Energy Bars

As I mentioned in my first post, I'm new to the blog world--both as a writer and reader.  This summer, I searched for blogs about healthy eating and discovered Craving Ellie in my Belly.  Each group, a group of bloggers try and blog about a specific recipe from one of Ellie Krieger's cookbooks.  Since I've recently been trying to put her cookbook to use, this seemed like a good fit.

First recipe: Energy Bars
 

This recipe intrigued me immediately.  As a teacher, I'm constantly looking for healthy, filling snacks that I can grab on the go, since I seldom have time to sit down and eat my lunch.  I enjoy granola bars, but seldom eat them because I'm cheap and I figure they're full of preservatives.  I was excited to try these out!

First, I assembled all of my ingredients.  I subbed out the raisins and used dried cranberries instead.

The recipe is quite simple: you dump all of the ingredients in the food processors except the egg and maple syrup.  Pulse until everything is finely chopped.

Yikes--I haven't even added my dried fruit yet, and look how full my food processor is!  We'll see how this goes...

Whew! It fits--barely!

 Add the eggs and maple syrup; pulse until combined.

My food processor was a little too small, so I transferred it to a bowl and finished 'mixing' by hand.  

I thought I'd experiment a little, so I added 1/4 cup mini chocolate chips to half of the batter.I figure it's only a teaspoon of chocolate per bar, so it doesn't add that many calories.  I also figured it was the only way I'd get the husband to try them--he's definitely not a fan of dried fruit.

 
 Spread into a 13 x 9 and bake for 20 minutes at 350 degrees. 

   **This was no easy task!  I should have sprayed my rubber scraper/spatula with cooking spray first. 

The consensus--they're good!  I might use fewer dates/apricots next time and more cherries (or our favorite--cherry-flavored cranberries) for a little stronger cherry flavor.  We definitely enjoyed the ones with chocolate chips a little more than those without (no surprise there). 

Pros:
*Inexpensive
*Uses pantry ingredients
*Quick and easy

Cons
*a little "healthy" for some tastes (example: the husband and my picky nephew)

Perhaps adding a little more maple syrup or larger chocolate chips would cause these to appeal to more palates? 

Overall--worth making again, but I'll definitely do some tweaking in the future.