Earlier this week, my friends KokoraKara, Ms. Dyer (aka SeaCats) and I planned a craft night. I elected to host and we all agreed that there MUST be tasty snacks! But what to make? KokoraKara is vegan, and she had found a recipe that claimed to replicate the ever delicious Lara Bars. This amazing recipe from Enlightened Cooking, in fact!
I set out to attempt the basic bar.

However, because I was making for 3 hungry craft ladies, I increased my proportions. This is what I ended up using and doing:

Homemade Raw/Vegan/Sweet Tasty Snacks

1 Cup roughly chopped dates

1 Cup mixed raisins & dried cranberries

1/4 Cup whole raw almonds

1/8 Teaspoon ground cinnamon

Because my kitchen doesn’t have a food processor, I used our blender. I chopped the dates up as much as I could before putting them in. Chopping the raisins+cranberries seemed too troublesome, so they just went straight in.

Ok, now I’m positive that this recipe is easy breezy with a food processor. Using a blender works, but it takes a lot of muscle and ends up being extremely messy! I had to keep packing/mixing/mashing/scooping out goop to help the blender do its thing. It worked eventually, but it’s never a good sign when your roomie comes in and pours you a sympathy beer just because he’s been hearing you curse for an hour! Much appreciated, but still…

In the end, I had some lovely brown goop that was delicious when I licked it off my fingers. Dried fruits (especially dates) truly are nature’s candy! I decided to let the blender rest and hand chopped the raw almonds as finely as I could. I added those and the cinnamon and dove back in to get my hands sticky mixing everything up. You really have to use your hands. I cannot see how a spoon would ever work with the density of the goop!

I decided that instead of bars, I would make little round treats instead. I rolled them using my hands and placed them in a ziplock bag. The amount of ingredients I used resulted in 14 mini Lara “balls”  I stuck them in the fridge for about an hour.

They were extremely tasty, deemed a rousing success by the ladies, gave us energy to craft well into the night, and were worth the effort! I’m not sure when I’ll try it again, because again I say, a food processor is a must! Phew…