Travel Snacks: Fruit and Nut Bars
Busy kids, busy moms: we’re all on the go these days and often eat on the go, too. Back in San Francisco, I had access to a wide variety of affordable and healthy prepackaged snack options, often low in sugar, preservative-free, and/or organic. In Switzerland, the selection of this type of packaged food is much smaller and more expensive, making them more of a luxury treat than an everyday snack. Happily, some of these healthy snacks can be easily replicated at home.
One homemade snack that travels well is a copycat LäraBar, a popular fruit/nut snack bar in America. It can be made with as few as two ingredients (dried dates and nuts) and takes only a couple of minutes to make using a food processor. It’s a nice alternative to store-bought granola bars, which are usually packed full of sugar and preservatives.
I offer my simple go-to recipe below, but there are dozens of variations of increasing complexity. Of the many websites with Lärabar-knockoff recipes, I can recommend 100 Days of Real Food and Leite’s Culinaria. Feel free to experiment with your own combinations, starting with whatever you find in your pantry.
Fruit and Nut Bars
This recipe makes 12 bars.
Ingredients:
200 g almonds (whole or ground) or other nuts like pecans or hazelnuts
200 g dried dates
100 g dried apricots
Salt to taste
Method:
1. If the fruit is very hard, soak it in hot water for 5 minutes until softened. Drain, then proceed.
2. Place nuts in food processor. If using whole nuts, first process nuts into coarse bits before adding fruit.
3. Add dried fruit and pinch of salt. Process until mixture clumps together. Taste mixture and add more salt if necessary.
4. Line a 20×20-cm pan with plastic wrap. Pat mixture into pan. Cover with more plastic and refrigerate at least 30 minutes.
5. Remove from fridge and cut the mixture into bars. Wrap each bar individually in plastic film. Bars can be left at room temperature but are best stored for longer term in the refrigerator.
By Tanya Deans
Tanya has lived in Zurich for the past eight years, after almost a decade in San Francisco. She hopes her two boys one day appreciate all the good food they’ve been eating (or at least seeing) all these years. She writes the blog Moms: Tots: Zurich, which details family-friendly activities in and around Zurich, particularly hikes and outdoor adventures.
