Prize Winning Carmelitas

These carmelitas are the perfect crowd-pleasing dessert!  Also, they whip up quickly without a long ingredient list, which means you can wow your coworker or friends with a made-from-scratch-dessert, that didn’t take all evening to make! Trust me they will go fast and won’t disappoint.

It’s been a couple of weeks since I have added a new recipe to the blog.  There are several reasons for this, one being a few crazy weeks of busy evenings and family travels. Another being the fact that I suddenly came down with a spring cold that gave me a fever and chills for five days, and cough that still persists.   Needless to say, I was not feeling the writing, recipe creating, or blogging in general.  Last week, as I was on the mend and finally back at work, my coworkers decided to have a bit of competitive fun. We had an office “bake off” which was the perfect motivation for me to finally pull out one of my old favorite dessert recipes and makes this the first time I have shared my baking skills with you all!!

It was all started when one coworker who boldly proclaimed she made the best chocolate chip cookies in the world. 

Turns out carmelitas are the best baked good in the world…

Or at least my office, anyway. Yup, these creamy, caramelly (should be a word), and chocolate stuffed bars beat out every other baked good brought into our little bake off.  It was pretty official too, with a blind taste test and numbered ballots in a cardboard box.

At the end of the day, it was really just a fun excuse to bring sweets to work, and really this isn’t a chocolate chip cookie so she may still hold her self proclaimed title. But if you are looking for an easy baked good that is sure to be gobbled up quickly, try this one out!

How to make Carmelitas:

First, you make a crust by combing flour, brown sugar, butter, and oats in a mixing bowl. Press half of that mixture into a greased pan.  Bake for 10 minutes at 350 or until the crust has set up and is beginning to brown.

For my carmelitas I like to make a caramel sauce from “scratch.” Which really just means I like the melt caramel bits with sweetened condensed milk.  But if you are looking to save even more time and hassle you could buy a premade caramel sauce. Also if you can’t find caramel bits regular caramel squares will work, you will just need to unwrap about thirty of them for this sauce.

Once the crust has been removed from the oven cooled a tad, top with chocolate chips and smoother in the caramel sauce. 

Sprinkle the remaining portion of the crust mixture over the caramel, pop it back into the oven for 20 minutes and voila! Carmelitas! Simply one of the easiest and best desserts you will ever make.

5 from 1 vote

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Carmelitas

Ingredients

• 1 1/2 sticks butter 3/4 cup
• 3/4 cup brown sugar
• 1 cup flour
• 1 cup oatmeal
• 11 oz caramel baking bits 1 bag
• 1/2 cup sweetened condensed milk
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 1 1/2 cup semi sweet chocolate chips
• 1 tsp baking soda

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 350. Melt butter.  Add butter, brown sugar, flour, oatmeal, and baking soda in a medium sized mixing bowl. Mix until mixture forms small clumps and is well combined.

2. Press 1/2 of the mixture into the bottom of a greased 8×8 pan.  Bake the bottom crust for 10 minutes until lightly browned. 

3. While crust is baking add caramels, vanilla, and sweetened condensed milk to a small sauce pan on low heat.  Stir to combine until caramels have completely melted.  Remove from heat. 

4. Allow the bottom crust to cool slightly.  Then spread semi-sweet chocolate chips across the crust.  Top with the caramel sauce. 

5. Sprinkle the remaining crust mixture over the pan until most of the caramel is covered.  Return to the oven and bake for 20 minutes or until the top is golden brown. 

6. Remove the bars and let cool completely before cutting to serve.  It may take several hours for the carmel to set up, you can chill the bars in the fridge to speed up this process. 

Do you have a prize-winning dessert?

If so I would love to hear about it! Shoot me an email at midmittenmorsels@gmail.com or comment below!

Happy Baking!

~ Chloe M.