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These are by far my favorite energy bar recipes on the blog! Introducing Nutella-Filled Soft Granola Bars!
You probably know by now that I love snack bars, as you can see with my Healthier Chocolate Candy Bars or these white chocolate macadamia bars. These no-bake granola bars are soft, crispy, and not too sweet, and they are filled with chocolate hazelnut butter!
When I saw that Clif Bar released some nut butter-filled granola bars, I knew I had to make my own version. To be honest, these bars taste even better than the store-bought ones! Nutella lovers: this granola bar is for you!
The crust is chewy and crunchy at the same time, while the inside is soft, chocolatey, and nutty. These soft granola bars are tasty and easy to make, and they are gluten-free and packed with healthy fats to provide lasting energy.
The filling is a simple blend of nut butter and dark chocolate. I used hazelnut butter because hazelnuts and chocolate are a great combo, but you can use any other nut butter. The chocolate is not optional. It helps firm up the filling.
The crust is easy to make. You process the rolled oats, oat flour, and protein powder in a food processor until you get a coarse meal. Then transfer to a bowl and stir in the brown rice syrup, almond butter, and coconut sugar. Brown rice syrup is a thick sweetener and helps bind all ingredients together. You can use coconut nectar, but I don’t recommend maple syrup or agave nectar. The bars would not hold together well.
Then, add in the rice crisps and carefully mix until just combined.
Roll the dough using a pastry roller and cut it into 12 rectangles. Place a tablespoon of chocolate hazelnut butter on half of them and cover with another rectangle of dough, pressing the sides to close the bars.
You can keep the bars at room temperature, but if it’s 86°F like it was when I took the photos, then the inside will be softer. As you can see in the photo below, the filling is a little bit firmer when the bars are kept at the usual room temperature.
If you like clif bars and nutella, you should definitely try these! The bars are chewy, flavorful, and filled with a generous amount of nut butter to keep you full for hours. One bar keeps me full for about 3-4 hours, and they are only 225 calories each!
Let me know if you try these super addicting bars in the comments!
Nutella Filled Soft Granola Bars
Ingredients
Chocolate hazelnut butter
- 2 ounces hazelnut butter or other nut butter
- 4 ounces dark chocolate
Bars
- 1 cup rolled oats
- 1/4 cup oat flour
- 1/4 cup protein powder or PB2, or oat flour
- 1/2 cup brown rice syrup
- 1/4 cup coconut sugar
- 3 tbsp almond butter
- 1 and 1/2 cup rice crisps
- 1 and 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
Instructions
Chocolate hazelnut butter
- Melt the chocolate over a double boiler.
- Remove from heat and mix with the hazelnut butter until well combined.
- Let it cool at room temperature for a few minutes and place the bowl in the refrigerator for at least 2 hours. Once it is firm, remove from the refrigerator and let sit at room temperature, the hazelnut butter will become a little bit softer and easier to work with.
Bars
- Add the rolled oats, oat flour and protein powder to the bowl of a food processor. Process for 3-5 seconds, or until the oats are roughly chopped. Transfer to a mixing bowl.
- In a small pan, combine the brown rice syrup, coconut sugar, and almond butter. Heat on medium heat until everything is well combined and the sugar is dissolved.
- Pour the brown rice mixture over the oats and protein powder. Stir in the vanilla extract and mix using a wooden spoon or spatula until you get a soft and sticky dough.
- Add the rice crisps and mix until they are well incorporated. Do not overmix to keep the crunchy texture.
- Place the dough between two sheets of parchment paper and roll it using a pastry roller. You want to have a really thin layer of dough.
- Cut the dough into 12 rectangles of about 4×2 inches.
- Using your hands, form a small log with the chocolate hazelnut butter (about 1 tbsp). Be careful, if your kitchen is too hot, the hazelnut butter will be really soft. I recommend you keep the chocolate hazelnut butter in your refrigerator if it is the case.
- Add the chocolate hazelnut butter log on top of a rectangle, leaving about 1/4-inch on the sides. Top with another rectangle of dough.
- Carefully press the sides to close bar. Repeat with the next 5 bars.
- Place in the refrigerator for at least 1 hour.
- The bars will keep at room temperature, or in the refrigerator if it’s too hot outside.
Nutrition
About the Author
Thomas Pagot is the founder, photographer, and recipe developer behind Full of Plants. He created the blog in 2016 as a personal cookbook for vegan recipes. Through years of recipe development, Thomas has successfully grown Full of Plants into a trusted resource for plant-based recipes.
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Great recipe, it looks yummy 🙂
can you do a tutorial on how to do them?
It’s now on my long to-do list 🙂
I understand that you are requesting a tutorial on how to make these though, it’s not evident to know how to fill and shape them.
Hooray! Finding your recipe just made my day, or quite possibly my whole week. (In fact, finding your blog did that in general, as of about twenty minutes ago! Vegan Blue Cheese? Yes, please!) I love the Clif bars that are similar to these, but can’t eat some of the ingredients due to food allergies. Your recipe gives me a great starting point for making my own homemade adaptation. Thanks!!
Thanks for your kind words Rachel!
Thanks for the recipe. My family loves it. I made a few changes to accommodate what I had available at the time, but it was great. So easy and very tasty. We love Cliff Bars, but will probably not need to buy them anymore. Thank you so much.
Thank you so much for sharing your recipe! I had found your recipe after searching for a recipe to remake the nut butter-filled Clif bars that were chocolate & peanut butter flavored. I modified your recipe to get that flavor type, and using the ingredients that I had on-hand to swap out some that I didn’t. Anyway, still mostly your recipe, which was AMAZING!
Mods (to make choc peanut butter flavor)
-replaced the protein powder/pb2 with almond flour
-didn’t use oat flour, swapped in cocoa powder
-replaced rice syrup with honey (maple syrup worked too)
-changed the filling to just peanut butter!
Hi Amalia,
So glad to hear your liked the recipe 🙂 Thanks for sharing your tweaks!
What are rice krisps?
Puffed rice 🙂
Rawtella works well.
Never heard about chocolate stuffed granola bars. Will definitely give them a try. Thanks for sharing
I would love to do them! How much gram is one cup?
1 cup rolled oats equals about 90g.
Just made these totally easy to make and taste great. To make the recipe easier I substitute nuetela for the hazelnut butter and chocolate. I also rolled them out than added the nuetela to the rolled out batter and rolled it up like sushi. This worked better than I thought and made to 14″ logs I will later cut into portion sizes
Awesome! Glad you liked the recipe Shawn!
Thanks for your feedback 🙂
Do you think you could use dates in the processed oat mixture instead of syrup afterwards to hold it together? I’ve never made anything like this really!
I think date paste should work, but you will have to test on how much to use.