Earth Muffin Family & Friends: White Chocolate Berry Blondies with Jen

So here I am again with the berries! This weekend some of my oldest friends descended upon Boston, and I needed (/used this as an excuse) to bake something delicious. My first concoction was mocha frosted cookies, but they are the subject of a future post.

My best friend of fourteen (gah!) years, Jen, arrived late Thursday night. As we leisurely awoke Friday morning, she declared that she wanted to do "whatever you normally do" on days like this. I was slightly ashamed to admit to my usually active and busy friend that this entailed reading in bed and a bowl of oatmeal. And, obviously, BAKING. So we set about trying to find a recipe that was easy, enjoyable, and would feed the rest of the girls.

Success! Jen says: "this recipe combines two of my favorite things: raspberries and white chocolate."

Although the term "blondie" led me to believe these would be as chewy and dense as chocolate brownies, they are in fact more like cake, or quick bread. They are also inexplicably remniscient of cheesecake. In an amazing way.

White Chocolate Berry Blondies
Seriously adapted from this recipe

16 oz. (1 1/3 bags) white chocolate chips
2 tbsp. vanilla extract
1/2 cup butter
1/2 cup shortening
2 1/2 cups flour
4 eggs
1 1/2 teaspoon salt
2/3 cup white sugar

1 bag mixed frozen berries
2 Tbsp sugar
1/4 cup slivered almonds

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Melt the shortening, butter, and white chocolate chips over low heat, stirring constantly.
3. Mix the eggs and sugar together.
4. Combine flour and salt, and add slowly to egg mixture.
5. Finally, mix in cooled white chocolate, in small amounts.
6. Pour batter into a 9 x 13 in. pan. This might also be good as muffins!
7. Bake the batter for 15 minutes, or until the sides of the pan have firmed up.
8. Meanwhile, combine the frozen berries with sugar.
9. Remove the pan from the oven, and sprinkle berry mixture over the batter. Return to oven. (TIP: Allowing the batter to cook for several minutes keeps the berries from sinking. If you wanted to mix the berries in entirely, you might try coating them with flour (in a ziploc bag) before incorporating them. This will help them to stay suspended in the batter.)
10. Bake for another 45 minutes or so, checking occasionally. The blondies are done when a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.
11. Sprinkle with slivered almonds and let them cool! They taste 11 times better when they've cooled.

Personally, I am an edge person. Others, like Jen, prefer the middle pieces: