Back many many years ago there was a story that a woman asked for the recipe for a cookie she bought at Neiman Marcus. She thought she had been told $2.50, she was charged $250. She then got her revenge on Neiman Marcus by giving away said recipe. Keep in mind that this particular recipe went viral in the decades prior to social media. Per Snopes, this particular story dates to 1996/97 ish but there has been many forms and variations since at least the 1940s.
Here’s a fine example from a 1948 cookbook, Massachusetts Cooking Rules, Old and New, which lists not only the recipe for “$25 Fudge Cake” but also gives the following explanation for the name:
This friend had to pay $25 upon the receipt of the recipe from the chef of one of the railroads. She had asked for the recipe while eating on a train. The chef gladly sent it to her, together with a bill for $25, which her attorney said she had to pay. She then gave the recipe to all her friends, hoping they would get some pleasure from it.
One thing I find interesting about this particular version of the recipe is that it calls for Hershey (assuming milk) chocolate when I highly doubt that Neiman Marcus would use such a pedestrian ingredient. (Cue me getting sidetracked looking at the NM website and drooling over $600 shoes when the last shoes I bought came from the thrift store, but I digress)
Are these Congo Squares or Blondies? I’ve seen this particular recipe called both. In some cases, a Congo Square has the addition of coconut but this particular recipe doesn’t. I can’t even find a history of why they are called a Congo Square or bar- one blogger thought it was because people saw them as exotic but even Rachel Ray has no clue as to the history.