Peanut Butter Pecan Caramel Bars

Hi Everyone!

First day of school today for my kiddos! I am both sad and excited, they are all getting so big waaayyy too fast!

Anyhow, enough about me. Let's get to this week's recipe. I was having a hard time this week coming up with a recipe, I gotta tell ya. I had two criteria when trying to decide what to make:

1) I wanted to do something original...not just copied from Pinterest or the webiverse. Now, I don't doubt that there are probably similar recipes out there; but this one came right from my own little head.
2) I didn't want to go to the store. I had to use what I already had in the cupboards.

So, in the end, this is what I came up with. You could cut these into squares, which I did at first; but as a word of warning, the are very rich. I felt like a little bit went a long way, so I cut them in half. I sprinkled half with pecans on top and left half plain. I have one child that likes them and one who doesn't....I'm here to try to please everyone!

Ingredients:

-- 1 Cup Peanut Butter. (Crunchy or creamy your choice...I used a little bit of both)
-- 1/2 cup white sugar
--1/2 cup brown sugar
-- 1/8 to 1/4 cup Coconut Oil
-- 2 eggs
-- 1/2 cup flour
-- 1 tsp baking powder
-- 1 tsp salt
-- Chocolate chips. (optional...I used Enjoy Life Dark Chocolate allergy friendly)
-- Chopped Pecans (optional)
-- 1/4 cup butter and 1/4 cup brown sugar (for caramel)


Directions

-- Preheat oven to 350
-- Put peanut butter and sugars into a mixing bowl and cream together.
-- Add the Coconut Oil. Start with 1/8 cup (2 Tbsp) and add more if you need to get that "creamy texture"
-- Stop mixer and scrape the bowl.
-- Add eggs one at a time mix until incorporated.
-- Add vanilla
-- Combine flour, baking powder and salt in a separate bowl.
-- Slowly add flour mixture to peanut butter mixture until all incorporated. Don't over mix
-- Stir in chocolate chips if using.
-- Spread batter into 11x7 pan ( I used my Pampered Chef medium bar pan)
-- Bake for 15 mins
-- While they are baking, melt the butter and the brown sugar in a small pan and stir together to make the caramel sauce. Watch it carefully and don't let it burn.
-- After 15 minutes take the pan out of the oven and pour the warm caramel sauce over the warm bars and top with pecans if using.
-- Return pan to the oven for 3 or 4 minutes.
-- Cool completely before cutting.

Adding this recipe to the following linky parties:

1. Bowl Me Over: Try a Bite Tuesday *

2. Flour Me With Love: Mix it Up Monday

3. Joy Love Food: What'd you do this Weekend? 

4. Nibbles by Nic: Munching Mondays 105

6. Table For Seven: Inspire Me Mondays 

7. Smart Party Planning: Marvelous Monday 68

8. Skip to My Lou: Made by You Monday