You’ll laugh when I tell you the inspiration for these chewy, chocolaty granola bars.
On a recent shopping trip I discovered chopped dried plums on sale for half price in the baking section.
Half price! How could I pass that up!
It didn’t matter whether I needed them for a recipe I had in the works, they were half price with a shelf date far in the future.
Truth is they sat on the counter waiting for inspiration for a few days, then were relegated to the pantry where they haunted me every time I opened the cupboard.
Also lurking in the cupboard was half a package of dark chocolate chips. Since scientists have recently discovered the health benefits of chocolate (dark that is), I felt confident I could add those little morsels into my batch of granola bars.
This excerpt in the LA Times backs me up.”Specific chocolate-loving microbes in the gut convert an otherwise indigestible portion of the candy into anti-inflammatory compounds.”
Nice! A few anti-inflammatory compounds never hurt anyone, right?
I packed my dried plums into a baking dish with those chocolaty chips, oats, almonds and a few binding ingredients and popped them into the oven.
Turns out those half priced dried plums make a terrific granola bar, and now I am absolved from the guilt of having let my bargain sit in the cupboard for so long.
Print Homemade Granola Bars with Almonds, Dried Fruit and Chocolate Chips
Serving Size: 8
Shake It Up! I had dried plums on hand, but any dried fruit works in this bar. Dried apricots are a favorite in this house.
Ingredients
- 2 Âź cups oats
- ½ cup diced dried plums
- ½ cup almonds, chopped
- ½ teaspoon cinnamon
- â…› cup coconut oil, melted
- Âź cup brown sugar
- ½ cup low fat milk
- 1 large egg
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Grease an 8" square pan or smaller baking dish with cooking spray.
- Combine oats, plums, almonds and cinnamon in a bowl.
- Melt coconut and oil brown sugar by microwaving on high for 35 seconds.
- Whip egg and milk together.
- Add coconut mixture to the bowl and mix together well.
- Add egg mixture to bowl and mix together well,
- Add chocolate chips.
- Pour into the baking dish and push down to flatten with a spoon.
- Bake for 20 - 30 minutes until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.
Notes
Food energy: 210kcal Weight Watchers PointsPlus 6 Saturated fatty acids: 3.76g Monounsaturated fatty acids: 3.04g Polyunsaturated fatty acids: 1.54g Total fat: 8.33g Calories from fat: 74 Cholesterol: 26mg Carbohydrate, by difference: 28.80g Total dietary fiber: 3.51g Protein: 6.04g Total lipid (fat): 9.12g Water: 31.59g Ash: 1.02g Total sugars: 11.90g Calcium: 60mg Iron: 1.55mg Magnesium: 84mg Phosphorus: 167mg Potassium: 218mg Sodium: 18mg
Schema/Recipe SEO Data Markup by ZipList Recipe Plugin2.2http://motherrimmy.com/recipe-homemade-granola-bars-almonds-dried-fruit-chocolate-chipsMother Rimmy�s Cooking Light Done Right by Kristin A. Rimkus is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.
Chocolate not your thing? These energy bars with oats, apples, and chia seeds might be the thing for you. They have a lovely hint of lemon in the mix too.
I’m off to the paying job. Have a terrific weekend everyone!
~Kristi
