Thanksgiving Pumpkin Blondies

From The Best 50 collection of cookbooks. This is straight out of the Brownies and Blondies edition. A little of this goes a LONG way! Not really a blondie by my standards, but it passes off as an interesting bar-type dessert. PLEASE NOTE: Because most people are not really used to tasting molasses, it may take a few bites to fall in love with this recipe. I did not like it at all when I first tried it. But, after giving it a second bite, I found I can't get enough of it. This seemed to happen with EVERYONE who tried it. So, please, before giving an unhappy review, try it again. If you find that the molasses is just too much to handle, try cutting the topping ingredients in half. It really does make a lot of topping as it is. I hope you enjoy this!

• Ready In: 45 mins
• Serves: 16
• Yields: 16 bars

Ingredients

• TOPPING

• 6  tablespoons  vegetable oil
• 1⁄3 cup dark molasses
• 1⁄2 cup light brown sugar, packed
• 1 1⁄2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1  teaspoon ground cinnamon

• BLONDIES

• 2  teaspoons butter
• 1  tablespoon all-purpose flour
• 1 1⁄4 cups all-purpose flour
• 1⁄4 teaspoon baking powder
• 1⁄4 teaspoon salt
• 3⁄4 teaspoon ground ginger
• 1⁄2 cup light brown sugar, packed
• 1⁄4 cup granulated sugar
• 6  tablespoons butter, melted and cooled
• 1  large egg, lightly beaten
• 1  teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 1  cup canned pumpkin, packed
• 3⁄4 cup  milk chocolate chips (add about 1/2 tsp sugar if you use semi-sweet)

Directions

1. Prepare crumb topping: In medium bowl, combine topping ingredients with fingers or pastry blender until well blended; continue until a soft dough forms. Cover and set aside.
2. Prepare baking pan: Heat oven to 350 degrees farenheit. Grease an 8-inch square baking pan with 2 tsp of butter. Dust with 1 Tbsp flour. Tap out excess flour.
3. Prepare blondies: With a fork, thoroughly mix together 1 1/4 cups flour, baking powder, salt, ground ginger, and sugars in medium bowl.
4. Stir in melted butter, egg, vanilla extract, and pumpkin until well blended and smooth.
5. Stir in chocolate chips just until blended.
6. Spread pumpkin batter evenly in pan.
7. Finishing: With your fingers, break off dime-sized pieces of molasses mixture. Sprinkle evenly over the top of the pumpkin batter.
8. Bake in center of oven for 25 to 35 minutes or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean with a few moist crumbs (not wet batter).
9. Cool thoroughly in the pan on a wire rack for about 1 hour. Cut into 16 equal bars and remove from pan. Enjoy!