Receta Fruit & Nuts Cookie Bars – An Easy Dessert and a Perfect Festive Sweet Recipe
Celebrations never end in India, just when I thought that the hectic months of festivals are over, Diwali is round the corner. Time to indulge in sweets and savories again. I love to make sweets which are easy to prepare without compromising on good taste, my time & of course health. And I am planning to bake cookies or goodies which are light on sugar and oil instead of making those time consuming traditional Indian sweets this festive season. I got to browse these coconut and chocolate bars from my assigned blog on SRC for the month of September. This lovely blog Crumbs And Chaos is managed by four sisters Becca, Emily, Kate and Megan. Thanks for this beautiful recipe Crumbs & Chaos.
I made some changes to the recipe to suit my taste, I skipped the sugar for the cookie base as I felt it would be too sweet for us with condensed milk in the topping. I added dried fruits and reduced the quantity of condensed milk, butter, coconut and the chocolate chips used in the recipe to make it more healthy for my kids.
Rest assured the Fruit & Nuts Cookie bar recipe is to treasure and I will be making & packing the same to my friends & relatives this Diwali…make sure to keep in touch and do remain in my friend’s list
Ingredients you will need...
Ingredients;
(makes 12 medium size pieces)
- 1 cup finely ground cookies
- 1 tbsp. butter/oil
- 1-2 tsp milk
- 1/4 cup nuts (cashew/almond/walnuts)
- 1/4 cup dried fruits (raisins/black current/dates)
- 1 tbsp. chocolate sprinklers/chips
- 2 tbsp. condensed milk (milkmaid)
- 1 tbsp. desiccated coconut
Method; I used a mix of Marie biscuits and McVities digestive biscuits for the one cup of ground cookies. Crush the biscuits in a mixer and take out the ground powder in a large vessel. Add 1 tbsp. butter or oil in the cookie powder and mix well. At this point you can add about 1 tsp or more of milk to bind the powder into a loose dough. Do not add too much milk, keep the dough crumbly. j
Ahaa..love the coating of condensed milk..
Coarsely crush the nuts and chop the dried fruits into small pieces.
Line a rectangular baking tin with a butter paper in such a way that it does not form any folds in the tin. Add the cookie mix and lightly press it with the back of a spoon. Bake this for about 10 minutes at 200°C.
Take out the baking tin from the oven and let it cool completely.
..chocolaty shower
Pour the condensed milk over the cooled cookie crust evenly, avoid covering the sides of the tin with condensed milk. Spread a layer of crushed nuts and dried fruits over the condensed milk. Sprinkle chocolate sprinklers and coconut evenly over it. ll
...freshly baked bed of rosted coconut
Bake it for about 12-15 minutes at 200°C till the coconut is lightly roasted and turns golden brown in color. Take out from the oven and cool it completely before slicing it. For better results keep it refrigerated till use. ll
Melt-in-mouth cookie bars..
You need to resist the temptation to slice the bars, as the slices will not come even. I could not control myself…forgot, I need to photograph it too
Can you resist this sinful cookie bar!
I am totally sold out to the whole idea of making these bars with cookies and just a few ingredients, so easy and fuss free sweets. This is much healthier option than the traditional fudges we make during our festivals loaded with tons of sugar and floating in oil. Try the recipe and am sure you would like it too.
Notes;
Spread a thin layer of condensed milk if you like less sweet.
I felt the condensed milk too sweet for us, might think of adding unsweetened cocoa powder into it and then baking the same next time.
These Fruit & Nuts Cookie Bars are so easy to make and you can also refrigerate the whole batch for later use.
Perfect dessert for someone looking out for low cal and healthy eats.