Chubby Hubby Bars gone gluten free

My work hosted an office picnic, last weekend. There was a bake-off as a part of the festivities. For me, that's just an extra excuse to cook up something yummy! Most of my usual desserts didn't jive with the season - hello, fall! - or just weren't bake-off material. I DO make some incredible cookies, but I didn't think they were terribly impressive enough for this. After racking my brain for a bit, I decided to scroll through my desserts board on Pinterest. Aside from always making me hungry, Pinterest has AMAZING ideas for food (yup, I'm hungry), crafts, decorating, etc. The possibilities are endless.

In my search, I stumbled across Chubby Hubby Bars. Perfect. :) If you check out the recipe, you'll see it's all from scratch and it's certainly not gluten free. I didn't want to overexert myself, I was already entering a chili cook-off  with my team at work. Yes, I tend to put a lot on my plate. Anyhow, back to those bars of amazingness. I decided to take a few short cuts. I use gluten free short bread for the cookie, fat free caramel dip, gluten free pretzels, and ghiradelli 60% cacao semi sweet chocolate chips. The result was pure "amazingness." That's the honest to goodness truth. I can't believe I am saying this, but I think they would be great (if not better) with out the reese's. I tend to like more simple desserts, and this was does have a lot going on. Maybe you can have a bar, and eat a reese's on the side. That sounds like a plan

Gluten Free Chubby Hubby Bar

Ingredients
Gluten Free Shortbread Cookie Dough (I used Bob's Red Mill.)
8oz - Reese's mini's
1 1/2 Cups - Chopped Pretzels (I used Glutino)
14 oz tub - Caramel dip (I used the fat free version for apples.)
2 Cups - Melted, semi sweet chocolate chips (I used Ghiradelli, 60% Cacao.)


Directions
Preheat oven to 350 (or if your cookie packaging states differently). Spray a 9×13 pan lightly with cooking spray. Prepare the cookie dough according to the package instructions. I use a stand mixer for cookies, etc. Add half of the Reese's and pretzels, allowing them to mix well.

Add the other half of Reese's and pretzels. Mix the dough thoroughly.

 

Spread dough mix in to prepared pan. Bake for 25 minutes or according to the cookie dough directions.

 

Once the cookie mix has finished baking, allow it to cool completely. Once this is cooled, heat the caramel dip in the microwave. I just heated it until it seemed easy to spread. Pour the caramel over the cooled bars. Chill the bars and caramel in the refrigerator for at least 15 minutes.

Melt chocolate chips in a double-boiler or in the microwave, stirring every minute. Once they chocolate is melted, spread over the chilled caramel.

Chill the chocolate, caramel, and cookies in the refrigerator for at least 30 minutes, or until the chocolate has set. Cut in to squares, serve, and enjoy!