If you’ve done much reading on this blog, you know that I love to cook and eat delicious foods. Unfortunately, they’re not all the healthiest choices, so my husband and I have decided to make more of an effort to plan healthy, lower-fat, lower starch, higher fiber, more veggie-filled meals. I also made a list of healthful snacks we should try to have on hand.
On the list was granola bars.
But do you know what??? They’re not all healthy! Some of the granola bars you can buy in stores may as well be candy bars, with the amount of sugar and “fluff” they include in their ingredients. And most of them (except Kashi) also have high fructose corn syrup as a main ingredient. Disgusting. While I love Kashi granola bars, the guy and I tend to go through a bunch of those, so it gets pretty expensive.
So I decided to take matters into my own hands. After reading tons of granola bar recipes (and throwing out the ones that sounded like disguised candy), I came up with my own mixture that works deliciously well to create healthful, filling granola bars. If I eat half of one of these and a small piece of fruit, I’m good to go for several hours. And it makes me happy knowing that I didn’t eat anything disgusting to feel full.
So here’s my recipe. Let me know if you try it out!
Preheat the oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit.
Gather your ingredients:
- 2 cups oats
- 3/4 cup wheat germ
- 3/4 cup sunflower seeds
- 1 cup peanuts, crushed
- 2/3 cup brown sugar
- 1/2 cup honey
- 4 Tbsp butter
- 2 tsp vanilla extract
- 1/2 tsp Kosher salt
- approximately 8 oz. dried fruit
To crush your peanuts, put them in a plastic bag and smash them with a heavy mallet, measuring cup, or sauce pan.
Then, mix the peanuts, oats, wheat germ, and sunflower seeds in a baking dish with sides. Toast them in the oven for 10-12 minutes, stirring every few minutes so that they don’t get burned.
Meanwhile, prepare a glass baking dish (about 11 x 13 inches) for your granola by lining it with waxed paper lightly sprayed with a nonstick spray.
Put the brown sugar, honey, butter, vanilla, and salt into a saucepan and bring to a simmer, stirring constantly. (I forgot to take a picture of this step, but it looks so pretty!)
By now, your grains and nuts should be toasted, so mix everything together in a large bowl. The grains, the liquid “glue,” and the dried fruit. Oh, and turn off your oven, because you’re finished with it now.
Mix everything REALLY WELL because you want to make sure the “glue” gets all over everything. Now, dump your granola mixture into your prepared baking dish.
Spread out the mixture with a wooden spoon or spatula.
Now fold over the sides of the waxed paper or add a sheet on top, and PRESS HARD all over the granola. You want to compact it together so that your bars won’t fall apart when you cut them.
Wait 2-3 hours or until the granola has totally cooled.
Then, open the waxed paper …
And carefully turn the granola onto a large cutting board, peeling away the rest of the paper.
Now, firmly pressing down with a big knife (not sawing), cut your granola into whatever size bars you’d like.
I wrapped ours individually in plastic wrap, so that we could just throw one into our bag or lunch box in the morning. If you’d like to save on packaging though, you can store yours in an airtight container, between sheets of waxed paper (so they don’t stick together).
Enjoy!
Of course, you can mix up the recipe. I used peanuts because they’re what we had, but next time I’m going to make the granola nutless at first, but during the pressing-down part, I plan to press almonds into the top of the bars.
Another combo that would be fun to try is macadamia nuts, dried pineapple, and coconut flakes.
Or try dried cranberries, walnuts, and white chocolate chips (just a few).
I also plan to add flax seed to my granola mix.
Different flavors of honey would also probably change the final outcome too. Mmm…
So many options! Good thing we have time!
Hi! I'm Emily. I'm a Navy wife and stay at home mom of two beautiful children. I cook simple, delicious, grain-free recipes, do crafts, decorate my home on a budget, and keep a happy household. I tandem breastfeed, babywear, cloth diaper, practice elimination communication, homebirth, and co-sleep, but I'm not a hippie.
Thank you…..just what I was looking for….will try them today
These bars are wonderful! I use 1/2 honey and 1/2 molasses, add 1 tsp. nutmeg, cinnamon, and ginger to the original recipe.
I make this over and over..
Thanks for the recipe
[...] been toying with two: here and here. Both are supposed to replicate Kashi, but I'm still working out the kinks since I keep [...]
I made these yesterday – used flax seed instead of wheat germ, mixed nuts, and dried cranberries and blueberries. Turned out REALLY good. Thank you so much!
[...] Then, mix the peanuts, oats, wheat germ, and sunflower seeds in a baking dish with sides. Toast them in the oven for 10-12 minutes, stirring every few minutes so that they don’t get burned. Meanwhile, prepare a glass baking dish (about 11 x 13 inches) for your granola by lining it with waxed paper lightly sprayed with a nonstick spray. Homemade Granola Bar Recipe – (No high fructose corn syrup in these bars!) | Joyful Abode [...]
I made these today and they’re amazing!!!!!! I used dried apricots=yum!!! So much better than store bought! Thanks for recipe!
THESE ARE DELICIOUS!! I modified the recipe…didn’t use wheat germ, used Cascadian Farms Oats cereal instead of oats and added cinnamon. Deeeeeeeelicious!!
I have been baking these granola bars for over a year now and I never get sick of them! I have shared the recipe with so many friends and family members that they have taken on a life of themselves. Thank you for the basics for which my circle has grown
[...] I did it today. I looked at several recipes, but I liked the one at Joyful Abode because it contains no corn syrup, eggs, or baking soda. I had most of the ingredients laying [...]
Thank you so much for such a fantastic recipe. I’ve been wanting to make my own granola/energy bars for years but have been a little lazy. With the discovery of GMO products being in my usual brand of granola bars and a gift of homemade bars, I got off my duff. Your recipe is easy to follow, and I used a combination of nuts (almond, sesame seeds, pumpkin seeds) and dried fruit (raisins, cherries, dates) that I had laying around the house. I just tried them, and they are great! Thanks again.
Oh, and I also made my own brown sugar by using fair trade cane sugar and organic molasses.
Sweet Mary these are fabulous.
I can see why some people may have had challenges with them crumbling. You have to take your time ensuring ALL the stuff is coated with the honey-glue AND you also have to make sure you are making these bars thick enough…too thin and all the coating in the world will not allow them to stick together.
My method yielded me 16 decent sized bars, although I can probably stretch it to 20. This is the first time I made them, and I used dark brown sugar and Old Fashioned (not quick cook) oats; I will probably stick with that combo as I like how it came out and the whole dried cranberries really brought it over the top.
This is going to be easy and fun to experiment with. Thanks so much for this fantastic recipe!!
I just made these, and they’re sitting in the pan cooling right now. It all smelled SO good and I tasted a little bit of the warm mixture… I have a new go-to granola bar recipe. It was wonderful! I did make a few changes according to item prices and my preferences. Instead of wheat germ, I used ground flax seed as I already had some on hand. Wheat germ here is also over $4, and I didn’t want to spend that. I substituted almonds (unsalted, coarsely chopped) for the peanuts, and the flavor they get from being toasted is really what makes these so good! For my brown sugar, I used homemade which took 5 minutes to whip up and it’s also very flavorful. (1 cup of regular sugar and 1-2 Tbl molasses, for anyone that’s curious. Just whisk it together until it’s clump free!) My final alteration was just 2 Tbl natural peanut butter and then 2 Tbl regular margarine instead of all butter. Craisins were my fruit of choice, too. Oh, and I left out the salt. I’ll definitely be making these often!
I’ve made these several times and love them. The first time they worked out great but each subsequent time, they fell apart unless I kept them refrigerated. This time I replaced the butter with oil and put a book and a 15-lb weight on them when they were cooling. I like the flavor better (and I generally like butter) and they’re holding together!
Instead of regular butter, try using mana coconut butter, great texture and added coconut flavour. I also opted out of wheat germ and replaced it with flax seed powder.
These granola bars are super easy to make make a great (healthy) snack for when your on outdoor adventures. yumm
Just finished wrapping these, such a strength of will not to just eat them all!! I swapped out wheat germ for wheat flakes, guessed amounts and used cinnamon and masses of fruit, and its so good!! Cant wait to show them off tomorrow at work!!
I stumbled upon your blog searching for homemade granola recipes – for the same reasons you cited! I just finished making yours – varied the peanuts to cashews and the van. extract to almond extract (because that’s what was on hand). AMAZING! So good. Thanks so much!
I just made your granola bar recipe and would like to ask about decreasing the honey. I love the recipe but find it a little too sweet. What is a substitute for honey? Or, could I mix honey, gava, brown rice syrup, or others to help with the glue?
This is a wonderful recipe and I can see so many different possibilities when substituting different ingredients for variety but I’m not quite sure how to change the glue!
Thanks,
Lynn
Thank you SO much for this recipe. I just made them and they came out awesome! I will need to let them set longer next time though, so they don’t crumble as much. But I just couldn’t wait to try them
Thanks again!
I was wondering if I could make these without the fruit and they’d still stick together. For myself, I love the recipe and will make it for me. But I want to make some for my grandkids’ school lunches and they don’t care for dried fruit (yet). Thanks.
My boys are not fond of dried fruit either. I added dairy-free chocolate chips with good results.
[...] search led me to Joyful Abode. I liked the basis of her Homemade Granola Bar Recipe. I just tweaked her recipe to meet our [...]
Hey master, i have tried it out but there are some stuff in the ingredients that i can not find in my place. Can I replace vanilla with something else?
I think this is going to turn out really good, i am doing food and nutrition at GCSE and i’m thinking about using this recipe, its just what I’ve been looking for!
These are delicious and easy to make. Thanks so much.
PS to print the recipe, copy and paste the text into Word first. I even did the picture!
How long do these keep for and would they still stick together if you cut down the sugar content?
I’ve cut the brown sugar back to a 1/4 cup with half the butter and they still hold up as long as you really press them down!
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These sound great. One problem. How do I print it? I can’t take my desktop computer into my kitchen.
[...] Make it YoursRecipe Shed Meme – 5 ingredients or lessa FREE e-cookbook [5 ingredientsHomemade Granola Bar Recipe – (No high fructose corn syrup in these bars!) var _gaq = _gaq || []; _gaq.push(['_setAccount', 'UA-10699154-37']); [...]
Hello
I did this change that I want share with you guys in order to have the Super Healthy Granola Bars. As you may know, sugar has a lot of chemicals involved in process ( the browm sugar too), so I decided to change it to Panela (sugar cane juice extract) difficult to get it in the states, but if you have a Colombian store near you, you will find it there. This powder, doesn’t have any chemical and has all the benefits and more than regural sugar.
Hello
I did this change that I want share with you guys in order to have the Super Healthy Granola Bars. As you may know, sugar has a lot of chemicals involved in process ( the browm sugar too), so I decided to change it to Panela (sugar cane juice extract) difficult to get it in the states, but if you have a Colombian store near you, you will find it there. This poweder, doesn’t have any chemical and has all the benefits and more than regural sugar.
Thank you so much for this recipe! I was looking around for an easy-to-make, yet healthy, granola bar and think I have found it! I always read through comments on recipe websites. Once I saw that people added less sugar, less butter, I definitely did the same. Let me tell you, with adding less, they are still so sweet! It’s not a bad thing since it gets my man to eat them, but I definitely have been adding less butter and less sugar each time I make these. Awesome!!
I made these first using the exact recipe but found them too sweet. This time I left out the sugar, but they don’t want to stay together. Any suggestions?
These look good! Any recommendations for people who can’t eat wheat? I am not sure what to substitute for wheat germ.
My question is what is the purpose of having wheat germ in this recipe?
[...] dairy. Not easy to find. Many, many recipes use that condensed milk combo. I finally found one at Joyful Abode called Homemade Granola Bars. The syrup that holds these bars together is dairy free – and [...]
Hi, I love your recipe and your directions and pictures are great. But sometimes you just need to buy some really healthy all-natural nutrition bars that are made of real fruits, grains, nuts, seeds with no preservatives, additives or sweeteners. they sell a terrific selection at enutritionbars.com and their prices are reasonable.
Hi, I love your recipe and your directions and pictures are great. But sometimes you just need to buy some really healthy all-natural nutrition bars that are made of real fruits, grains, nuts, seeds with no preservatives, additives or sweeteners. they sell a terrific selection at enutritionbars.com and they discount the prices.
[...] came across this recipe a year or so ago thanks to the Joyful Abode. Since then, I’ve made it numerous times and shared them with several people. These granola [...]
[...] came across this recipe a year or so ago thanks to Joyful Abode. Since then, I’ve made it numerous times and shared it with several people. These granola [...]
I am excited to try your recipe! I have a granola recipe adapted from Prevention magazine in the 1970′s. I use 1/4 cup of honey, 1 tsp vanilla, and 1/4 cup canola oil to about 5-6 cups of dry ingredients, so I question the need for the sugar and butter. I would strongly suggest adding 1 T of cinnamon!
I’m still waiting for these to finish cooling but if they taste as good as my kitchen smelled while making them this is going to be my new favorite recipe! I didn’t have peanuts so I did 1/2 cup of flax seeds instead. I also used only 1/2 cup of brown sugar and for the honey I did a mixture of 1/4 cup honey and 1/4 cup light agave nectar. I also had about a 1/4 bag of chocolate chips lying around so I threw those in mix too and used a bag of mixed fruit containing dried blueberries, cherries, cranberries and golden raisins. This recipe was super easy I am so glad I stumbled upon it!
These granola bars are fabulous! I followed the recipe as written except used almonds, instead of peanuts, added unsweetened coconut flakes, also ground flax seed for some of the wheat germ. Fun to try different nut/fruit combinations. Chewy, satisfying and not too sweet…definitely worth the effort. My boyfriend begs me to make these for him to take to work for a snack. Thanks for a great recipe..definitely a keeper!
This recepe is excellent. I prepared so many bathces. I used almonds,and pistachios instead of peanuts, reduce amount of butter, and sugar, remove salt(no salt). Added ground flaxseeds, black sesame seeds. For the fruits I used dates, cranbery, and cherry. It is very easy to prepare. It is healthy, less sugar, no salt, less butter.
These are amazing! I’ve made several batches in the past few weeks and have shared the recipe countless times. My favorite so far is chocolate cherry with almonds, but I also really like the recipe with macadamia nuts, papaya, mango, coconut (toasted along with the rest of the dry ingredients), and pineapple. Thanks for sharing!
These things are my crack! My husband and I both love them. Awesome recipe!
Emily,
Thanks for this recipe. I made them one morning and subbed agave for honey and toasted sesame seeds for peanuts. They were a hit here and at my son’s daycare!
And if the folklore is true, the oats did great things for my milk supply!
[...] No High Fructose Corn Syrup Granola Bars – double batch [...]
those look so good. i just made some using my own recipe. i took a few packets of oatmeal and mixed it with a package of pumkin flax seed granola. added in some nuts and toasted coconut. then to glue it together mixed in some nutela and maple syrup. they are so yummy.
These were wonderful! I had to substitute some ingredients due to what I did and did not have in the cupboards, but I kept the same proportion of wet to dry ingredients. Delicious!
I really like this recipe, it tastes great! I did have a problem with the wax paper though…I don’t see anyone else posting this so I don’t know if I did something wrong. When trying to get the wax paper off after it cooled for a couple of hours it wanted to stick really back. Didn’t get all of it off of some of it. Did I do something wrong?
I use parchment paper….never sticks.
Very yummie and very easy to follow!
thnks