Congo Bars are soft and gooey chocolate chip cookie bars made with 2 kinds of chocolate. Using both light and dark brown sugar gives them an extra rich caramel flavor that sets them apart.
So Congo Bars…I have no idea where the name came from. They sound like they are super exotic and should maybe have some weird fruit ingredient that you could only buy online. Well folks, sorry to disappoint.
They’re actually just an extra special version of a chocolate chip cookie bar. This is a totally nostalgic recipe that I snagged out of my Grandma’s recipe box. Leave it to the 80s to take an everyday kind of recipe and give it a fancy name.
But What Are Congo Bars?
So like I said, they’re basically a chocolate chip cookie baked into a bar dessert…with a few minor tweaks:
- 2 kinds of chocolate! I mean why just use semi sweet chocolate when you can also use milk chocolate! AND I’m using chunk and chips too…we’re going big today!
- 2 kinds of brown sugar! Let’s up the richness and caramel favor by adding both dark and light brown sugar. No boring granulated today folks.
- An extra egg. Ok this is minor, but it’s important in this recipe, as it affects the texture and richness. And since we’re baking these as bars, the extra egg adds a little more chewiness that works!
Ingredients List:
- butter
- brown sugar: light and dark
- eggs
- vanilla extract
- kosher salt
- baking powder
- all purpose flour
- semi-sweet chocolate chunks (or even chopped chocolate)
- milk chocolate chips (or chopped milk chocolate)
Instructions:
- Line a 9×13 pan with parchment paper and coat with nonstick spray.
- Beat the butter and both light and dark brown sugar together in your stand or hand mixer. Add in the eggs, vanilla, salt and baking powder and mix for an additional minute and scrape the sides of the bowl as needed. Then add in the flour and mix until just combined.
- Stir in all the chocolate and spread the dough into the prepared pan. Bake for 30 minutes at 350°F or until the edges are set and lightly golden and the center appears slightly under-baked.
- Remove the pan from the oven and allow the bars to cool completely before cutting.
How Do You Know When They’re Done?
You might think I listed the bake time wrong because after 30 minutes they might not seem quite done in the centers. But trust me no this, they will seem a little gooey, but that’s ok. As they cool they will stay soft and delicious.
If you bake them until they look completely done in the centers they will end up a little dry, which is not what we want.
Congo Bars
- Prep Time: 10 minutes
- Cook Time: 30 minutes
- Total Time: 40 minutes
- Yield: 24 bars 1x
- Category: Cookie Bar
- Method: Oven
- Cuisine: Dessert
Description
Congo Bars are an amped up chocolate chip cookie bar with 2 types of chocolate to make them extra gooey!
Ingredients
- 1 cup butter, room temperature
- 1 cup dark brown sugar, packed
- 1 cup light brown sugar, packed
- 3 large eggs
- 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
- 1 teaspoon kosher salt
- 2 teaspoons baking powder
- 2 1/2 cups all purpose flour
- 2 cups semi-sweet chocolate chunks, or chopped chocolate
- 1/2 cup milk chocolate chips
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350°F. Line a 9×13 pan with parchment paper and coat with nonstick spray. Set aside.
- In the bowl of your stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment mix the butter and the light and dark brown sugars together for 2 minutes on medium speed. Add in the eggs, vanilla, salt and baking powder and mix for an additional minute on medium, scraping the sides of the bowl as necessary.
- Turn the mixer to low and add in the flour, mixing until just combined.
- Finally add in both kinds of chocolate and stir to incorporate.
- Spread the dough into the prepared pan and bake for 30 minutes or until the edges are set and lightly golden and the center appears slightly under-baked.
- Remove the pan from the oven and allow the bars to cool completely before cutting.
- Alternately you can chill the bars before cutting.
Notes
store at room temperature for up to 3 days or in the refrigerator for up to 5 days.
Nutrition
- Serving Size: 1 bar
- Calories: 303
- Sugar: 29.5 g
- Sodium: 68 mg
- Fat: 14.8 g
- Carbohydrates: 41.5 g
- Protein: 3.8 g
- Cholesterol: 44.4 mg
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My mom used to make these for us. My dad and I always had the most bars in the family. WE were the chocoholics! My mom didn’t like chocolate but knew how to bake it!
Do you know if these Congo bars freeze well!
They freeze great! Thaw them at room temperature!
Just got the Congo bars out of the over. They are so thick can’t wait to try them. Look delicious.
I haven’t made these yet, but from the sound of them, I’ll be making them soon. I have one question, Is the “extra” egg mean that it’s 4 eggs that are added. or is that already included in the recipe?
It’s three eggs!
So glad you enjoyed them!!
Thanks for the great recipe! When I have had Congo Bars they also had raisins. Has anyone added in raisins? Thanks!
Brought these babies to a pool gathering yesterday. Everyone loved them. They’re a step above cc cookie bars! They were confused by the name, however. Lol
hahaha! Yeah the name is a little weird 🙂
Congo bars were given the name because Mothers and Grandmothers made them to send to the troops in Vietnam (the Congo)during the war! They held up better than cookies! My recipe calls for one Pound of brown sugar (dark), also melted in the margarine (!) not butter. I got the recipe from a friend’s mother in 1970.
Thanks for bringing back the great memory!
Thank you Kathy Z for the history of how Congo Bars got it’s name. I never knew that. My grandmother made them when I was little (in the 70’s) & I’ve been using her recipe for years. 🙂
Thanks for that interesting information! I was wondering where on earth that name came from for what seems like a giant chocolate chip cookie lol! Going to try them they look fantastic!
Was Vietnam called “the Congo” colloquially? That’s strange – the Congo was a free state in Africa around teh turn of the century, not in Southeast Asia.
I think the name explanation sounds a bit unlikely. I was only a kid at the time of the Vietnam War, so I might not have heard all the then-current expressions for Vietnam, but in any case never heard it called the Congo. I read elsewhere a suggestion that the name might be related to Congo Square in New Orleans, that the name was chosen because of the exotic sound and several explanations that seem at least as plausible. Not to mention that one article suggested the bars had been made at least as early as the late 40’s, well before the Vietnam War.
Um, the Congo is in Africa. Vietnam is in SE Asia…