Family Fun No-Bake Chewy Granola Bars

My family loves to snack. A couple of years back I tried reducing the amount of snacks that I had in the house and all that ended up resulting was my husband going to the mini-mart multiple times a week. So, since that didn't work out so effectively I decided to try to make as many snacks as I could from scratch, instead of relying solely on pre-packaged alternatives. I have tried many snack recipes since that time, some have been great, some less than stellar. Nevertheless I keep trying out new snack options to see which ones stick. The September issue of Family Fun magazine had a recipe for No-Bake Chewy Granola Bars using cashew butter, which looked like a delicious change of pace from my normal granola bar recipes.

This recipe has 7 ingredients. It makes 24 bars and takes approximately 75 minutes, 15 minutes of which is active. Most of the ingredients for this recipe I already had in my pantry cupboard, with the exception of cashew butter, which I was able to find in the organic section of my local grocery store. I had never bought cashew butter for my family before this recipe and my husband and two-year-old absolutely feel in love with it. I did notice a few things with the recipe. My finished granola bars were still very sticky after cooling for an hour, so I placed them in the fridge to firm. After sitting in the fridge the texture was much better, but different than the photograph in the magazine. I'm guessing that the granola cereal that I bought might have had a different texture than the one photographed for the article. I followed the recipe as stated stated, with no modifications.

My two boys thoroughly enjoyed these granola bars and have eaten almost the whole batch since I made them yesterday. My husband liked the taste of the cashew butter, but is not a fan of light corn syrup and would have preferred honey instead. I thought that this recipe was very easy and it was nice discovering that my family likes cashew butter. If cashew butter is unavailable in your area, or to save money peanut butter could also be substituted. Overall, a tasty and easy granola bar recipe.

For the recipe go to No-Bake Chewy Granola Bars.