Caramel Coffee Cake Blondies Recipe

by Lonna Spitaleri

In our opinion, Fall is the ultimate season where baked goods really get to shine their brightest! We love creating comfy, cozy treats for Fall and this Caramel Coffee Cake Blondie recipe will NOT disappoint. And what's even better is that we do half of the work for you with our cookie dough! 

While we do offer these full baked and ready to enjoy on our website, we wanted to give you the opportunity to put your chef's hat on and bake these fresh at home with your friends and family. In this recipe, we use our "Just The Dough" cookie dough, which is a brown sugar cookie, as our super soft and chewy blondie base. While we recommend this flavor for the blondies, you can choose any of our flavors as your base! You can order our dough here.

Start with your toppings 

 

Cinnamon Streusel Topping

  • 1/2 cup flour
  • 1 cup brown sugar
  • 1 tbsp cinnamon
  • 1/4 cup vegan butter cold and cubed (substitute with real butter if you prefer)
  • In a bowl, add the ingredients for the cinnamon streusel.
  • Use a fork or pastry cutter to cut the butter into the other ingredients. You should end up with a sand-like texture.

Caramel sauce: (3 ingredients!)

  • 3/4 cup coconut or cane or brown sugar
  • 1 cup full fat coconut milkfrom the can – the thick white part
  • 1/4 teaspoon coarse sea salt
  • Heat a pot over medium high heat.
  • Add sugar and stir around the pot for about 1 minute to heat through.
  • Add coconut milk and and sea salt stir to combine.
  • Bring to a boil. Reduce to a simmer at low medium heat and let simmer for about 15 minutes, until caramel has thickened, stirring occasionally. It should be sticking to the back of your spatula or spoon.
  • You can stir in up to ¾ teaspoon extra sea salt at this point if you want salted caramel.
  • Remove pan from heat. Allow to cool slightly for 10 minutes then transfer to a jar with a lid.
  • Cover jar, and place in fridge to cool further for at least two hours. The sauce will thicken up much more upon cooling and also upon placing in the fridge, even if it doesn’t look very thick after removing from the stove.

Now let's bake!

1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees F 

2. Get a 9x9 pan, or truly, any size or pan shape you have on hand. Whatever the size, make sure you spray it down with a non-stick spray or you could cut parchment paper to fit the pan. Just make sure the parchment paper goes up the sides of the pan as well. 

3. You will fill your pan with the cookie dough and have it reach about midway up the sides of your pan. The cookie dough will rise during baking so you don't want to over fill it.

4. Next, you will take your cooled down caramel sauce and spread it over the top of your cookie dough base. Use as much or as little as you'd like!

5. Once caramel sauce is spread, you'll take your cinnamon streusel and sprinkle it over the top. Cover it completely with your streusel so there are no empty spots.

6. If you're using at least a 9x9 pan, bake for about 22 minutes. If you're making a smaller batch, start with 15 minutes or until the top is less "watery". The caramel sauce and streusel are going to deliciously combine during the bake and you'll notice that if it's too "watery" on top, you'll want to keep baking until it's less glossy on top. Your blondies should still have a slight gloss on the top when they are done baking. 

Let cool and if you have left over caramel sauce, drizzle some on top when you're ready to enjoy!