What’s more quintessential on Valentine’s Day than chocolate-covered strawberries?
Aside from bouquets of red roses, not much.
As much as I LOVE a chocolate-dipped berry, I decided to switch things up a bit this year. I’m taking the idea and flavors and infusing them into one of my favorite baked treats of all time: blondies!
Yes. Let’s do this.
I love a good blondie. Dense and fudgy with that awesome carqarmely-buttery flavor we all know and love. I could eat a blondie with nothing else in the batter and be just fine. I’m obsessed with the dough itself.
These blondies start with brown butter. So, you know they’re going to be good. Nothing is better in a cookie or a blondie than the nuttiness of brown butter. Its deliciousness is nothing short of miraculous.
The brown butter batter is flavored with freeze-dried strawberries and a healthy dose of semisweet (or bittersweet!) chocolate chips. Hence, our chocolate-covered strawberry effect.
I really recommend that you stay away from sweeter chocolate (milk or white chocolate) because the blondies will end up being too sweet. We need that slightly bitter chocolate to offset the inherent sweetness of the brown sugar.
The freeze-dried strawberries are so awesome here because they add potent strawberry flavor but without any extra moisture, which would totally mess with the texture of these blondies after they’re baked. Plus, they give the batter a slightly pink hue, which I am low-key obsessed with.
Pink food is so rare but so pretty!
After these are pressed into a pan, I like to top them with a few more pieces of freeze dried strawberries and a few extra decorative chocolate chips. More chocolate never hurt a damn thing, in my opinion. And if not on Valentine’s Day, then when?
These bake for 20 minutes or so – the key is to NOT overbake them! We want the edges to be golden and the top to be lightly golden and the center to be JUST set. A teensy jiggle in the center is actually juuuust fine. They will continue to set up in the hot pan after they come out of the oven. Overbaking blondies totally robs them of their magical textural experience. We want that gooey chew!
And THEN after these are baked, I go for the dramatic effect with an extra drizzle of melted chocolate, more freeze-dried strawberry sprinkles, and even a chocolate-dipped strawberry or two.
Yes! So fun, so festive, and SO DELICIOUS.
Come to mama.
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Chocolate Strawberry Blondies
- Total Time: 30 minutes
- Yield: 8 blondies 1x
Description
These Chocolate Strawberry Blondies are a take on the quintessential chocolate-covered strawberries you see all over the place for Valentine’s Day. These are buttery, fudgy, have an amazing chew, and are chock-full of chocolate and strawberry flavor. They’re so fun and so delicious!
Ingredients
- 1 stick of unsalted butter
- 1 cup freeze-dried strawberries, divided
- 1 cup all-purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 1 teaspoon kosher salt
- ¾ cup semisweet or bittersweet chocolate chips (or chopped chocolate)
- 1 cup light brown sugar
- 1 large egg
- 2 teaspoon vanilla bean paste or extract
Optional Garnish:
- Additional freeze dried strawberries
- Drizzle of melted chocolate
- Chocolate-dipped strawberries
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350°F and line an 8 x 8-inch baking pan with parchment paper, leaving some of the paper hanging over the edges to make the blondies easy to remove after baking.
- In a small skillet set over medium heat, melt the butter. Swirl the pan, watching the butter constantly, until it is toasty smelling and lightly golden. Remove from the heat and pour the brown butter into a mixing bowl. Allow the butter to cool for a few minutes.
- Meanwhile, place roughly ½ cup of the dried strawberries in the bowl of a food processor. Pulse the machine to break down the strawberries until they are finely chopped, almost like a fine breadcrumb consistency.
- Whisk the flour, baking powder, salt, chopped dried strawberries, remaining whole dried strawberries, and the chocolate chips in a second mixing bowl.
- Stir the brown sugar, egg, and vanilla into the cooled brown butter and mix until well combined.
- Add the dried ingredients and mix until everything is just combined – do not overmix. I stop as soon as I no longer see flour chunks in the batter. The batter will be thick.
- Spread the batter into the prepared pan, smoothing out the top in an even layer.
- Bake for 20-25 minutes, or until the edges are golden brown and the center is set and lightly golden. Resist the urge to overbake!
- Remove from the oven and allow to cool in the pan before slicing into squares.
- To serve, I like to make these extra fun and festive by drizzling them with a little bit of melted dark chocolate, some more of the finely chopped dried strawberries, and a chocolate-dipped strawberry or two for drama. All totally optional! The blondies are delicious without these extra touches as well.
Notes
- Store blondies in an airtight container at room temperature for up to one week.
- You can also freeze the baked and cooled blondies. I recommend cutting them into squares and wrapping them well individually.
- Prep Time: 10 minutes
- Cook Time: 20 minutes
- Category: dessert
Hi There. I'm Molly. I'm a food-obsessed, self-taught cook and I can't wait to share my passion for all things culinary with you. My love for egg yolks is just the tip of the iceberg!
Love this idea, can’t wait to make these!
Yay! I hope you love them as much as I do!
I am so sold on these. They look so good I’m going to make them this weekend!
Awesome! I hope you love them! 🙂
Reporting back to say these were incredibly amazing! So easy to put together and so much strawberry flavor and nutty brown butter deliciousness. Thank you so much for this recipe! <3
I am so happy to hear that you enjoyed them! Thank you for taking the time to come back and leave feedback – it is so very much appreciated! <3