Homemade Granola Bars with Almonds, Dried Fruit and Dark Chocolate Chips

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

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Grease an 8" square pan or smaller baking dish with cooking spray.
2. Combine oats, plums, almonds and cinnamon in a bowl.
3. Melt coconut and oil brown sugar by microwaving on high for 35 seconds.
4. Whip egg and milk together.
5. Add coconut mixture to the bowl and mix together well.
6. Add egg mixture to bowl and mix together well,
7. Add chocolate chips.
8. Pour into the baking dish and push down to flatten with a spoon.
9. 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

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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