- Granola bars are such a healthy snack,
especially when you're on the go in the mornings,
but many of the packaged ones contain added sugar,
unnecessary calories, and artificial ingredients.
Today, I wanna share with you a homemade
healthier granola bar.
First, I'm Yumna, AKA FeelGoodFoodie.
I share wholesome, nutritious recipes
that make your body feel good,
and this granola bar recipe is definitely one
you'll feel good about having and giving your kids.
It's made with dates, nuts, oats, and other ingredients
you can definitely pronounce.
It's easy for meal prepping, perfect for lunchboxes,
and lasts weeks in the fridge.
Everyone loves these,
so here's what you'll need.
You'll need oats, dates, coconut oil, maple syrup,
flax seeds, chopped dried apples,
almonds, vanilla extract, and cinnamon.
We're gonna start by making the date paste.
It's simply chopped, pitted dates,
along with some warm water.
You can also use date paste if you can find it in the store.
It can be a little hard to find, though.
We're gonna give it a whirl.
You can stop the food processor and scrape the walls
just a little bit to make sure everything is well-blended,
and this is the consistency you're looking for.
And now we're gonna transfer this to a sauce pan
to make a caramel sauce,
and to that we're adding four tablespoons of coconut oil,
one tablespoon of maple syrup,
a teaspoon of vanilla extract,
and 1/4 of a teaspoon of cinnamon.
Now we just wanna cook all this together
until the coconut oil melts
and the date piece becomes darker.
It should take about five to seven minutes.
All right, while we're letting that simmer,
we're gonna go ahead and prepare
some of the other toppings for the granola bars.
We'll take a nice little quarter sheet pan
and we'll add to it some oats,
some chopped almonds, and whole flax seeds.
Give it a good shake,
and we're gonna toast these in the oven at 350
for just 10 to 15 minutes,
just until they get a little bit golden
and nice and toasted.
All right, the oats mixture is nice and toasted.
The date mixture over here has gotten nice and dark,
and we also have some dried apples
that have just been chopped up like this.
So now we're just gonna mix everything together,
the chopped apples,
we'll add this right on top,
and now just give everything a mix
until it's nice and combined.
And when you're stirring, you wanna make sure
that every single thing is very well-coated
by the date paste.
That way it gets nice and sticky.
All right, now we'll transfer this to an eight by eight pan
and just drop it in here and make everything nice
and smooth and flat.
If you wanted to have thinner granola bars,
you can also use a nine by nine pan,
but I love the way it looks with an eight by eight,
and now we just smooth it up.
Okay, and the key to getting these granola bars
not to crumble at all is to really pack it in there.
So you can be done at this point,
but I highly recommend pushing it even more in there
and trying to really pack it into the pan.
So I like to use a parchment paper
and just push down on it.
You can even use something like a cup
to help smoothen it out,
'cause we want these granola bars to look legit, you guys.
We want 'em to look like they're store-bought,
and this is what's really gonna help do that.
When it looks like this, you know you've done a good job.
And now what you wanna do is just cover it
and store it in the fridge for two hours until it's chilled,
and then you can cut it up.
All right, these have been setting in the fridge
for two hours, so it's time to slice them up.
And what we did here was we greased the baking pan
and we also used parchment paper
because it makes it super simple
to just lift these up like that.
So you could slice these into squares or bars.
What I like to do is make them into 12 equal bars,
so they look like legit granola bars.
And if you'd like, you can wipe the knife
between each slice, just to make sure that each slice
is nice and neat,
and look how good these look.
They are so delicious, full of ingredients
you can actually pronounce,
and they pretty much stay well-together,
just like a granola bar would,
so let's give it a taste test.
Tastes just like fall,
so flavorful, so delicious.
I think it's also time for Video Matt to try one of these.
All right, Video Matt,
let's give you one of these granola bars.
Here you go.
Awesome! (laughs)
He likes it and I hope you guys try the recipe
and like it as well.
Thank you so much for watching.
Check out the video description below
for a full written recipe and be sure to like,
follow, subscribe for more healthy-ish recipes
with feel-good ingredients.
See you guys next time!