Revel in Deliciousness: Chocolate-Espresso Revel Bars

Despite my midwest bona fides -- I was born and raised in Nebraska -- I had never heard of a revel bar before coming across Shauna Sever's recipe for "Chocolate-Espresso Revel Bars" in Midwest Made. She says that the original concept uses a mixture of chocolate and condensed milk to create a truffle-like layer between the oatmeal cookie crust and topping. Her version uses bittersweet ganache instead.

This recipe comes together quickly. First, you make the ganache by bringing heavy cream, sugar, espresso powder, and salt to a simmer; pouring the mixture over bittersweet chocolate; whisking until smooth; and letting the mixture cool. (I have to say that I was happy to see that there was salt in the ganache -- one of my most common complaints about baked goods is the lack of salt. I've made six recipes so far from Midwest Made and Shauna puts salt in everything, meaning every individual component of each dessert. I love it.)

For the crust and topping, you beat softened butter until creamy; add dark brown sugar and vanilla, followed by eggs; and stir in the dry ingredients (old-fashioned oats, flour, espresso powder, baking soda, and salt). You take two-thirds of the oatmeal cookie mixture, stir in chocolate (I chopped Scharffen Berger 62% petite squares instead of chips), and press it into the bottom of a parchment-lined pan. The you spread on the cooled ganache, drop on bits of the remaining (chocolate-less) oatmeal batter, and bake.

The recipe says to bake the bars for 35-40 minutes, when "there is the slightest wobble in the very center." I've made these bars twice, and both times I took them out at the minimum baking time and there was absolutely no wobble anywhere. The dollops of oatmeal batter on top of the ganache expanded to cover most, but not all, of the chocolate during baking. Also, the recipe says that you should chill them for an hour for easy cutting, but I found that I didn't have any problem getting clean slices even when I just left the bars at room temperature overnight. The ganache layer in the middle was perfectly creamy, but maintained its shape.

These bars are so freakin' delicious. They are chewy and hearty from the oats, and the espresso and chocolate give the bars a decadent richness and incredible depth of flavor. The proportion of the oatmeal crust and topping to the ganache is perfect. And I loved the texture of the chopped chocolate in the crust. These bars were quite rich and I found that even cutting the 9-inch by 13-inch pan into 32 portions created a generous serving size. You could easily cut the pan into 48 squares and still leave folks satisfied. Or maybe not, because honestly, Tom and I just wanted to keep eating more.

Recipe: "Chocolate-Espresso Revel Bars" from Midwest Made by Shauna Sever.