Happy Monday, everyone! I hope you all had a lovely weekend, I know I did! One of my best friends Meg came to visit from Vermont on Friday night. Like always, we ended up spending a great deal of time eating and cooking, which is how we ended up with these delicious imitation Chewy bars. These bad boys took all of ten minutes to whip together and are insanely good. Take my word for it and add these to your menu this week.
The glue of these bars are dates, nature’s oh-so-scrumptious candy. After a few pulses in a food processor it becomes the sweet and chewy binding for the rest of the ingredients. Dates have become my favorite natural sweetener and I will often eat them as a dessert on the nights I am craving something sugary.
Once these chocolate chewy bars have been pressed into your baking tin, the key is to put them in the freezer. This helps the ingredients to stiffen together and harden the drizzled chocolate. We used Lily’s Dark Chocolate for this recipe. This brand has become my go-to baking chocolate and was the perfect compliment to the chopped pecans and almonds.
Meg's Chocolate Chewy Bars
Ingredients:
- 12 pitted dates
- 3 tbsp almond butter
- 1 tbsp agave nectar (or maple syrup or honey)
- 1/2 cup rolled oats
- 4.5 tsp chia seeds
- 2 oz dark chocolate (plus more for drizzling)
- 1/4 cup chopped pecans
- 1/4 cup chopped almonds
Directions:
- Blend dates evenly in a food processor until they form a paste. They should roll into a ball when ready.
- Remove the dates and add the nuts, pulsing until they meet your desired size.
- Add the dates and the rest of the ingredients, blending until fully combined. Be sure to use a spoon or silicone spatula to push the mixture down from the sides of the food processor.
- Line a 9″ x 9″ (or any smaller size) baking tin with parchment paper and press the mixture evenly throughout the pan. Make sure to press evenly into each corner.
- Place the bars in the freezer for 10-20 minutes then cut into bars with a knife. Drizzle some melted chocolate and top with optional shaved coconut. Store in an air tight container for up to 2 weeks in the freezer. Enjoy!
And there you have it! Shoutout to Meg for sharing this recipe with me, we ate half the pan before the weekend was over. She made these a few weeks ago before running in a Spartan Race and said they were the only thing that got her through the course. Give them a try and let us know what you think down below!
Until next time…
