Hippie Chow

I love those Fiber One Oats & Chocolate bars they have out now. The problem is that they are loaded with high fructose corn syrup, among other junk I don't want to be eating. Wendy (who's blog I've been following for a while now) postsed a recipe for healthy homemade granola bars back at the beginning of January. I've been meaning to try it.... but you know how that goes. I finally got to it yesterday, and I could just kick myself for putting it off for so long! With Wendy's permission, I'm posting it to share here. I even have pictures!

Healthy Granola Bars

Ingredients:

2 cups quick cook oats (I used regular rolled oats)
1/2 C brown sugar
1/4 cup ground flax seed meal
1/4 cup wheat germ
1 tsp cinnamon
1 C whole wheat flour
1/2 C chocolate chips
1/2 C chopped nuts (Wendy used peanuts, I used pecans)
3/4 tsp salt
1/2 C honey
1 beaten egg
1/2 C vegetable oil
2 tsp vanilla extract

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease 9x13 pan. (I just sprayed it with Pam because honestly? I'm lazy). Place oats, brown sugar, wheat germ, flax meal, cinnamon, flour, chocolate chips, and salt in a large bowl.

Mix well, making sure there are no big clumps of brown sugar left behind.

Make well in center and pour in oil, then honey (pouring in the oil first in the mixing cup ensures your honey doesn't stick to the measuring cup), egg, and vanilla.

Mix well.

Pat mixture into the prepared pan, leaving 1.5 inch on one side. (I think next time I'm just going to put it into a 9"x 9" pan and see how that works.

Bake until the edges brown - about 20 minutes. Cut in pan right out of oven; leave to cool.

Where's the picture of the finished bars? Um, yeah, I sorta forgot to take one. It looks a lot like the last photo anyway. After they were completely cooled, I wrapped the bars individually in plastic wrap and placed them in the refrigerator. They're really sweet at room temperature, but PERFECT cold.

Best part? No chemicals or preservatives, and most of the ingredients I used were organic too. (Not the Toll House morsels that I found in the fridge. Hey, I said "most!")

Yum Yum!


****EDITED TO ADD****

I made some modifications to this recipe and thought maybe I should add them here.  

*First off - switching to a 9" x 9" pan.  SO MUCH EASIER!  

*I cut the finished bars into 16 pieces instead of ten so they were a more manageable serving size.

*I reduced the brown sugar by half because they were a bit too sweet.  If you know me, this is saying a LOT.  1/4 cup seems to be just right.

*I reduced the amount of vegetable oil by half and substituted an equal amount of unsweetened applesauce.  This saves you 14.5 grams of fat and doesn't change the taste/consistency AT ALL, which is pretty dang cool in my book!