No-Bake Granola Bars

This Homemade No-Bake Granola Bars recipe is basically the homemade heathier version of your favorite store-bought granola bars. Homemade Granola Bars are a perfect portable morning or afternoon snack- great for lunch boxes, road trips, or outdoor picnics!

What I love the most about this No-Bake Granola Bars recipe is that I always have the ingredients available in my pantry. These granola bars are also versatile, with tons of options to add any other ingredient that you’d like!  It took me a few tries to get the recipe right, the third was a charm! They came out super soft, chewy and yummy!

This healthy snack bars recipe makes a wonderful breakfast. It also stores beautifully, so it makes a great homemade gift.

Once you try homemade no-bake granola bars, you won’t go back to store-bought granola bars. It’s so much better!

No-Bake Granola Bars Recipe Ingredients

You need these basic ingredients to make this homemade granola bar recipe:

(Exact measurements at the end of this post)

Oats: healthy, whole-grain old-fashioned oats helps keep these bars hold a shape. Be sure to use certified gluten-free oats if you need gluten-free granola bars.

Nuts & seeds: I used whole almonds, and roasted sunflower seeds. But you can also try, walnuts, pecans, cashews, peanuts, pistachios, macadamia nuts or pumpkin seeds.

Peanut butter (or sunflower butter for nut free).

Rice Cereal: Rice Krispies cereal is the best!

Honey: Natural sweetener

Brown sugar

Dried fruits: Dried fruit lends some extra sweetness, chewy texture and irresistible fruity flavor. I used dried raisons for these homemade bars. You can also add dried cranberries, cherries or apricots.

Mini chocolate chips 

Salt

Vanilla extract

How to Make Homemade Healthy Granola Bars:

1. In a large skillet, over medium heat, heat the butter, brown sugar, and honey. 
2. Remover from heat and add the peanut butter, vanilla extract and peanut butter. 
3. Mix until everything is coated.
4. Add the oats, rice cereal, raisins, almonds and sunflower seeds, and stir to combine.
5. Place the mixture into a parchment lined 8×8 baking pan, and press down firmly.
6. Sprinkle in the mini chocolate chips.
7. Set in the fridge for a at least 1 hour before slicing into bars.

These are the best granola bars, they’re:

HOW DO YOU GET GRANOLA BARS TO STICK TOGETHER?

Here are my top tips for getting granola bars to not fall apart (the worst!):

1. Don’t over measure your oats, nuts, and rice cereal. If you measure the dry ingredients too generously the granola bars won’t stick together because they won’t be enough liquid ingredients to “glue” them together. Don’t throw off the dry to wet ratio with heavy-handed measuring.
2. Let the honey, butter, brown sugar mixture boil for one minute. That helps the sugar to caramelize just a little and it makes everything stick together better.
3. Press the bars into the pan very firmly. I normally will grease the bottom of a glass cup or measuring up and use it to stamp down the mixture in the pan.

More Healthy Dessert Recipes:

Coconut Date Bars

Healthy Peanut Butter Cups

These Healthy Homemade No-Bake Granola Bars are not only easy to make, but also guilt-free to eat. Let me know how it turned out for you! Leave a comment below and share a picture on Instagram with the hashtag #thesaltandsweetkitchen or on my Facebook group! 

No-Bake Granola Bars Recipe