Make your own Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Larabars at home with as little as five ingredients – ready to eat in just minutes.
Larabars are one of my go-to travel snacks. They taste delicious, they’re super convenient and, most importantly, they’re made with a handful of simple ingredients like dates, peanuts, cherries, cashews, etc.
Given my love of Larabars, when I saw these baking dates at a Middle Eastern grocery store recently I knew I had to pick them up. Homemade date paste is not difficult to make but if you can find baking dates online or at an international market, I highly recommend picking up a pack.
There are a million and one recipes you could make with date paste but I knew right away I wanted to try making homemade Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Larabars first. With all of the travel I’ve been doing lately, I’ve become quite smitten with these sweet, salty and chewy snack bars.
The entire recipe is just 5 simple ingredients and comes together in just minutes. We like to refrigerate them so that they can harden a bit before slicing.
But sometimes a certain toddler or two isn’t that patient and we eat them right away. And by eat them I mean take off all the chocolate chips first…
Once you get down this recipe you can mix and match the ingredients to create any number of flavors. Dried cherries and raw cashews are next on my list but the options are endless.
What are your favorite travel snacks?? I’m all ears.
No forks required.
Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Bars
Ingredients
- 13 ounce package date paste (store-bought or homemade)
- 1 cup all-natural peanut butter (salted)
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
- ¼ teaspoon salt
- 3 tablespoons chocolate chips
Instructions
- Place date paste, peanut butter, vanilla and salt in a high-speed food processor and pulse until smooth, adding 1-2 tablespoons of water if needed.
- When the mixture forms into one large ball, you know you’re ready to form the bars.
- Spray a 8 1/2″ x 11″ baking dish with cooking spray. Remove the date and nut mixture from the food processor and press into a smooth, even layer in the dish.
- Press the chocolate chips evenly on to the top of the bars before refrigerating until chilled.
- Slice into 16 bars and store in the refrigerator for up to 10 days.
If i don’t have date paste, can i just start with real pitted dates? If so, what amount equates to the amout of date paste in your recipe? Equivalent? Or maybe 1.5 cups dates?
Yes exactly!!