Coffe Crunch Bars

The Court that I work for moved from the Town Hall into a new building last month. We still have some kinks to work out but all in all it was a good move. The only complaint I have is that it is very lonely working there without other people. Lonely and scary, but I think the scary part is from living in NY all my life. In NY you may not be too safe sitting alone in an office building in the woods.

This past Thursday we had an open house luncheon and invited about 50 lawyers, judges, Town Hall friends, etc. I ordered food from the local grocery store deli and made cookies for dessert. I had gotten a new Bon Appetite magazine and in it was a recipe that sounded right up my alley....Coffee Crunch Bars. Of course I had to make them for the party.

Bon Appetite has a whole article by Molly Wizenberg about these cookies.

She writes, "The coffee and toffee flavors of this crunchy dessert are heightened by the dark brown sugar and espresso powder."

Finding the espresso powder was the problem, a big problem when you live in a small town. After visiting several stores I went to Whole Foods, they didn't even have it, but they came up with a solution - they grounded up espresso beans into a powder and I used that.

The cookies came out wonderful, or so I thought. My husband doesn't like anything coffee related.

After the party there were a few cookies left so I sent them to work with my husband, his co-workers just love it when he brings stuff in.

Later that night I asked him how they liked the coffee crunch bars. He said, "No one ate them". "Why?", I asked. And in true Capt form he said, "I told them that you put coffee grinds in them".

I'm sure the image of old, cold, used coffee grinds would take anyone's appetite away.