I won!!! I won!!!! -- EVERYONE loves chocolate energy bars

Upaya Naturals Contest Winners


For a couple of years I have been making various versions of energy squares -- nutritionally dense combinations of raw ingredients that make perfectly snackable and awesomely delicious results.

The combination of such things as dates, raw nuts, and raw cacao means there's nothing in there a little kid shouldn't eat, and he's getting all kinds of good stuff to fuel his body and his brain.

One of my favourite online sources for high quality ingredients is upayanaturals.com, which is based out of Barrie, but has a local pick up in Toronto. They carry almost exclusively organic raw and natural ingredients such as raw almonds, sunflower seeds, pumpin seeds etc at truly excellent prices. Every month Upaya Naturals holds a contest to create a raw vegan recipe using ingredients they sell. When the ingredient was Raw Cacao, I decided to submit Zephyr's Favourite Energy Bars. And guess what? I won!! If you haven't tried these goodies, please check 'em out. My own favourite energy bars are the fruity superfood ones with goji berries and golden berries, but if you are a chocolate lover, the other ones may be your cup of tea. Ooh, and the chocolate peanut butter ones. Oh, and the chocolate and peppermint or chocolate and orange ones ... oh boy!! At any rate, I now have a shiny gift-certificate to spend on more ingredients, which will definitely lead to more recipes .... so, prepare to be annoyed.


Zephyr's Favourite Chocolate Energy Bars

Chocolate Energy Bars for School

Fruity Superfood Energy Bars

Chocolate and Peanut Butter Energy Bars

Superfood Energy Bars for School

New Superfood Energy Bars -- berries and peanut butter

I have a slightly embarrassing addiction to peanut butter. This flavour combination of peanut butter with goji berries and golden berries is aces. It's like they are dirty dancing or something.


ingredients:

1 cup raw almonds -- the really unpasteurized kind from Spain or somewhere like that

1 cup raw pumpkin seeds

1 cup shredded coconut

1/4 cup black sesame seeds

1/4 cup flax meal

1/4 cup wheat grass

1 tbsp ground vanilla bean

1/2 tsp sea salt

1 cup pitted honey dates

1/2 cup goji berries

1/2 cup golden berries

1/4 cup extra virgin coconut oil

1/2 cup organic peanut butter (or almond butter, coconut butter, cashew butter, whatever you like nut butter)

directions:

1. in a food processor, combine the raw almonds, pumpkin seeds, shredded coconut, sesame seeds, flax meal, wheat grass, vanilla bean, and sea salt

2. turn on and process until it resembles sand

3. add the dates, goji berries, and golden berries and pulse and then process until ground up

4. add the coconut oil, and pulse

5. add the peanut butter, and pulse

6. divide between 2 square silicone pans, score into pieces, and freeze

7. when fully chilled, break along the score lines, and store in airtight containers in the fridge.

Power Bars -- Power to the People

RAW SUPERFOOD 'POWER' BARS

I realized I had many ingredients on hand that seem to fall into the category of 'superfood' -- that would be food that packs a real nutritional punch. I thought it would be fun to throw a bunch of stuff into the food processor and see what came out the other side. We're on our third batch this week, so needless to say, they seem to be very popular in our house. They are a little high in sugar because of the raisins and dates, but they go down easy, are packed with protein (and fiber, both of which help regulate blood sugar levels), phytonutrients, and deliciousness, and are very quick and easy to make.

ingredients:

1/2 cup organic flame raisins (but any kind of seedless raisins would be pretty much equivalent)

1/2 cup pitted honey dates (that means the pit has already been removed, unlike seeded grapes which mean the grapes have seeds. go figure.)

2 tbsp extra virgin coconut oil

1/4 to 1/2 tsp sea salt (some salts are 'saltier' than others, some tongues like salt more than others)

1 tbsp cinnamon

1/2 cup pecan meal

1/2 cup blanched almond meal

1/2 cup raw cashews

1/4 cup flax seeds, finely ground (aka linseeds)

2 tbsp salba seeds, whole or ground (aka chia seeds)

2 tbsp maca root powder (they now sell this at bulk barn)

2 tbsp hemp protein powder

2 tbsp raw cacao powder (or cocoa powder)

1 tbsp acai powder

1. using a food processor, puree the raisins and dates (check for random pits before throwing the dates in the food processor)

2. add nuts, seeds, salt, and cinamon, and whirl.

3. add maca, hemp powder, cacao or cocoa, and acai, and mix

4. add coconut oil

pulse until everything is finely and even chopped, and can easily be encouraged to clump together. Press the mixture into a square pan and chill it in the fridge for a couple of hours.

I cut it into 32 pieces and then put them into an airtight container in the fridge. They store well. Who am I kidding? They never last long enough to worry about it.

If you want to skip the maca, hemp, or acai, add the equivalent in extra cocoa, or almond meal.

If you want to use only raisins or only dates, substitute the one for the other. Apricots would probably work too, but stick to unsulphured ones. Hmm. Pistachio and apricot next time?

You can safely skip the salba without affecting the texture enough to worry.

Other nuts are fine to try, although some hard ones (eg whole almonds) can be tricky to work with.

Yummy. My 2 1/2 year old son seems to be in love with them. Then again, he's also been known to pick up the occasional cigarette butt in the park and put that in his mouth.