I have a bad habit of going to the grocery store, finding what I want, but then picking up an entirely different product sitting right beside it. I do this more often than I’d care to admit. About a week ago, I needed some evaporated milk for a pumpkin pie. It was on the shelves right above the pumpkin and pie fillings and I put what I though was evaporated milk in my cart, but it turned out to be sweetened condensed milk. In my defense, the two Carnation cans look much alike.
I didn’t discover my error until I opened the can. Now I was the proud owner of a now opened can of condensed milk with no particular recipe in mind. I decided to salvage my indiscretion by making a batch of Magic Cookie Bars. And they were quite good. Here’s how.
First. don’t pay any attention to what you are doing a put a can of condensed milk in your cart, then open the can and you have no choice.
Coat a 10 X 13 baking pan with cooking spray. Combine 2 C graham cracker crumbs with a stick of melted butter. Press the crumbs into the bottom of the pan as a crust. Pour your open and unwanted can of condensed milk over the crust. Make layers of 2 C semi-sweet chocolate chips, 1 ½ C and whatever else you might have in the pantry – chopped nuts, butterscotch chips, Heath bar chips, raisins, cranberries or whatever.
Press it all down with your hands and pop in a 350 oven for 30 minutes, until the top turns a little brown. Loosen the sides of the pan while still warm and cut into bars when cooled.
And then, like magic, you have made use of your open can of condensed milk
Magic Cookie Bars
2 C graham cracker crumbs
1/2 cup butter, melted
1 (14 oz.) can Sweetened Condensed Milk
2 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips
1 1/2 cup flaked coconut
1 cup chopped nuts (or raisins, butterscotch chips, cranberries, etc.)
