My Granola Bar Challenge

It is not every day that my sweet boyfriend becomes enamored with the taste of a granola bar. I mean, granola bars are not exactly his food of choice or anything, but when some friends shared a few of their "sweet and salty" cashew bars by Nature Valley during a recent hiking excursion, my boyfriend could not stop raving about them. I decided then that I would make him some home-made granola bars similar to this store-bought kind he was munching on. After doing a little online search for a recipe, I found one that appeared to fit the bill. This recipe was actually posted by another fan of the sweet and salty cashew bar who was also trying to recreate the bar. The ingredient list reminded me of a rice krispie treat except that 3 cups of oats are mixed in, and there are no marshmallows anywhere to be found. The granola bars are pretty simple to make and only take a few minutes. In addition to the cashews, I also added some toasted macadamia nuts. The hardest part was probably cutting the bars after leaving them in the fridge overnight to set. I must have cut about 3 bars before my hand became tired and my boyfriend took over and cut the rest! So you may be wondering how close these tasted to the "real thing"? Well, according to my BF, they were pretty similar but maybe a little "too sweet" for him; and texture-wise, my bars resembled peanut-brittle more than a traditional granola bar. Hmmm. Makes me want to go back to the granola-bar-drawing-board and try it again. I think next time I'll cut back on the amount of butterscotch chips and maybe even cut down on the brown sugar since the condensed milk already is pretty sweet. If that doesn't work, I also bought him a box of the Nature Valley cashew bars (just in case)!