Breakfast bars

Do you or your children struggle with eating breakfast? Or maybe it’s just Little S. She’s the kind of child who has to eat little and often, and wakes up ravenous but doesn’t really like much breakfast food. I don’t blame her really, if you take dairy, eggs and nuts out of the equation there is limited choice. She likes oat milk, but not soggy cereal – so she has a bowl of dry cereal followed by some toast – hardly thrilling or nutritious enough to keep her going for long. She is very keen on my pancakes, so we’ll have those once a week, but other than that she struggles. These bars were developed as a tempting, trusty breakfast alternative. They’ve been sorting the rest of the family out at breakfast time too!

Breakfast Bars (dairy-free, egg-free, nut-free, soya-free, sesame-free, gluten, vegetarian and vegan)

makes about 16

• 1 cup oats
• 2 cups cornflakes
• 1/3 cup honey or syrup
• 1/4 cup dairy-free spread
• 1/4 cup Demerara sugar
• Pinch of salt
• 1/4 cup dairy-free chocolate, chopped
• 1/4 cup dried fruit, I used dehydrated strawberries
• 1 tbsp chocolate chips to finish

– Line a square baking tin with parchment
– Dry toast the oats in a frying pan until they start to turn golden
– Pour into a bowl with the cornflakes
– Melt together the spread, honey, sugar until the sugar has dissolved
– Pour into the cornflake mix
– Add the chopped chocolate, salt and dried fruit and stir well until all is sticky with the syrup mix
– Tip into the baking tin and firmly press down firmly with a spatula, and I mean really press it down to compact the mix
– Sprinkle the chocolate chips on top and press them into the mix
– Place in the fridge to firm up, ideally for a couple of hours
– Cut into bars.
– keep in the fridge until ready to eat.