Category Archives: bar

chocolate chip granola bars

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granola bar 9985

Every time I eat granola bars I always think of how insanely easy they have to be to make, and how much healthier they could potentially be if I took the time to make them at home.

Well, I finally got around to it.  Why?  Because I recently received a package of ViSalus Shake Mix, which is a high-quality protein shake powder with a vanilla flavor.  Not to go on or anything, but can I just say with all the hype about GMO soy (and GMO crops in general) I was pleasantly surprised to see them specify on the label that they use only non-GMO soy for their protein.  I’ve NEVER seen that on any other protein mix that I’ve used before (and I’ve used quite a few).

I’m not a body builder or anything, but I definitely go through my health-kicks.  You pretty much have to when you spend all of your free time “testing recipes” (aka: eating).

Sure, anyone can mix some powder into some milk, and that makes a quick and healthy breakfast or post-workout-drink, but what about the rest of the time?  What about all that in-between time?  How can I make my inevitable snacking slightly less bad for me?

granola bar 9980

Well, inspired by feeding the BF (or by parents who trick their children into eating healthy) the answer seemed easy: HIDE IT IN OTHER THINGS!  Just like hiding spinach in the BF’s pasta, I decided to hide my protein in granola bars.

The powder’s sweet vanilla flavor worked out quite well in these bars.  In fact, they were such a good match that I’m going to see what else I can mix this stuff into (if you don’t want the added protein, go ahead and make the recipe as follows just leaving the protein powder out!)

The only thing I might change for next time is to use less honey, the shake-mix itself has a little bit of sweetness to it (which is weird, because it has like one gram of sugar in it), so it doesn’t really need a whole half cup of honey.  You could also add dried fruit or chopped nuts to create pretty much any flavor you want!

Granola Bars

Makes 16 2-inch square bars

Printable Recipe

  • 1 ½ cups quick-cooking oats
  • 1 cup crisp rice cereal
  • 1 Tablespoon protein powder (I used ViSalus Shake Mix)
  • ¼ cup peanut butter
  • ½ cup honey (scant)
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • ½ cup chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 325°F and line an 8-by-8-inch baking pan with foil or parchment.

Toss oats, cereal, protein powder  in a medium bowl.

In another bowl, heat peanut butter and honey at 50% power in the microwave until the peanut butter has melted.  Add vanilla extract and stir to combine.  Pour honey mixture over cereal mixture and stir to combine.

Once thoroughly moistened, stir in the chocolate chips.  Press into baking pan and bake for about 20 minutes for chewy bars or up to 30 minutes if you like them more crispy.

Cool completely before cutting.  (Spending a little time in the fridge may help with the cutting process as well)

*Can be stored 1 week at room temperature in an airtight container, longer in the fridge, or individually wrapped and frozen for future you to snack on.

 granola bar pin

butterscotch bars

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It’s fall!

I know because I’ve baked with pumpkin.

And I’ve made chili.

And we went for a bike ride (to eat ice cream… but a bike ride no less!).

And we can turn off the air conditioning.

And we can open the windows for (almost) the whole day.

Plus, I wear a jacket sometimes now in the early morning.

I need all these other things, because we don’t have leaves. Or deciduous trees. I don’t have the pretty colors to tell me that it’s fall, but I do have all of these.

It’s fall!

And so I made these bars. I wish I had taken a ‘before’ pictures, it looked really cool and orange-y, like fall.

But I didn’t, so you’re stuck with the ‘afters’.

These are filled with butterscotch.  And chocolate.  And marshmallows. (oh my!).

Because it’s fall these are homey and comforting and heart-warming flavors.

These bars are amazing, even though my “disappearing marshmallows” didn’t disappear 100%.  Crispy, chewy, light and airy and they only took like 10 minutes to make.

Butterscotch Bars with Chocolate and Disappearing Marshmallows

[ Printable Recipe ]

  • 1 cup butterscotch chips
  • ½ cup unsalted butter
  • 1 ½ cups all-purpose flour
  • 2/3 cup packed brown sugar
  • 2 teaspoons baking powder
  • ½ teaspoon salt
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • 2 large eggs
  • 2 ½ cups mini marshmallows
  • 2 cups semi sweet chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350° and prepare a 9 x 13-inch pan for baking (I line with foil and then spray with baking spray)

In a large saucepan over medium low heat, melt the butterscotch chips and butter, stirring constantly. Despite my best efforts, I couldn’t do this without thinking that I wasn’t messing something up. (I wish I had taken a picture) Butterscotch chips do NOT like to melt, I could not get mine completely blended, just do your best. Set aside to cool.

While the butter mixture is cooling, whisk together the flour, brown sugar, baking powder, and salt in a medium bowl.

Once the butter mixture has cooled, add the vanilla and eggs to the butterscotch mixture, stirring well. Add the flour mixture and stir to combine.

Fold in the marshmallows and chocolate chips, until just combined (don’t want to over-mix!).
Spread into prepared pan and bake for 20 to 25 minutes, until a toothpick comes out mostly clean. The edges should be browned nicely, but the center does not have to be completely set. The bars will firm up more once they cool.

[ Adapted from A Farmgirl’s Dabbles ]

no-bake s’more bars

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smore bar no bake 1

Today is the last day to celebrate National S’more Month!!! So hurry up and make these quick and easy S’more Bars!!

You can make these babies in the microwave, which means you don’t have to endure any extra heat – no stove, no oven, no fire, no outside. Just sweet, delicious s’more goodness in the comfort of your air-conditioned home.

For these bars I used a recipe that melted the chocolate with the marshmallow, but I think my usual recipe of s’more bars that mixes chocolate chips in at the end is actually better.

Also, these are SUPER STICKY!!! REALLY, REALLY STICKY. I suspect the corn syrup is to blame… the recipe I usually make is just the good ol’ Rice Krispy Treat recipe with Golden Grahams in place of Rice Krispies and add the extra mini mallows and chocolate chips at the end…

Luckily, these are so easy to make that you can make them both ways and judge for yourself.

No-Bake S’more Bars

[ Printable Recipe ]

  • 8 cups (1 box) Golden Grahams cereal
  • 6 cups (1 bag)  miniature marshmallows, reserve 1 cup
  • 1½ cups chocolate chips*
  • ¼ cup light corn syrup
  • 5 tablespoons butter
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla (optional)
  1. Butter a 9×13-inch baking dish and line with parchment paper or plastic wrap; set aside.
  2. Place the cereal in a large mixing bowl; set aside.
  3. In a large bowl, combine 5 cups of marshmallows, chocolate*, light corn syrup and butter. Microwave in 30-second increments, stirring after each, until the mixture is completely melted and smooth. Stir in the vanilla.
  4. Pour the melted mixture over the cereal and, using a buttered spatula or wooden spoon, gently stir until all of the cereal is coated. Stir in the additional cup of marshmallows (and chocolate, if you didn’t melt it with the marshmallows)
  5. Turn the mixture out into the prepared baking pan. Butter your hands and press the mixture evenly into the pan, pushing it down into a flat, even layer. Cool for at least 1 hour at room temperature (refrigerate to speed up this process).

**READ THE TIPS BELOW**

*You can either melt the chocolate with the 5 cups of marshmallows, or stir it in with the last 1 cup. Make sure you use a REALLY BIG BOWL and REALLY STRONG ARMS for stirring. It’s REALLY HARD!!!

*Cover with parchment paper and smoosh down to help you spread them more easily.

*These can also be made on the stovetop, just like you would make regular rice krispy treats, melt it all over low heat, and then stir in cereal and mix-ins, and pour into pan and spread. 

*These can be stored in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 2 days, but good luck with that.

[ Adapted from Brown Eyed Baker ]

OG No Bake S’more Bars

  • 3 Tbsp butter
  • 10 oz large marshmallows
  • 4 1/2 C Golden Grahams
  • 1 – 2 C mini mallows
  • 1 C mini chocolate chips

1. Melt butter & marshmallows together. Once melted, add cereal. Once the cereal is mostly coated, add the mini mallows and chocolate chips.

2. Spread into greased pan. Sprinkle with additional mallows/chips, if desired. I think it’s fun to drizzle a little criss-cross of melted chocolate over the top, too. If I’m feeling motivated.

3. Once cooled, cut into squares and store in an air-tight container.

*Tip: Cover with parchment paper and smoosh down to help you spread them more easily.

[ Adapted from the Rice Krispies box ]

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chubby hubby bars

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chubby hubby small

Finally, one of my favorite Ben & Jerry’s flavors has been transformed into a cookie. This is great for a number of reasons, most importantly that I can eat them with reckless abandon without the risk of brain freeze. For those of you who aren’t aware, chubby hubby ice cream contains chocolate, peanut butter, and pretzels in vanilla malt ice cream. Since I have had no luck finding this ever elusive “malt powder”, I made do without the malt and went for it anyway.

The bar form, my friends, is cookie dough, pretzels, chocolate, caramel, and mini reeses. You could translate it any number of ways, these are just the ingredients I happened to use. In an effort to keep them slightly less messy, I mixed the caramel with the chocolate ganache coating. Unfortunately, that caused the chocolate to not harden completely, but you live and you learn, I suppose. They are delicious all the same. Over at Cookies & Cups they did a layer of caramel instead, which was a bit messier than I was looking for, but I posted that version below as an option. Also, you may notice the actual ice cream does not have caramel, so just go ahead and skip it if you want, I won’t tell.  🙂

My main issue, aside from the chocolate that didn’t want to harden, was the fillings. When I was spreading the cookie dough the fillings all tended to stay towards the middle. So when you’re pouring from your  mixer bowl into the baking pan, i recommend doing four or five large “dollops” of dough, and then spreading them in their own areas to ensure equal distribution of the candy add-ins.

Chubby Hubby Bars

[ Printable Recipe ]

  • 2 1/2 cups all purpose flour
  • 1 cup (2 sticks) butter, room temp
  • 1 cup brown sugar
  • 1/4 cup white sugar
  • 2 eggs
  • 2 tsp vanilla
  • 1 tsp baking soda
  • 1/2 tsp coarse sea salt
  • 1 1/2 cups coarsely chopped pretzels
  • 1 (8oz) bag of Reese’s Mini cups (or 2 cups coarsely chopped full sized Reese’s)
  • 1 (14 oz) bag of caramels, unwrapped + 2 Tbsp water * (This is the 2nd option; see note)

Ganache Layer:

  • 1/4 Cup of creamy peanut butter
  • 2 Cups of semisweet chocolate chips
  • 1/4 Cup of butter
  • 2 Tbsp of heavy whipping cream
  1. Preheat oven to 350
  2. Line a 9×13 pan with foil or parchment and grease lightly with cooking spray.
  3. Beat together your butter and sugars until light and fluffy, approx 1 min. 
  4. Add eggs and vanilla, mix until incorporated. 
  5. On low speed add in your salt, baking soda and flour, mixing until just combined. 
  6. Slowly add in your Reeses and Pretzels, mixing until evenly distributed. 
  7. Spread in your prepared pan* (see note, no pictures because that part was extra messy and BF may have killed me if I got cookie dough on his fancy schmancy camera) and bake for 25 minutes.
  8. Let cool completely. Approx 30 minutes to an hour.
  9. When cooled, melt your caramels and 2 Tbsp water in a microwave safe bowl stirring every minute until melted.
  10. Pour over your bars.
  11. Chill in fridge for 15 minutes to set caramel.
  12. Make ganache: Take a small saucepan and a glass or heatproof bowl. Simmer water and place the bowl over the saucepan. Melt the ganache ingredients together and stir to combine. Pour over cookies. Place whole or crushed pretzels on top of chocolate, if desired.
  13. Put back in the fridge for at least 30 minutes or until chocolate is set.
  14. Cut into squares when ready to serve.

Notes:

*I mixed the caramel with the chocolate ganache coating. Unfortunately, that caused the chocolate to not harden completely, but you live and you learn, I suppose. 

* I recommend doing four or five large “dollops” of dough, and then spreading them in their own areas to ensure equal distribution of the candy add-ins. 

better than crack brownies

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better than crack brownies

These brownies were baked on Saturday night, while enjoying jellybean cocktails and watching reality TV. Chocolate, alcohol, and trashy TV… I can’t think of a better way to spend a Saturday night. Can you?

Layers of chewy brownies, chopped Reese’s and a crunchy chocolate/crisp rice cereal mixture make these positively divine. Be sure to cut these into tiny squares, not only because they’re rich but so that when you share, you only have to share a little bit (and you can hoard the rest for yourself).

The recipe called for peanuts as well, but I don’t like nuts in my baked goods (generally speaking) so I left them out. Feel free to use them if you like. I might have added more Reese’s to the peanut butter cup layer, but that’s up to you. If you want a thicker brownie layer, go ahead and double the batch of brownies (I had a hard time spreading mine to take up the whole pan).

Crunchy, chewy, sweet, and salty – these brownies have it all.

Better-Than-Crack Brownies

[ Printable Recipe ]

  • 1 batch brownies (boxed mix or your favorite recipe)
  • 1/2 cup salted peanuts (optional)
  • 1 cup chopped Reese’s peanut butter cups
  • 1 1/2 cup milk chocolate chips
  • 1 1/2 cup creamy peanut butter
  • 1/2 tablespoon butter
  • 1 1/2 cups Crisp Rice Cereal

1. Mix brownies according to directions, and bake for 20-25 minutes in a 9 x 13 baking dish. Remove and top with peanuts and peanut butter cups, and bake for 4-6 minutes more.

2. When they are finished baking, melt chocolate chips, peanut butter and butter. Stir in cereal. Pour cereal mixture evenly over brownies.

3. Chill two hours to firm up before cutting.

[ Adapted from How Sweet It Is ]

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