Coconut Quinoa Granola Bars

Name: Coconut Quinoa Granola Bars
Prep time: 10 min
Cook time: 12 min
Total time: 22 min
Yield: 12 bars
Ingredients: 1 3/4 cups old-fashioned oats; 1/4 cup sliced almonds, (roughly chopped); 1/4 cup cashews, (roughly chopped); 1/4 cup quinoa; 3/4 cup puffed rice cereal; 1/3 cup honey; 1/3 cup almond butter; 1/4 cup vegetable or canola oil; 1/4 cup brown sugar; 1/2 tsp salt; 3/4 tsp vanilla extract; 1/2 cup sweetened coconut flakes

June 12, 2014 By Alyssa 36 Comments

Coconut quinoa granola bars are chock full of tasty, nutritious ingredients for a healthy and hearty snack bar recipe. These bars are chewy with an almond butter and honey mixture binding together the oats, nuts, coconut flakes, and quinoa.

If I was stuck in a foxhole around ohhh, let’s say 3 pm, I’d choose to be stuck in there with these coconut quinoa granola bars.

There are plenty of reasons why, first off simply because I haven’t been able to stop thinking about them since I made them. I’m always on the lookout for healthier snacks, so I bought coconut quinoa granola bars at the store awhile back. I really liked the flavor and the extra nutritious boost from the quinoa, but every time I bit into a bar, an avalanche of crumbs would come tumbling down. Unless I wanted to make a colossal mess everywhere I went, I needed to use both hands and at least one napkin. For a granola bar. Ridiculous.

These coconut quinoa granola bars are chewy – and basically crumb-less. Yes! The puffed rice cereal adds a nice crisp as you bite into them, with the coconut flakes and almond butter/honey mixture bringing the chewiness. Because of the filling, nutritious ingredients packed into these bars, each bite will take you a few extra moments to chew. They’re nutritious, and satisfying – I ate one around lunchtime and wasn’t hungry until dinner! I’m a total snacker, so anything that causes me to forgo my mid-afternoon snack is a big deal.

And the taste? Fab. There are a bunch of flavors happening here, but they all play so nicely together you won’t feel like they’re competing. These bars are just sweet enough for you not to think they’re intended to be a healthier snack. B is slowly warming to quinoa (a few months ago he could have played the “what the heck is qween-oh?” guy from that Bud Light commercial), and he couldn’t taste it in these bars at all. Of course he found out there was quinoa in them once he asked what those dots were, but by then he was a few bites in and that factoid wasn’t going to deter him. 🙂

With our big time road trip coming up, I’ve had snacks on the brain big time. Despite how much I love these bars and want to shout my love declaration from the rooftop, these babies won’t make the pack list for our trip. Their only teensy tiny drawback is that they’re best stored in the fridge, because the binding ingredients begin to lose their binding abilities as the bars warm. Maybe not the best road trip compadres for 2,000+ miles across the southern U.S. in the summertime.

But, I’m willing to bet that one of the first times I turn on my oven in TN will be to toast up some oats, nuts, and quinoa (thankfully we have A/C!).

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