When it comes to Thanksgiving pies, only one matters in my family’s household: Chocolate pudding pie. It’s my dad’s specialty; so coveted he has to make two whole desserts (plus several pudding cups) to keep us from stabbing each other with forks, fighting for each morsel.

I’m only just barely exaggerating here.

The only one safe from the pudding pie melee is my brother, Tyler, who prefers pecan to anything else. He’s woefully outnumbered and typically content with pecan of any kind (even the 50-cent mini pies sold near the Walmart checkout), so typically, his Thanksgiving dessert of choice comes from a store. Especially since the average pie recipe can include $7-$9 worth of pecans!

This year, I wanted to make two pecan pies completely from scratch. The ingredients alone cost $28 — not much, but when compared to the stacks of desserts sold for $6 apiece, you start to question whether it could possibly be worth the effort.

I followed this Food Network recipe, not realizing it was meant for a deep-dish pecan pie, and wound up with a full pie’s worth of leftover filling and no more crust or pie tins. I couldn’t just dump that in the trash. Scrambling, I remembered making pecan bars for Delish earlier that year, and remembered that I was making chocolate ganache for the bottom of one of Dad’s pudding pies.

Why not combine the two?!

I made a basic crust out of butter, sugar and flour, and while that layer baked, I stirred a few handfuls of semisweet chocolate chips into the leftover pecan pie filling. The warm filling melted most of the chips, infusing the filling with a rich dark cocoa-meets-caramel flavor. I poured it on the baked crust, then finished the bars in the oven, cooking them enough for the filling to set, then drizzled the whole thing with extra chocolate ganache (because I’m all about going all out), and popped it in the fridge to cool.

My miscalculation led to some of the best pecan pie bars we’ve ever tasted. If you like fudgy brownies, seven-layer bars or Congo Bars, you’re going to go crazy for these, I pinky-promise.

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Accidentally Awesome Fudge Pecan Pie Bars

Ingredients

For the Crust:
• 1 1/2 cups flour
• 1/2 cup butter, softened
• 1/4 cup sugar
For the Filling:
• 5 tablespoons unsalted butter
• 1 cup packed light brown sugar
• 3/4 cup light corn syrup
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 1/2 cups pecan pieces
• 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
• 3 eggs, lightly beaten
• 1 cup semisweet chocolate chips
For the Ganache Drizzle (optional):
• 1/2 cup heavy cream
• 1/2 cup semisweet chocolate chips

Instructions

1. For the crust: Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Blend flour, butter and sugar until the mixture forms pea-sized balls. Press dough onto the bottom of a greased 9″x9″ baking tin, then bake for 18-20 minutes, or until lightly golden.
2. For the filling: As the crust bakes, put the butter, brown sugar, corn syrup and salt in a medium saucepan and bring to a boil over medium heat.Stir constantly, letting it boil for a full minute before removing it from the heat entirely.
3. Stir in the nuts and vanilla, then let cool for about 10 minutes before adding in the eggs, stirring thoroughly to combine. Fold in the chocolate chips, mixing just enough so that about half of them melt into the filling.
4. Pour the filling onto the warm crust, then bake for about 30-32 minutes, or until the center has set and is no longer jiggly.
5. For the ganache: Heat heavy cream in a saucepan over medium heat until you start to see bubbles form around the edge of the pan. Once it’s lightly simmering like that, remove the pan from the heat and pour in the chocolate chips. Cover the pan and leave it alone for five minutes, then whisk the chocolate and heavy cream to combine it into a rich, thick sauce. Drizzle over the pecan pie bars, then refrigerate the bars for at least 1 hour before serving.

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