Fruit & Nut Bars - Suma Blogger's Network

Here's my latest post for the Suma Blogger's Network, which also ties in quite nicely with Veganuary. 

I currently buy a certain brand of fruit and nut bars for healthy snacks, but they're very expensive, so I thought I'd have a go at making my own. I've made a couple of different varieties so far, and found you can mix and match the ingredients, so long as you keep the fruit and nut ratio roughly the same. I used my Optimum 9400 blender to get quite a smooth textured bar, but a normal food processor or blender should work, if you're happy with a chunkier texture.

Makes 6 bars

• 75g/3oz cashews
• 50g/2oz dairy-free chocolate or raw chocolate - I used Plamil vegan dark chocolate 
• 100g/4oz dried dates (or 50g/2oz dates plus 50g/2oz raisins) - I used Suma pitted dates
• a dash of cinnamon powder, vanilla/mint extract or orange zest to flavour

Blend the nuts briefly, until ground into a fine powder. Remove from the blender. 
Repeat with the chocolate.
Blend the dates with a little cinnamon/flavouring to taste. Scrape out of the blender.
Combine all of the ingredients in a large bowl. Mix until completely combined into a dough-like consistency.
If the mixture seems very sticky, add more ground nuts, or some unsweetened cocoa powder.

Squeeze together using your hands and place on a sheet of greaseproof paper. Cover with another sheet of paper and roll to approx 1cm thick. Push the edges in with a palette knife to neaten them up.
Chill for 30 mins then cut into 6 bars.
Wrap the individual bars in greaseproof paper and chill until needed, in an airtight box.

Variations: Double the ingredients to make a batch of 12 bars.
Use different combinations of dried fruits and nuts for different flavours and add your choice of flavouring extract. You may need to add more ground nuts, if you use softer dried fruits. If you want to use softer nuts (such as Brazils, walnuts, macadamias or pecans, it's best to mix them half and half with harder nuts such as cashews, hazelnuts or almonds. Toast the nuts gently before grinding for a fuller flavour.
You could also roll the mixture into balls and dust in cocoa powder to make raw, vegan truffles. 

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