits etc. to save getting a big food processor dirty.  

Martha Stewart's Hazelnut Blondies

4 tbsp butter,

2 cups/8.5ozs/240g all purpose flour (plain flour to us British bakers),

2 tsp baking powder,

1/2-1 tsp salt,

1 3/4 cups/12ozs/305g of light brown sugar,  

2 large eggs,

1 tsp vanilla essence,

1/3 cup/4oz/100g of chopped hazelnuts,

1 heaped tablespoon of Nutella, plus extra to serve (optional).

1. Preheat the oven to 180/260 fan/gas mark 4 and line a 8" by 11" tin with foil.

2. Melt the butter and cream with the sugar. 

3. Beat in the eggs and vanilla.

4. Mix in the flour, baking powder and salt.

5. Add the hazelnuts and nutella and mix well. (It makes quite a stiff mixture, like gingerbread). 

 6. Pour into the tin and bake for 25-30 minutes until the top is golden brown and a cocktail stick comes out when cleanly when inserted.

7. Leave to cool for 15 minutes before cutting into squares. If you want, top each piece with an extra bit of nutella, you could do this with a piping bag.

Overall, I think I still prefer brownies as I am a total chocaholic but blondies are a nice alternative for a less chocolatey day! My friend Dave, who I met when we did antenatal, and the lovely Alison, who I work with, make the BEST chocolate brownies! I will see if I can get one of their recipes for you...

Let me know where you stand on blondies vs. brownies! 

xxx