My birthday is coming up, so I've created this recipe to pay tribute to my mom, who so kindly made this birthday possible.
My mom ran a tight ship when it came to food. Boxed cookies were rare, potato chips were even rarer, and sugar cereal came once a year in the form of a box of Lucky Charms under the Christmas tree. Like all sugar-deprived kids, I managed to get my fill at the neighbor's house, sucking down bowls of Circus Fun cereal in its mildly ominous black box alonsgside sleeves of Oreos and Chips Ahoy.
Yet at the same time, my mom did allow home-baked sugar to infiltrate the house. She regularly cooked me "cookie brownies" around my birthday at my request, piling the stiff Nestle tollhouse dough into a big baking pan, always commenting how much she liked the recipe with only half the chocolate chips while I disagreed vehemently in silence.
So, this recipe is in honor of my mom, combining all the crap she wouldn't keep in the house with the birthday blondies I remember so dearly. Potato chips, Oreos, Lucky Charms, and store-bought La Lechera caramel infiltrate a classic chocolate chip cookie base. Yeah, it's a little gross. And a LOT awesome.
My suggestion is to add whatever you weren't allowed to eat as a kid, be it Snickers, Cap'n Crunch or whatever.
Love ya, Mom!
Forbidden Blondies
Yield: About 20
Prep Time: 30 min Cook Time: 30 min Total Time: 1 hour
Ingredients:
2 sticks of butter, room temperature
1/2 cup granulated white sugar
1 cup brown sugar, lightly packed
2 eggs
2 tsp vanilla extract
2 cups flour
1 tsp salt
1 tsp baking soda
1 cup dark chocolate chips
About 3 oz Lays potato chips (the size of the 2-serving bags at the bodega)
1 1/2 cups Lucky Charms (about the size of a single-serve cereal cup)
About 15 Oreos
1 small can La Lechera dulce de leche sauce
Preheat oven to 350F / 175C. Grease and butter a 9" x 11" baking pan.
With a stand mixer or hand beaters, cream together butter and sugars on medium speed til soft and fluffy, about 3 minutes. Reduce speed to low, and add vanilla extract and eggs, one by one. Beat til combined.
Combine flour, salt and baking soda, then add to butter mixture, keeping speed at lowest level and beating until just combined. Using a spoon or rubber spatula, stir in chocolate chips.
Using your hands, crush potato chips into coarse pieces. Stir 2/3 of the chips and half the Lucky Charms into the batter, and reserve the remaining chips and cereal.
Spread about half the batter over the pan. Using your hands, crumble the Oreos over the top, breaking into fairly large bite-sized pieces. Spread remaining batter over the top, slightly combining Oreos with top layer of batter. Smooth surface and bake for 25 minutes.
Remove blondies from oven, sprinkle over remaining chips and cereal, then drizzle with about half the can of La Lechera. (Pop the caramel in the microwave for a minute prior to drizzling if it's too thick) Bake for an additional 3 minutes. Let cool, then slice into bars and serve.
