Millionaire Bars Joey Berens

millionaire bars

Joey Berens

INGREDIENTS:

2 packets (200g each) Shortbread Biscuits, crushed
1/2 cup Unsalted Butter, melted

1 can (397g) Sweetened Condensed Milk
2 TB Butter
1/3 cup Golden Syrup  {or Treacle}

1 cup Fresh Cream   {double cream/whipping cream}
2 TB Caster Sugar
160g White Chocolate melted and cooled to room temperature
2 Egg Whites, beaten stiff
1/3 cup Chocolate Chips

1/4 cup Dark Chocolate, for drizzling

DIRECTIONS:

1.) Combine the crushed Biscuits and melted Butter - press into the bottom of a baking paper lined, 20 x 30cm pie dish - chill until needed.
2.) Place the Condensed Milk, Butter, and Syrup in a medium saucepan - bring to the boil and turn down the heat to medium - cook, whilst stirring continuously, for about 5 minutes, until the mixture turns a light golden caramel color - remove from heat and let cool 10 - 15 minutes.
3.) Once the Caramel has cool, spoon over the Shortbread crust and return to the refrigerator for at least 30 minutes.
4.) Whip the Fresh Cream until stiff peaks form - add in the Caster Sugar - whisk another few seconds.
5.) Fold in the melted White Chocolate and the beaten Egg Whites to the whipped Cream - stir in the Chocolate Chips and spoon the Mousse over the Caramel layer.
6.) Drizzle with Dark Chocolate once the Mousse has set.

Slice into bars and serve. Keep leftovers in the refrigerator in a sealed container.

Millionaire bars are the perfect combination of chocolate mousse, caramel, and biscuit. The savory mousse combined with the mouth-watering and sweet caramel compliment the buttery bottom biscuit. The bars smelled AMAZING, it was like smelling a light whiff of cocoa combined with the buttery scent from the base. The bars were not aesthetically pleasing, due to the wax paper and the unevenness of the mousse. This, for me at least, didn't hinder the taste of the dessert. The whole dessert is a really delicious snack for any time.

This recipe was created in the U.K., so some of the ingredients weren't available to me, which made exact measurements hard to do. For example, golden syrup had to be made by combining 2 parts of corn syrup to 1 part of honey. This rough estimate affected how the caramel was cooked. The first batch burned due to an excess of honey, but the second worked decently, with only a few burnt flecks on the bottom. The pot I was using was scratched too much to be used again and had to be thrown away since I mixed to hard. The mousse was the best part personally for me, and it utilized the egg foam method in 2 ways. The first method was the egg whites that were a base of the mousse, and the whipping cream, which gave it the soft creamy texture. The egg foaming method whips the liquid to where tiny air bubbles form, which expands the volume of the egg 2-3 times its original size. The peaks were perfectly curled, which made for a very fluffy mousse. The crust in the millionaire bars was laden with mistakes. Firstly, the amount of butter was too small to stick the shortbread crumbs together to make a solid base piece. The only shortbread crumbs were the overly buttered ones or the crumbs closest to the caramel. 

This is a recipe I would definitely choose to bake again. The changes I would make would be to add more butter to the bottom crust so it doesn't fall apart while serving. This recipe is like when I saw the whipped cream demo since it uses the exact same principle to make the chocolate mousse on top of the bars. I learned from this lab how important it is to use exact quantities and measurements while baking. I personally believe that if I was more exact in my measurements, the caramel would have turned out way better, with a sweeter taste. Overall, this is a dessert that I will make again and again