Frosted Mini-Wheats Breakfast Bars

We eat a lot of cereal. A lot. Ro's favorite is "Wheats" (Frosted Mini-Wheats). And because we eat so much cereal, we've come up with ways of stretching that cereal budget. When it comes time to stock up on diapers and wipes (and dog food, and paper towels, and toilet paper, etc.), we do an Amazon Subscribe & Save order. If you order enough stuff, the discount is even more, and one of the things you can order is Frosted Mini-Wheats. Also, the Malt-o-Meal brand is a very nice rip-off. Both of these solutions, however, result in a vast increase in the amount of leftover frosted wheat shreds at the bottom of the bag once the cereal has been eaten (the Malt-o-Meal just has a lot of shreds, and the Subscribe and Save order tends to find the box crushed by the dog food, so ... our bad, I guess).

So what do you do with those shreds? (Is "shreds" a word?) Throw them out?! "Oh no," said my friend Andrea, who apparently eats as much cereal as we do. She developed a recipe for her own Frosted Mini-Wheats Breakfast Bars, and they are delicious.

** Side-note, I finally decided to learn to take proper pictures of food, because SOMEONE [eh-hem, Christopher] has been dragging his feet on actually writing his cooking blog, the one he's been talking about for at least a year. I figure if I can take some good pictures of his cooking, he'll actually write down his recipes. So these are my first attempts at REAL foodie shots. **

Also, understand that you need A LOT of shreds to make these, so you'll have to save them up over a few boxes. For a Printable version of this recipe, click the "Print Friendly" button at the bottom of this post.

Frosted Mini-Wheats Breakfast Bars

Re-printed with permission from Andrea Williams Wan.

Makes 10-12 bars.

Ingredients:
3 cups frosted mini wheat shreds
1/2 cup flour
1 1/2 tsps cinnamon
1 tsp salt
1/4 cup shortening
2 tbsp butter, softened
1 tsp vanilla
3 eggs
1/2 cup chocolate chips

Directions:

1) Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

2) In a large bowl, mix mini-wheat shreds, flour, cinnamon, and salt.

3) Add shortening, butter, and vanilla, and mix with an electric mixer on low. Add eggs, mixing after each egg.

4) Form into half-inch thick bars of desired size and place on parchment paper-lined cookie sheets.

5) Bake for 8-10 minutes, until bottoms are toasted. Cool on a wire rack.

6) Melt chocolate in microwave or in a glass bowl over a pan of boiling water. Stir as chocolate melts.

7) Drizzle or spread melted chocolate on top of bars.

Store in sealed container ... if you don't eat them all on the first day.