Made with browned butter, chocolate, white chocolate, and plenty of sprinkles, these soft, sweet butter bites are a fun, easy treat.
Happy Memorial Day! I hope you’re enjoying a nice, long, extended weekend (that’s hopefully much sunnier and less rainy where you are than it is here).
Zach and I went strawberry picking with his family on Saturday (as you might’ve seen on my Instagram stories, if you follow along) so I’ve been extremely busy working those berries into a few recipes for you that I hope to have ready soon. If you have any berry-related recipe suggestions, I’d love to hear them!
Until those are ready, I have a simple, buttery, sprinkle-y recipe to share with you today, a fun new way to eat blondies that I’m calling “butter bites”.
They’re a cousin to my brown butter cookies, but easily baked in a pan.
Butter bites are essentially blondies cut into tiny, 1-inch squares (meaning you get 117 bites out of a 13×9 pan!). They’re not just blondies, though.
These are made with browned butter (I can’t seem to get enough of this easy technique, since this is approximately my 10th browned butter recipe this year, have you tried my brown butter frosting or brown butter infused pistachio cake?), making them taste extra, well, buttery.
The flavor is deep and rich, and there are plenty of steps in the recipe to help you through the browning process if you’ve never done it before!
You could just stop there — brown the butter, bake the blondies, cut them up and be finished, but I like to take things a step further and decorate them with chocolate and sprinkles.
I prefer to use melting wafers but you could instead melt chocolate chips in the microwave. I melt a handful of white chocolate, a handful of dark chocolate, and then set out a bowl of sprinkles and dip, dunk, and let them cool (with the melting wafers, the chocolate sets must faster than it would if you used chocolate chips).
I definitely recommend doing this last step, it takes only a couple of minutes to dip and sprinkle the squares and it’s what makes them so unique. The sprinkles add a nice texture to the smooth chocolate and the melt-in-your-mouth, chewy blondie bites.
Enjoy!
Butter Bites
Ingredients
- 1 cup unsalted butter cut into pieces (226g)
- 1 cup light brown sugar tightly packed (200g)
- ¾ cup sugar (150g)
- 2 eggs + 1 egg yolk room temperature preferred
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 2 ½ cups all-purpose flour (285g)
- 2 teaspoons cornstarch
- ½ teaspoon baking powder
- 1 teaspoon salt
- ½ cup white chocolate melting wafers (85g)
- ½ cup dark chocolate melting wafers (85g)
- Colorful nonpareils or sprinkles for decorating
Instructions
- Brown the butter by placing it in a medium-sized saucepan and melting over medium-low heat.
- Once butter has melted, increase heat to just above medium. Stir constantly with a wooden spoon as it bubbles, pops and foams. Once the bubbling slows and the liquid begins to turn brown (you’ll notice golden flakes of cooked butter), remove from heat immediately and pour into a large, heatproof bowl.
- Allow to cool 25 minutes before proceeding.
- Preheat oven to 350F (175C) and line a 13x9-inch pan with parchment paper.
- Combine browned butter and sugars, stir well.
- Add eggs and egg yolk, stirring well after each addition. Stir in vanilla extract.
- In a separate bowl, whisk together flour, cornstarch, baking powder, and salt.
- Gradually stir dry ingredients into wet until completely combined.
- Spread batter evenly into prepared pan. Smooth the surface with a spatula or knife so that it doesn’t have any craggy pieces when baked (I like to spread it into the pan, then lay a piece of wax paper over the surface and use my hands to smooth the surface, then discard the wax paper).
- Bake on 350F (175C) for 18-23 minutes -- until edges just begin to turn golden brown and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean or with few crumbs. Allow to cool completely.
- Once cooled, lift from pan (using parchment paper) and transfer to cutting board -- cut into 1” squares (I cut 13 rows down the longer end and 9 down the shorter end -- super simple!).
- Prepare melting wafers according to package instructions in shallow bowls (keep white and dark chocolate in separate bowls).
- Dip the tops or bottoms (I alternated) of the butter bites in chocolate and place on wax paper. Immediately sprinkle with nonpareils, if desired.
- Allow chocolate to harden before enjoying (just a few minutes!).
Nutrition
Nutritional information is based on third-party calculations and should be considered an estimate only. Actual nutritional content will vary based upon brands used, measuring methods, cooking method, portion sizes, and more.
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Heather
I’ve made blondies before, but never with all the little tips and explanations, I look forward to trying these!! Thanks!
Darrelan McBride
Hi!! I’m new to your site/blog. I’m in the tail end of the ‘baby boomers’ and the computer thing is catching me S L O W L Y… ;-))) but I’m totally in love with your blog/your recipes/your creativity! I’ve decided I want to do a modified Julie/Julia! I’m going to try at least a recipe a week and eat my way to the gym. We have 6 kids who are “all in” with mom’s new project! I’m also an ICU nurse and the nurses at work are reaping the rewards of your site too!!
Ok, for the strawberry idea-I would really love a great strawberry shortcake recipe (the biscuit slightly crunchy, maybe sugar glazed type crunch on the outside, slightly sweet/creamy on the inside but able to withstand the juice from the strawberry topping).
Now, for the “Butter” bites-OHHH you had me at butter 😉 I have not tried to brown butter before but you really explained it well and these are so yummo!! They melt in your mouth and I really like that they are just bite size, makes them a little more guilt free!! I made them late last night and dipped them this morning to let them cool over night, well I woke up to the cutest note from one of my teen aged sons that said, “Sorry mom I couldn’t help it. BTW these are sooo good” ( and a chunk about the size of 8 bites removed!!) I think they are a hit! These literally melt in your mouth with that nutty butter taste and when you dip them in the chocolate it truly does take them right over the great scale-Thank you!!
I really enjoy your blog and love hearing about all of your adventures! I’m sure we’ll all benefit from you leaving your job and devoting more time to well, us-those great recipes!! Keep up the great work.
Thank you!
Darrelan
Sam
Darrelan! Thank you for such a kind comment, I’m glad you’re getting with this whole computer thing 😉 😉
You are so sweet and I’m glad to hear that you are enjoying the blog. That’s incredible that you are doing all of these things with 6 kids (side note — I’m also one of 6 kids so I know how hectic and awesome big family life can be!).
I can’t believe I don’t already have a strawberry shortcake recipe on my site, I definitely need one, you are right! I’m so happy that you enjoyed the butter bites! Isn’t that browned butter flavor AMAZING!?!
Thank you so much for commenting and the kind words about my blog, I really appreciate you reading <3
Zubia khan
The Butter Energy Bites are SO healthy & delicious.It looks so Flavorful, and sweet. One of my favorites is butter bites. I’ll must try this at home.
Melissa Griffiths
These are so cute, and I’m all over 117 pieces in a pan!! I just shared a recipe for strawberry pancakes from my friend at Allergy Awesomeness. Great use of strawberries, especially if you have food allergies!
Sam
I will have to check that out, thank you, Melissa!! 🙂
Annie @ The Garlic Diaries
I’m dying over these in every possible way. The title, the fact that they contain brown butter, and how cute and adorable they are! Seriously, I want to kill about fifty of these babies right now. Love!
Sam
Thank you so much, Annie!! 🙂
Pat
Strawberry recipe easy and quick kids love it
my mom made this for years
1 pint of strawberries washed hulled and sliced.
1 large bag minature marshmellows
1 pint whipping cream
combine and refrigerate
stir every so often
The marshmellows turn into little sponges and the cream gets thick and pink.
serve a generous portion on top of a slice of angel food cake.
Sam
This sounds SO good, Pat. Thank you for this suggestion, I definitely need to try it out, especially with angel food cake (my favorite cake!). Thank you for commenting!!
Sues
117 bites in one pan?! Sooo how many would be acceptable to eat in one sitting?? I def agree that chocolate-dipping and sprinkles step is a must-do- they’re so pretty!
Sam
Definitely not as many as I ate in one sitting, but I didn’t let that stop me! 😉
Thank you so much, Sues!