The Amell Family Blog

I originally made this recipe when I was having a hard time breastfeeding Jordanna. One of the ways to increase your milk supply was to increase your intake of oats. Ever since I found this recipe, it has been a family favourite, approved by all members of the Amell family! Normally I would just link the original recipe and I am here, but I have made this recipe enough times with enough substitutions each time that I wanted to include these substitutions in a recipe post on its own. This way if you do not have the ingredients from the original recipe, hopefully you will have some of the substitutions I have included and can make these delicious bars! Plus, on the day I was making this post, the original poster completely revamped the recipe! I don’t know if Starbucks changed their recipe so she updated hers to match theirs, but the original recipe was freaking delicious. All the kids mow down on this oat bar and I am sticking with this recipe.

I wanted to make these bars when we were headed out of town for Joshua’s track and field meet. Then as I was preparing the meals for our time away, I realized I only had 3 eggs and no butter! I needed the eggs for an experiment to see if I could bind these Peanut Butter Granola Bars together better than the original recipe (spoiler alert: I was able to bind them and they are delicious!), and the butter that was left in the house was for the Shepherd’s Pie I was making for dinner that night. Since we were leaving for Toronto for Joshua’s track and field event right after dinner, I did not have time to run to the store to get more butter so that is when we make substitutions!

substitutions

• You can replace the oil with any oil you have on hand or butter. I have made this recipe with canola oil and vegetable oil when I have run out of butter since the original recipe calls for butter. Beware of any oils that will leave an overpowering taste. For every 1 cup of melted butter needed for the recipe, you substitute it with 3/4 cup of oil. I find these bars stick together better using oil though.
• You can substitute the quick oats for large flake oats. For the oat flour, you would process the large flakes long enough that they will resemble a flour consistency. To replace the quick oats that stay whole with large flake oats, I just pulsed the large flake oats in a food processor to break them apart a little bit.
• The honey can be substituted for corn syrup, maple syrup, agave syrup, or any type of thick syrup.
• For the milk, I always use 2% milk. You could probably use the thick coconut milk, but I have never ventured away from using 2% or 3.25% milk.

Preheat the oven

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees Fahrenheit.

Make oat “flour”

You can use quick oats or large flake oats for this recipe. The key is using a food processor to bust down the oats to a flour-like consistency, so don’t be afraid to let the food processor run for a while until it the powder it fine. You will break down 5 cups of oats into a flour and then pour it into a large mixing bowl. Then add 2 cups of oats to the bowl. If you are using large flake oats, you will want to pulse the 2 cups in the food processor just to break them apart. They bind into a bar better this way. You can definitely use the large flake oats for the oat “flour” and the quick oats for adding in whole as well.
Mix the oats to combine the “flour” and oats together.

Get the hot mixture going

You can start with this step, but it really does not take long to melt the sugar into the oil and honey. You can definitely use butter instead of oil, just increase it to 1 cup of butter. The key is to melt the sugar and heat up the honey. This creates a nice sticky texture to bind the bars together! Add the oil, honey, and brown sugar to a small saucepan and place it on the stove over medium heat. Be sure to mix it occasionally. Once the sugar is melted, turn the stove off and set the saucepan aside to cool some.

Add the wet ingredients to the bowl

Add the vanilla and milk to either the saucepan when it has cooled some, or directly to the mixing bowl with the oats in it. If you add the milk to the wet ingredients when it is too hot, it can curdle, so be careful. Then add in the wet ingredients from the saucepan. Make sure to mix it well. Your goal is to get all of the oat mixture wet and you will be able to tell a clear difference in the colours of the oats when you are mixing.

prepare your baking dish

Line a 9×13-inch Pyrex dish with parchment paper. Add in your oat bar mixture and press it firmly into the baking dish. Make sure to pay attention to the sides as they tend to rise as you are pressing the mixture into the dish. Create a nice even layer.

pop it into the oven and bake

Pop your dish into the oven and bake the bars for about 20 minutes or until the sides are nice and golden brown.

Let them cool!

Let the bars cool completely before cutting them into bars. You can freeze the bars in a Ziploc bag or put them into an airtight container to eat within the week. You can freeze them in the airtight container too, but try not to eat the whole thing in one day! I hope you enjoy them as much as our whole family does! They are absolutely delicious!

Delicious, Kid-Approved
Oat Bars

Ingredients

• 5 cups quick oats, processed into flour
  (use a food processor with the blades attachment to make oat “flour”)
• 2 cup quick oats
• 3/4 cup vegetable or canola oil
• 1 cup brown sugar
• 1/2 cup honey
• 1/2 cup milk
• 2 tsp. vanilla

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees Fahrenheit.
2. In a small saucepan, over medium heat, stir together oil, sugar, and honey. Stir occasionally until sugar is melted and mixture is combined.
3. Using a food processor, take the 5 cups of oats that you are processing into flour and grind down using the blade attachment until the oats resemble a flour consistency.
4. In a large bowl, combine the oat “flour” and quick oats. Mix to combine.
5. Once liquid mixture on stove is incorporated and sugar is melted into mixture, remove from heat.
6. Prepare a 9×13-inch baking dish by lining it with parchment paper.
7. To the wet ingredients, mix in vanilla and milk. Pour over dry ingredients and mix together ensuring all dry ingredients become wet from the wet mixture.
8. Pour the oat mixture into the prepared 9×13-inch dish and press firmly using a spatula or dampened hands.
9. Bake for 20-25 minutes or until the edges become golden brown.
10. Let cool completely before cutting and serving.

Notes

You can definitely freeze these bars! Be sure to cut them before freezing so you can take out one bar at a time. You can cut them into squares or bars, whichever you prefer. Keep the bars wrapped in parchment paper and store in a freezer bag or airtight container in the freezer. Allow them to come to room temperature before eating.

Original recipe is from xoxoBella, but has now been completely changed.

watch the video tutorial here!

The original recipe can be found here, but I can’t say it is the original recipe because the original poster completely revamped the recipe, but I always give credit where credit is due. Without the original, pre-2023 recipe, I would never have found these delicious oat bars!