Derby Pie Bars

It's a good thing I love my kitchen because I've been spending some serious quality time with it lately. With Christmas just a few days away, I've been baking and freezing all week long.  I just pulled these out of the refrigerator to take to my parents' house tonight:

 I found a recipe for pecan pie bars on allrecipes.com and adapted it to make them Derby Pie bars instead. Even though we are nowhere near Derby time in Kentucky, in my opinion, Derby pie is the perfect combination of chocolate and pecans and this recipe actually turned out great!

Ingredients

• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 cup packed brown sugar
• 1/2 cup butter
• 1/3 cup margarine
• 5 eggs
• 1 cup dark corn syrup
• 3/4 cup white sugar
• 1 pinch salt
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1 cup chopped pecans
• 1 bag of milk chocolate chips

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F
2. Mix together flour and brown sugar. Soften the butter and margarine and stir it into the flour until it is a thick, crumbly mixture.
3. Press into a 9 x 13 inch pan and bake for 10 minutes at 350.
4. Combine remaining ingredients except pecans and chocolate chips and blend well. 
5. Stir in pecans and chocolate chips by hand. Pour over baked crust.
6. Reduce oven temperature to 275 degrees F. Bake 1 hour or until a thin crust has formed over the top. 
7. Let it cool completely before cutting into bars.