Snickerdoodle blondies. Better than your average cookie.

I must start this blog post out with a confession: I made a huge, scary, rookie mistake when baking these blondies. I mean, the rookiest of all rookie mistakes. I almost ruined everything.

Luckily, these blondies are so delicious by nature they could withstand the destruction of an amateur baker like me.

So, I put the blondies in the oven, all ready to go and excited to see how they turned out… without mixing in the flour. That’s right. I forgot to add all of the dry ingredients and just poured the soupy, soupy mess of the wet ingredients into the Pyrex and stuck it in the oven. The whole time, I was thinking, “Gee, this batter seems pretty thin and wet and gross.”

And then, after five full minutes of the blondies baking in the oven, I saw the bowl of flour sitting on the counter. My heart stopped. I groaned.

The "after the mistake" batter. Still looks scrumptious, I'd say.

In order to save ingredients (read: $$$) and time, I decided to mix it all together then, after the eggy, wet batter had been cooking for awhile, and hope for the best.

I’m telling you, not even my pitiful antics could mess up these blondies. They are that good. Soft and fluffy and snickerdoole-y in a way that is more hearty and satisfying than any cookie I’ve ever had.

I should note, these would be perfect for an autumn tailgate with some hot chocolate. Or beer, whatever.

Here’s the recipe, courtesy of Cookin’ A Blue Streak blog and various tips from Dozen Flours blog.

• 2 2/3 cup flour
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 2 cups packed brown sugar
• 1 cup butter, softened
• 2 eggs
• 1 tsp vanilla
• Pam or butter, to grease pan
• For the cinnamon sugar topping:
• 2 tbs white sugar
• 2 tsp cinnamon
• 1/4 tsp nutmeg

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Grease up a 9 x 13 baking dish.
3. Combine sugar, cinnamon, and nutmeg in a small bowl. Set aside.
4. Mix flour, baking powder and salt in a medium bowl. Sift (or fluff) and set aside.
5. Mix (beat if you have a mixer) butter, brown sugar, eggs and vanilla.
6. Add the dry ingredients to the wet in thirds, mixing well after each addition. (DON’T SKIP THIS STEP!)
7. Pour the batter into the baking dish and spread evenly.
   

   It's like a cinnamon sugar wonderland.

8. Sprinkle the cinnamon sugar evenly over the batter. Marvel at how pretty it looks.
9. Bake for 25 to 30 minutes.
10. Take the bars out when set and an inserted knife or toothpick comes out clean. Cut while the blondies are still warm from the oven.
11. Have at it.

Some thoughts while baking:

-Well, “oops” was my biggest thought for this project.

-I don’t have a sifter or a mixer. I don’t bake enough to be that official. So I used a fork to stir and fluff the flour and melted the butter in the microwave in order to “beat” the wet ingredients better. I hope Ina Garten will forgive me.

-The recipe called for regular sugar, which I somehow didn’t have. I have three bags of brown sugar but no white sugar. So I just used powdered sugar to mix with the cinnamon.

-Unfortunately, because of my over-eager mistake, the batter was already cooked enough that the cinnamon sugar didn’t really sink into the brownies like I expected. It ended up not making a difference in taste, but I’m sure you will have even better-looking results.

A plateful of delight.