Vegan Energy Bars

Jeff and I have just started training for a 5-mile race that I've been running in since 2008. This actually entails quite a lot of running, and as we eat breakfast before running and lunch at the typical noon hour, we are left pretty hungry in the intervening hours. Instead of buying individually plastic wrapped processed bars, I decided to try my hand at making my own energy bars.

I was surprised at how hard it was to make these, because most of the recipes online call for nuts (which I can't eat because of my braces) or peanut butter (which I don't eat because I don't like it). A lot of recipes called for corn syrup, which I find to be icky, or lots of coconut oil. So I decided I had better invent my own recipe, hoping that the end product would be soft enough to be braces-friendly, delicious enough to eat and filling enough to hold us over until lunch.

Fortunately, the resulting product did live up to all of my exacting requirements! Here's the recipe for you to try out at home:

Vegan Energy Bars
Yields 12 bars

1 cup dates, pitted
1 cup oatmeal (uncooked)
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 cup dried cherries (or dried fruit of your choice)
1 tsp cinnamon
2 tbsp maple syrup
2 tbsp water

1. Preheat oven to 350^oF.
2. Chop the dates as fine as you can, or process them in your food processor. (Mine pretty much just laughed at me and refused to chop the dates at all.)
3. Process or mix together the dates with the oatmeal, vanilla, cinnamon and maple syrup.
4. In a medium sized mixing bowl, mix together the above with coarsely chopped dried cherries and water.
5. Spread this mixture evenly into a foil-lined 8x8 baking dish.
6. Bake at 350 for 15 minutes.
7. Allow to cool completely until cutting into bars. Store in an airtight container in the fridge.