Brown Butter and Miso Blondies with Pecan Nuts and White Chocolate

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Soft and fluffy, yet a little gooey on the inside, these blondies are loaded with white chocolate, and if you choose, some roast pecan nuts. But it’s the brown butter and miso paste which take these cakes to another level. The brown butter brings rich, caramelised, nutty flavours whilst the miso adds a salty unami which enhances all the different flavours.

These blondies are not a classical Japanese dish but I am including them in my Japan insta week because they are made with miso paste. Adding miso paste to a variety of sweet and savoury western dishes has become very trendy, (and there are many good reasons for this!) and as a result these blondies make the perfect dessert after many different styles of food. They would be as delicious served after a burger or pan fried fish as they would be after Japanese food. Equally they make a wonderful treat with your morning coffee or afternoon tea and they are a great way of using some miso paste in a slightly unusual but incredibly tasty way.

I firmly associate blondies and pecan nuts with America; and given that it is Thanksgiving today, I wanted a recipe which would be a wonderful addition to your table. Happy Thanksgiving to all our American friends; wishing you a wonderful day full of love, happiness and laughter and hopefully a better year ahead.

How to make Brown Butter and Miso Blondies with Pecan Nuts and White Chocolate

Collect all your ingredients together and line the baking tin:

In order to guarantee soft and fudgy blondies, it is important to use the correct size tin – in this case it is a 20cm/8inch square tin. If your tin is larger the depth of your cake batter will be less and the blondies will cook more quickly. Equally if the tin is smaller, your cake batter will be deeper and the blondies will cook more slowly.

1. Sit the tin on greaseproof paper making sure the paper is large enough to line the tin, come up the sides and have a little overhang.
2. Cut out the corners of the paper so it will fit easily into the tin
3. Fold the paper from corner to corner so the size of the centre of the paper matches the base of the tin. Slot inside the tin.

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Ingredients:

• unsalted butter, in cubes
• soft brown sugar
• large eggs
• white miso paste
• vanilla paste or extract
• plain/all-purpose flour, sieved
• white chocolate
• pecan nuts

How to make blondies:

The method is almost identical to brownies but you do not need to melt any chocolate!

1. Cook the pecan nuts in a pre-heated oven for 5 minutes.
2. Remove 16 complete pecan halves and return the rest to the oven for a further 3 minutes and then remove and set aside to cool.
3. Chop the butter into squares and place in a saucepan. Heat over a moderate heat, stirring from time to time, until the butter turns brown. To read more about browning butter, please see here.
4. Meanwhile measure the sugar and eggs into a mixing bowl.
5. Whisk with an electric whisk until thick and creamy. This will take around 3 minutes.
6. Add the miso and vanilla extract to the brown butter.
7. Use a balloon whisk to thoroughly mix the butter, miso and vanilla.
8. Pour the butter mix into the eggs and sugar, whilst whisking, and mix thoroughly with the electric whisk until smooth and glossy.
9. Put a sieve over the bowl and sift the flour directly over the cake batter.
10. Fold until nearly mixed in and add the chopped white chocolate and pecan nuts
11. Fold in but be careful not to over-mix at this stage.
12. Transfer to your baking tin and level the surface, making sure the cake batter goes all the way into the corners.
13. Decorate with the 16 complete pecan halves placing them at the centre of the blondie.
14. Cook in the oven for 25 – 30 minutes, depending on how squidgy you like the centre to be. It will carry on cooking when you take it out of the oven so bear this in mind.
15. Leave to cool in the tin for 30 minutes and then, using the overhanging parchment, transfer the blondies to a cooling rack – do not remove the parchment, they will be too fragile.
16. Leave to cool completely before cutting into squares 
17. N.B. To speed up the cooling process and/or create particularly neat edges when cutting, transfer to a fridge to cool and slice when very cool. However, they are best served at room temperature. 

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Made this recipe?

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