No-Bake Granola Bars (Gluten-Free, Vegan)

Upon flipping through Molly Yeh’s new book, Home is Where the Eggs Are, I found myself immediately drawn to the cookie dough oat bars, which Molly describes as “the new staple bar of your dessert-as-breakfast dreams.”

My children love granola bars — Z-Bars, Clif Bars, Chewy Quaker Oat Bars — and if I’m being honest, I do, too. When we have a box of peanut butter Clif Bars on hand, I have a hard time resisting them. And while there are worse things to snack on, I never feel great buying or eating them.

It was time to give making granola bars from scratch another go. Molly’s bars looked simple enough, a no-bake recipe she noted she could make with Bernie, her daughter, strapped to her in her carrier and “toss in whatever mix-ins were within arm’s reach.”

Encouraged by this note, along with another about the many variations — approximately 435,785,406 — Molly has made over the years, I made them with a few substitutions: chia seeds, melted butter, and chopped dark chocolate for the hemp seeds, coconut oil, and mini chocolate chips, respectively.

They turned out beautifully, tasting, as Molly promised, like cookie dough — seed-flecked, toasted-oat cookie dough. The first batch disappeared quickly, and I have since made many variations, including the original recipe as well as one with almond flour in place of the seeds, when I found myself without any. They all work, so play around! I do think the mini chocolate chips (as opposed to larger ones or a chopped chocolate bar) work best.

Friends, Molly Yeh’s new book, Home is Where the Eggs Are, is so much fun. If you follow Molly on Instagram or watch her Food Network Show, you know she exudes joy. But what this book has reminded me of is that she is such an excellent writer, too, her recipe head notes and chapter openers reflecting the witty and self-effacing, honest and curious, whimsical but approachable Molly Yeh that captivated us from the very beginning.

If you are someone who likes to read cookbooks cover to cover as you would a novel, this will be a great addition to your library. Bonus: All of the baking recipes include gram measurements 🎉🎉🎉

How To Make No-Bake Granola Bars, Step by Step

Gather your ingredients:

Toast the oats for 10 minutes.

Then transfer them to a food processor with cashews, chia or hemp seeds, salt, and brown sugar.

Purée until very fine.

Add melted butter or coconut oil, honey or maple syrup, and vanilla.

Process until the mixture begins to come together.

Press into a pan. Top with chocolate chips and sea salt. Press again. Then chill for 1 hour.

Remove from the pan.

Then cut into bars and store in the fridge for up to two weeks.

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