Nanaimo Bar

Cookie recipes with a story behind them always spark my interest. The Nanaimo bar has a lovely story.

Nanaimo is actually a city on Vancouver Island in the province of British Columbia, Canada.

The story goes that a Nanaimo housewife entered a magazine cooking contest with her recipe for chocolate squares. Rather than naming the recipe after herself, as most people would do, she named it after her town and called them Nanaimo bars.

Well the recipe won a prize and was published. This really put the city of Nanaimo on the map so to speak.

The city responded to the publicity by making the recipe available as a handout. It was also printed on souvenir aprons and probably tee shirts as well.

There's also a bit of controversy to the recipe. I do believe the above story is true however similar recipes claim to be the basis of Nanaimo Bars.

There are also hundreds of variations all going by the same name. In fact in the mid 1980's the city of Nanaimo held a contest for the bars and there were over 100 different entries.

What I have here is claimed to be the official Nanaimo Bar.

Nanaimo Bar Recipe

Bottom Layer
1/2 cup unsalted butter (European style cultured)
1/4 cup sugar
5 tbsp. Cocoa
1 egg beaten
1 1/4 cups graham wafer crumbs
1/2 c. finely chopped almonds
1 cup coconut

Melt first 3 ingredients in top of double boiler. Add egg and stir to cook and thicken. Remove from heat. Stir in crumbs, coconut, and nuts. Press firmly into an ungreased 8" x 8" pan.

1/2 cup unsalted butter
2 Tbsp. and 2 Tsp. Cream
2 Tbsp. vanilla custard powder
2 cups icing sugar

Cream butter, cream, custard powder, and icing sugar together well. Beat until light. Spread over bottom layer.

4 squares semi-sweet chocolate (1 oz. each)
2 Tbsp. unsalted butter

Melt chocolate and butter over low heat. Cool. Once cool, but still liquid, pour over second layer and chill in refrigerator.