Pretzel M&M Cookie Bars

25

October 27, 2010 by Dana

Today is my birthday!!!

Yes, folks, it’s true.  I’m 25 years old, and I still get excited by my birthday.  I love the presents attention cake chance to reflect.  To look back at the previous year.  To appreciate all of the things I’ve learned.

And, since I’m in graduate school, I’m supposed to have learned quite a bit this year.  Take macroeconomics, for example.  At this point in my macroeconomics studies, I am supposed to be able to tell you how this:

Y = E_p

after about a million steps, becomes this:

Y = Ca – cT_a + I_p + G + NX – (b₁ + b₂)r + cY – cty – nxy

In fact, not only am I supposed to be able to be able to tell you, I have to prove it in a midterm the first week of November!

So, as any normal graduate student approaching a ridiculously daunting midterm would do, I’ve been denying that the first week of November is actually next week.  In fact, I refuse to look past October 31.

As far as I’m concerned, Halloween is the end of time.  And, of course, there’s no better way to celebrate the end of time, than with a delicious Halloween recipe.

Ingredients

2 cups all purpose flour
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 ½ sticks unsalted butter, softened
1 cup light brown sugar
½ cup granulated sugar
2 eggs
2 tsp vanilla extract
12-oz pretzel m&m’s
1 ½ cups pretzel twists, crushed, plus more for sprinkling
Nutella (for melting and drizzling)

This recipe, created by The Messie Kitchen, just screams Halloween (no pun intended).  It’s packed with tons of candy and goodies… m&m’s, pretzels,  Nutella (which was my own substitution), and cookie dough!  What’s more Halloween-y than that?

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350ºF.  Spray a 9×13 pan with cooking spray.

2. Whisk together the flour, baking soda and salt. In a standing mixer (or with a hand mixer) beat butter, brown sugar and white sugar on medium until light and fluffy.  Add in the eggs, one by one, and the vanilla. Switch the mixer to low speed and add in the dry ingredients until just mixed. Fold in the m&m’s and pretzels.

3. Spread batter into pan and press firmly down with a spatula, evening out the batter. Bake for 25-30 minutes, or until golden brown. Cool completely.

4. Heat Nutella in microwave and drizzle over cooled bars.  Sprinkle more pretzels on top.

These bars were great!  We enjoyed them with some simple homemade vanilla ice cream on top, which let the delicious salty/sweet flavor combo shine.  Just be careful to watch them carefully when baking, because they have the potential to get too dried out.

Since these were so tasty and were packed chock full of Halloween goodies, I’m submitting this to the All Through the Year Cheer for their Halloween Recipe compilation :)

Oh!  I almost forgot.  I owe five of you some Green & Blacks’s Chocolate!  The lucky giveaway winners (chosen by random.org) are:

3 – Ravie – RavieNomNoms
9 – Amanda – Baking Without a Box
13 – Victoria – Mission: Food
22 – Judy – Judy’s Kitchen
39 – the_rob_bot

Send me your addresses so I can get your yummy chocolate sent out ASAP!  Congrats :)