Cranberry blondies with white chocolate and orange-infused cream cheese frosting.
CRANBERRY BLISS BARS / DREAMCAT115 / CC BY
Starbuck’s cranberry bliss bars are everything you need to spice up a cold winter’s day! These bars are actually blondies – rich, dense, and sweet dessert bars that resemble a traditional brownie only with brown sugar and vanilla to substitute the cocoa. Starbucks has some of the best recipes out there and they generously released their original banana bread recipe I posted here but haven’t revealed their cranberry bliss bars… yet.
So we had to do a little bit of digging to find a nearly identical recipe and the one we found is right on the bullet! These cranberry bliss bars taste exactly the same, if not TEN TIMES better. I have to admit that these are totally addictive and taste like nothing I’ve ever tried before! They are filled with white chocolate, cranberries, and a hint of orange. All wonderful flavors of the season that taste delicious when combined together. The frosting is made of cream cheese, white chocolate, and freshly grated orange zest.
Lately I’ve been seeing a lot of recipes to secret menus for not only Starbucks, but also Tim Hortons, McDonalds, even copycat recipes for the Costco muffins. The copycat recipes taste nearly identical and makes me feel like I’m cheating without getting caught! I’ve been tempted to try of the Costco muffins recipe for a while now. When I do, I’ll be sure to post it along with some really pretty pictures. But for now, try these holiday inspired Starbucks cranberry bliss bars:
Starbucks Cranberry Bliss Bars Copycat Recipe
- 3/4 cup butter, cut into chunks
- 1 cup brown sugar
- 2 eggs
- 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
- pinch of salt
- 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 1/2 cup dried cranberries
- 6 oz white baking chocolate, chopped
- 8 oz (1 package) cream cheese, at room temp
- 1 cup powdered sugar
- 6 oz white baking chocolate, melted
- 1/2 cup dried cranberries, chopped
- 2 tsp fresh orange zest
Instructions:
- Preheat oven to 350F and grease and line with parchment paper a 9×13″ baking pan.
- In a large mixing bowl with a electric mixer on low, combine sugar, butter, and then beat in eggs and vanilla.
- In a separate bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, salt, and cinnamon until combined. Pour dry ingredients into wet ingredients and mix until incorporated. Fold in cranberries and white chocolate.
- Pour batter into prepared pan and bake for about 20 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.
- Remove from oven and allow to cool in pan for 15 minutes before transferring to a wire rack.
- In a large mixing bowl using an electric mixer on high, beat cream cheese and powdered sugar until well combined. Slowly add in half of the melted white chocolate and beat until well incorporated.
- Frost the blondies and then sprinkle over with chopped cranberries. Drizzle the remaining white chocolate over the blondies and place in the fridge to chill. Once completely cooled and ready to serve, cut blondies into triangle shapes, and voila!
