Last week I made a delicious cake and one of the ingredients was sweetened condensed milk, something that you don't normally buy. I didn't need the whole can of it for the cake so I wanted to find something delicious to use it for. Then I stumbled on the Magic Cookie Bar recipe on the Eagle Brand website. (For those of you who don't know, Eagle Brand is the company that makes the sweetened milk so all they're recipes include it.) This was the perfect choice to use the rest of the milk because it's super easy, definitely a plus for me, and totally customizable for the things you like.
Start with a greased 13 x 9 pan. I opted to use a 9 x 9 pan because I didn't have the whole can of milk left. The recipe calls for 1 1/2 c. graham cracker crumbs which you can buy or crush yourself. I chose to crush my own because that way you have whole graham crackers left over. It took 8 crackers to get 1 1/2 cups.
Once you have the crumbs, add them to 1/2 c. melted butter and mix. Take this crust mixture and press it into the pan. If you want, you can line the pan with foil and spray with cooking spray if you want it to be easier to remove the bars at the end. 
Pour one can (14oz) of sweetened condensed milk onto the crust in the pan, I didn't use the whole can since my pan was smaller. You want it to cover the whole surface.
Now here's where the customizing comes in. The recipe calls for 2 c. semi-sweet chocolate chips, 1/3 c. flaked coconut and 1 c. chopped nuts but you can put whatever you want for the toppings. I decided to keep the chocolate chips because that's pretty much the basic topping for the bars. Then I added mini-marshmallows because I thought the graham crackers and chocolate chips would make it like a s'more. I love coconut but Jeff's not a fan of it so I put shredded coconut on one half and Reese's Pieces on the other half for Jeff. Like I said, you can substitute and add whatever toppings you enjoy.
Bake them at 350F for 25-30 minutes or until golden brown. I had to bake mine for longer because the centers were too soft still after the normal baking time. I think this might be because I added more milk than I should have plus the marshmallows add to the "gooey-ness" of the bars. Once they've cooled you can loosen them from the edges and cut them into bars.
They made our apartment smell delicious and I definitely want to eat the whole pan already. But since we haven't had dinner yet, I'll have to resist.
Hmmm. They look really simple, which is good when it comes to baking. I guess I feel like it'd be missing something. Like there's crust, and toppings, and that's it??
ReplyDeleteI bet they were good though.
YUM! I can just imagine the gooey marshmallowy goodness. Were they super delicious??
ReplyDeleteThey were definitely delicious. Could have used a little less condensed milk (they're a little too gooey) and I might add something for a little crunch next time, like walnuts. But overall they were a hit.
ReplyDelete