Cherry Crumb Cream Cheese Bars and Candy Bar Blondies

This Valentines Day weekend was a killer at work! Valentines Day wasn’t just one day at the restaurant, it ended up being the whole weekend. Saturday morning we had 300 people in for breakfast from 7am till 11:oo am, then we dealt with lunch! On Sunday it seems sweethearts were bringing they’re entire families in after church for lunch, what a madhouse we had!! LOL!! I was in bed every night at 8:30 trying to nurse my burning aching feet. Yesterday I took it easy trying to recover, you know the old saying …the mind is willing but the body, well mine was revolting against me. I tried to visit as many of you as I could over the weekend but I need to get caught up. It’s amazing how much blogs and the people behind them can become a part of your life and when you can’t get to the blogs you enjoy reading on a daily basis you miss them! Today I feel rested and decided to make bars, the first bar is a

Cherry Crumb Cream Cheese Bar

This is based on an Apple Crumble Bar that I made quite awhile ago that I found on pete bakes. I LOVE that bar! I adore crumb topping and that bar had loads of it. The top as well as the bottom of the bar is made of crumb topping.  To Read More, Click On The Recipe Title.
Since my husband loves anything cherry I decided to try it with a cherry pie filling with a cream cheese layer thrown in for good measure. I followed pete bakes recipe and just substituted cherry pie filling for the apples and made a cream cheese filling. This turned out very very well! Below is pete bakes recipe with my changes.

Cherry Cream Cheese Crumb Bars
Adapted from
pete bakes Apple Crumble Bars

4 cups flour
1/2 tsp salt
1 1/2 cups sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 1/2 cups butter, softened
1 can cherry pie filling

Cream Cheese Filling

8 0z cream cheese, softened
1/3 cup sugar
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla

1. Take the butter out of the fridge to soften (do NOT melt) on the counter.
2. Combine the flour, salt, white sugar and brown sugar in a bowl.
3. Cut the butter into the dry ingredients. the butter should not be melted. what we’re going for here are crumbs. you can either do this with a wooden spoon, or you can do what i do, and use your hands to crush it all together.
4. Take 1 cup of the crumb mixture and mix it with the the cherry pie filling.
5. Preheat the oven to 350 F and grease and flour a 9×13 baking pan. take 1/2 of your remaining crumb mixture and press it into the bottom of the pan. bake for 10 minutes.
6. Remove the crust from the oven, pour in the cherry mixture , then top the pie filling with the cream cheese filling and spread the rest of the crumbs on top. Put it back in the oven for another 45 minutes. when it’s done, the top should be a beautiful golden brown. cool by putting the pan on a wire rack so air can circulate around it. cut into bars after they’ve completely cooled, if you can resist it. it’s a great idea to refrigerate the bars so they set a bit more.

The second bar I made today was a very easy blondie that you make in a saucepan, much like the Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Brownie…er Blondie, sorry Ingrid!! LOL!! Oh boy did the kids love this! I used Reese’s Peanut Butter cups, a Heath bar and a Butter finger Candy bar. These were the bigger bars, the pb cups had 3 in the pack. You can use any combination you like to make this, next time I’m thinking …Milky Way Bars!!

Candy Bar Blondie

Carol posted this recipe on a private forum, she got the recipe from snagwire, I knew the minute I saw it I was making it! It didn’t disappoint, it was fantastic!

Candy Bar Blondies
adapted from Gourmet
Found on Snagwire Media

2 sticks (1/2 lb) unsalted butter
2 cups packed light brown sugar
1 tsp pure vanilla extract
2 large eggs
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
2 cups of your favorite candy bars, roughly chopped

Preheat oven to 350°F with rack in middle. Butter and flour a 13- by 9-inch baking pan.
Melt butter in a 3-qt heavy saucepan over low heat, stirring, until smooth. Remove from heat and cool to lukewarm. Whisk in brown sugar and vanilla. Whisk in eggs 1 at a time until mixture is glossy and smooth.
Whisk together flour, baking soda, and salt, then whisk into butter mixture. Stir in candy pieces reserving 1/2 cup to sprinkle on top.
Spread in pan and sprinkle with remaining 1/2 cup candy. Bake until a pick inserted in center comes out clean, about 35 minutes. Cool completely