Sunday, February 19, 2012

Homemade Clif Bars

Let me preface this by saying that this is not a purely original recipe. I'm not the first to have thought "I should make my own Clif Bars!" as evidenced by the many recipes found using a search engine. I've noticed that most of the recipes I have run into use more or less the same base ingredients: oats, puffed rice, and flaxseed meal. I followed that example, but the rest is my own adaptation. There are dozens of different combinations that one could come up with to meet their likes, and I encourage you to be creative.  I feel that I should also add that while these are healthy, they are relatively high in calories as they are made primarily to fuel sports and exercise.

Here are the ingredients that I used:
  • 1&1/4 Cups Gluten Free, Brown Rice Krispies 
  • 1 Cup Rolled Oats
  • 2 Tbsp Flaxseed Meal
  • 1/4 Cup Crushed Nuts (Any type can be used, I chose walnuts for this batch.)
  • 1/4 Cup Dried Fruit (I used a combination of apricots, apples, and pears.)
  • 1/3 Cup Honey (Plus extra*.)
  • 1/2 Cup Nut Butter (Once again, up to you. I used Organic Creamy Roasted Almond Butter.)
  • 1 tsp Vanilla Extract
  • **Optional: A few squares of dark chocolate and some rice milk (Or any other kind of "milk".)
  • You can also add shredded coconut, spices such as cinnamon and nutmeg, chocolate chunks, and anything else you like to snack on!
For anybody trying this who is not very experienced with cooking, I recommend to always start by measuring out your ingredients. That way, you don't realize midway through cooking that you forgot something important that forces you to deviate from the task at hand.


Once your ingredients are measured, go ahead and follow these simple steps:
  • Get a large bowl and mix together the rice, oats, flaxseed, fruit and nuts. 
  • Put the honey and nut butter in a small sauce pan over medium-low heat. Stir this well until the two are melted and combined, making sure to not allow it to burn. Add the vanilla extract and stir some more and take the mixture off the heat.
  • Pour the honey, butter, and vanilla mixture over the dried ingredients in the bowl and start mixing. It's best to use your hands here as a spoon will just get sticky and make things all the more messy. If you have kids or culinarily-challenged loved ones (The type that only can only make omelets.), now is a good time to employ their help as very little can go wrong and it's fun to get others involved.
  • *Based on how sticky your mixture is, you may want to go back and heat another 1/3 to 1/2 cup of honey with just a few Tbsp of water in the small sauce pan you previously used. Stir until a syrup forms, then pour this over everything and mix again. This will help things keep together if you are finding that your mixture is too crumbly.
  • Once everything is thoroughly combined, press the mixture into a pan of your choice (Preferably square of rectangular if you are going for the energy-bar look). This step allows you to create nice, evenly shaped bars.
  • From here you can proceed one of two ways. I chose to use the pan to shape one large bar, then un-molded it all onto some wax paper to allow it to cool properly and make it easier to cut. You could also cut individual bars straight in the pan the way many people do with brownies. Either way is fine.
  • **Optional: For those of you that feel the need to make this a tad bit more elaborate, chop up 4 or 5 squares of chocolate (I used 70% dark) and use a splash of rice milk (or whatever kind of "milk" you like), and put that in a bain-Marie over a fairly low heat. Stir frantically until the chocolate melts, and you will have a chocolate syrup. Pour it over the molded Clif mixture (fun patterns encouraged) and allow it to set.
Depending on what you will be using these bars for (eg snack at home or energy bar for on the go workouts), you can cut the bars any different number of ways. I eyeballed my cutting and made 15 bars out of this batch. Wrapping is another story. I chose to let the bars dry out a bit on the counter to make sure that they wouldn't get destroyed in my jersey pockets while I was on the bike. I don't plan on pre-wrapping them all individually. Rather, I'll let them hang out in my kitchen and wrap one or two in plastic wrap, parchment paper, or aluminum wrap before my workouts. That way they stay nice and fresh, and I can enjoy them when I'm out on the road.

Please share any thoughts on possible variations, comments, and constrctive criticism in the comments! Click here for detailed nutritional information for 1 bar (1/15th of a batch).

9 comments:

  1. I need to try a bite! Good Job, great info. and presentation. I need to try the recipe :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks! Make sure you vary it with ingredients that you like to make it suit your taste!

      Delete
  2. I love your creativity Mael. Great work!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Very good recipe! Just tried it and it turned out well.

    I tweaked it by adding cocoa powder, dark chocolate chocolate chips, and a little bit of 'sour cherry syrup' into the honey/peanut butter mix, while cutting some of the honey, which made it taste sweeter/more decadent but still cut the sugar a little bit. I'm going to experiment with esspresso grounds or instant coffee crystals next time, I think, a la Cliff's 'Cool Mint' variety.

    Also, adding ground almond meal helps add protein without changing the consistency too much, and it helps to keep everything stuck together without adding extra honey!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Splendid, thanks for sharing your variations! I actually wanted almond meal instead of flaxseed but I was short on time and couldn't find it in my standard grocery store.

      I like your chocolate theme as well, sounds delicious!

      Glad you enjoyed the recipe!

      Delete
  4. Thanks for the recipe! I'm trying out the Clean Diet so I altered it a bit. I used agave nectar to replace the honey and instead of oats used more brown rice puffs. I also added coconut to help with the lack of oats. I used almonds, walnuts and pine nuts (because I had them) and added raisins! I'm so happy with the way they turned out. Thanks for posting this!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. All the thanks goes to you, my friend! I'm way happy to hear that you modified it to meet your diet/taste. How did the consistency turn out?
      Thanks for the support!

      Delete
    2. The consistency came out better than expected, but not as sticky as I was hoping for. I'm still letting them sit for a bit to see if they get a little more solid.. I literally just finished making them when I posted! I may throw them in the freezer for a few minutes to see if that helps. I did taste them so I know they taste great! Let's just hope they get a little more bar-like!

      Delete
  5. I have been making bars like these for years. My mom always made peanut butter rice crispies, and about 5 years back I started thinking I could also make my own clif bars. So I started adding to the treats. The recipe I use is obviously different (simpler) but the same basic idea. Yours look really good and gives me ideas on how to make mine even better.

    I need to make some of mine soon. YUM!!!

    ReplyDelete

Popular Posts

Followers

Labels

Blogroll

About

Blogger templates

Blogger news