Milk chocolate 'Everyone knows oats are good for you' Flapjacks

Mmmm, delicious oaty goodness. Oats really are very good for you. Full of soluble fibre and with a low GI, they'll keep you full for longer. Flapjack on the other hand, is sadly not very good for you. Flapjack is chock full of sugar and butter and in this case, delicious Green and Blacks chocolate. But flapjack really is delicious and so you should forget that it isn't as good for you as you want to believe and just enjoy it!

What prompted that little ramble there? Well, when I took these into work, they disappeared rather quickly. Far more quickly than I had expected. I took them in at the same time as an apple cake (recipe to follow, just to keep you in suspense!) and they were definitely more popular. Now this could be for a couple of different reasons; a) the cake looked nasty (which it didn't, I promise) or b) people believe flapjack is good for them because it's full of oats. Hmmm.

These were a request from a colleague who 'doesn't like cake'. I don't know where these people hide, but they obviously do exist! Anyway, she liked these flapjacks and was most put out when other people ate them too!

Anyway, what you really want is the recipe for these flapjacks because they were rightly popular - chewy and sticky with little nuggets of chocolately goodness (!) spread throughout. They are simplicity itself to make and in just 40 minutes you too could be eating warm flapjack with melting chocolate....Enjoy them for what they are (just don't kid yourself that they're health food!).

Milk chocolate flapjacks

Ingredients

175g butter

120g light brown soft sugar

200g golden syrup

350g rolled oats

100g milk chocolate (or dark if that's your thing!) chopped into little chunks

Method

- Preheat the oven to 180C/Gas 4. Grease and line an 8" x 12" (20 x 30 cm) baking tin. Please use parchment paper, greaseproof paper may well stick to your delicious flapjacks rendering them sadly inedible (I speak from experience - not mine, but J's!!!).

- Melt the butter, sugar and syrup over a low heat.

- When melted add the oats and mix well until everything is coated.

- Add the chocolate and mix briefly and quickly to prevent the chocolate melting entirely.

- Spoon into the prepared tin and roughly level out. Place in the preheated oven and cook for 30 minutes until deliciously light golden brown.

- Mark into pieces while still warm (this is much easier than waiting until they are completely cold - believe me!) and allow to cool completely in the tin.

- Store in an airtight container. They should keep for a few days. Unless you just can't resist them, which may well be the case!