Рецепт Clean Eating No Bake Oatmeal Granola Bars
The kids have gone back to school and moms everywhere are facing the “what to pack in their lunch” dilemma. The truth is, kids just want a lunch that tastes good and makes them feel like they are “part of the crowd” in the lunch room.
As a kid, I felt deprived when my school mates would have those yummy looking, pre-packaged snack and oat bars packed in their school lunches. I would sit down to my small thermos of home cooked lentils or cabbage soup (which I loved), and somehow feel like an outsider because I didn’t have anything in my lunch basket (not so lovingly dubbed, “the cat cage” by my grade school nemesis, Eric) that was in shiny packaging or not made at home.
I had no idea how good I had it when I had a home cooked meal for lunch. All I knew was that my lunch was very different from the lunches my peers were eating. Never mind the lucky ducks who got to actually buy their lunches in the cafeteria. Those were the chosen elite in my book. I guess you could say I had serious lunch envy as a kid.
Up until now, I haven’t had to worry too much about school lunches because Mini Chef gets out of school early enough to still have lunch at home. But no parent can escape the daily lunch grind, and lets face it. If your kids are watching what most mainstream American kids are eating in the cafeteria, they might be feeling a little lunch envy themselves if you make their lunches from scratch. Most kids have no idea what lurks in those seemingly harmless packages of sugar and chemical infested “treats”. And as a kid, they probably don’t care all that much anyway. They just want to be like their friends. Nobody wants to stand out from the crowd at that age. It’s the same way with every generation.
I was reminded of this when I saw Mini Chef watching one of his friends pick through her after-school snacks to get to “the good stuff” first. While it was a healthy treat, I sat there watching him quietly wish she would share her goodies with him. It brought back my own school lunch memories so vividly, that I just knew I had to come up with a snack bar that he would love to have in his lunch basket.
So I set off to create a really yummy, super-duper delicious granola bar. I had some Arrowhead Mills Old Fashion Oats (love them for whole grains!) as well as a jar of their MaraNatha All Natural Raw Almond Butter. I also had some raw cocoa nibs and cranberries I had just gotten at the health food store. It was a match meant to happen!
Plus, I felt like I was part of the “in crowd” making a recipe with oats this month because September is whole grains month and Arrowhead Mills is sponsoring a program with the whole grains council for Good Grains for a Good Cause . Sometimes, it’s just fun to create recipes based on a theme, and I can’t think of any theme better than a good cause!
And to top it all off, Arrowhead Mills decided to give two of my readers $50 worth in products from their web site! How cool is that??!!
Now if I could only figure out some snazzy wrappers for those bars…
CONTEST
2 of my lucky readers have a chance to win
CONTEST IS NOW CLOSED
RULES
Every contest has rules:
You must be a USA resident.
You must be at least 18 years of age.
Contest open from Sept 23, 2013 at 1am to Sept 24, 2013 at 10pm. Times are PST.
2 winners chosen at random by Random.org and will be announced in this blog post on Sept 25, 2013.
WINNERS
#1 – Laura H.
#2 – R.C. L.
Clean Eating No Bake Oatmeal Granola Bars
(Makes 7 bars – more if you don’t mind smaller bars)
Ingredients:
- 2 cups (200 g) Arrowhead Mills Old Fashion Oats
- 1/2 cup (70 g) dried cranberries, fruit juice sweetened
- 1/3 cup (50 g) raw cocoa nibs
- 2 tsp. ground cinnamon
- 1 pinch sea salt (optional)
- 1/3 cup (80 ml) coconut oil
- 1/3 cup (80 ml) honey
- 1 tbsp. pure vanilla extract
- 3/4 cup (200 g) raw, creamy almond butter
Directions:
In a large mixing bowl, combine the oats, cranberries, cocoa nibs and cinnamon. Stir well.
In a small pot, combine the oil, honey, vanilla extract and almond butter over medium heat. You want to warm this enough to combine the liquids well. But DO NOT BOIL! Stir constantly to avoid any simmering. This warmth is strictly to get everything to combine as well as to make it a bit more fluid for mixing with the oats.
Pour the nut butter into the mixing bowl and mix well to completely coat the oats.
Press mixture into an oiled or parchment lined baking dish. (Mine -pictured above- was 9 x 4 1/2)
Freeze for 2 hours.
Cut bars with a sharp knife and store in the freezer for up to 2 months, tightly wrapped so no air gets to them. Note that by the time lunch time comes around, these will no longer be frozen and will be perfect to eat. (These keep in the fridge for about a week.)
Disclosure: I am working with Arrowhead Mills as a brand ambassador. I was compensated to create this recipe using their products. All opinions are my own.