You know what hours of endless brainstorming results in?

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Combining two desserts to make one awesome… dessert love child. Dessert love childs are kind of a thing in the food blogging world.

Think about it. Without food bloggers we would not have the Better than Crack Brownies, 7 Layer Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookie BarsOatmeal and Chocolate Cookie Bars, Peanut Butter S’more 7 Layer Bars or Oreos stuffed in just about anything.

Dessert would be just plain boring with out us. I mean really, we all need brownies, ice cream and cookies rolled into one. Right?

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Yeah, yeah. Dont answer that.

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Seriously though, I thought these up because of my brother, Kai.

Poor broken Kai. It seems like he is always broken. This time it’s his collarbone, for the second time. He had surgery on it the other day, which totally gave me an excuse to make Special K-Bars. Cause obviously they are special. Oh and they are his favorite.

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But then I went hiking……

The dot, dot, dots are my way of saying, oh no here I go. Cause when I go hiking, I brainstorm. Some things are just gross, somethings could be ok, but then there are some things that just work. These, these and these were all hiking creations.

Kai, he loves only three desserts. Yeah, three. Chocolate chip cookies (and just chocolate chip, no crazy add ins), Special K-Bars and cookie dough (the real stuff with eggs and all).

So yeah, you get where this is going. I put cookie dough in the K-bars. Minus the raw egg of course.

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I used this dough recipe from the Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Cups I made earlier this year and it just so happens that they are like kind of, NOT all that bad for you. Yeah, skinny cookie dough.

And it’s actually good. Kai approved. Promise.

Skinny Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Special K-Bars-14Here’s the funny thing. I presented these to Kai and he said, “what the heck, you put cookie dough in the K-Bars. Tieghan, come on you can’t do that. I want K-Bars and Cookie Dough, but I don’t want them together!”

Kai, he hates all love childs. The rest of us?

We love um. He’s just plain boring. Oh and since they’re “skinny” you can totally have like four, five, or maybe six!

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4.41 from 5 votes

Nutritional information is only an estimate. The accuracy of the nutritional information for any recipe on this site is not guaranteed.

The Recipe

Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Special K-Bars

By halfbakedharvest

Course: Dessert, Snack
Cuisine: American
Keyword: chocolate, chocolate bar

These bars are truly special and oh so tasty

Prep Time 20 minutes
Cook Time 5 minutes
Total Time 3 hours 15 minutes
Servings 20 Bars
Calories 395 kcal

Ingredients

Special K-Bar

Cookie Dough

  • 2 cups roasted salted cashews
  • 1/2 cup raw unsalted pecans
  • 2 tablespoons sugar
  • 2 tablespoons sucanat or brown sugar
  • 1/2 tablespoons butter softened
  • 2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
  • 1/2 cup mini chocolate chips
  • 2 1/2 cups dark chocolate chips or milk chocolate chips

Instructions

  1. Grease 9×13 inch pyrex pan.
  2. Place cashews and pecans into a food processor and process until the mixture resembles a smooth nut butter, stopping to scrape down the side of the bowl if necessary. This can take 5 to 10 minutes of processing, so be patient.
  3. Process in the sugars, butter and vanilla. The sweeteners will at first thicken the nut butter quite a bit, but keep processing and the heat will eventually melt the sugar and smooth out the nut butter. Once again, if it still looks too thick, keep processing!
  4. Now here is the hard part – when your nut butter is finished processing, you need to pop it into the fridge to chill. If you don’t chill it, the chocolate chips will melt right into the nut butter and turn everything brown (yes, this happened!). Once it’s chilled, about 25 minutes, stir in the mini chocolate chips.
  5. While the "cookie dough" is cooling off, mix Karo syrup, peanut butter and sugar all together in large saucepan. Heat almost to a boil, being careful not to burn. Turn off heat and mix in corn flakes. Press into the greased pyrex pan.
  6. When the cookie dough is ready spread an even layer. Just do the best you can, I used my hands and patted the dough in that way.
  7. Melt the chocolate chips (I do mine in the microwave, heating on full power for 30 seconds, stir, 30 seconds again, and stir until melted). Pour the melted chocolate over the cookie dough and spread out in an even layer. Refrigerate at least 2 hour. Let the bars sit 15 minutes at room temperature before cutting. Dont freak if the top chocolate layer cracks. This is going to happen and there is nothing you can do about it. Store in the refrigerator.
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Addicting? Definitely.