No weekend updates today. Except that I got sick on Saturday night after eating at Chipotle. Vishnu thinks it was a combination of me eating too much too fast. Those are two very plausible possibilities. All I know is it was not fun and I felt gross. Therefore, Chipotle and I are taking a break.
Thankfully I felt much better Sunday morning. I even headed out bright and early for our weekly grocery shopping trip at my new favorite farmer’s market and Publix. I. Love. Grocery. Shopping! Yes, I realize this makes me sound dorky. I don’t care.
While at Publix I looked for some nutritious granola bars that Vishnu and I could take to work/school during the week. After looking at about five different kinds, I gave up. There are some decent ones out there – it’s just that my wallet wasn’t impressed enough for me to purchase.
When I got home, I started looking up recipes for homemade granola bars. And then I remembered that there’s a pretty good one on my own blog! Duh.
When I clicked on it however, I got a weird “this page does not exist” message. For a split second, I thought all my recipes were gone. And then I realized that when I switched over to a new blog design, I deleted a bunch of pages, of which the granola bar recipe was one. Oops! Sometimes I get excited with the whole technical side of the blog, think of myself as an IT expert, and end up messing things up. Sometimes. That’s when having a super techie husband really helps!
All was not lost though. I knew that at some point in the past I had emailed this recipe to someone. After doing a quick search, I found it! And lucky us (and you guys) because what came out of the oven was better than any store bought granola bars. These bars are soft, chewy, slightly sweet, and full of dark chocolate bits.
Ready to go into the oven
After trying a piece, I couldn’t believe I had waited so long to make these again. Seeing that Vishnu had two pieces last night, I think I unknowingly started a weekly/biweekly homemade granola bar tradition. Not a bad thing!
Chocolate Chip Granola Bars
4 cups quick cooking oats
1 cup nuts of your choice (I used slivered almonds)
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon cinnamon
3/4 cup chocolate chips of your choice, chopped into little pieces (I used dark chocolate)
1/2 cup dark brown sugar
6 tablespoons butter, melted (I used Earth Balance)
1/4 cup honey
6 teaspoons smooth peanut butter
4 teaspoons milk (I used almond milk)
Preheat the oven to 325 degrees. Mix together the first six ingredients in a large bowl. In a separate bowl, combine the rest of the ingredient and stir until smooth. Add the wet ingredients to the dry and mix well. Spray a 13x9x2 pan with non-stick cooking spray. Spread the mixture evenly, pushing down with the back of your spoon to ensure that everything is nice and compact. Bake for 25-30 minutes. Allow the bars to cool for a few hours before cutting into pieces.
P.S. Don’t worry if your bars break apart a little. They’ll still taste delicious. So delicious in fact that I’m hoping ours stick around for more then 48 hours. Vishnuletstrytomaketheselastforatleastfourdaysplease!
Tell me something fun about your weekend!