I spent a recent weekend in DC for the cherry blossom festival, and was fortunate to have absolutely splendid weather and even lovelier company. Although it wasn’t necessarily a food-centric trip, I did get to visit the Dupont Circle farmer’s market (next time I’m bringing a cooler!), and an adorable bistro called Montmartre that had excellent moules with chorizo. One of the friends that I stayed with also gave me some containers of duck fat that she’d brought back from her home in Bordeaux. Let me say that it is wonderful to meet someone new who within four hours knows me well enough to understand why I would get excited about a jar of fat. Duck confit, anyone?
Before my little retreat, though, I made a big batch of caramel bars to liven up some stressed-out, anxious-for-spring moods. These are probably rich enough to be called candies, but who says you can’t celebrate spring with rich caramel and dark chocolate? The recipe was particularly interesting in that that it uses some ingredients that are a little atypical for me — the base is made with saltine crackers (!) and the caramel layer uses condensed milk — not from my normal camp of obsessively-made-from-scratch endeavors. But I was sweetly rewarded for not turning my nose up at these little gems. They are hardly less elegant looking (or tasting) than the usual make-your-own caramel bars, and so bloody easy it’s practically a crime not to have them in your repertoire, especially for holidays or times when you need to feed a lot of people on short notice. Perhaps if forced to choose, I’d admit a slight preference toward the make-you-own version, but that’s not to say I wouldn’t make these again in a heartbeat. I squirreled a container away in the freezer to nibble on, cold, when my caramel jones strikes at odd hours.
The bars are very rich, so I recommend cutting them into quarters. The recipe makes quite a bit — around 40 bite-size bars — so they really are perfect for a crowd.