Healthy, whole ingredients like almonds, dates, and whole grain oats come together in this easy no-bake recipe for Lemon Poppy Seed Energy Bars. Fresh lemon and shredded coconut create bright, delicious flavor. These gluten-free, plant-based vegan bars are kid-friendly and great for a healthy snack.
How to Make Healthy, Plant-Based Energy Bars
Making homemade vegan energy bars is incredibly easy and a great way to ensure that your plant-based snacks are made with nutritious ingredients. Basically, you put all of your ingredients in a food processor, give it a whirl, drizzle in some water until everything clumps together, and you’re ready to go! Once you have the mixture done, you just have to press the bars into a pan, let them set, and then cut them into whatever size you like.
If you like this vegan recipe, you should check out some of my other variations: Peanut Butter and Jelly Chewy Energy Bites, Raw Gluten-Free Trail Mix Energy Bars, Mayan Raw Cacao Chia Energy Balls, and Easy Vegan Chocolate Coconut Oat Balls.
Using High-Quality Ingredients in your Plant-Based Energy Bars
Making homemade plant-based energy bars from scratch means you get to choose high-quality whole foods ingredients for you bars. The premade bars found in the store often contain preservatives and lots of refined sugar — not the best options for optimal health. Rather, by using whole grain oats, dried dates, healthy nuts, and high-quality cocoa powder, you are ensuring whole foods eating.
Chef Katie’s Plant-Based Cooking Tips:
Dates in Place of Sugar: I’m on a mission to get rid of empty calories, like those found in cane sugar, coconut sugar, and brown sugar. For this recipe, whole dates are used to provide natural sweetness. Dates are loaded with fiber which helps your body regulate blood sugar and satiety better than any refined sweetener or syrup
Truly Raw? Almonds sold in the US are pasteurized, for food safety reasons, meaning they aren’t truly “raw”. You can swap them out for raw nuts like brazil nuts, macadamia, or cashews.
Maximum Lemon Flavor: Use the zest of the entire lemon for maximum lemon flavor. A microplane works best for removing the zest without getting any of the bitter parts of the peel.
Lemon Poppy Seed No-Bake Energy Bars
- MediumÂ
- Servings: 24Â
- Ready In: 15 minutes + 1 hour to SetÂ
- Yield: 24 bars
Lemon Poppy Seed No-Bake Energy Bars
Ingredients
- 1 cup Almonds* 4 oz
- 1 ½ cup Dates 300g
- 1 teaspoon Vanilla Extract
- 1 lemon zest (and juice from only half the lemon)
- 2 teaspoons Poppy Seeds
- 1 ½ cup 120g Rolled Oats
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 1 cup 80g shredded Coconut flake, unsweetened
- 2-4 tablespoons water as needed
Instructions
To make the Lemon Poppy Seed Bars:
- In a food processor, combine the almonds and dates. Puree until well-chopped and starting to stick together. This might take a good 1-2 minutes, depending on the dryness of your dates.
- Add the vanilla, lemon zest and juice, poppy seeds, oats, and salt. Puree until the mixture starts to come together. While the food processor is running, stream in 2 tablespoons of water. Remove the lid and feel the bar mix to check the consistency. You want the mixture to be sticky and clump together. If the mixture is too dry, place the lid back on and stream in water, 1 tablespoon at a time, until you reach this consistency. I usually end up using about 4 tablespoons of water. Add in the coconut flake and puree just 2-3 seconds to incorporate.
To press and set your No-Bake bars:
- Line a 9×9 square pan with plastic wrap or parchment paper. Place the bar mixture into the pan and use your fingers to press it all the way to the edges. Cover the top with another layer of plastic or parchment. Place another 9×9 pan on top and weigh it down with a couple of heavy cans.
- Place the pans in a freezer for 1 hour.
- When the bars have set, remove them from the pan. Cut into 24 bars and enjoy!
- Yield: 24 Bars
Nutrition Facts
Serving size: 1/24 of a recipe (1.3 ounces).
Calories 166.27
Calories From Fat (49%) 81.81
Serving size: 1/24 of a recipe (1.3 ounces).
Calories 166.27
- Total Fat 15.44g 24%
- Total Fat 9.78g 15%
- Saturated Fat 6.19g 31%
- Cholesterol 0mg 0%
- Sodium 52.8mg 2%
- Potassium 207.11mg 6%
- Total Carbohydrates 18.43g 6%
- Fiber 4.22g 17%
- Sugar 8.05g
- Protein 3.67g 7%
- Calcium 0.68mg <1%
- Iron 28.23mg 157%
- Vitamin A 1.23IU <1%
- Vitamin C 0mg 0%
Shopping List
- Frontier Natural Products Poppy Seed
- Bob’s Red Mill Gluten Free Organic Old Fashioned Rolled Oats
- Terrasoul Superfoods Organic Shredded Coconut
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