Flavor twist on fig bars

When I last wrote about making fig bars, I said I was going to try different flavors eventually.  So recently I decided to do just that.  I love dried apricots and really thought that apricot bars sounded good.  So I used the same recipe and just substituted the filling.  First I made the crust.  Then I pureed apricots with a little bit of water in a food processor.  I didn’t add the vanilla to the puree like the recipe calls for.  For some reason I didn’t think the vanilla would be as good with the apricots and I certainly didn’t want it to overpower it.  I rolled out the dough and spread the filling on top, folded the dough in half and baked it.  I felt that the fig bars could have used more filling so I pureed a whole bag of dried apricots and used about three fourths of the puree-I wanted there to be a lot of filling.   I am in love with these apricot bars.  I think I might even like them more than the fig bars.   I am enjoying them cold out of the refrigerator.  A) they keep longer refrigerated and B) almond flour products tend to get a little gummy if left at room temperature, but not so when you refrigerate them.  With the success of this recipe, I know I’ll be trying other flavor fillings as well.

Apricot puree.

     

Man, a rough week and now I have a super busy weekend and week ahead.  I am currently taking a break from writing a 5 page research paper for one of my classes.  Then I also have to write a journal for my skills class and study for two exams.  So I should probably get back to homework now.  But I wanted to share this recipe and I really wanted to share the following pictures that I finally remembered and took this week:

My baker pose!

My chef pose!