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Lunch Lady Chocolate Glazed Peanut Butter Bars. Taking it back to grade school today with these DELICIOUS peanut butter oatmeal bars. Picture a doughy, buttery, peanut butter oatmeal cookie base, layered with creamy peanut butter, and the simplest chocolate glaze that’s rich and fudgy. These bars require a simple box of vanilla cake mix, oats, butter, peanut butter, an egg, and plenty of chocolate. Almost zero effort goes into these bars. They’re sweet, salty, heavy on the peanut butter, extra chocolatey, and every last bite is truly delicious.
Well, aren’t these fun! I love this recipe. It’s honestly so different for me, but yet, the same. You all, I used my first box of vanilla cake mix to create these bars. And while I don’t love using store-bought ingredients like cake mix every day, they have a time and a place.
Recently I have been so intrigued by the idea of a dump, mix, and bake style recipe. Something very retro and something very easy. With the amount of cooking and baking I’ve been doing daily, I think I just needed to find new things to excite me and keep me feeling creative.
Well, I am excited! I just adore these no-effort peanut butter butter.
Plus, they’re fun! They remind me of the peanut butter bars the lunch day would hand out on Pizza Day at school. We’d get a choice of a peanut butter cookie bar or a chocolate chip cookie.
Do you all remember those? Did your school offer them? Either way, I love these take-me-back-to-being-a-kid bars! And what I love even more is just how yummy each bar is.
Little Oslo is totally obsessed!
Here are the details
Step 1: mix the wet ingredients
Beat together a stick of softened salted butter, melted coconut oil, an egg, and creamy peanut butter.
That’s it!
Step 2: the dry mix
For this step, you’ll need your favorite box of vanilla cake mix and some old-fashioned oats. Mix the cake mix and oats into the wet ingredients until combined.
Step 3: bake and glaze
Next, we bake. These take about 25 minutes. You want them to be a little doughy in the center, so be sure to not overbake.
For the glaze, it’s simply mini chocolate chips melted with milk. Just two simple ingredients and you’ll have a creamy, dark, and rich glaze that stays soft on the bars. It’s delicious and leaves you with chocolatey fingers. Exactly what we all want.
What’s the secret?
The mix of ingredients is basic, especially the cake mix. It makes it easier the put these bars together and adds a yummy, sweet vanilla flavor.
Nothing too fancy, but all things incredibly delicious.
The perfect dessert to enjoy mid-school day, after school or work, for lunch meetings, and definitely late at night. Just bake, eat, and enjoy all the deliciousness!
Looking for easy Lunch Lady style desserts? Here are a few ideas:
Chocolate Peanut Butter Pretzel Blondies
Giant Salted Espresso Hot Fudge Cookies
Lunchroom Chocolate Peanut Butter Bars
Lastly, if you make these Lunch Lady Chocolate Glazed Peanut Butter Bars, be sure to leave a comment and/or give this recipe a rating! Above all, I love to hear from you guys and always do my best to respond to each and every comment. And of course, if you do make this recipe, don’t forget to tag me on Instagram! Looking through the photos of recipes you all have made is my favorite!
Lunch Lady Chocolate Glazed Peanut Butter Bars.
Servings: 24 bars
Calories Per Serving: 228 kcal
Nutritional information is only an estimate. The accuracy of the nutritional information for any recipe on this site is not guaranteed.
Ingredients
- 1 stick (8 tablespoons) salted butter, at room temperature
- 1/2 cup melted coconut oil
- 1 egg
- 1 1/2 cups creamy peanut butter
- 1 box (16 ounce) vanilla cake mix
- 2 cups old fashioned oatmeal
- 2 cups mini chocolate chips
- 1/3 cup milk
- chocolate sprinkles optional
Instructions
- 1. Preheat the oven to 350° F. Line a 9×13 inch baking dish with parchment paper.2. In a large bowl, beat together the butter, coconut oil, egg, and 1/2 cup peanut butter until smooth. Add the cake mix, oatmeal, and 1/4 cup water. Mix until combined. 3. Spread the dough out into the prepared dish. Bake for 22-25 minutes, until just set in the center. Remove and dollop the remaining 1 cup of peanut butter over the bars, gently spreading the peanut butter in an even layer. Chill until set. 4. To make the glaze. Melt the chocolate chips and milk on 30-second intervals, stirring after each, until melted. Spread the glaze over the bars. Let set for 30 minutes, slice, snack, and enjoy! Keep stored at room temp or in the fridge.
The bars taste great but there are a bit dry and fall apart. I followed recipe exactly and did not over bake. I feel are too many oats and if I were to make again, I will only use 1 cup of oats.
Thank you so much for trying out the recipe! I appreciate the feedback! xT
You knocked it out of the park with this one, Tieghan! Everyone loved these! And so easy, too! Will definitely be making again.
Thank you so much Lynn! xT
Oh My Gosh!!!! In Love!!
Thank you so much for trying out this recipe! Hope you enjoyed it 🙂 xT
I need to know was your lunch lady named Mrs Myers?
Tasted great but the peanut butter/chocolate layer separated from the cake layer so people had to hold the layers together to eat. I’m not sure what I did wrong.
Hi Catherine! Did you let the bars set for a bit before serving?
I did. I put the peanut butter on while the bottom layer was still hot, then refrigerated. Added the chocolate layer and refrigerated again. Thank you, Tieghan.
Love these bars! Better after refrigerating a day. Next time I will use higher quality chocolate. And brother wants more peanut butter! I’m thinking I can add a bit more to that layer without changing the flavor balance too much. Thank you Tieghan!
Thank you so so much! xT
Made these last week and they were a big hit! I couldn’t find a plain vanilla cake mix, so I used French vanilla. Thanks for the coconut oil substitution. I couldn’t bear spending $8 for a jar and probably not using the rest. Melted butter worked out great.
It feels like daily recipe posting has turned into over saturation. There aren’t many entirely fresh recipes anymore. Lots of the same idea of a recipe with one or two ingredients slightly shifted. Like you tested a recipe and then posted the different experiments under “slightly” different names: Lunch Lady Chocolate Glazed Peanut Butter Bars, Lunchroom Chocolate Peanut Butter Bars, Fudgy Chocolate Peanut Butter Bars.
Simple Thai chicken zucchini meatball Curry, Simple Coconut Chicken Meatball Curry with Rice Noodles, Coconut Curry Chicken Meatballs with Garlic Butter, Coconut Curry Chicken Meatball Soup with Rice, Creamy Coconut Chicken Meatball and Noodle Curry, Weeknight 30 Minute Coconut Curry Chicken Meatballs.
I’m sure there are more instances. The redundancy of “curry” (not knocking. I love curry) is prevalent. 6 separate chicken meatball curry dishes alone.
100% agree
Look elsewhere if you feel the recipes are redundant!
Love Tieghan’s recipes!
Hmmm Maybe try other blogs? I love everything I have tried from here and am impressed that Tieghan offers her recipes for free.
I can’t understand why you would say this to someone who is offering you free recipes. It’s like if your neighbor brought you a plate of cookies each week, and you said, “You keep bringing me cookies with peanut butter in them. Why can’t you bring me something different?” Unbelievable. If you don’t like the free blog, find something else.
I think it’s a perspective thing. She is teaching us that by tweaking one or 2 ingredients in similar dishes that you can have so much variety, and that’s what I love about her recipes. She shows me it’s ok to be experimental with food, kinda like a mad scientist(but not in the bad way).
Did you notice that she didn’t reply to you because what you said sounded rude and inconsiderate? It’s easy to be a bully when anonymity is involved, so perhaps try asking yourself next time before you post if what you’re going to say is to tear others down or build them up. Words matter, and I believe in building others up. Food for thought….
Easy to make and everyone enjoyed them! I added walnuts to the batter mix, as we are a big fan of nuts.
Thank you so much for trying out this recipe! Have a lovely day! xT
you have so many very similar desserts like this, can you change it up?
Hey Leah, I’ll definitely be working on some new dessert recipes for the fall! Thanks for the feedback! xT
These look great , but can one use some other ingredients besides a cake mix? Thanks so much!
Hi Kimberley! I have a similar recipe here on my blog for peanut butter bars and they don’t use a cake mix! Here’s the link: https://www.halfbakedharvest.com/chocolate-peanut-butter-bars/
Do u use natural peanut butter or just regular? These look amazing!!!
I use natural peanut butter!
What do you professionals think about using a gluten free cake mix?
I haven’t ever tried this so I’m not sure! So sorry!
has anyone made these with nut free butter? unfortunately we have a nut allergy in our house and most of these delicious chocolate peanut but things we can’t have
I haven’t ever tried that before so I’m not sure! xT
Haha- Love the title for these- brings back memories of my hairnet-wearing, white-uniformed, militant lunch lady who stoically performed many missions heading back to my private all-girls prep school kitchen to see if there were any Lance’s peanut block bars and giant chocolate chip cookies left for the day. Us savage girls were insatiable & fought to the death for those! These look delicious!! xoxo
How do these differ from the lunchroom chocolate pb bars?
I think the differences are:
one is frosted and one is glazed; one uses a store bought cake mix and the other you mix up the batter from scratch;
and one uses quite a lot of oatmeal and the other has none.
They’re actually very different recipes.
If you don’t have coconut oil, what can you use instead?
I have the same question.
Vegetable oil or melted butter! xT
Is the oatmeal meant to be cooked first, or just use dry rolled oats? Thanks!!
Hi there! The oats are just dry! xT