Oaty Caramel Slice

My in-laws were up last week. My father in law was helping build a part of our new fence. As I have mentioned before, it always like to fill the tins before guests arrived and this time I made some biscuits (which I will blog about at a later date) and this oaty caramel slice. Both were a hit, but in particular the caramel slice. As you know by now, I love caramel slice. I actually love caramel, so it doesn’t particularly bother me what kind of caramel slice it is. This oaty one could fool you into thinking that it was a little bit good for you. But, even though the oats do offer up a little more fibre than some of the other variations of caramel slice that I make, the amount of butter in this slice probably counteracts against the wholesomeness of the oats!

The original recipe had chopped dates in the crumble topping. I didn’t have any dates at home, so I substituted dried apricots. I actually think that dates would probably work better as they would probably incorporate into the topping a little more – the apricots tended to fall off. I also made the slice in a smaller tin than that specified and while that was good for the caramel layer, if I made this again I would make it in the bigger tin but do 1 ½ times the caramel. The recipe used purchased caramelised condensed milk (similar to dulche de leuche). However, you can make your own by boiling an un-opened can of condensed milk for 2 hours, making sure you keep the water topped up to cover the can, and you are very careful when opening the can, as the hot caramel often splutters (a friend once got a bad pock mark on her forehead when opening a hot can of caramelised condensed milk).

Oaty Caramel Slice

220g butter
1 c brown sugar
1 c rolled oats
1 tsp vanilla essence
1 ½ c flour
1 tsp baking powder
380g can caramelised condensed milk (I would use 1 1/.2 or even 2 cans)

• Melt butter and then add in rest of ingredients other than condensed milk
• Press into a 20x30 cm tin and bake at 180c for 15-20 minutes
• Lightly cool, spread over caramel and then sprinkle with the following topping and bake for a further 15 minutes

1 c rolled oats
1 c finely chopped dates or dried apricots
½ tsp cinnamon
½ c flour
100g butter

• Combine dry ingredients and then rub in butter to make a crumble mixture