Finlandia Butter Blondies are (you guessed it!) blondies made with a ridiculously good butter called Finlandia. If the name sounds familiar, you probably recognize it from their cheese, which has been in US delis for over 50 years. I don't know how long they've been importing their butter, but I'm starting to see Finlandia more often in mainstream grocery stores.
7 oz Blocks
Finlandia butter comes 7 oz blocks in both unsalted and salted. The unsalted variety is cultured, which means it has a live bacteria added and has a slightly tangy flavor, while the salted is made with cream, salt and milk. I like both varieties, though I do sprinkle the unsalted with flakes of sea salt when using it as a spread.
Finlandia Butter Salted and Unsalted
As for baking, European style butter is one of my favorite ingredients and I was very happy when Finlandia offered a sample to use in a recipe. I wanted to use it in a baked good that would really showcase the flavor of the butter, and both pound cake and blondies came to mind.
Finlandia Classic Butter Pound Cake
The first thing I made was the Classic Butter Pound Cake from the Finlandia recipe collection. It was fantastic, so I made it again and added a stripe of chocolate by combining ¾ cup of the batter with some chocolate. This cake gets its leavening from air instead of baking powder, so plan on using your stand mixer.
The blondies are a little easier to make than the pound cake, and there's no stand mixer required. This is my usual recipe, and I think the blondies taste better and have more butter flavor with the Finlandia. I used hazelnuts and chocolate chips for this batch, but any kind of nuts and chips will do.
Recipe
Finlandia Blondies
Ingredients
- 1 cup unbleached all-purpose flour 140 grams
- ¾ teaspoon baking powder
- ¼ teaspoon salt
- 8 tablespoons unsalted Finlandia butter 114 grams
- 1 cup packed brown sugar 210 grams
- 1 large egg
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
- ½ tablespoon rum
- 1 cup bittersweet or dark chocolate chips
- ½ cup toasted nuts your favorite (I used hazelnuts here)
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 F degrees F. Line an 8 inch metal pan with foil and grease the bottom.
- Mix together the flour, baking powder and salt; set aside.
- Melt butter in a large saucepan set over medium heat. Add the brown sugar to the warm butter. Remove from heat and let the mixture cool for 5 minutes before beating in the egg.
- With a spoon or whisk, gently beat in the egg, vanilla and rum. Stir dry ingredients into batter. Let the batter cool down if it is still warm, then stir in the chips and nuts.
- Spread in pan and bake for about 35 minutes or until pale golden and edges start to pull away from the sides,
- Let cool completely, then lift from pan and cut into squares.
Sue
I have had blondies on the brain. I love Lurpak but will be on the look out for Finlandia.
Anna
Gloria, I think it looks like the Pringles guy but with one eye.
Also, here's something I learned about adding chocolate to pound cake. You have to make sure the chocolate batter weighs about the same or less than the vanilla batter. If you add melted semisweet chocolate, it usually weighs down the cocolate batter causing it too sink. To keep the chocolate batter buoyant and minimize sinking, use Dove chocolate or possibly Lindt or one that has a lot of cocoa butter (usually slick and melts quickly). If you don't have any chocolate like that, add a half tablespoon of shortening along with the melted chocolate. Adding a half tablespoon of extra butter might work as well. Also, make sure to add pretty thick layer of white batter to the bottom of the pan and give the chocolate batter some room to sink.
As I'm typing this, I'm thinking melted couverture or melting wafers would also work well. So if you have couverture lying around (and don't we all? Heh) you could use that.
I'm sort of obsessed with marbling pound cakes, btw.
Also, my favorite European style butter is all of them! I haven't found one I don't like, though some work better than others in terms of making pie crusts flaky or cookies taller. For flavor, Finlandia is a good one. In most cases you get what you pay for, so if you splurge and buy good butter you won't regret it. Here in Chicago I've been able to find Amish butter. I love that, too.
Sonya
I love Gloria's comment !
Gloria
Your pound cake looks like it is smiling. Maybe that's because it knows how good it looks! I have never tried an imported butter. I think I will to see if it makes my strawberry rhubarb jam almond shortbread bars even more buttery. I have heard of Plugra also. Do you have a favorite?