recipe: biscoff pretzel bars

I have recently fallen head over heels in love with Biscoff spread. What's that, you ask? It's a spread that has the consistency of peanut butter, and it's made from Biscoff cookies. Apparently, Delta distributes Biscoff cookies on their flights; I found them at World Market. They are crispy, slightly cinnamony, and oh so addictive. I've been following the recipe blog Two Peas & Their Pod for the last several months, and that's where I first heard about Biscoff spread. After drooling over Maria's Biscoff recipes for months, I finally decided to bite the bullet and pay an insane amount of money to buy some Biscoff on Amazon. I tweeted about the spread when it arrived, and Meagan mentioned she'd seen some at her Walmart. So the next time I went, I checked it out ... and there it was, right next to the peanut butter! And several of the jars even had $1 off coupons on them! It's still expensive (regular price is almost $4 for 14 oz.), but so much better than nearly $14 for two jars!

While I could eat an entire jar by the spoonful (and I have), I also wanted to use some in a recipe. So I went to Pinterest. (Where else?) First, I tried this Biscoff Puppy Chow recipe. It was good, but the chocolate and sugar totally overpowered the taste of the Biscoff. For my next attempt, I took this peanut butter bar recipe and adapted it ... a lot. I wanted to be sure the powdered sugar didn't overpower the Biscoff, so using half brown sugar, as the original recipe did, seemed like the way to go. But because Biscoff already is sweet, I didn't use all of the sugar called for in the original recipe. I also cut back on the amount of pretzels and upped the amount of Biscoff (instead of substituting it one-to-one for the peanut butter). And I cut the entire recipe in half ... it would be too dangerous for me to have a 9x13 of this stuff hanging around the house! The end result was quite satisfactory, if I do say so myself!

Biscoff Pretzel Bars
adapted from Chocolate Peanut Butter Pretzel Bars on Make Happy

Bars:
1 c Biscoff spread (I used half creamy/half crunchy, but you could do all of one or the other)
½ c light brown sugar
½ c powdered sugar
¼ c melted butter
1 c crushed pretzels

Topping:
½ c bittersweet chocolate chips (I used Ghirardelli)
1 T butter
1 T creamy Biscoff spread

Line 8x8 pan with parchment paper and set aside. Mix Biscoff spread, sugars, and butter until combined. Add pretzels and stir until incorporated. (The mixture won't form a ball, but it should stick together. If it doesn't, add another tablespoon of butter.) Press mixture into prepared pan and refrigerate while preparing the topping. Place chocolate chips, butter, and Biscoff in a microwavable bowl. Microwave until melted, stirring after each 30-second increment. Spread over bars. Refrigerate until chocolate is set. Lift out of pan and use a sharp knife to cut into bars. Store in refrigerator to keep chocolate from getting too soft. Enjoy!

The Biscoff and pretzels pair very well together. Pretzels are also great dipped
directly into your jar of Biscoff!

This is what you're looking for. It's so, so, so good!