Chocolate coated oat & nut bar

A raw, refrigerated muesli bar with a hint of fresh citrus. Mix it up by adding whatever nuts and seeds you wish. Probably about the easiest bar recipe I've played with - no need for a food processor...just a large mixing bowl and a hand held kitchen wizz or blender for mixing the wet ingredients.

Dry Ingredients​

• ​​1 cup quick cook oats
• 1/4 cup chopped peanuts
• 1/4 cup ground flax seeds
• 1/4 cup chia seeds
• 1/4 cup pumpkin seeds
• 1/4 cup sunflower seeds
• 1/4 cup sliced/chopped almonds
• 1/4 cup chopped up dark chocolate

Mix all the dry ingredients in a large bowl and set aside.

Wet Ingredients

• 1 cup dates, soaked in water for 20-30 minutes or until soft
• 1/3 cup water that the dates were soaking in
• 1/4 cup coconut oil
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract (or almond essence)
• 1/4 teaspoon fine salt
• 2 tablespoons almond or peanut butter
• 2 tablespoons fresh lemon or lime juice

Place all wet ingredients into a blender (or small bowl if you are using a handheld kitchen wizz) and blend until it forms a nice caramel-like texture.

Mix the wet and dry ingredients together in the large bowl. Press the mixture in a bread loaf tin that has been lined with baking paper. Place in the freezer for around 2 hours. ​

Chocolate Coating

• 1/4 cup cocoa powder
• 1/4 cup maple syrup (or other liquid sweetener such as rice syrup)
• 1/4 cup coconut oil
• 5 drops or essence (choose your flavour - peppermint, orange, almond, vanilla etc)
• salt to taste

Melt coconut oil and mix in the other other ingredients until well combined.

Take the bar mixture out of the freezer, remove the baking paper and slice into bars. Pour the coating mixture into the loaf tin and, one at a time, coat each bar in the chocolate mixture. Place the bars back onto the baking paper and refrigerate until the chocolate coating has become hard (about 15-30 minutes). Cut into smaller pieces if you wish. 

Store in an air tight container in the refrigerator.