Chewy Chocolate Chip Coconut Peanut Butter Granola Bars
| October 11, 2012 | Posted by Koalaborg under Food, recipes, Vegan, Vegan Mofo 2012 |
As we move toward preparing most of our food from scratch around here, one item I have started to tackle has been breakfast/snack items. Granola bars are more “emergency” food for us – we tend not to keep them in the pantry, but my husband will have a box of individually wrapped granola bars at work for mornings where he has missed breakfast or he just needs a filling snack later in the day.
I would like to have a healthier option – packaged food tends to have a lot of additonal ingredients, and I want to keep to simple and healthy.
I came across this recipe and modified it a bit. This was fairly easy to prepare – Kyri especially liked being my helper for this! We ate several the same day and the rest went to work with my husband, where they were quite well received.
Chewy Chocolate Chip Coconut Peanut Butter Granola Bars
2 cups rolled oats
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 cup quick oats (a crispy rice cereal would be a good substitution here)
1/2 cup +4 Tbsp oat flour
1 tsp vanilla
2 Tbsp oil (I used canola but coconut oil would work well here)
2-3 Tbsp natural creamy peanut butter
1/2 cup agave syrup
4 Tbsp brown sugar
1/2 tsp salt
4 Tbsp apple sauce
Add-ins:
1/2 cup chocolate chips
1/2 cup shredded coconut flakes (unsweetened)
Preheat oven to 350F. Combine all dry ingredients in a large bowl and mix well. Combine wet ingredients in a smaller bowl and mix well.
Mix wet ingredients with dry and mix completelely – be sure you don’t miss any dry spots. Spread mixture into a 9×13″ baking dish and flatten completely using a sheet of wax or parchment paper. Press mixture firmly so that bars will be quite compact. Bake for 18 minutes at 350F and remove from oven. Flatten again using wax paper and move baking dish to fridge to cool off before cutting into bars.
Note: I doubled the main ingredients of the original recipe I modified, but you could easily half if you are using a smaller baking dish. My feeling is, though, why would you want fewer yummy granola bars?! There was also a no-bake option suggested (skip the baking step – just put the baking dish into fridge until firm – coconut oil rather than vegetable oil works best for the no-bake option apparently..).
We have been busy in the kitchen the last few days so we haven’t had a chance to prep another batch. For the next batch, I will be using almonds and craisins as my add ins. I’ll be sure to post how these turn out!
Chewy granola bars – these came out awesome! Store in fridge in tupperware. These should freeze well also, but I didn’t bother since I knew my family would tear through these in no time.
[...] recipe prepared today, but it is a quick prep and totally worth the effort. Recently I shared some granola bars I had prepared – tonight I prepped a Pumpkin Chocolate Chip version of these granola bars [...]