Wednesday Real Food Recipe – Homemade Clean Eating Granola Bars
With a peanut allergic little peanut in the house, buying granola bars is just out of the question. Even the nut-free kinds are usually made in the same factories with the nut ones, which is a big no-no when you have a munchin as allergic as ours is. But even setting the allergy thing aside, store bought granola bars are so full of artificial junk, they aren’t worth it anyway. Especially when you can whip up a batch of these delicious granola bars super fast, and for so much cheaper!
I love to make these to have on hand for road trips, fast and easy snacks, or for anytime we will need food on the go and won’t have access to a fridge. Let’s be honest, I love to have these on hand all the time, just because they are super yummy!
The inspiration for this recipe came from this one right here, and then I cleaned it up and changed a whole bunch of stuff. Give them a try and let me know what you think!
As a side note, I love to use SunButter in these. There is a weird chemical reaction that can occur when you use SunButter together with baking soda. There really isn’t enough baking soda in these for it to happen, but if you ever happen to see dark, forest green spots in the granola bars, they aren’t going bad! Just a weird chemical reaction. It won’t hurt you, and it’s actually pretty fun to do this on purpose to cookies around St. Paddy’s Day. You could, of course, use peanut butter or another nut butter instead.
Quick tip: I like to use a pizza cutter to cut these, makes it fast and easy!
- 1-1/3 cup butter, plus a little more soft butter to butter the pan
- 1 cup honey
- ½ cup SunButter
- 2 tsp vanilla
- 9 cups rolled oats
- 2 cups whole wheat flour
- 2 tsp baking soda
- ¼ cup ground flaxseed
- 1 cup chocolate chips, raisins, dried cranberries, sunflower seeds, nuts, or other yummies
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees and butter a sheet cake pan.
- Melt butter and honey together in a pan on the stove. Once almost melted, add SunButter and stir just until SunButter is melted. Remove from heat and add vanilla.
- While butter and honey are melting, combine remaining ingredients except chocolate chips (or alternate yumminess) in a very large bowl.
- Combine melted ingredients with the dry and mix well. Then add chocolate chips and stir well again.
- Pour into sheet cake pan. Press the mixture down into the pan.
- Bake for 15-20 minutes.
- Allow to cool before cutting into bars. I like to wrap them in plastic wrap or waxed paper, then store in an airtight container until I'm ready to use them.
This recipe has been linked to the In and Out of the Kitchen Link Party, go check out all the other fun posts!
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i made these, and they never formed bars… I don’t know if I cooked them too long, not long enough, or if my helpers added too much oatmeal, or what. It is wonderful granola… the kiddos call it granola-bar granola and eat it on greek yogurt with berries. The few bars that did stick together they ate with great gusto. 🙂
Oh, no! Actually, I just recently made another batch of these and they did the same thing, all crumble, no bars. I’m going to continue tinkering to see what I am missing! I’m glad the kids enjoyed them as granola, anyway!
Did you ever figure out why the granola bars were not sticking together? I want to make some for my kids but want to make sure they will stay together first. Are these a crunchy or chewy bar?
I have tinkered with this recipe a little and got it to stick a little bit better, but then I promptly forgot about them! I am going to make a batch soon and see what happens, and I’ll let you know. They are definitely more of a chewy bar. If you want a crunchy one, try my granola recipe. When it comes out of the oven, don’t touch it at all until it’s totally cool. Once cool, you can Keep it in bigger chunks that are perfect crunchy granola bars.
I make something similar to these. They are called energy bites though. It’s all the same except the butter and baking soda (what is that for anyway?) and they don’t get baked. Very yummy!
I’ve made energy bites, too. Those are so delicious, and so easy! I might just have to go make me some today, now that you reminded me about those, yum!