Granola Bars

My family loooves granola bars. My son would go through a whole box of the store bought ones in, like, 3 days if I don't watch him. My husband is a big fan of them for breakfast. However, I don't particularly like the store bought ones. I nearly fell over when the "New Recipe, Same Taste!" announcement on the trusty brand I'd been buying for over a year turned out to be an extra billion (give or take a few) grams of sugar.Which made me stop buying them. But my son (and husband) missed them. So I started searching for homemade granola bars recipes, and after finding several, I came up with these. I love that the sugar content is low(ish), and how interchangeable they are. You can make them more of a sweet treat by adding chocolate chips, or go a bit healthier breakfast bar sort with dried fruit. These turn out chewy and thick, and just yummy.

Ingredients

1 cup rolled oats
2 cups puffed rice cereal
1/3 cup honey
2 Tbsp. brown sugar
2 Tbsp. peanut butter
2 Tbsp. butter
1 Tbsp. vanilla
Pinch of salt
1 1/2 cups chocolate chips, peanut butter chips, or dried fruit-or a combination. It's your choice!

Directions

1. Heat oven to 350 degrees. Lightly grease a 9 inch baking dish.

2. Combine rolled oats and puffed rice cereal. Spread in an even layer on a rimmed cooking sheet, toast int he oven for about 10-15 minutes. Remove from oven and set aside.

3. Combine honey, brown sugar, butter, peanut butter, vanilla, and salt in a small sauce pan over medium heat. Cook until mixture is smooth, about five minutes.

4. Mix oat mixture and honey mixture together in a large bowl. Pour into prepared pan. Mix in chips or dried fruit gently. Press mixture firmly into pan, so that the surface is flat. Cover and refrigerate about 1 hour.

5. Cut the granola bars into strips and wrap them individually with plastic wrap. Store wrapped bars together in a gallon plastic bag.

The granola bars can be stored, unrefrigerated, for about two weeks. If they last that long.