Alright ladies, we’ve all been there before, right? You get the note or phone call that tells you the good news: You’ve been volunteered to bring snacks or treats for the next 4H club meeting (or girl scouts, an event at school, etc). YAY! The world rejoices that you get to add this to your long list of “to dos” this week. Oh wait, maybe the rest of the world rejoices while mom’s around the world grumble! Well ladies, I have a short-cut, a cheat sheet, that will make you look like you slaved for hours in the kitchen!
You’re going to make my Easy Bar recipe and not have any pans to clean up and will get your bars cut all in the same size and shape (without needing some fancy brownie cutting pan)!
The Recipe
- 1 cake mix, any flavor
- 5T melted butter
- 2 eggs
- Stir-Ins
- Combine the cake mix, melted butter, and eggs thoroughly.
- Add in stir ins.
- Pour in a parchment paper lined pan
- Bake for 20min at 350
Cooks Tips
- You can use just about any combination of cake mix and stir-ins that you can think of: a spice cake mix with nuts, chocolate with chocolate chip, peanut butter with chocolate chips, chocolate with peanut butter chips. Let your imagination run wild! (I chose yellow cake mix with chocolate chips to mimic chocolate chip bars.)
- Before pouring batter into pans, line your pans with parchment paper! No need for cooking spray, which means less mess and you can lift the bars right up out of the pans and no having to wash pans!!
- Use a pizza cutter to cut your bars! It saves so much time compared using a knife and hoping you cut through and ever piece is the same side. You can also easily cut off the edges, since we know kids don’t like to eat that part anyway!
- Buy juice packs! Please don’t buy pop (as a parent, I cringe when I see my kid come out of a meeting at 7PM on a Monday night with a can of Mountain Dew)! I bought juice packs and I bought more than enough…any extras can be used in a lunch box! (No waste)
There you go! It’s that simple to look like you slaved away making bars from scratch and meticulously cutting them! After all, isn’t part of being a parent, finding the hacks in life? It’s all part of Learning As I Go!
PS – those edges you cut off with your pizza cutter…those are your reward for feeding the group!
Love this!!! You are really sharing some great stuff here even for us who don’t have kids at home anymore. Thanks, Katy!!!!
Thanks! When I came up with this today, I was so proud of myself I had to share! T didn’t share my enthusiasm, but of course he wasn’t the one trying to get it all done!
Men rarely “get it” when we get excited about something like this. 🙂
How have i NEVER thought to use a pizza cutter?! Love this! Thanks Katy!
I dont know either! I felt like i won the lotto when it dawned on me.
Do this come out more cake like or cookie like….just wondering what size pan to put into 9×13?
Thanks appreciate the hack!
I used a 9×13 pan and they really come out somewhere between a bar and a cake! More bar or cake than cookie!