Energy Bars

Yesterday my friend and I went on a bike adventure. We packed a picnic, and I biked about 45 minutes to meet up with her (and then home afterwards!), then we made our way to High Park. We biked through the zoo, and saw bison, peacocks, yaks, cattle, emus, llamas, and lots of ducks. One llama in particular looked so happy, and came over and licked my bike!

We ate our picnic by a duck pond, and after feeding a couple of ducks and a Canadian goose, we ate veggies, delicious vegan chocolate pudding, and Energy Bars I made that morning. These guys were loaded with nuts, seeds, berries and delicious peanut butter, coconut, carob chips and Canadian maple syrup. Perfect boosts of high energy, protein and fibre goodness, but they're treats too, perfect for munching on a long bike ride. I'm glad they didn't make my friend sick, so I would be comfortable saying this recipe is gluten free friendly (make sure all of your ingredients are gluten free if you make this!) I made a big batch, so don't be intimidated by the amount of nuts I used.

Ingredients

I pretty much eyeballed everything, it was either a 1/2 cup of the nuts, or 1/4 of a cup, depending on size and fat content (if it was a fattier nut I reduced the amount)

Oats

shredded coconut (unsweetened)

peanuts

almonds

flax seeds

walnuts

sunflower seeds

pumpkin seeds

goji berries

raisins

cranberries

cashews

carob chips

1 cup melted peanut butter

3/4 cup of maple syrup (I know...it's a lot)

1 teaspoon of vanilla

Method

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees.

Combine dry ingredients in a bowl (you may want to smash up the nuts a bit first, and I saved the carob chips to sprinkle on top)

Next, heat peanut butter until it is runny. Add in maple syrup and vanilla, stir to mix together.

Add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients and mix well.

Next, press ingredients into a large baking pan. PRESS it down, and sprinkle with carob chips or coconut, or really, whatever you want.

As delicious as these are right out of the oven, they will be a bit mushy, so let them cool completely. I cut mine first, but left them in the pan.

Enjoy!