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    Home » Recipes » Brownies & Bars

    Caramel Oatmeal Bars

    Published: Jun 11, 2023 by Hakima · This post may contain affiliate links · 6 Comments

    Jump to Recipe Print Recipe

    These Caramel Oatmeal Bars are made with brown butter and have layers of caramel and chocolate that make these bars so gooey and rich!

    caramel oatmeal bars on parchment paper with sea salt on top

    I recently made a batch of caramel for the blog and needed some recipes to add them to, so Caramel Oatmeal Bars were it! These are essentially Carmelitas! They have a cookie dough base on the bottom, with chocolate and caramel in the middle layer, then topped with more cookie dough. They're fudgy and chewy, and have the best flavor due to the caramel and brown butter.

    close up shot of caramel oozing out of a bar

    Why You'll Love this Recipe

    • Brown Butter: this Caramel Oatmeal Bars recipe is absolutely elevated with the addition of brown butter. Gives it such a delicious nutty flavor.
    • Fudgy & chewy: The oatmeal/flour combination and the caramel give the bars such a fudgy texture.
    • Easy: It's a pretty easy recipe and can be whipped up in less than 40 minutes.
    stack of caramel oatmeal bars
    Jump to:
    • Why You'll Love this Recipe
    • Ingredients You'll Need
    • How to Make Caramel Oatmeal Bars
    • Substitutions
    • Variations to Try
    • Storage
    • Pro Tips
    • FAQ
    • Other Recipes to Try:
    • 📖 Recipe Card
    • 💬 Reviews

    Ingredients You'll Need

    oatmeal bars ingredients
    • Butter: For this recipe, I use brown butter, which is melting the butter, than continuing to cook it to brown. This gives the bars a rich and nutty flavor.
    • Flour: All purpose flour works great here.
    • Quick oats: I only ever have quick oats on hand so all my recipes use that. In a pinch, you can use old fashion oats and just pulse it a few times in the food processor.
    • Brown sugar: These bars use all brown sugar, which cuts down on the sweetness a little, especially since we're adding sweetness with the caramel sauce.
    • Egg: One egg for binding.
    • Vanilla extract: Flavor galore!
    • Baking powder: We need a bit of a lift, so leavening is important.
    • Salt: Balances sweetness and for flavor.
    • Chocolate: I use 70% chopped chocolate, but you can use semi-sweet chocolate chips.
    • Caramel sauce: I highly recommend making your own homemade caramel sauce and I have a wonderful recipe, but you can use store-bought as well.

    See recipe card for quantities.

    bite shot in the middle of oatmeal bars

    How to Make Caramel Oatmeal Bars

    Steps to make brown butter

    • Melt butter in a medium sauce pan on medium heat. Stir the butter to make sure it melts evenly. Once the butter is completely melted, it will start to foam up. Continue stirring the butter. As it cooks, it will start to change into a deeper color. This could take 6-8 minutes.
    • You'll start to notice a nutty aroma and the butter will begin to have brown specs at the bottom of the pan. 
    • The entire process of browning butter from start to finish should not take more than 10 minutes on medium heat.
    • Once butter is browned, pour it into a heat proof bowl and set it aside to cool for about 5 or 10 minutes.

    Steps to make Caramel Oatmeal Bars

    • Wet Ingredients: In a medium bowl, add (slightly cooled) brown butter and brown sugar and mix using a spatula. Add the egg and vanilla extract and mix.
    add brown butter and brown sugar and mix
    add egg and vanilla extract
    • Dry Ingredients: Add the flour, quick oats, salt, and baking powder and mix, then add 1.5 oz of the chocolate (or chocolate chips if that's what you're using) and mix.
    add dry ingredients: oatmeal, flour, baking powder, salt
    mix in chocolate chunks
    • Spread in pan: Place ⅔ of the dough into the bottom of an 8x8 pan and spread it out completely.
    • First bake: Bake for 10 minutes, then remove it from the oven and sprinkle the rest of the chocolate on top. Then pour the caramel on top. (if it's not very pourable consistency, microwave it for about 20 seconds). If you need to, you can use a spoon or offset spatula and spread the caramel all over the chocolate. If it mixes together, that's fine.
    spread in a pan
    add chocolate chunks and caramel sauce
    • Add remaining dough: Take the remaining dough and add it to the top of the caramel. Just flatten each piece a little with your fingers and place them all around. It won't cover the entire pan, but that's ok.
    • Second bake: Place back in the oven for 18-23 minutes until the edges are golden brown and you start to see the caramel bubble.
    add remaining dough
    bake and remove once bubbly and golden edges
    • Cool: Remove from the oven and cool for at least 2 hours before slicing and enjoying.

    Hint: Let the brown butter cool before adding the brown sugar and egg, otherwise the egg could scramble.

    Substitutions

    • Chocolate: Instead of chopped chocolate, you can use semi-sweet chocolate chips or a mix of milk and dark chocolate.
    • Caramel: I love adding homemade caramel sauce, but store-bought works too.
    stack of bars with a bite taken out of the top one
    close up of a bite shot of caramel oatmeal bar

    Variations to Try

    These Caramel Oatmeal Bars are delicious as is, but if you’d like to jazz them up some more, you can add any kind of mix ins like nuts or chocolate candies. Experiment and see what you like!

    Storage

    Storing: They keep well for 4-5 days at room temperature in an airtight container or ziploc bag.

    Freezing: You can freeze them tightly wrapped for a few months.

    Pro Tips

    Measure Ingredients Correctly: As always, with any recipe, use a kitchen scale, as it is the best form of measuring your ingredients. If you don't have a kitchen scale, fluff your flour, scoop flour with a spoon into a measuring cup and level off.

    Don't burn the brown butter: Once the brown butter starts to pop, foam, and form specs at the bottom of the pan, remove it. Otherwise you could burn it and it will end up tasting bitter.

    Don't over mix: Using a spatula instead of a hand mixer reduces the chances of overmixing, but once your ingredients come together, stop mixing.

    Don't over bake: Take out the bars at 10 minutes on the first bake, and start checking at 18 minutes on the second bake.

    Cool completely: Make sure you let the bars cool completely. A safe timeframe is about 2-3 hours. Otherwise when you go to cut them, it will be a mess.

    Parchment paper: To avoid sticking, make sure to line the pan.

    High quality chocolate: I like using Ghirardelli, Lindt, or Guittard because I know they all taste wonderful in recipes. Here's more info on baking with the right chocolate.

    FAQ

    What does Brown Butter do to the Caramel Oatmeal bars?

    Brown butter instead of regular or melted butter creates a deep and nutty flavor that gives off notes of caramel.

    Can I use Old Fashioned Oats?

    You can, but I suggest pulsing it a few times in the food processor to get it to more of a quick oats texture and consistency.

    Can I use store-bought caramel?

    If you don't want to make your own, you can buy the caramel candies and melt them down with some heavy cream until you get a nice caramel consistency. Or buy caramel in a jar, but it might be a little too thin.

    oatmeal bars with caramel in the center

    Other Recipes to Try:

    • Biscoff Blondies
    • Brown Butter Pecan Chocolate Chip Cookies
    • Espresso Brownies with Espresso Cream Cheese Frosting
    • Double Chocolate Brownies

    📖 Recipe Card

    caramel oatmeal bars

    Caramel Oatmeal Bars

    Hakima
    These Caramel Oatmeal Bars are made with brown butter and have layers of caramel and chocolate that make these bars so gooey and rich!
    5 from 6 votes
    Print Recipe Pin Recipe Save Recipe Saved!
    Prep Time 10 minutes mins
    Cook Time 30 minutes mins
    Total Time 40 minutes mins
    Course Dessert
    Cuisine American
    Servings 16
    Prevent your screen from going dark

    Ingredients
     

    • 11 tablespoon (155g) unsalted butter
    • ¾ cup (150g) brown sugar, packed light or dark
    • 1 large egg room temperature
    • 1½ teaspoon vanilla extract
    • 1 cup (95g) quick oats
    • 1 cup (120g) all purpose flour
    • ½ teaspoon baking powder
    • ½ teaspoon salt
    • 3.5 oz (100g) chopped chocolate, divided chocolate chips work too
    • ½ cup caramel sauce see recipe
    Get Recipe Ingredients

    Instructions
     

    • Caramel sauce: Make at least an hour ahead.
    • Preheat the oven to 350℉ and a line an 8x8 baking pan with parchment paper and set aside.

    For the Brown Butter

    • Melt butter in a medium sauce pan on medium heat. Stir the butter to make sure it melts evenly. Once the butter is completely melted, it will start to foam up. Continue stirring the butter. As it cooks, it will start to change into a deeper color. This could take 6-8 minutes.
      You'll start to notice a nutty aroma and the butter will begin to have brown specs at the bottom of the pan. The entire process of browning butter from start to finish should not take more than 10 minutes on medium heat.
    • Once butter is browned, pour it into a heat proof bowl and set it aside to cool for about 5 or 10 minutes.

    Caramel Oatmeal Bars

    • Wet Ingredients: In a medium bowl, add (slightly cooled) brown butter and brown sugar and mix using a spatula. Add the egg and vanilla extract and mix.
    • Dry Ingredients: Add the flour, quick oats, salt, and baking powder and mix, then add 1.5 oz of the chocolate (or chocolate chips if that's what you're using) and mix.
    • Spread in pan: Place ⅔ of the dough into the bottom of an 8x8 pan and spread it out completely.
    • First bake: Bake for 10 minutes, then remove it from the oven and sprinkle the rest of the chocolate on top. Then pour the caramel on top. (if it's not very pourable consistency, microwave it for about 20 seconds). If you need to, you can use a spoon or offset spatula and spread the caramel all over the chocolate. If it mixes together, that's fine.
    • Add remaining dough: Take the remaining dough and add it to the top of the caramel. Just flatten each piece a little with your fingers and place them all around. It won't cover the entire pan, but that's ok.
    • Second bake: Place back in the oven for 18-23 minutes until the edges are golden brown and you start to see the caramel bubble.
    • Cool: Remove from the oven and cool for at least 2 hours before slicing and enjoying.
    Keyword brown butter, caramel bars, caramel oatmeal bars, carmelitas, oatmeal bars
    Tried this recipe?Mention @siftwithkima or tag #SiftwithKima on Instagram!

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    Comments

    1. Steph says

      June 26, 2023 at 8:17 am

      5 stars
      These were SO good! I even made the caramel sauce that you suggested and it was pretty easy and straightforward! I had some caramel leftover and drizzled it over some of bars. I'll be making these again.

      Reply
      • Hakima says

        June 26, 2023 at 7:56 pm

        Thank you so much for trying the recipe, Steph! I'm so happy you liked them!

        Reply
    2. Melanie Anderson says

      June 28, 2023 at 9:46 pm

      5 stars
      There are three words I can confidently use to describe these: fudgy, decadent and delicious! I also made the caramel sauce using Kima's recipe and it tasted divine.

      I bake a lot, and distribute my baked goods to large groups of people at my husband's workplace. The reviews of these bars were extremely positive, with many stating that they were "amazing". This is a recipe that I will definitely make again!

      Reply
      • Hakima says

        June 29, 2023 at 7:16 am

        Aw, Melanie! Thank you for making my recipes and leaving beautiful reviews. I'm so happy you all enjoyed these bars! 🙂

        Reply
    3. Hilary says

      September 14, 2023 at 4:06 pm

      5 stars
      Love these bars, Kima! I feel like they’re such a great staple item that can have different variations of fillings (like the caramel apple version). The flavors were perfectly balanced and the texture was excellent!

      Reply
      • Hakima says

        September 14, 2023 at 5:17 pm

        Thank you SO much for trying the recipe, Hilary! I love the idea of a variation of these, especially for the holidays. I'll have to hop in the kitchen and test some things out! 😉

        Reply
    5 from 6 votes (3 ratings without comment)

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    Hi there, I'm Hakima!

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