By Genevieve
I think I’ve finally found the granola bar recipe I’ve been looking for!
I’ve made many variations of granola bars, and while I will always prefer my homemade versions to the storebought kind, I still haven’t managed to perfect them.
I feel a bit like Goldilocks - this one is too dry...this one is too crumbly... this one is too peanut-buttery and sticks to the inside of my mouth...But now – this one is juuust right!
Who would have thought that the secret would be chickpeas!
These granola bars turned out nice and moist and chewy and they actually hold together when you eat them instead of disintegrating into a pile of crumbs. I also thought both the cinnamon and peanut butter flavours were perfect – kind of like a cross between a peanut butter cookie and a snickerdoodle, but in a much healthier form!
And don’t be scared of the chickpeas – if you didn’t know they were in there, you probably wouldn’t guess! (Although I haven’t actually been able to test out this theory on any naive subjects).
I followed this recipe, but cut all the amounts in half. I used a combination of raisins and cranberries for the dried fruit. The only other changes I made were to use rolled oats instead of quick oats, and I replaced some of the oats with my Kashi granola because I realized that I didn’t have quite enough oats!
I also tried out this adorable way of packaging them with ribbon from Oh She Glows!
Chickpea Granola Bars
Adapted from Have Cake Will Travel
Ingredients:
- ½ tbsp ground flax
- 2 tbsp warm water
- 1 cup + 2 tbsp canned chickpeas, rinsed and drained
- ½ tbsp brown sugar
- 1 tsp cinnamon
- Pinch of salt
- ¼ cup peanut butter
- 2 tbsp agave nectar
- 1.5 tbsp melted coconut oil
- ½ cup rolled oats + ¼ cup granola (or ¾ cup oats)
- ½ cup puffed rice cereal
- ¼ cup dried cranberries and raisins (about 2 tbsp of each)
Instructions:
Preheat oven to 375. Combine the flax with water and set aside.
Combine the chickpeas with brown sugar and ½ tsp of the cinnamon in a baking dish. Bake for 8 minutes, stir, then bake 8 more minutes. Let cool and then mash until there are no whole chickpeas left.
Combine the peanut butter, agave, and coconut oil. Then stir in the flax mixture.
In a separate bowl, mix together the oats, granola, puffed rice, and dried fruit, with the remaining ½ tsp cinnamon and pinch of salt. Then add in mashed chickpeas and stir together.
Add wet ingredients to dry and stir to incorporate.
Pour mixture into a greased 8 x 8 pan. Press down firmly with a rubber spatula.
Refrigerate for at least 2 hours before cutting, until firm (otherwise they might crumble apart). Store in the refrigerator.
Mine filled about 2/3 of the pan, which got me 6 full sized bars.
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