Eating Your Oats Another Way

Today I made some oatmeal chocolate chip bars with apricot preserves. I happened to find this recipe from an old Cooking Light magazine, circa 2001, that I had in my stack of old mags. Since I was going to my aunt's BBQ this evening and wanted to bring something sweet, I opted for these. Despite the gooey, rich look of the bars, these really are not too shabby health-wise. Each serving has about 6 grams of fat and 175 calories. Okay, so not super-low in fat and calories but still better than that scoop of Haagen-Dazs right? The original recipe called for raspberry jam but since I didn't have this, I used some low sugar apricot preserves instead. I think the flavors of the apricot with the semi-sweet chocolate worked out beautifully.

Apricot Chocolate Oat Bars: Adapted from Cooking Light October 2001

1 cup AP flour (or you can substitute whole wheat pastry flour)

1 cup quick-cooking oats ( I used old fashioned oats)

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

3/4 cup packed brown sugar

5 tablespoons butter, softened

1/2 cup semisweet chocolate chips

1 (10oz) jar apricot preserves (you can substitute with a different flavor if you'd like)

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F

2. Combine the first four ingredients into a small bowl, stir well, and set aside.

3. Combine sugar and butter in a medium bowl and meat with a mixer at mediums speed until smooth. Add the flour mixture to the butter mixture, stir until well blended (the mix will now be quite crumbly). Remove 3/4 cup of dough; toss this with chocolate chips and set aside. Press the remaining dough into an 8-inch square baking pan and spread evenly with jam. Sprinkle with the chocolate chip mixture.

4. Bake at 375 degrees for 30 minutes or until golden brown. Cool the pan completely on a wire rack.

5. Once cool, cut into squares. Yields 16 bars.