Brown Butter Fruit Bars

Here's a fun fact that you didn't know about me, I'm actually a recipe hoarder. 

In truth, I only came to this realisation quite recently after it was pointed out to me that I have one too many notebooks with a bizarre amalgamation of 'recipes' i.e. scribbled ingredients with notes in the margins that make little to no sense even to me. But what the lovely aforementioned individual did not know is that I also have a collection of magazine/paper clippings of recipes that I know I'm never going to make like 'Golden Snitch Cake Pops' (I hate cake pops, why would I make a cake only to crush it to smithereens and mix with icing/coat with chocolate/put it on a stick?!). My camera roll also has a worrying number of screenshots of random recipes I've found online and my computer is similarly plagued (a whole dedicated folder). 

My point being that I try a lot of recipes, some turn out not so great, some are decent, some are one hit wonders (great but too much effort/not enjoyable to make) and very few make it into my cooking repertoire. Those that do I notice have a few things in common, they're relatively easy to make, use no fuss ingredients and they're delicious. These 'brown butter fruit bars' tick all the boxes and no lie, I make these very often!

These bars are a combination of wonderful flavours and are somewhat adaptable! Let me explain.. the base is golden buttery shortbread topped with a generous scattering of chopped fruit encased in a brown butter cake batter. 
All of which sounds incredible right? as for the resilience to adaptability, the fruit you use depends on what you like, you could also experiment with the biscuit base and tinkle with the batter topping. However I should tell you that this combination is gold and I would highly recommend that you give it a go!

To make these brown butter fruit bars you will need a few ingredients:

1. Butter/margarine
2. Caster sugar
3. Vanilla essence
4. Plain flour
5. Fleshy fruit
6. Eggs

To start with preheat your oven to Gas Mark 5, then we can make the base by mixing together 115g of melted butter/margarine, 85g sugar and 1 tsp of vanilla (or more!)

To this add 190g of plain flour and stir together until well combined, the 'dough' will stick together and should leave a clean bowl when inverted.

Press the resulting mixture into a greaseproof paper lined tray, you can use the back of a spoon to ensure that it is all smooth. Also if you want a thicker base, double up the mixture or just use a smaller tray (but you will get less bars, compromise). Pop this into the oven and bake for around 15 minutes.

Meanwhile chop up your fleshy fruit, I've used a variety of fruits in the past including cherries, plums, nectarines. You could experiment with other berries, citrus fruit or even mango, whatever you have to hand.  

For the brown butter batter (say that five times really quickly!), on medium heat slowly melt 115g butter in a pan, keep heating/stirring until it starts to get frothy and takes on a golden brown colour, you'll also notice a warm nutty smell. Leave this to cool before you use it.

For the remainder of the batter you need to whisk together 115g caster sugar and 2 large eggs.

To this add 55g plain flour, 1 tsp vanilla and then slowly stir in the browned butter.

Now to combine everything together - onto the shortbread base, scatter on the fruit, then pour on the brown butter batter.

Bake this for 40 minutes in a Gas Mark 5 oven until everything is golden brown.

Slice into bars or squares and serve. Hope you give this recipe a go, its one my all time favourites.

😋

Enjoy!

 Q x