Date Squares - 12 Days of Cookies - Baked Occasions

I always thought about dates being something that my grandma used in baking and I would not enjoy it at all. I would often look for alternatives in a recipe that used dates. This time I decided to use them and see what all the fuss is about. Also, I have found that dates are used in a lot of places where people want to sweeten desserts naturally without using sugar.

Since I had heard that dates are used as an alternative sweetener I was surprised about how much additional sugar is used in this recipe, a whole cup in the filling and another cup in the topping. I felt that I should just follow the recipe though and trust the Baked expertise. In the end, trusting the recipe was a good call. The bars were not overly sweet as I worried. I forgot to write down how long it took me to make these bars, but I do remember that it was not too long. The layers were not complicated to put together, but the simplicity was wonderful.

The filling was sweet and almost had a touch of molasses flavor to it, I'm sure that was the brown sugar. The topping was crisp and had a nice contrast to the chewy, sticky filling. The bars were not very large, but they were dense and rich, so the bars could even be cut smaller and serve more. I enjoyed these bars much more than I thought and would be very happy to have them again and try more recipes with dates.

The recipe for these and thoughts from other bakers can be found at Baked Sunday Mornings here.

Timing: Recipe States: timing not listed, My Actual Timing: I forgot to keep track.
Servings: Recipe States: 24 bars, Servings For My Family: 24 bars
Leftovers: These were great for about a week.


Family Ratings:
Me: These surprised me a lot and they were wonderful.
Hubby:
Big Man: He did not like the bars at all.
Bear: I don't want to eat these.
Mr. T: No thanks.

Will I repeat: Yes.

What will I change: I will not change a thing.