Granola Flapjacks or Oat Bars are an easy snack, perfect for after-school, picnics, or as a quick pick-me-up. Packed with nuts, seeds, and dried fruits, they also make a great breakfast bar. This easy recipe with just five ingredients, is easily adaptable and makes delicious granola bars with a lovely chewy texture and an added bit of crunch.
Making your own flapjack granola bars is super easy and cheaper than shop-bought ones. Plus, they're plastic-free. It's easy to add nuts, seeds, and dried fruits to make them just how you like them.
Other flapjack or Oatbar recipes you'll love are my Simple Fruit Flapjacks, or for a delicious vegan version check out my Maple Syrup with Apple Flapjacks. My Easy Banana Flapjacks have less added sugar and are a great way to use up bananas that are past their best.
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Ingredients
Granola Flapjacks have just 5 simple ingredients.
- Butter - use unsalted butter for baking.
- Dark Brown or Muscovado Sugar - this is the best sugar to use in flapjacks as it gives them a nice chewy texture and a slightly caramelized flavour.
- Golden Syrup - this binds them together.
- Granola - use any granola.
- Dried Fruits & Seeds - I use pumpkin seeds, dried cranberries or craisins, and sultanas.
See the recipe card for quantities.
Instructions
How to make granola bars with pre-made granola.
Preheat the oven to 180°C/350°F/gas mark 4 & melt the butter in a large saucepan over a low heat.
Stir in the sugar and golden syrup and turn off the heat.
Stir in the granola and seeds, dried fruits, and/or nuts.
Line a baking tray roughly 20cm x 20cm with baking paper or a reusable oven liner and tip the mixture in. Spread it evenly and press the mixture into the tin using the back of a spoon, ensuring you spread right up to the corners. Cook in the oven on the middle shelf for 15 minutes.
After 15 minutes, your flapjacks should be slightly browned around the edges. There will still be some liquid on the surface. This is normal and it will quickly harden once cooled.
Hint: Leave your flapjacks to cool properly before cutting them into squares.
Substitutions
- Healthy - for a healthier granola flapjack, use sugar-free or low-sugar granola. The texture may be slightly different as not all sugar-free varieties form the granola into the typical granola clusters.
- Gluten Free - you can still enjoy these granola breakfast bars on a gluten-free diet. Gluten-free varieties of granola are widely available and use gluten-free oat flakes.
Variations
Instead of dried fruits and seeds, you can add in some of the following to add new flavours. Be careful to not add more than 100g / 3.5 ounces in total to the recipe or your granola bars won't hold together well. You should also chop any dried fruits, berries, or nuts to about the size of a sultana.
- Seeds - sunflower seeds as well as pumpkin seeds.
- Dried Fruits & Berries - sultanas, raisins, dried apricots (chopped into small pieces), candied peel, dried cranberries or craisins as well as dried prunes, pineapple, papaya, dates, mango or strawberries.
- Nuts - walnuts, pecan nuts, toasted almonds. Chop them into small pieces.
Green Tip! These breakfast bars are a great opportunity to use up any leftover dried fruits, nuts, and seeds you have in your cupboard.
Equipment
All you need to make these granola flapjacks is :-
- A large pan
- Weighing scales
- A baking tin roughly 20cm x 20cm / 8 inches x 8 inches or similar surface area.
- Baking parchment or greaseproof paper or a reusable liner.
Storage
Store in an airtight container for about one week. If you are in a very warm environment, you may need to store them in the refrigerator. If this makes them too hard, just leave them at room temperature for about one hour.
Flapjacks can also be frozen for 2 - 3 months.
Top tip
Make sure you press the mixture down firmly into your baking tray, ensuring you have pressed it into all four corners.
Sustainability
These granola oat bars are perfect for using up smaller quantities of dried fruits, nuts, and seeds and helping to reduce food waste. All of the ingredients in this recipe, granola, dark brown sugar, dried fruits, nuts, and seeds as well as golden syrup are available to buy from Fairtrade. Fairtrade is an international organisation that works with small-scale farmers to pay a proper living wage, improve their living standards, invest in their communities, and work with them to adapt to climate change. Look out for the Fairtrade Logo.
FAQ
Granola is most commonly eaten as a breakfast cereal. It's made of ground oats, honey, or another sweetener and added nuts, seeds, and dried fruits. Because it is already sweetened, I've reduced the amount of sugar in this recipe. Using granola rather than rolled oats in this recipe gives a nice crunchy texture.
Flapjack and granola bars are both made from oats. Granola bars have more added ingredients such as nuts, seeds, and dried fruits. A flapjack bar has a slightly softer more chewy texture.
Related
Looking for other easy snack recipes like this? Try these:
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📖 Recipe
Easy Granola Flapjack Recipe
Equipment
- 1 Large Pan
- Weighing Scales
- Baking paper or reusable oven liner
- 20cm x 20cm baking tray / 8 inch x 8 inch or similar area. This gives flapjacks 2.5cm deep / 1 inch.
Ingredients
- 125 g unsalted butter
- 75 g dark brown sugar fairtrade available
- 80 g golden syrup
- 225 g granola
- 100 g nuts and dried fruits eg. pumpkin seeds, sultanas, dried cranberries (craisins)
Instructions
- Pre-heat the oven to 180°C/350°F/gas mark 4 & melt the butter in a large saucepan over a low heat125 g unsalted butter
- Stir in the sugar and golden syrup and turn off the heat75 g dark brown sugar, 80 g golden syrup
- Stir in the granola and seeds, dried fruits and / or nuts.225 g granola, 100 g nuts and dried fruits
- Line a baking tray roughly 20cm x 20cm with baking paper or a reusable oven liner and tip the mixture in. Spread it evenly and press the mixture into the tin using the back of a spoon, ensuring you spread right up to the corners. Cook in the oven on the middle shelf for 15 minutes.
- After 15 minutes, your flapjacks should be slightly browned around the edges. There will still be some liquid on the surface. This is normal and it will quickly harden once cooled. Remove from the oven and leave to cool. Once cool, cut your granola bars into squares.
Notes
Ingredient Notes
-
- Butter - use unsalted butter for baking
-
- Dark Brown or Muscovado Sugar - this is the best sugar to use in flapjacks as it gives them a nice chewy texture and a slightly caramelized flavour.
-
- Golden Syrup - this binds them together.
-
- Granola - use any granola.
-
- Dried Fruits & Seeds - I use pumpkin seeds, dried cranberries or craisins, and sultanas.
Storage
Store these flapjacks in an airtight container for about one week. If you are in a very warm environment, you may need to store them in the refrigerator. If this makes them too hard, just leave them at room temperature for about one hour.Nutrition per serving
The Nutritional Values are computer generated estimates based on industry standards and are provided as a helpful guide only.
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