Chewy Butterscotch Bars with Pecans and Dark Chocolate Recipe

These are delicious, moist, chewy morsels of heaven in a bar that your family and friends are going to want more and more of. I make batches of these for lunchboxes, school fetes and they make fabulous Christmas presents.

These Butterscotch Bars are based on the American 'blondie' which most of us in the UK have never even heard of, but it's okay I get it now, Brownies are brown with chocolate and blondies are their paler counterparts. These are extremely easy to make and you can vary the recipe and use your favourite ingredients with ease, sometimes I add oats to these which gives them a slightly denser heavier feel but with or without the oats they're very moreish.

If you get all your ingredients ready and it will only take you 10 minutes preparation and 30 minutes of baking in the oven and then your only problem will be to keep everyone away from them while they're cooling - it's not only the dogs that will be drooling over these delicious bars. And you can store these in airtight containers for up to 3 days, but trust me they are never going to last that long.

140g / 5oz Butter

2 Large Free Range Eggs

350g / 12oz Light Muscovado Sugar / or Light Soft Brown Sugar / or Demerara Sugar

2 teaspoons of Vanilla Extract

250g / 9oz of Self-Raising Flour

100g of Milk or Dark Chocolate, chopped

100g of your Favourite Nuts, coarsely chopped

Icing Sugar for dusting

• Pre-heat your oven to 180ºC / 350ºF / Gas Mark 4.

• Melt the 140g / 5oz of butter in a bowl and set it aside to cool - Note: Please don't try to use the Butter while it's warm as the Eggs may curdle.

• Butter and line a shallow tin about 20cm x 24cm in size.

• In another bowl beat the two large Eggs.

• You will probably need a wooden spoon to mix the rest of this together as it's a very heavy mixture. To the eggs add the 2 teaspoons of Vanilla Extract and the 350g / 12oz of whichever Sugar you are using.

• Smells good huh?

• Add to this mixture the 250g / 9oz of Self-Raising Flour, the chopped Chocolate and ¾ / 75% of the chopped nuts (I highly recommend Green & Black's Organic Chocolate but please use your favourite bar it will make all the difference to you personally when you come to eat them). Now beat until incorporated but don't overbeat, you don't want to wear yourself out you've got a lot of eating to do.

• Pour the mixture into the tin and spread to ensure it reaches into the corners.

• Now scatter the mixture with the remaining nuts - you don't have to push them in, the mixture will rise when it's baking to ensure that they stay in place.

• Bake for 25-30 minutes.

• Leave to cool in the tray for 10-15 minutes and then remove to a cooling rack.

• Cut into bars, dust with icing sugar.

Now is the time to hide some of these in the cupboard otherwise you will go back later to get one and you'll be disappointed - your friends and family however will be sitting with huge satisfied smiles on their faces.