Homemade Larabar Recipe – Chocolate Brownie
Last month I stumbled on a terrific deal at my grocery store – 10 for $10 Larabars! I immediately snatched up a variety to bring to work. I’m a rather “scheduled” person and every work day I eat a granola bar as my morning snack around 10am. Usually I stick to Nature Valley, but they contain a lot of added sugar and unnecessary ingredients. Larabars are only contain 3-6 ingredients and almost no added sugar. The problem is they usually cost $1.50 / bar. Way more than I’m willing to spend.
Since I’m on a bit of a “make everything homemade” kick, a light bulb went off as I was raving to my husband about my Larabar excitement. Why not try to come up with a homemade Larabar recipe? There’s such a small number of ingredients, surely it can’t be too difficult to replicate. A quick internet search told me this is certainly possible…and even easy! I modified a few of the recipes I found to create my own homemade Larabar recipe – Chocolate Chip Brownie flavor (my favorite).
There are also endless possibilities for customization. Swap in peanut butter and peanuts for a peanut butter cookie or use pecans and cinnamon for a Pecan Pie variety! Enjoy!
Homemade Larabar Recipe (makes approx 8 bars):
Ingredients:
2 cups pitted dates
1 1/2 cup walnuts
1/2 cup chocolate chips
1/4 cup + 1 TBSP cocoa powder
Instructions:
1 – Soak dates in warm water for 5 min if they need to be softened. The softer the dates, the better the texture of your bars. Pat them dry.
2 – Add walnuts and chocolate chips to a food processor. Process for about thirty seconds or until the walnuts are finely chopped.
3 – Add dates and cocoa powder. Process for approximately 1 to 1 1/2 min until ingredients are combined and start to stick together.
4 – Line a baking sheet with cling wrap or wax paper and press mixture into a rectangle. Refrigerate for at least 1 hour before cutting into bars.
You can also roll these into balls for bite size snacks! Perfect for eating on the go.
On a side note, being an accountant, I couldn’t resist running the numbers to see if I was actually saving money. I’ll admit I balked when I realized a 40oz pack of pitted dates cost $9.99 by itself. The numbers don’t lie, though! After a quick calculation, I discovered each of my homemade Larabars only costs $.60. That’s a savings of $.40 on sale and $.90 at regular price!! Cue happy dance in my kitchen. Disclosure – if I was being completely accurate, I’d also need to factor in the cost of my food processor, baking pan, and saranwrap but that would just be way too nerdy 🙂
What other flavors would you like to try for a homemade Larabar recipe?
So cool! I like that they don’t even need to be baked!
Exactly – they come together quite quickly. Let me know if you try them out!
Awesome! I make peanut butter energy balls that sounds really similar. I’ll go through periods where I make my own yogurt, bread, granola, everything. Then I get lazy and don’t make anything from scratch! I recently found some delicious granola-type bars at Aldi that I’m obsessed with. They’re sweetened with maple syrup and are made with pumpkin seeds and chia seeds.
Ha I can see that same exact thing happening to me. We’ll see how long this stretch lasts. I still want to tackle a few types of bread! If you had any go-to recipes let me know.