Savory Power Bars
These homemade power bars are based on the recipe I published years ago in Super Natural Cooking. The main difference here is I made these savory with toasted walnuts, crumbled kale chips, and oil-cured olives.
Those of you who have been readers for a stretch know how much I love a homemade travel snack. These were based on the recipe I published years ago in Super Natural Cooking (2007!). The main difference here was that I made them savory. They're packed full of toasted walnuts, crumbled kale chips, and oil-cured olives. Super fantastic! And I can actually imagine little architectural cubes of them being right at home on a cheese plate. They're the perfect plane snack, and were very resilient after a long day wrapped in parchment paper in my purse. The saffron and chile flakes were a flavor bonus, but you could substitute whatever spice blend you're inspired by at the moment, and build the bars around that. I posted the recipe below.
More Snack Ideas
- No-bake Energy Bites
- Perfect Stovetop Popcorn (or Turmeric Popcorn)
- Eight Energy Bars
- Kale Chips
- Candied Walnuts
- Toasted Pumpkin Seeds
- Chocolate Energy Bites
- Turmeric Cashews
- Rice Cake Toppings
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Savory Power Bars
A savory take on the DIY Power Bars I developed years ago when writing Super Natural Cooking. They're the perfect plane snack, or, wrapped in parchment.
- 1 tablespoon coconut oil or ghee
- 1 1/4 cups rolled oats
- 1/2 cup kale chips crumbled
- 1/2 cup chopped oil-cured olives
- 1 cup chopped toasted walnuts
- 1 1/2 cups unsweetened crisp brown rice cereal
- 1 cup brown rice syrup
- pinch of saffron (optional)
- pinch of dried chile flakes (optional)
- scant 1/2 teaspoon fine-grain sea salt
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Grease a baking pan with the coconut oil or ghee. If you like thick power bars, opt for an 8 by 8-inch pan (or smaller); for thinner bars, use a 9 by 13-inch pan. Mix the oats, kale chips, olives, walnuts, and rice cereal together in a large bowl and set aside. Combine the rice syrup, saffron, chile flakes, and salt in a small saucepan over medium heat and stir constantly as it comes to a boil and thickens just a bit, about 4 minutes. Pour over the oat mixture and stir until the syrup is evenly incorporated.
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Spread into the prepared pan and cool to room temperature, pressing down on the surface of the bars to compress them a bit about half way through cooling, before cutting into whatever size bars you desire.
Makes 16.
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Comments
Hi! I’ve long wanted more options for savory bars and these look delicious. Think they’d freeze well?
Not sure actually. But please let everyone know if you try.
Hi Heidi! I want to try making these bars in the next couple of days, but do you think I could use maple syrup instead of brown rice syrup? I know it’s sweeter so I was going to use less of it, but don’t want to mess up the recipe if the flavor is completely wrong. What do you think? Thank you so much!
I think you’ll likely be fine, and yes, use a bit less. And please report back. I feel like I’ve don’t this before, w/out trouble, but don’t have it in my notes.
Is there a way to omit the rice syrup for a sugar free version?
Hi Christine – I think you’d have to re-think the recipe from the ground up. Apologies!
Hi Heidi, Yum! I will be making these today. Any suggestions for a substitute for the kale chips? Love your blog, recipes and ideas. Cheers, Wendy
Hi Wendy, you can leave them out entirely!
Wow that’s different, love your creativity!
Brilliant! Do they come out on the chewy or side? Do you think that making the thinner variety and baking them may crisp them? Either way, thanks!
Hi Pepper – they’re a similar consistency to rice crispy treats. You can firm them up more by pressing them into the pan as much or as little as you like as they cool. They’re never going to get snappy, but you can impact density.
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