Chocolate Chip Congo Bars

You may be asking yourself what a Congo Bar is...well I sure was when I first read this recipe! This particular recipe is a cross between a chocolate chip cookie and a brownie and for some reason, these are called Congo Bars overseas. Some may consider it a Blondie but I disagree as Blondie's traditionally have white chocolate in them. I was curious to taste this recipe once I saw it up on the Bakerella website so here you go...

2 & 3/4 cups plain flour
2 & 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
150g unsalted butter, softened
455g brown sugar (light brown if you can find it, it's not common in Australia)
3 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
325g of milk chocolate chips
1 cup chopped pecans (optional)

Preheat oven to 175 degrees (160 degrees fan forced) and line a 33cm by 22cm tray with baking paper.

Sift the flour, baking powder and salt into a large bowl. In another bowl, stir the brown sugar into softened butter until the butter disappears into the mixture. It will take approximately 10 minutes. Add eggs one at a time into butter mixture and mix well until combined.

Add vanilla, chocolate chips and nuts and stir to combine. Add flour mixture and stir until combined and then spread the batter into the lined tray. Bake for 30 minutes or until top is golden brown.

Results: At first I wasn't sure if I really liked this but after I kept going back for more, I realised it was pretty good! You do expect more of a chocolate flavour because of the brownie texture but the chocolate chips are great. Because the chocolate chips come in 275g bags here, I also added some chunks of chocolate from a block and it really made a difference - I loved biting into the big chunks! I would even consider making the bars completely of chocolate chunks next time. If you prefer to preserve your arm muscles then you can use a mixer but the texture does turn out better mixing by hand.

Source - Bakerella website