Espresso Blondies with chocolate chunks and toasted hazelnuts. Easy to make and a nice change from traditional brownies.
I'm not bagging on brownies, I promise I love brownies! Just take a look at these Chai Spice Chocolate or even my crazy Krispy Kreme Chocolate Brownies as proof, but sometimes you need the buttery brown sugar flavor of a blondie. I combined my love of strong coffee and chocolate in these blondies and didn't hold back on the caffeine. If you can't get really fine espresso ground coffee then regular will do, but try and buzz it as fine as you can in the grinder. And how do you eat these sassy espresso laced blondies? With MORE coffee of course! Can you tell I like my joe? M had to take a work trip to Seattle last week and she surprised me with a bag of Starbucks Pantheon coffee beans which can only be bought at their Reserve Roastery and Tasting Room. Sounds fancy right?
I know some people don't like Starbucks coffee, but I hold up my hands and can honestly say that I like the dark heavy roasted flavor, so the Pantheon beans were perfect to use in these blondies. There's something I love about the butterscotch flavor of blondies, and so far this recipe which is super adaptable has been made with caramel apples and rhubarb and white chocolate. They all follow the same base pretty much so I encourage you to switch these up for any other ingredients you think would go well in the blondie. Try some chocolate, candy, dried fruit or preserves. It's pretty hard to mess up, actually I think unless you seriously under baked blondies or brownies, you could still eat them. I like them on the squishier side. Have a great week guys and a virtual coffee cup-clink to ya!
