Pumpkin Blondies with Chocolate Chips

Pic courtesy Mel's Kitchen Cafe

I have been pinning everything from Mel's Kitchen Cafe lately. She's my favorite food blogger and pretty much everything I have tried from her blog has turned out great. And, this is no exception. I ate almost the whole pan myself, and I'm only partly embarrassed to admit that. Anyway, I followed her "low fat" option on these by subbing applesauce for half of the butter and it made it so moist and yummy, but not as rich and dense as I imagine butter would have made it (It was more like a cake than a brownie). But, it was so yummy and pumpkin-y.

Pumpkin Blondies with Chocolate Chips
adapted from Mel's Kitchen Cafe 

*Note: I adapted the original recipe so that I could sub out half the butter for applesauce. Yay for the cut in calories! By doing this, the bars become slightly more cakey than brownie-like so if you want the denser texture, use 2 sticks of butter and omit the applesauce instead. Also, if you don’t have pumpkin pie spice on hand, I’ve included a DIY below the recipe (for this recipe, triple the DIY amounts to get the 1 tablespoon called for in the recipe).

*Makes 9X13-pan of bars

INGREDIENTS:
2 1/3 cups all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon pumpkin pie spice*
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon baking soda
3/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, room temperature
1/2 cup unsweetened applesauce
3/4 cup granulated sugar
3/4 cup dark brown sugar
1 large egg
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 (15-ounce) can pure pumpkin puree
2 cups semisweet chocolate chips


DIRECTIONS:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line a 9X13-inch pan with parchment paper or foil, leaving an overhang on each long side so the bars can be easily pulled out of the pan once they are done baking and cooling.
In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, pumpkin pie spice, cinnamon, baking soda, and salt; set aside. In the bowl of a stand mixer or in a large bowl using a handheld electric mixer, cream the butter, applesauce, granulated sugar and brown sugar on medium-high speed until smooth. Beat in egg and vanilla until combined. Add pumpkin puree and mix until combined. Don’t worry if the mixture looks curdled – that’s completely fine!
Mix in the dry ingredients, stirring just until combined. Fold in the chocolate chips.
Spread the batter evenly in the prepared pan. Bake until the edges begin to pull away from the sides of the pan and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out with just a few moist crumbs attached, 35 to 40 minutes. Cool completely in the pan before lifting the bars out of the pan, cutting into squares and serving.

*For a homemade pumpkin pie spice mix use the following, 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon, 1/4 teaspoon ginger and 1/8 teaspoon nutmeg and 1/8 teaspoon cloves. Mix together for the equivalent of 1 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice.