TWD Rewind: Snickery Squares

Whenever I pick up a cookbook for the first time, I flip through it and look for the most attractive pictures. I'm pretty sure everybody does this - when you aren't familiar with a book, the first thing you do is try to find the tastiest thing in there! When I picked up BFMHTY, the picture of the Snickery Squares caught my eye right away. I mean, what was essentially homemade snickers?? I've had this book for years, so I have no idea why it took me so long to get around to making this recipe. I think I had always thought the middle layer was going to be some complicated homemade caramel recipe, but as I was reading the recipe last week when I decided I was finally going to make it, I realized it is really just a layer of store-bought dulce de leche. You can easily use homemade dulce de leche, but I have a brand I love that I buy at a Brazilian supermarket, and it's always in my kitchen.
This recipe is surprisingly simple to make, but seems like it took hours when you bite into one of the little squares. It starts with a simple shortbread on the bottom, which I made gluten-free by subbing in gluten-free all-purpose flour and a little xanthan gum for the wheat flour. Then comes a layer of dulce de leche sprinkled with caramelized peanuts. The peanuts were really quick to candy - the caramel cooked extremely fast and they were ready to break apart in just a few minutes. I would maybe have liked a thicker layer of "candy" on them, because it wasn't all that noticeable when eating the bars. After the peanuts comes a layer of bittersweet chocolate, followed by some more crushed peanuts. Yum!

I was so happy with how this recipe turned out, and can't believe it took me about four years to get around to making it! The recipe can be found in Baking From My Home To Yours, as always!
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