I am always looking for different easy breakfast options. Since I don’t eat processed and packaged foods, breakfast can be tough sometimes if I don’t feel like eggs, a smoothie or fresh fruit and yogurt. If I don’t plan ahead and have some homemade baked goods or some fresh bread to toast up, my options can be a bit limited since I don’t eat most cereals and I never eat packaged cereal bars or things of that nature. I came across a great post on The Kitchn in January that featured “10 Vegan Breakfast Ideas“, though some of the recipes contain things I can’t eat, the first post was about breakfast bars and it had a link to two different recipes. The one that caught my eye was for Gluten Free Breakfast Bars, another great recipe from Elana’s Pantry. They looked incredible and surprisingly I had every last ingredient on hand in my pantry and I always do. This made me so excited since besides muffins, if these turned out as good as I had imagined they would, I knew this gave me another great breakfast option and additionally another great travel breakfast item.

Sure enough, these were just as incredible as I had imagined. I changed up the recipe slightly by substituting dried cranberries for the raisins and adding ground cinnamon and fresh ground nutmeg. I couldn’t resist adding the spices and they were just perfect in there. The crunch from the nuts and seeds was so perfect. The original recipe mentions just using the seeds and nuts raw, untoasted since that made it even easier, so that is what I did. They still had a perfect nutty crunch.

It should be noted that after I let the pan cool for a while and went to cut in, the pieces came out very easily but were a tad bit crumbly. I decided to put plastic wrap over the pan and refrigerate the rest. When I cut the remaining bars the following day, they stayed together much better and were far less crumbly. After spending a little time on Elana’s blog I am learning there are lots of different almond flours available and a lot of people prefer buying online to get the right one, so I am curious if a different almond flour changes the way the bar is held together. I will have to experiment with that. Another note on this recipe is that wherever I can in recipes I buy organic ingredients. Many of the items in these bars are organic, I just thought it may be a bit redundant to continuously post that.

Gluten Free Breakfast Bars
adapted from Elana’s Pantry
Makes 12-16 bars

1 1/4 cup blanched almond flour
1/4 teaspoon celtic sea salt
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon fresh ground nutmeg
1/4 cup grapeseed oil
1/4 cup agave nectar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 cup shredded coconut
1/2 cup pumpkin seeds
½ cup sunflower seeds
¼ cup almond slivers
¼ cup dried cranberries, unsweetened

Preheat  oven to 350º.

In a small bowl, combine almond flour, salt, baking soda, cinnamon and nutmeg. In a large bowl, combine grapeseed oil, agave and vanilla.
Stir dry ingredients into wet. Mix in coconut, pumpkin seeds, sunflower seeds, almond slivers and cranberries.
Grease an 8×8 baking dish with grapeseed oil. Press the dough into the baking dish, wetting your hands with water to help pat the dough down evenly.
Bake for 20 minutes.

Allow to cool completely before cutting. I found they were a bit crumbly even after cooling, so I allowed it to cool overnight in the fridge and then cut the pieces, it held together much better.

* None of the nuts and seeds in this recipe are toasted.  This keeps it easy and fast, you could certainly toast them if you wish, it’s just an extra step before you start.