These are a tasty, simple to make, no-bake snack that I found years back when I was searching for healthy treats for Lil. But I probably end up eating as much of them as he does.
You only need 4-5 ingredients:
- 1/2 cup unsweetened coconut flakes
- 12 oz dates, pitted (it’s always worth checking because it’s a pretty common occurrence to have one random pit in a bag that got missed)
- 1/4 cup peanut butter (or other nut butter. I use the natural unsweetened stuff but I don’t see why any sort wouldn’t work.)
- 1/2 cup peanuts (or other nuts – cashews also work really well)
- Optional: 2 tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder
The cocoa powder is a nice touch that balances some of the sweetness of the dates. And if your nuts and nut butter are unsalted, throw a pinch of salt in there too.
Throw everything in a food processor and blend for a good while, until you have a paste consistency. If you pick up a bit of it and smush it, it should want to hold together. If the dates were kinda dried out and not very sticky, you might find it doesn’t want to hold together that well. In those cases, I’ve found that adding a little extra peanut butter helps.
Put into a 9×5 inch pan lined with parchment. (Or really any size pan. It’s just going to change how thick the bars are. But you could even just roll them into balls if you want.) Press very firmly down into the bottom of the dish with your hands or a spatula. Cover and refrigerate for 30 minutes.
Remove from the pan and cut into bars. Best kept in an air-tight container in the fridge. They do fine at room temperature (and are a great snack to take hiking), they can just get a little greasy with the natural peanut butter.
A few years ago we were invited to two New Year’s Eve parties. One party was hosted by vegans and attended primarily by vegans. The other party featured ribs and burgers. (We have varied food friend groups.) Anyway, I made Coconut Date Bars to take along to the first party…except the recipe I used said to roll them individual balls. Mine came out more like a golf ball than like a ping pong ball – they were huge (user error). I was embarrassed to take them to the party, but the vegans loved them and were happy to see them super-sized! They tasted good – but would have been much more attractive had I used your technique!
Great time of year for a tasty no need to run the oven treat.
…before I read the title & realized these were healthy I thought from the picture they might be a thing that used to be made pretty often in my family…but those are basically chocolate, butter, golden syrup & crushed digestive biscuits (biscuits as in cookies but I’d feel daft calling a digestive a cookie)…so…tasty but not exactly the healthy option?
Definitely not healthy but they do sound tasty!