Mmmm, these are so good!

I wanted to make something that could be versatile for me. Something I could have for breakfast alone, or crumbled over oatmeal, as a not-too-sweet dessert, or something to grab as just a snack.

These carrot cake bars work perfectly. Subtly sweet and packed with healthy whole ingredients, they are a great choice anytime!

The center is so soft and chewy, but they hold together nicely like an oatmeal square.

These would be insane with the cinnamon cream cheese spread I made for my apple bars a while back.

What is your go-to snack?

My first recipe for Vegan MoFo!

These. Are. Awesome.

I started out thinking I was going to make an apple version of the date bites I made a while back, but it evolved into something else as I was doing my prep work and I couldn’t be happier with what I came up with instead.

What you’ll need for the bars:

• 1 cup raw almonds
• 1 cup shredded apple (liquid squeezed out)
• 1 cup pitted dates
• 2 tbsp. maple syrup
• 2 tbsp. cinnamon

And for the frosting:

• 4 oz. plain Tofutti “cream cheese”
• approx. 3-4 tbsp. agave nectar
• sprinkle of cinnamon to taste

Start by chopping the almonds.

My food processor wasn’t strong enough to handle this task by itself so I ended up having to pour the almonds out onto a cutting board, chop them by hand, and then return them to the food processor for a final blitzing.

This is the size I stopped at…

Pour that out and set aside.

Next I peeled and cored 2 largish honeycrisp apples.

I used the shredding attachment on my food processor to shred them evenly.  Make sure to remember to take the blade out before you do this or the blade will just annihilate all the shredded apples into applesauce.

Those get squeezed dry in a tea towel and set aside with the almonds.

Next, the dates. I chopped them a bit before adding them to the food processor along with the almonds and apple shreds.

Just add the maple syrup and cinnamon and process until it’s starting to clump together.

This mixture tasted amazing but I felt like it was going to be too wet to form into balls like I originally planned. I could have added more nuts to dry it up some but I really just didn’t want to have to clean the food processor and hand chop a bunch more almonds to make this happen.

Baked bars were going to be the way to go, but I realized that it didn’t have enough of the mixture to really fill even my smallest square baking dish. If you’re planning on making these, I would totally recommend doubling my recipe and baking in a 9×9 dish. I had to improvise though, so I chose to mold the mixture in a small plastic storage container lined with plastic wrap then turn it out onto a baking sheet lined with parchment paper.

It looked like this…

I baked it low and slow at 300 degrees.  20 minutes on one side, flipped it and baked for another 20 minutes.

I then cut it into bars and arranged them on the baking sheet for a last 20 minutes in the oven.

While they were finishing up, I made a quick frosting. I just stuck a bowl with the Toffuti, agave, and cinnamon in the microwave and let it heat on a low setting for just a few seconds to loosen it up.

With a whisking I had this…

I spread it generously on the cooled bars and bit into a delicious treat.

They are really special. I bet they would be insane with shredded carrots and pecans for carrot cake bars!

I think this recipe would work really well in a dehydrator too if you’re into that type of thing.

Awesome start to Vegan Mofo. It even got me to try Tofutti for the first time! I’m excited to see what other new things I’ll get to try as I learn how to further de-meat my eats!