If you are looking for a healthy chocolate bars recipe that is great for a snack or dessert, these chocolate hazelnut bars are loaded with dates, hazelnuts, almond butter and vanilla extract.
So Valentine’s Day is just around the corner and that’s normally an excuse to eat something sweet and decadent. But as we know these days, we can’t just eat all the sugar we want. I mean we’d love to, but it’s just not in the cards. While I love desserts, I can go without them but it’s much more difficult for Lauren. She’s definitely got a sweet tooth and realizes it. So these chocolate hazelnut bars are meant to combat that craving but also be much better for you than straight sugar. The secret ingredient here is the dates which is naturally sweet and can replace sugar. There are quite a few benefits of dates. I mean just google it, and you’ll run across a ton of articles.
The other benefit is these specific bars are great for anyone that has a peanut allergy. I just happen to love hazelnuts and almond butter goes great, but you can really combine and type of nut and nut butter to your liking. From cashews to peanut butter to even tahini – they all can work with this recipe. In fact, if you want a good cashew bar recipe, check out Half Baked Harvest’s 5 ingredient chocolate covered cashew bars, which inspired these. I may be a little biased but I truly believe for something that’s actually good for you, these are the best chocolate bars out there. Hope you enjoy.
What Ingredients are in this Chocolate Hazelnut Bars Recipe?
- Pitted medjool dates
- Hazelnuts
- Almond butter
- Vanilla extract
- Sea salt
- Dark chocolate
How to Make Chocolate Bars
For these homemade chocolate bars, the actual time spent preparing them is 15 minutes or so. You simply just throw all of the ingredients, except for the chocolate in a food processor and blend until combined with no large chunks left. You pack the hazelnut mixture in an 8×8 baking dish and then freeze for an hour to let it harden. Right before you’re ready to dip in the chocolate, you melt the chocolate in a microwave save bowl. Then just cut the frozen hazelnut mixture into the sizes you prefer and dip in the chocolate. Top with some crush nuts and place in fridge to let the chocolate harden.
Other Nuts You Can Use
As I mentioned above, you can be really creative when it comes to these bars. For the nuts, you can use any nut or seed you want, whether it’s almonds, cashews, sunflower seeds, pistachios or peanuts. And you can replace the almond butter with peanut butter, sunflower seed butter, tahini, soynut butter or even coconut butter. You really can’t go wrong with any of them! Just keep the ratios the same.
Other Healthy(ish) Desserts
Chocolate Hazelnut Bars
Ingredients
- 8 oz pitted medjool dates (1 cup)
- 1 cup roasted hazelnuts
- 3/4 cup almond butter
- 1 tbsp vanilla extract
- 1/4 tsp sea salt
- 12 oz dark chocolate
Instructions
- Line an 8x8 square baking dish with parchment paper.
- In food processor, add dates, hazelnuts, almond butter, vanilla extract and sea salt and pulse until well combined and no large chunks left, about 1-2 minutes. Use bottom of wide glass to press mixture into baking dish. Freeze for 1 hour.
- Place chocolate in medium bowl and heat in microwave until melted and smooth, stirring every 30 seconds. Let cool for 10 minutes.
- Cut the frozen hazelnut mixture into 16 bars. Dip in chocolate and top with some crushed hazelnuts. Place in fridge for 30 minutes or until chocolate is hardened. Serve immediately or store in fridge.
Big hazelnut fan!