Food Friday - Hittin' the Bars

from Kris B.

By the tardiness of this post, you’d think that Tracey and I have been hitting the bars literally and are just now recovering from our weekend.  Lol!  I am happy to report that that is not the case.  I was out of town for a retreat this weekend.  I had most of my work for this post done before I left and figured I’d load the photo onto my iPad, take my written draft, polish it up “after hours,” and post it while I was gone.  Little did I know that I was going to be part of a mandatory wireless weekend.  That was a good thing in most ways, but…here it is Monday.

If it had been one of my kids who had such a “plan,” I probably would have insisted that they get the project  done before they left, reminding them that procrastination is not becoming, nor is it a good discipline.  I can honestly say that I don’t think that procrastination was the real issue here.  I simply have not yet adjusted to being back in school and fitting all that I need and want to do in to the short twenty fours of every day; this  just isn’t working well for me at the moment.  I have no doubt that things will settle down into a manageable routine here shortly.  That just had not happened yet last week.

By anyone’s standards, my teaching schedule is strenuous.  On Tuesdays and Thursdays I teach four hour and twenty-five minute classes (all different courses) back to back beginning at 7:30.  It is not the physical energy required that is the issue; it is the mental energy this demands that, well, kicks my rear.  Every class deserves my very best, but I have to admit that by the time I am five hours into teaching, my brain is tired!  I decided that I needed to find a recipe for a healthy, easy to make, and easy to eat snack that I could throw in my backpack and eat in the two or three minutes that I have between classes.  I had no such recipe of my own so I began looking at recipes by others.  There are MANY out there; I settled on the one’s found here on budget101.com.  As I scoured online sources, these sounded simple; and with twenty-four variations, there is enough variety to have a different flavor every week of school, and then some. 

Each recipe begins with the same base - 1 cup of nuts, any kind that you happen to have on hand or can find on sale, and one cup of dates.  Various other dried fruits, spices, or flavorings are then added to create the different varieties.  Visit the above website to see the complete list of recipes.

I made the “Girl Scout Samoa” Cookie and the Cappuccino.  Both were excellent, and the “recipe” is so easy.  Throw all of the ingredients into a food processor.  Process until integrated.  Press into a parchment lined loaf pan.  Freeze for an hour (or longer.)  Slice into 6 bars.  Wrap the bars individually in plastic wrap and store them in the freezer.  Easy, easy, easy!

Because when I get tired, I tend to eat things that give me a quick pick-me-up but that aren’t necessarily healthy, I ran these two recipes through the Weight Watchers Point Calculator.  The “Girl Scout Samoa” bars are 7 points, and the Cappuccino are 3.  I guess we know which one will give me more bang for my buck.  Lol!  In place of a meal, the seven point bar is OK, but for me, as a snack, that is a few too many points to give up on something that takes less than a minute to consume.  I will finish eating the batch I have, and then move on to the Cappuccino bars which are just as good and are guilt free!  

The one thing that I will do differently the next time that I make the Cappuccino bars is grinding the coffee beans in the coffee grinder first, before adding them to the rest of the mixture and count on the food process to grind them finely enough..  It may be that the blades on my food processor are a bit on the dull side, but the coffee beans were “chunkier” than I would have liked.  I didn’t want to over-process the whole thing or I’d end up with nut butter garnished with dates and ground coffee.  I definitely did not want that!

If you are looking for an easy “hold you over” kind of snack, these are it!  Try one.  Try them all.  Let me know which one is your favorite!



from Tracey G.

Granola bars don't last very long around here - they are a big favorite of myself and my husband - and certain ones (involving no nuts, lol) are my son's. I've been wanting to try to make my own for awhile, but for whatever reason, I just never got around to trying it or even looking for a recipe for that matter. When Kris mentioned making some kind of "power" snack recipes this week I was happy to take on the challenge to find a recipe as I didn't have one. I knew Jeremy would appreciate packing some in his lunch for the day, and it would help me to choose my snacking food a little more wisely! So, the hunt began, and then there's the careful choosing, because it would really stink if I tried a recipe and it was awful and I didn't have time to find something worthy of sharing! So, I scoured a few favorite recipe sites, and there were so many recipes!! I'd think I found one, then I'd notice some weird ingredient that I know I'd never find in my area since I am pretty limited in what I can find for "special" ingredients in my small town. Then I ran across this one - and to be honest, I was a bit skeptical I'd find the ground flax seed, so I went shopping for the ingredients the day I found the recipe in case I needed to go back to the drawing board and look for something else, but, I was pleasantly surprised to find it at my local Walmart! Yay! It came from one of my favorite recipes sites, Allrecipes.com. The link to it will be with the recipe below. 

This particular recipe came together really fast, I was pretty surprised at the ease of making them. I did follow a few of the tips I'd read in the reviews of it - one was to combine the honey and the peanut butter in a microwavable bowl and warm it enough for easy mixing, another was to stir the ground flaxseed into the peanut butter-honey mixture before you combine it with the other ingredients. And the last tip I found useful was to refrigerate it at least overnight so the flavors blend well. It was easy to cut and serve - I took a spatula and loosened the edges in the pan, then flipped the pan over and they mixture came right out onto the cutting board for super easy cutting. There really is no need to grease the pan at all, thanks to the peanut butter!  The other great thing about this recipe, is, you could vary up the ingredients really easily, which is always a good thing!

In the making of the recipe, I did change a couple things - instead of a 9x11" baking dish, I used a 9x13" and instead of regular chocolate chips I used mini-chocolate chips and those worked really well. And after mixing with the spatula for awhile, I then switched to using my hands like for a meatloaf, it was a bit sticky of course, but it was a good way to make sure the ingredients were combined well.

For pressing into the pan, I did use a spatula AND my hands to press the mixture in the pan. The recipe calls for cutting it into 12 bars - that seemed a bit large to me, so I cut mine into 20, and that was perfect. I then ended up cutting those in half, for storage purposes and it still was a good size!

No-Bake Granola Bars

original recipe: No Bake Granola Bars

2 c rolled oats

1 1/4 c natural crunchy peanut butter

1 c ground flaxseed

3/4 c honey

3/4 c dried cranberries

1/2 c chocolate chips

1/4 c sliced almonds

1) Stir oats, peanut butter, flaxseed, honey, cranberries, chocolate chips and almonds together in a bowl; press into a 9x13" baking dish, using the back of a spatula to press into a flat layer.

2) Refrigerate at least 1 hour.

3) Cut into 12 bars and wrap each individually in plastic wrap for storage.