No-Bake Super-Chewy Chocolate Chip Peanut Butter Oat Bars Recipe

Chewy oatmeal bars are one of my favorite go-to travel snack foods, especially when faced with budget airlines that don't feed you for free and also don't want you to bring your own stash. Regardless, I try to pop something sort of healthy and hearty (and easy to scarf down on the sly) in my bag before I hop on the plane. I've tried twice to make the chewy variety of these bars at home, but gave up. Nothing worked to get them significantly chewy while staying together. I have come to terms with the fact that using all from-scratch ingredients will simply not get you that really chewy texture that you expect.

Then I got to thinking: The manufacturers are probably not baking their bars. So what no-bake cookie could give me an amazingly chewy consistency? Rice Krispie treats. Which means marshmallow. It made perfect sense that stretchy gelatin would hold everything together.

I took a look at a basic recipe for Rice Krispie treats, then played around with the ingredients to get the right consistency. Because the oats are not baked, I used quick cooking oats, and I toasted them in a skillet first. The most frustrating part was flavoring the bars, as I wanted them more like an oat bar than like marshmallow. Adding lots of honey made the bars way too soft. Peanut butter to the rescue! A little bit of honey, a bit of thick peanut butter, and some chopped peanuts did the trick to mask the marshmallow. Toss in a handful of chocolate chips and just press into the pan. Easy, chewy, and chocolaty.