Cream Cheese Blondies

I wanted to celebrate Veteran's day with this.


But I couldn't find it anywhere! I had to settle for this.
And it's pretty good, but it's no Ben and Jerry's pumpkin cheesecake. Plus, it's LIGHT. Ugh. So I had to fatten it up somehow, and I wanted cream cheese.


My solution: cream cheese blondies. I found the recipe here, but afterwards stumbled across my friend Martha's recipe, and it appears that recipediva could also be called plagiaristdiva. She used Martha's recipe, yet on her little profile she is a "self-proclaimed expert cook." And she has a picture of a stupid baby for her picture. I think I've just made myself a new enemy. Move over, Comcast! Move over The Amish!


But I digress.

Once the blondies were finished, and Mitch and I had together polished off about a third of the pan of them, I decided to heat them up on a skillet, and throw the pumpkin ice cream on top.

I can't resist a dessert on a skillet. And, once paired with the blondie, that ice cream didn't taste light at all. . .
Here's MARTHA's recipe, not the one from my enemy, recipediva.

Ingredients
Makes 9 large or 16 small squares
11 tablespoons (1 stick plus 3 tablespoons) unsalted butter, room temperature, plus more for pan
1 2/3 cups plus 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
3/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup packed light-brown sugar
3 large eggs
1 1/2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
6 ounces cream cheese, room temperature
1/4 cup sugar

Directions
1.Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Line a buttered 8-inch square baking pan with parchment, allowing a 2-inch overhang. Butter lining (excluding overhang); set pan aside.
2.Whisk together 1 2/3 cups flour, the baking powder, and salt in a medium bowl, and set aside.
3.Put 9 tablespoons butter and the brown sugar in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment; mix on medium speed until pale and fluffy, about 3 minutes. Add 2 eggs and 1 teaspoon vanilla; mix until combined. Reduce speed to low. Add flour mixture, mix, scraping down sides of bowl, until well combined. Transfer to a large bowl.
4.Put cream cheese, granulated sugar, remaining 2 tablespoons butter, 2 tablespoons flour, 1 egg, and 1/2 teaspoon vanilla into the clean bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment; beat on medium speed until just smooth.
5.Pour half the blondie batter into prepared pan, and spread evenly with an offset spatula. Spoon two-thirds of cream-cheese mixture on top, and spread evenly. Drop dollops of remaining batter on top (spacing about 1 inch apart), and spread. Top with dollops of remaining cream-cheese mixture, about 1 inch apart.
6.Gently swirl cream cheese mixture into batter with a butter knife, running the knife lengthwise and crosswise through layers. Bake until golden brown and a cake tester inserted into center comes out with a few crumbs but is not wet, 45 to 47 minutes. Let cool completely on a wire rack before cutting into squares. Blondies can be stored between layers of parchment in an airtight container at room temperature up to 2 days.

**The only thing that I did differently was that I folded in walnuts after step 3.

Just to be clear, this is Martha's recipe and not my own. And I am not an expert cook. I am good at finding recipes and following them. Stupid recipediva!