Kind of like Kind Bars

These are pretty amazing nut bars that are very delicious. Requires a bit of effort but the end result is worth it. I made them thick but for a thinner bar, use a larger baking tin, maybe somewhere between an 8 inch X 8 inch and a 9 inch X 13 inch. 9x11 is perfect! The recipe is very flexible in that you can use the nut mixture of your choice, even adding a few chocolate chips or butterscotch morsels as well. The Rice Syrup is the constant as it is an integral part of the "glue" that holds the bar together. Other syrups do not substitute well.If you like the bars to be sweeter, add another tablespoon or two of rice syrup.

½ cup raw, unsalted Almonds, cut in half

1 cup of more coarsely chopped Almonds (a quick pulse in a food processor does this)

1 ½ cups coarsely chopped walnuts

½ cup unsalted Sunflower seeds

¾ cup shelled, unsalted pumpkin seeds

½ cup sesame seeds (you can substitute a puffed cereal like quinoa, millet for this. Puffed wheat grains are too big)

¼ cup Flax Seed meal

1 tablespoon Oat Bran cereal

2 tablespoons Flax or Chia Seeds (your preference)

½ cup Old Fashioned Oats

3 tablespoons oil of your choosing (vegetable, coconut, olive, grapeseed etc)

4 tablespoons rice syrup (you can also use Barley Malt syrup but that gives a stronger, more distinctive taste

“Glue” Mixture

1 cup dried cranberries

2 tablespoons rice syrup (I sometimes add a tablespoon of molasses too if I want a darker bar)

2 tablespoons of oil of your choosing

1 teaspoon cinnamon

½ teaspoon salt 1 teaspoon of vanilla

Directions

1.      Preheat oven to 300 degrees Fahrenheit. Cut a square of parchment paper that is larger than the baking pan or dish that you have selected to use. There must be overhang of the paper on all sides.

2.      Place the more coarsely chopped Almonds in a sieve and pour boiling water over them. Allow to drain completely.

3.      Mix the rice syrup and oil with the nut/seed/oat mixture and spread that over a large baking sheet, again lined with parchment paper (a lot of parchment paper but makes clean up easier). Bake in the oven for about 25 minutes, turning 2-3 times to prevent burning (nuts will do that in a flash, so be careful).

4.      For the “Glue”, combine, cranberries, rice syrup, oil, salt, cinnamon, and vanilla, and pulse in a food processor until it is a smooth paste.

5.      Now comes the “difficult” part, combining the “glue” and the nuts! It’s easy with a wooden spoon but does require a lot of effort as the cranberry mixture has a similar consistency to  a thickset mortar for tiling. It’s also easier if the nuts are still warm from the oven. Try to combine both together so that it looks uniform and there are no “islands” of “glue” remaining in the mixture. You could also use clean hands to do the mixing but that is really “yukky”!

6.      Place the mixture in the parchment lined pan and press down firmly (I use a square of wax paper cut to size and then press the mixture down with that, using my hands to ensure a good compression.

7.      Bake at 250 degrees Fahrenheit for about 30-35 minutes. Let the mixture dry out in the oven until its no longer sticky to touch

8.      Remove from the oven and cut into squares when cool