No Bake Dark Chocolate Sun Butter Cranberry Granola bars

I originally created this recipe idea with school in mind as my kids go to a "nut free" school due to allergies.  Obviously, we're out of school for at least the next few weeks over here in the U.S. but these granola bars have still come in handy for an afternoon pick me up snack when that home schooling energy is starting to drop each day.

These are easy to make, require no baking and you could easily substitute your favorite nut butter if that's your preference.  Don't have cranberries? No problem...throw in some raisins or other dried fruit.  Swap in a different type of chocolate chip! I'm all about the adaptable recipes these days as we all seem to be experiencing grocery stores that are doing their best to restock but are hit or miss with certain ingredients.

Here's what you'll need for these granola bars:

Ingredients
-3 cups rolled oats
-1 cups unsweetened coconut flakes (you can use sweetened if that's what you have)
-1/2 cup sun butter
-1/2 cup honey
-1 tsp vanilla extract
-1-2 tsp cinnamon
-3/4 cup dried cranberries or other dried fruit
-3/4 cup dark chocolate chips + 3-4 TBS more for drizzling

Directions

Line an 8x8 baking pan with parchment paper. In a large bowl, mix together the rolled oats, coconut flakes and cinnamon.  Place a small/medium sized pot on stove top and add the honey and sun butter.  Melt together on medium heat.  Once smoothly melted together, pour into the bowl of oats and allow to sit and cool together for 2-3 minutes.  Then add the dried cranberries and dark chocolate chips and mix together.  Work the mixture to get the sticky sun butter/honey  "glue" to incorporate with all of the dry ingredients.  

Pour the entire bowl of ingredients into the baking pan and use a rubber spatula or spoon to spread and flatten the granola bar mixture throughout the pan.  Place in the fridge to chill for 2-3 hours.

Remove from the fridge, lift the parchment paper up and out of the pan and slice into bars.  For storage, place the bars in an air tight tupperware or fridge safe container and keep in the fridge.  The bars will begin to fall apart if they are stored at room temperature.

Enjoy! I hope that this finds you all well in the midst of these crazy times.