Compost Blondies

At the end of your holiday baking/year you may end up with all sorts of odds and ends like me.  I had all sorts of little bags of baking bits sitting in my ‘baking basket’ in my cupboard.  These wouldn’t be enough for a recipe in itself, but I hate throwing stuff out.

Stuff like white chocolate wafers, a few walnuts, and umm… mini peanut butter cups?

I wasn’t quite sure what to do with these bits and bobs, but last minute I had to bring a dessert to a friends for dinner and I knew I didn’t want to venture out into the FREEZING cold to get any ingredients.  Plus, I wanted something super simple, quick and packable.  And it had to be with what I had on hand.

I know brownies are one of the easiest things to make, and the idea of a recipe where I could just throw in all those odd ends was perfect.  Et voila – Compost Blondie Brownies.

This recipe is from a Chatelaine recipe which appeared in their magazine in November 2009 (yes – I rip out stuff I like and see – I use it too!)  I took their basic blondie recipe, saw that they had 1 1/2 cups of stuff in it and improvised.

It turned out great!  Not too sweet, and it used up all those odd bits.  It will pack well, and was a snap to whip up.  The only thing I’d say is that the mixture was surprisingly thick to get in the pan (a first for me and brownies).  It plopped in like a big ball and I had to try and smear it flat (see my attempt above).  It all evened out in the oven though.

If you want an easy, not too sweet recipe and you want to use up odd stuff try this one out.  As mentioned, I used walnuts, chopped white chocolate wafers and the mini peanut butter cups but you could use anything – toffee bits, chocolate chips, pecans, cranberries, even candied pineapple (one of Chatelaine’s suggestions) although I would suggest an all pineapple brownie might be a bit odd…  Who knows though!