Easy Oatmeal Bars

Looking to get your oats in but still have a sweet tooth? Behold! Easy Oatmeal Bars!! This easy recipe can be customized to your mood or the season with various fillings. Lately I've been experimenting with caramel and pumpkin, though the original recipe calls for jam. You could also use chocolate chips, applesauce, apple butter, strawberry jelly, peanut butter, nuts, raisins, Nutella, etc for the filling. It's not hard to bake and goes together fast. There's even a bit of sweet-salty thing going on from the butter in the crust. Mmmm!

Easy Oatmeal Bars
2 c. quick oats, uncooked
1 3/4 cup wheat flour (or white)
2 T ground flax seed
1 c. firmly packed brown sugar (or make 1/4 cup of that honey)
3/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 cup real butter
1 to 1 1/2 cups of your choice of filling

Combine oats, flour, flax seed, brown sugar, salt, and baking soda in large bowl. Melt and stir until the mixture is crumbly and butter is evenly dispersed. Press 2/3 of mixture firmly in the bottom of a greased 9x13 pan. Spread filling evenly over crust, then sprinkle remaining crumble mixture over top. Bake at 400 for 25-30 minutes, or until golden brown. Let cool and cut into squares.

Filling note: Try 1 cup of old fashioned caramel as filling. Or, mix 1 c. pumpkin plus 1/4 cup sugar, 1/4 tsp ginger, 1/4 tsp allspice, and 1/4 tsp nutmeg and use as filling. I even did a pumpkin-caramel filling and it was delicious!!


Pictured below: Old fashioned caramel with chocolate chip filling