Home Made Granola Bars - YUM!

I saw this recipe on Pinterest last week and it instantly took me back to the child hood days of Quaker Granola bars. Don't they look just like them? I was immediately interested because of how easy the recipe sounded and looked! Here is the link to the recipe I tried initially. I have since tweaked it and love the results!

Here is the initial recipe:
No-Bake Chocolate Chip Granola Bars
adapted from Rachael Ray
Ingredients:
1/4 cup butter
1/4 cup honey
1/3 cup packed brown sugar
2 cups quick cooking oats {not rolled oats!}
1 cup crispy rice cereal
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
2 tablespoons mini chocolate chips
Directions:
In a large bowl, stir oats and rice cereal together. Set aside. In a small pot, melt butter, honey and brown sugar together over medium high heat until it comes to a bubble. Reduce the heat and cook 2 minutes. Pour in vanilla and stir. Pour over dry ingredients and mix well to moisten all ingredients. Pour into lightly greased small jelly roll pan {about 12x8x1} and press out to be about 3/4 inch in thickness. {If your pan isn’t small enough, pack the mixture into one side. You really want to press them down so they stick together.} Sprinkle with mini chocolate chips and press down lightly. Cool on a counter top to room temperature for two hours or until the chocolate chips are set before cutting into bars. Wrap in parchment or plastic wrap and store at room temperature.

The first night I made these last week I stuck to the recipe exactly. And the bars were so good. But they didn't hold together very well. I ended up putting them in the fridge and they held together nicely and didn't get too hard at all. My kids loved them!

I made the bars again tonight and did a double batch this time. The single recipe just doesn't make a very large quantity. I completely forgot to add the vanilla, I even had it on the counter and still forgot. And I added a half cup of peanut butter to the butter, brown sugar and honey. The bars held together so much better and they were delicious. Our little guy did not want to stop eating them!

This recipe to so easy to alter and I think we will try lots of variations. I have two friends who have made different variations in the last week. Lisa didn't use honey because she was making it baby friendly for her little one. She used Trader Joe's mango butter instead and she substituted yogurt covered raisins for the chocolate chips. Another friend eliminated the butter completely and used peanut butter instead and added craisins on top. Both turned out great!

Happy No Baking! :)