PEANUT BUTTER BARS

Today's post is a Peanut Butter Bar that I've been making since my kids were little. It has a sweet oatmeal base... a cream filling of sweetened condensed milk mixed with peanut butter and finally a topping of sweet oatmeal with chocolate chips. It is SO good, it travels well and it is perfect for bake sales or pot lucks, etc. It is a great recipe to have in your files.

2 cups raw quick oats
1¾ cups brown sugar
1½ cups all purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon baking soda
1 cup butter
2 cups chocolate chips (see note)
1 beaten egg
14 ounce can sweetened condensed milk (not evaporated)
1/3 cup creamy peanut butter

Combine the first 5 ingredients in a large bowl and then cut in the butter (like you would for a pie crust). You can do this step by hand or with a stand mixer, but don't do it with a food processor because it will chop the oatmeal to finely.

Remove 1¾ cups of these crumbs and put them in a small bowl, add the chocolate chips and set aside.

Mix the beaten egg into the remaining crumb mixture (not the part with the chocolate chips) and mix well.  Press into a greased (or Pammed) 10" x 15" x 2" baking pan and bake in preheated oven for 15 minutes.

While the base is in the oven, whisk the sweetened condensed milk together with the creamy peanut butter and set aside.

When the partially baked crust comes out of the oven, drizzle the milk-peanut butter mixture evenly over the crust. Top with the reserved crumb-chocolate chip  mixture.

Bake at 350 for another 15 minutes.  Cool completely in the pan before cutting into squares.

NOTE: Use any type/flavor chocolate chips that you like. I usually use a mixture of semi-sweet and Reece's peanut butter chips. Today's post has semi-sweet chocolate chips and mini-Reece's pieces.