Cookie Butter Bars
A few weeks ago, I bought proper Biscoff cookie butter and cookies. I had a vision in mind and after a few iterations, and countlessly dipping cookies into cookie butter (it’s as good as it sounds!), I came up with something that I think will surely blow your mind.
While chocolate has historically been my baking nemesis, I’ve learned that it’s more important to just keep trying and learning. If you’re anything like me, chocolate tends to either melt unevenly, seize and get very grainy when I melt it or reheat it, or it chips off as it cools.
If you want the perfect candy bar visual, I say try chocolate candy melts, which have paraffin wax, an ingredient that helps keep them shiny and prevents them from melting on your fingers as you hold them. As for me and these bars, I wanted to use high quality chocolate so that the final product wouldn’t be too sweet. These bars held together beautifully, only chipping slightly as we bit into it. Honestly, it was worth it to use Ghirardelli chocolate. I used a mix of dark and milk chocolate so that I had a gorgeous mix of richness and sweetness.
Trust me when I say this: You will never buy a store-bought candy bar again!
Cookie Butter Bars
Ingredients
12 Lotus Biscoff cookies
Caramel
1 cup brown sugar
1/2 white sugar
1/4 cup water
1 1/3 cups heavy cream
3 tablespoons unsalted butter
3 tablespoons cookie butter (I used Lotus brand)
1 tablespoon vanilla
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon salt
Chocolate
8 ounces chocolate, high quality, blitzed in the food processor or finely chopped
2 ounces unsalted butter, room temperature
Process
Yields 12 full-sized bars, or 24 minis.
For Caramel
Line an 8x8 pan with parchment paper, spraying with cooking spray before and after.
Combine heavy cream, butter and cookie butter in a heat-proof bowl and melt in microwave for 20-30 seconds at a time, stirring in between each iteration. In a smaller bowl, combine vanilla, cinnamon and salt with a whisk. Set both aside.
In a medium, heavy-bottomed sauce pan, heat sugars and water on medium-high (no stirring!) until a candy thermometer reads 270F. Turn off heat and slowly pour in heavy cream mixture, stirring constantly and being careful as it will bubble and steam. Turn heat back on to medium-high and stir until mixture is homogenous. At this point, you will stop stirring. Let caramel come to somewhere between 270-300F, and then take off heat and stir in vanilla mixture. Immediately pour caramel into parchment lined pan.
Let cool for about 2 minutes before gently adding whole cookies on top, being careful to give a little space in between each one. In my 8x8 pan, I fit two rows of five, and then two horizontally across the bottom.
Let cool completely in the refrigerator.
Assembly
Once caramel is completely cooled, gently loosen parchment paper and lift out of the pan, moving the entire caramel block to a cutting board. Using a sharp knife, cut caramel around the cookies until you have all cookies cut out with a thick layer of caramel on top. If you’d like to make smaller, bite-sized bars, place all bars cookie side down and cut each one in half, so you will have 24 bars.
Note: The remaining caramel can be rolled and saved for candy!
Add all cookie bars back into the pan and let sit in the freezer for an hour.
Remove cookies from freezer and in a medium sized, heat proof bowl, heat chocolate and butter together until smooth, being careful not to over-stir as the chocolate will harden. Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper and as you dip each cookie in the chocolate, carefully lay them out on the cookie sheet. Now would be the time to sprinkle with flaky salt if that’s your vibe. Continue until all candy bars are fully coated, reheating the chocolate for 15 seconds at a time in the microwave as needed to keep the chocolate from firming up in the bowl.
Let cool to room temperature, serve and enjoy! Cookie bars can be kept at room temperature for up to 5 days.