Make At Home Lara-like Bars

I first came across a recipe for these on Pinterest, then after digging deeper i found a few other bloggers (enlightened cooking and DAMY) who also posted recipes for their makeshift lara bars (check out enlightened cooking for her take on trio and kind bars too).  I thought i too would try my hand at these in hopes they would be an easy to prep recipe for my girls/teens workshop later this month.  Luckily they are, and i believe they are going to be a big hit with the sassy little ladies!

After hitting up Trader Joes and stocking up on maddening amounts of nuts, seeds, and dried fruits, i cleared off the counters, busted out the food processor and started making bars.  I was blown away at what a breeze they are to make.  I even used the now empty medjool date container to store my bars (stacked on sheets of parchment paper) in the fridgey.  I started with just three flavors but you could easily swap out the ingredients using similar measurements to make a special YOU bar.

the basic recipe is 1/2 cup of dried fruit processed to a paste to 1/3 cup of ground nuts.  Make sure you don't grind the nuts all the way down to a flour, the nuts should be like coarse gravel.


Apple Cinnamon Pumpkin Bars (my fave of the three)
makes four bars


8 dried apple rings (from T.J's)
4 large pitted medjool dates
1/3 cup of nuts/seeds:  this was half almonds and half roasted, salted pumpkin seeds
a few solid shakes of cinnamon and a dash of sea salt

Apricot Almond Bars
makes four bars


1/4 cup of pitted medjool dates (about 5)
1/4 cup of dried apricots (approx 7)
your dried fruit should equal 1/2 cup total
1/3 cup raw almonds
cinnamon
sea salt

Blueberry Coconut Cashew Bars
makes 6 bars


1/2 cup pitted medjool dates
3 heaping Tbsp of dried blueberries
1/3 cup cashew pieces
2 rounded Tbsps Coconut flour
cinnamon
sea salt

Directions:

Put the nuts in the food processor and grind to a coarse gravel.  Put these nuts aside in a bowl.  Add the dried fruit to the empty food processor and process to a thick, lightly-chunky paste.  Add the nuts to the dried fruit in the food processor and sprinkle in cinnamon and sea salt.  Process a bit to combine well.  When the mixture is tacky and you can pinch it together to stick well it's done (it will look like a sticky crumble).  Put this mixture into a large bowl and either use your hands or a spatula to press it together well.  Put your sticky (lara-like) ball onto a piece of parchment paper, lay saran wrap over top, and begin to shape into a rectangle by pressing down with the back of a drinking glass or your hands.  Trim the edges with a wet knife to create your perfect rectangle.  To cut the bars wet the knife first.  Store these in your fridge.