Who can resist a bar cookie with jam, coconut, and a cookie crust? The original called for raspberry jam but I had lingonberry (from IKEA) and thought it might work better since the recipe called for a fair amount of sugar and sweetened coconut since it is fairly tart for jam.
This is another recipe where I wonder how anyone made it in the pan called for. Made as-is, the base wasn’t enough to thoroughly cover a 9×13-inch pan. I switched to a 8×8-inch pan and while it made the base on the thicker side, it fully covered it and gave you more of a cakey cookie-ish bite than just a thin dusting of crumbs.
The directions were written in that confounding old-fashioned way where you read the ingredients and think okay that’s interesting–a jam-topped cookie then you work through the directions and realize there is a whole other layer with its own set of ingredients– in this case, eggs whipped with coconut. At least this one gave you some actual measurements. Some recipes I’ve come across will hide a major ingredient in the directions with no clue how much of it you need. I’m glad we’ve moved away from this convention in more modern recipes!
It was a quick, straightforward recipe and surprisingly only had one tablespoon of butter in the whole thing. It really made the most out of egg being a binder.
Beyond swapping out the jam, I added more vanilla and some spices to add some more flavor. I felt it was a little bland and one note without them. It is possible the author meant unsweetened coconut but that is much harder to find and drier–I felt like the recipe needed the moisture the flaked, sweetened brings.
Lingonberry Fingers
Ingredients
for the base:
- 1 cup flour
- ½ cup light brown sugar
- 1 egg
- 1 tablespoon milk
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- ¼ teaspoon ground cardamom
- pinch nutmeg
for the filling:
- 14 oz lingonberry jam or other favorite, tart jam
for the topping:
- 1 egg
- 1 cup sugar
- 1 tablespoon melted butter, cooled
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
- pinch cardamom
- pinch allspice
- pinch nutmeg
- 2 cups sweetened flaked coconut
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350. Lightly butter a 8×8 inch baking dish. Set aside.
- In a medium bowl or bowl of a stand mixer, beat together all the base ingredients until it looks like slightly clumpy wet sand. Press into the bottom of the pan.
- Spread the jam over the base.
- In a large bowl or bowl of a stand mixer beat the egg until creamy. Beat in the sugar until smooth. Add the butter and vanilla, beat until smooth. Mix in the coconut and spices until well coated in the egg mixture.
- Spread in an even layer over the jam.
- Bake 30 minutes or until golden brown and cooked through. The jam will be very hot and bubbling around the edges.
- Cool completely on a wire rack before slicing into rectangular pieces or squares. Store leftover in an air tight container at room temperature.
adapted and updated from an unknown contributor’s recipe for Raspberry Fingers from Oh Boy! Cookies… Sponsored by Southwestern Band Boosters (undated)