No Bake Protein Bars

(gluten, soy, dairy free, egg free, nut free option)

These are great to make in the summer when you don’t want to use the oven

Ingredients

  • 2 cups gluten free organic oats
  • 1 c. coconut flakes
  • ½ c. ground flax* (Mine smelled rancid the first time so I used hemp seeds instead)
  • 1/3 c. protein powder of choice (ie: collagen, whey, can use vanilla, chocolate, unflavored) I used grass fed vanilla whey
  • Dash sea salt
  • ¼ c. honey
  • ¼ c. coconut oil melted
  • 1 c. nut or seed butter of choice**
  • 2 t. pure vanilla extract
  • ½ c. add ins such as nuts, dark chocolate (I omitted the coconut flakes in the recipe and added in large handful almonds and around ½ cup-okay maybe more-dark chocolate and used Lily of the Valley brand)

*Flax: always buy your flax seed whole. Ideally buy it in the fridge section of your store as it can go rancid even in the whole seed form.  Store in the fridge and only grind up what you are going to use for the week.

**the first time I made these, they came out perfect. The next two times they came out dry. I finally figured out that I had switched from jar almond butter to freshly ground almond butter. I think the latter was not giving enough moisture to the recipe.

Directions

  1. Line an 8×8 pan with parchment and set aside
  2. In a large bowl combine all the dry ingredients
  3. Add to a pot the liquid ingredients (honey, oil, almond butter) and warm on the stove and blend all of it together until combined. (this should take only few minutes). Remove from stove and add in vanilla extract.
  4. Add stove top mixture to the dry mixture. Blend in the chocolate and/or other “add ins” of choice.
  5. Pour into pan. If you want thinner bars you can try using a larger pan.  In the 8×8 pan they come out thick but I like them this way.
  6. Place the pan in the freezer for one to two hours. Transfer to fridge. Slice and enjoy!

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