Blizzard: Darkening Skies

The sky is a darker gray; the snow is coming in sheets. The tree limbs are thickly covered and reaching for the ground. Visibility is decreasing.  It definitely feels like the storm is picking up intensity.

But we are still cozy inside.  Sis and I made a very decadent dessert, Deep Dish Oatmeal Chocolate Cookie Bars--with 2 cups of brown sugar, 2+ sticks of butter, and a whole can of sweetened condensed milk!  While they cooled--usually we would eat them straightaway, but the recipe warned that the filling would ooze--we all watched some of Fantasia, with the Nutcracker Suite, the Sorcerer's Apprentice, the dying dinosaurs.  And I fell sound asleep.

Now we're downstairs, making vegetable soup (and later cornbread) and working on the puzzle.  And watching the snow that still falls.  It never changed to rain.  It's been snowing some 9 hours straight now.  And the most is yet to come!

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Deep Dish Oatmeal Chocolate Cookie Bars
We thought there was too much chocolate filling, so below I have halved the recipe from the original.



2 sticks butter
2 eggs
2 1/2 cups flour
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. salt
2 cups brown sugar
2 tsp. vanilla
1/3 cup milk
3 cups oatmeal

Mix the butter, eggs and brown sugar.  Add vanilla and milk.  Slowly incorporate the rest of the dry ingredients.  Mix well.  I prefer using a stand mixer since it's quite thick.

In a saucepan over medium heat melt together:

1/2 can sweetened condensed milk
3 tablespoons butter
1/2 tsp. vanilla
1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips (typically one bag)

Then, spread 3/4 of the cookie mixture on the bottom of a greased 9x13 pan, pour chocolate mixture, then spread rest of cookie mixture on tops in spoonfuls (won't cover completely-but will leave cool designs.  Next time, we might do a 1/2 and 1/2 split of cookie batter). The top can tend to get done before it's completely cooked, so you can put aluminum foil over it for the last ten or so if it looks like it's browning too much. Bake for 25 minutes at 350 degrees (it took ours closer to 40 minutes and a teeny bit of the middle still isn't totally cooked). Let cool, otherwise it won't set up and will just run when you cut into it.