ORANGE FLAVOURED CHOCOLATE CHIP COOKIE BARS

Have you ever heard of a healthy chocolate chip cookie bar? No? Me either! I did however find a not-so-unhealthy chocolate chip cookie dough recipe on Cookie Madness.  It uses Kellogg's All Bran cereal.  I get a lot of inspiration from Anna's site.  Her recipes are tried and true. Then I mess around with them!  This recipe was forgiving with the changes I made and actually came out better than I expected! That is kind of why I made them into bars rather than spending extra time making cookies-I was not sure if my changes would ruin them or not. 

In keeping with the  Kellogg's healthy All Bran theme, I substituted a half of a cup of whole wheat flour for one half of a cup of white flour.  Because I wanted to ensure they did not taste "healthy", I added a little more brown sugar and a little less white sugar.  (The bars are a little softer because of this. Next time I might go back to Anna's original recipe of 3/4 cups brown and 3/4 cups white sugar).  I also added 3/4 teaspoon of orange extract instead of vanilla hoping it would hide any "healthy" flavour! (It worked). I left the nuts out of my first go at this recipe. Because there is enough salt in this dough (they are not salty!), you don't need the nuts to cut the richness or the sweetness.  Plus, when I'm experimenting, I don't use the nuts because they are expensive! Anyway, these bars are delicious.  No one would have a clue there is anything healthy in them!   I had four open chocolate chip bags of various flavours. I mixed them all together and ended up with the 2 cups needed for this recipe.  I had fun squishing up the empty bags with frayed twist ties and throwing them away! See the link above for the original recipe. My changed recipe is below.

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup Kellogg's All Bran cereal

• 1/4 cup hot water

• 1 stick salted butter softened, but not melted.

• 1/4 cup vegetable oil or extra light olive oil

• 1 cup golden brown sugar

• 1/2 cup white sugar

• 2 large eggs

• 3/4 teaspoon orange extract

• 2 cups all-purpose presifted flour

• 1/2 cup whole wheat flour

• 1 teaspoon baking soda

• heaping 1/4 teaspoon salt

• 2 cups chocolate chips (I used bittersweet, semi sweet, and white)

• 1 cup chopped, toasted nuts of your choice (optional)

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 325°. Lightly spray a 9 x 13" baking pan with non-stick spray or line with nonstick foil.
2. Pour the All Bran into a small bowl and pour the hot water over it. Mix it up a little bit and let sit until it softens and turns mushy.
3. In a medium-sized bowl combine flour, baking soda, and salt. Mix thoroughly.  Set aside.
4. In a large mixing bowl cream the softened butter with the sugars and oil until well combined.   Add eggs and orange extract. Beat only until well combined.  
5. Add the All Bran to the wet mixture and mix in until fully incorporated
6. Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and mix together on the lowest setting until JUST fully combined.  Stir in chocolate chips and nuts if you are using them.
7. Pour into the prepared pan and pat down so the batter is evenly distributed.
8. Bake on the middle rack of a 325° oven for approximately 28 minutes. Check at about 25 minutes as ovens vary.
9. Let cool for about an hour.  Cut them into squares before the chips harden. You don't need to remove them from the pan yet, but cutting them after the chips harden is the mistake I made!!!