Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Bars

We all need those recipes that you can whip up in a few minutes with ingredients that you always have on hand. There is always butter, flour, sugar, eggs, chocolate chips, and oats in my pantry. I never run out of them. They are truly staples in our house. With as much baking as I do, I make sure to keep stocked up on items that I bake with all the time. You don't even want to know how much butter is in my freezer.

My friend Mary at Bunny's Warm Oven posted these bars and I knew I had to make them. My husband loved oatmeal chocolate chip cookies so I knew these would be a hit with him.

I have to admit. I made a mistake while making these. Mary's original recipe called for dividing a full cup of chocolate chips (1/2 cup in the batter, 1/2 cup on top). Oops! I didn't read through it quite thoroughly enough and only saw that the chips needed to be divided after I had already put a full cup in the batter. Didn't stop me from adding more to the top though. In fact, the added chips just made them that much better so I slightly adapted the recipe below.



Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Bars
very slightly adapted from a recipe at Bunny's Warm Oven
PRINTABLE RECIPE
1 stick butter at room temp
1/3 cup brown sugar
1/3 cup white sugar
1 egg
1 Teaspoon vanilla
1/2 cup flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/8 teaspoon nutmeg
1 cup quick or rolled oats
1 cup milk chocolate chips plus more for sprinkling on top

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Lightly grease a 9 inch baking pan.

In a bowl, beat butter,sugars,egg and vanilla until light and fluffy. Combine the flour,baking powder,salt, cinnamon and nutmeg in another bowl and whisk to combine. With the mixer on low speed add the flour mixture to the butter mixture. Beat until just combined. Stir in the oatmeal and the chocolate chips. Spread the batter into the baking pan. Sprinkle the top with a few more chocolate chips. Bake 20 - 25 minutes or until set in the middle and toothpick inserted comes out clean.