Friday, November 20, 2009

Chocolate Friday - Heath bar history and recipe




"In 1914 an Illinois schoolteacher named L.S. Heath mortgaged his house for $3,000 to buy his sons a soda shop. A year later he quit his teaching job to join them and expanded the business into homemade ice cream and candy. One afternoon in the mid-1920s a salesman told them about a candy called Trail-Toffee that he'd seen in an other store. The Heath brothers took the basic recipe - almonds, butter, and sugar - and spent the next several months experimenting. In 1928 they finally came up with a chocolate-covered English toffee bar - the Heath Bar."
~Copied from Uncle John's Supremely Satisfying Bathroom Reader


I love Heath bars. I love cookies with Heath bars broken up in them. Yum! So I thought I'd share a recipe with Heath bars and a little bit of history about them.

After you've drooled over and copied this recipe, head over to Lisa's (@ Stop and Smell the Chocolates) and find some more goodies. You'll be glad you did! :)

Heath Bar Cookies Recipe

Ingredients

2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
1 1/2 cups sugar
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 1/2 cups chopped Heath Bar pieces (Eight 1.4 ounce bars)
1/2 cup chopped walnuts

1 Sift together the flour, salt, and baking soda. Set aside. In a separate bowl, combine Heath Bar pieces and chopped walnuts. Set aside.

2 Cream butter until fluffy. Add the sugar and continue to beat until light and fluffy (a couple minutes). Beat in eggs one at a time, and vanilla.

3 Alternatively mix in the Heath Bar mixture and the flour mixture, a third at a time, until well blended. Chill cookie dough for at least 30 minutes (better an hour).

4 Preheat oven to 350°F. On cookie sheets lined with parchment paper or Silpat, spoon out the cookie dough in small 1-inch diameter balls (size of a large marble). Place dough balls 3 inches away from each other on the cookie sheets. (Make sure there is plenty of room between the cookie balls, and that the cookie balls aren't too big. These cookies spread!)

heath-bar-cookies-5.jpg

5 Bake for 10-12 minutes, until the edges are just starting to brown. Remove from oven and let cool for a few minutes. Then transfer the cookies to a wire rack to cool completely.

Makes about 6 dozen cookies.

Enjoy!!

Until next time...

4 comments:

Carin said...

oh oh oh.... I am SOooooo in trouble now! I love Heath Bars!

Unknown said...

Oh YUM!! I love Heath bars, so I am drooling now! And you've made me a little smarter at the same time - LOL! :)

Celee said...

These sound really good! I'll have to try them!

He & Me + 3 said...

OH my word...yum. Thanks for sharing.