This recipe comes from a good friend of mine. This is the same friend who gave me her Salsa recipe! She's a very good cook and she takes great care in providing healthy, good quality food for her family. I admire her efforts and quite often seek out her advice in the kitchen and steal her ideas. My boys LOVE granola bars. And my husband asks for them in his lunches... Recently the big name brand companies out there have started leaving out the high fructose syrup (props to them!) but I still thought that I would like to try making them from scratch so that I know for sure what is in them and it's a pretty inexpensive way to do it, too!
Cream the following together:
- 1 cup butter
- 1/2 cup brown sugar
- 1/2 cup white sugar
- 3 eggs
- 1 tsp vanilla
Then mix together with:
- 1 1/2 cup whole wheat flour
- 1 tsp salt
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 2 tsp cinnamon
- 1 tsp allspice
- 1/2 tsp ground cloves
- 1 tsp nutmeg
- 3 cups oats
- 1 1/2 cup raisins
Bake at 325 degrees for 25 minutes in a buttered 15x10 pan (translation: a cookie sheet!). Cool and cut into bars. My friend told me that she wraps hers individually and stores them in the freezer. I put half in baggies in the fridge and the rest I wrapped up and put in the freezer. This recipe made 24 bars. They were kind of thick, so I think next time I may use a larger cookie sheet or even a jelly roll pan so that they are thinner and I can have more!
Another variation: Omit the spices and raisins and use 1 cup of chocolate chips and/or peanut butter chips instead! These bars kind of taste like a cookie, but chewier and denser.
Another variation: I am thinking this would be a great place to also hide some other wholesome ingredients like oat bran, wheat germ or flaxseed! What do you think?
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