Nanaimo Bars - Quick to make (in theory) and a brief blogging hiatus

I belong to an amazing church!  We also have an amazing pastor, whose wife is one of the kindest and sweetest ladies I've ever met.  When Susie asked me if I'd be willing to make Christmas cookie for her, for a cookie exchange-- I agreed to do it.  Truth be told, I have never done any kind of cooking or baking for hire.  I figured that bar cookies would be a slam dunk-- and I remembered that, years ago, I used to make Nanaimo Bars at Christmas Time.  If you've never heard of Nanaimo Bars, then let me tell you-- these are incredibly good and a very popular dessert treat that has origins from a town in Canada-- Nanaimo, British Columbia, to be specific..


The most common version has three layers-- the bottom layer is a graham cracker and Dutch chocolate crust, glued together by butter, egg and walnuts (or pecans) and coconut.  I have never added the coconut, because coconut is a love/hate kind of ingredient that I don't want to take chances on.  I love coconut, but some of my family members don't. The middle layer-- ah, that's my favorite part. It's a buttercream.  I've seen recipes that call for vanilla pudding mix, but I only use Bird's Eye Custard-- it's a must.   (Please take note of the Bird's Eye Container -- which was unopened-- that claims "Easy to Open".)

I would like to write a letter to the person who designed this packaging!  I had a custard explosion (the lid flew off! that set the tone for the rest of this cookie making adventure... oh, let me tell you!  It began with my wanting to quadruple the recipe. I couldn't find my original recipe, so I searched the internet for a recipe hat I could print. I found one from  Sunset Magaziine's website, and read the ingredients. Everything looked just as I remembered-- yep, I was ready. I had my four professional size cookie sheets ready to go. I was all set up for the assembly line:

I love my Cuisinart food processor!  Let's see-- I start with graham crackers (turned to crumbs) and then walnuts, finely chopped-- pecan work, too.

I obediently followed the directions-- beat the eggs, add sugar, coco powder and then I paused.... bake the cookie crust?  This didn't sound right!   But, how could Sunset be wrong? So, I baked the first batch, and it came out wrong-- like really wrong-- crumbly, falling apart no-way-is-this-going-to-hold-together wrong.

The crust tasted bitter (too much cocoa and not enough sugar) so it went into the garbage-- and I do not like wasting food! So, I searched the internet again-- sure enough, the butter, egg, sugar and Dutch Cocoa should have been cooked over a double boiler (which thickens it) and then it's combined to the graham crackers and nuts.  The last photograph in the collage (above) shows the right consistency of the bottom crust.  I don't have photos to show you, of the double boiler process--because I was in a grumpy mood and I had to start all over again.  Sunset Magazine will get a comment from me, telling them that their recipe is so, so ... not authentic! But, I need to practice forgiveness!  I forged on, and made the buttercream.