Salty ‘n sweet combinations taste especially good in the heat when I crack a sweat just brushing my teeth.
It’s a good thing that I’ve been replenishing my sodium stores with these.
These salty ‘n sweet, peanut buttery, caramely, crunchy little bars have hit the replenishment spot.
They have so many of my favorite elements rolled into one, there’s tons of texture, and they’re no-bake.
They’re as easy as making homemade caramel sauce in the microwave, infusing it with peanut butter, and then pouring the salted caramel over two of my favorite ingredients: cereal and pretzels.
Corn Pops happened to be in stock and on store shelves here in Aruba (never know what you’re going to get from one day to the next) and then I saw the Combos while I was in the checkout line and knew I had to do something with them. Either separately or together and I opted for together.
Does anyone else want to admit to trying to open up Combos like an Oreo, and rather than licking off frosting, licking off cheese? Okay, I’ll admit to that but probably shouldn’t.
Corn Pops and Combos. That screams either childhood memories of foods that only Grandma would give me or cold cereal and pretzels for dinner in my dorm room.
You could probably make these bars in a dorm room as long as you have a microwave and since all the other ingredients, for better or worse, are shelf stable for about 9 years, you’d be the most popular student on your floor.
They’re a little bit too easy to make, actually.
Everything tastes better with a copious chocolate drizzle and I not only need to replenish my sodium stores, but also my chocolate stores, daily.
Chocolate has a way of balancing sweet food and balancing salty food. It complements caramel, and it brings out the best in peanut butter. Heck, chocolate always brings out the best in me.
As the bars set up and cool in the pan, the salted caramel and peanut butter sauce sinks to the bottom and when you flip one over, you can really see what kind of treat you’re in for.
Isn’t that just a sticky, glistening, beautiful mess?
When biting through the layers, from the crunchy ‘n sweet Pops to the crunchy ‘n salty Combos to the firm chocolate, you’ll be in texture heaven, especially if you love crunchy foods and enjoy lots of texture going on like I do.
The soft, gooey, slightly salty caramel and peanut butter sauce envelops the cereal and pretzels and serves to glues the bars together and is definitely worth getting sticky hands for. That’s what napkins are for.
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Combos Pretzel and Salted Caramel Peanut Butter Bars (no-bake)
Makes one 8-by-8-inch pan, about 9 squares
3 cups Corn Pops cereal
2 cup Combos pretzels (one 7-ounce bag, I used Cheddar Cheese flavor)
1 cup creamy or crunchy peanut butter
2/3 cup light corn syrup
1/3 cup granulated sugar
1/4 cup light brown sugar, packed
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon salt, or to taste
1/4 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips, melted for drizzling
Line an 8-by-8-inch pan with foil, spray with cooking spray; set aside. In a large microwave-safe mixing bowl, add the peanut butter, corn syrup, sugars, and microwave on high power to melt, about 30 seconds. Stop and stir to combine and heat in 10-second bursts until mixture has melted and can be stirred smooth. Add vanilla, salt, and stir to combine. Add the cereal, Combos, and stir to coat. Pour the mixture into prepared pan and smooth it with a spatula; set aside.
In a small microwave-safe bowl, add the chocolate chips and heat on high power to melt, about 1 minute. Stop and stir to combine. Heat in 10-second bursts until chips have melted and can be stirred smooth. Drizzle chocolate over the bars with a spoon. Place pan in the freezer for 1 hour to allow bars to set up, or allow them to set up at room temperature for at least two hours, before slicing and serving. Bars will keep in an airtight container at room temperature or in the refrigerator for up to one week, or in the freezer for up to 3 months.
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Some of my favorite salty ‘n sweet recipes:
Cinnamon Sugar Chocolate Pretzels (no-bake, vegan, GF)
Candy Corn Cookie Dough Pretzel Bites (no-bake)
Vanilla Cake Batter and White Chocolate Chip Caramel Corn
Buttery Toasted Captain Crunchies (Vegan & GF options)
Peanut Butter Chex Mix, aka “Puppy Chow” (vegan, GF)
White Chocolate Vanilla Peanut Butter Puppy Chow (GF)
Do you like salty ‘n sweet combos?
I definitely have more of a sweet tooth than a salty palate, but here in Aruba and cracking a sweat doing nothing, salty foods taste extra good. And of course, gooey desserts with caramel and peanut butter don’t hurt.
If you have any easy, salty ‘n sweet, or just plain good snacky recipes, feel free to link them up.
Thanks for the Capresso 12-Cup Stainless Steel Coffee Maker Giveaway entries
Thanks for the Capresso 12-Cup Coffee Maker Giveaway entries
holy cow those look amazing!!! I love the flavor combination – sweet and salty and fabulous!
combos were the only snack food I’d buy on pit stops during road trips as a kid. Always cheese. Sometimes the pretzel ones. Oh my you have me craving them now in all their artificial cheesy goodness.
all their artificial cheesy goodness = YES and it’s a beautiful thing :)
I laughed when you said you could probably make these in a dorm room, since Corn Pops and Combos were always found in frat houses on campus, hahaha :D
Where’s the keg? :)
Oh. My. Goodness. Averie, this is easily the craziest yet coolest desserts I’ve ever seen. I never would have thought to pair cheese pretzels with caramel and peanut butter and chocolate, but holy cow, it looks INCREDIBLE! I can taste it now–salty, but not overpoweringly so, and sweet and sticky from the caramel and peanut butter…heaven in my mouth! I’m glad you went for it when you saw the Pops and Combos because I never would have thought of this and I’m glad you did!
Here were those Nutter Butter Bars I was talking about on your post
https://www.loveveggiesandyoga.com/2011/03/no-bake-nutter-butter-special-k-bars.html
And “salty, but not overpoweringly so, and sweet and sticky from the caramel and peanut butter” — yes you have it perfectly! I love it when people can really visualize the food and get into all the elements and layers. Love the way you think :)
YOU ARE KILLING ME! YUM YUM YUM YUM! And there goes my “healthy eating” plan……lol
Ill be making these for the grandbabies!
Averie, these bars look GREAT!! Especially with all that extra chocolate on top :)
It aint gonna make the food sites if it doesn’t at least have that going for it. All that orange and yellow food was not really….the best to look at :)
Now this is a combo (ha) that I never would have thought of. Wowza!!
You can make caramel in the MICROWAVE? I’m in awe of you Averie! Totally making that.
You can make just about anything in the microwave if you do it right! Trust me, it’s so hot here, I have no dishwasher and I have a stove and oven that takes forever to heat up and in the process heats up my house for like 6 hours and so I am quite creative with the ole microwave :)
I love making with combo’s
Just made the ice cream with them
Omg yes you did! Forgot about that and how good it would taste right now!
This is a total blast from the past!! I used to eat combos for lunch every day in middle school. My mom gave me enough money for the hot lunch, and I always opted for combos and coke. Not the healthiest “meal”, but I was a teenager, and I didn’t care. I definitely tried to eat them that way!
These bars look great! The corn pops look like peanuts, which would also be awesome with the peanut butter filled pretzels too. You’ve done it again!
thanks my friend – these are such a midwest, h.s. or jr. high cafeteria, dorm room, or 20something single girl dinner – between the cold cereal and the combos, there is plenty of memories involved…and your memory sounds eerily similar to my own!
Now you’re just teasing me! I used to LOVE those Combos the ones with PB. How fantastic would those bars be with the PB filling too. I do like salty/sweet. Nice balance of flavors.
And if only they had those here BUT the cheesy factor was quite awesome in this application!
My stepdaughter started college Monday so I think I’ll pass this on to her! I love a little salt with caramel and chocolate. I always chuckle a little (in amazement) when I see a recipe with so many different things going on–mainly because I don’t think I could come up with such a combo on my own. That kind of creativity always makes me want to try the recipe…and I definitely want to try this! I can really see how all the flavors will be so good together.
Salty ‘n sweet almost means there has to be crunch. And these days, rice krispies or crushed up Ritz crackers although fine, needed more of an edge – and I ‘shop locally’, meaning I buy what’s local and in the stores :) You never know what you’re going to get from amazing papaya to cheesy Combos from one day to the next!
I love combos. One of my favorite gas station snacks EVER! These bars look awesome! Great combo of flavors (haha, pun intended)!!
gas station snacks are pretty much awesome – I will admit to that :)
Averie, my dearest! Leave it to you to make what could be… the best no bake dessert i’ve ever seen. Seriously. I love love love salty sweet and pretzels with my chocolate (DUH!). The CHEDDAR CHEESE combos in this take the cake, though. They are my favorite kind! It’s like how Liz once added Doritos to brownies before. OR like potato chips in cookies! (I still have to try that!) Cheese/chocolate/PB/caramel/crunchy pretzels/and sweet crunchy Pops. What a killer combination. Were they hard to remove from the pan? I made caramel no bake dessert sort of like this last year and I couldn’t remove them from the pan at all. I used nonstick spray – not foil or anything.
I honestly feel like I could eat that entire pan. Esp after a long run… nothing is better than salty/sweet. I may request you send me some for after my half marathon lol ;)
the whole time I was making these, shooting & editing them, was thinking of you the ENTIRE time. Crunchy, salty ‘n sweet, with pretzels. Pan removal – I line all my pans with foil and then spray that and so no, not a biggie, it just peels right off. Anything also with peanut butter in the sauce, b/c of the fat and the oil in it, makes it less prone to sticking (but also less prone to setting up) which is where the corn syrup comes in and that’s soooo sticky. This is just a foil saves your life recipe b/c of absolutely effortless cleanup. I think without foil you’d be fine, too, but I need to be able to lift the whole thing out of the pan for photography purposes and make clean cuts :)