This month, Zoe & Eric are reviewing The Ultimate Shortcut Cookie Book, a cookie/dessert cookbook. This cookbook is all about shortcuts, making cookies with pre-made mixes and other shortcuts to make the process easier and faster.
Zoe’s Take:
8/10
I love pecan pie. It’s my favorite at Thanksgiving and my favorite at Christmas too. The biggest problem I have with pie is that the crust is often too much. With these pecan pie bars, I felt like I didn’t have to deal with a large amount of crust while I was eating it, which was definitely a plus. What I didn’t like so much was that the shortcut in the recipe made it so the pecans I added last didn’t really want to stay on the top, they just sunk into the batter. I also didn’t use corn syrup, I used honey instead, which didn’t make a big difference. I would definitely recommend these bars to a pecan pie lover, or someone who has a ton of people coming over for the holiday.
Eric’s Take
8/10
This cookie bar was delicious. It’s really just a denser pecan pie that you can cut into bars. The big “short-cut” here was using cake mix for the bottom. The recipe called for a 18.25 ounce package. The problem with that is most cake mixes don’t come in that size. It’s difficult to account for measured conversions when baking with eggs, so I just ignored the fact I was missing some mix. This was used in the crust, which is baked first. The dough wasn’t the easiest to spread, but I eventually got it level. The mix was easy enough to put together, but in following the directions exactly I believe I over-mixed my “Filling” (The pecan/custard part). The directions called for mixing for a minute on low speed, then a minute on medium speed. This recipe was also very rich. A square inch of this bar is enough for me. Those last two reasons are why this recipe lost two points. Overall very good and they ended up being a crowd pleaser!