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1900-1929 - American home bakers adapting early non-chocolate brownies into brown-sugar bar cookies
Blondies are American bar cookies built on brown sugar, butter, eggs, and flour. They preserve an older non-chocolate brownie lineage while becoming a lunchbox, bake-sale, and weeknight dessert standard.
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Difficulty
Easy
Prep time
15 minutes
Cook time
25 minutes
Total time
40 minutes
Servings
16 bars
Region
New England and Northeastern brown-sugar bar-cookie kitchens
Era introduced
1900-1929
Introduced by
American home bakers adapting early non-chocolate brownies into brown-sugar bar cookies
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Before the chocolate brownie took over the word brownie, American bakers made pale, molasses or brown-sugar bars that looked much closer to what we now call blondies. By the mid-20th century, butterscotch brownies or blonde brownies were a familiar home-baking category. Blondies remain useful because they are fast, sturdy, and adaptable: add nuts, chocolate chips, butterscotch chips, or leave them plain.
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