Copycat Nutri Grain Bars. Soft, oatmeal bars filled with delicious, homemade fruit jam. These are so good that you will never want to buy store breakfast bars again.
Starting this blog has been one of the most fun things I have ever done. Example A: Photo above. If I were not writing this, I doubt I ever would have thought, “I wonder if I can make my own Nutri Grain bars?” But I am, so I did. And I have made my hands down favorite ever breakfast bar.
Our weekday morning schedule is quite structured. Especially for my son. He wakes up, eats yogurt and drinks milk, and then goes to preschool. At preschool, he wants to immediately sit down and eat a breakfast bar (usually Nutri Grain or WalMart’s version of the same).
Recently I was running low on lunch snacks for myself, so I poached one of my son’s bars to take to work with me. Those Nutri Grain people make a good product. I got addicted and started adding them to my lunchbox everyday.
After a few weeks, I started thinking that I could probably make my son and I a similar bar. I told my son about my idea and he wanted to be a part of making them too (pictured below). My goal was to make a soft bar with a fruit filling, that was healthier and tastier than the store brand.
We had to try a few times to get these just right. The first time they were tasty, but the coating cracked too much when I tried to fold it. The second time I added more liquid, and it was a success. These were able to roll as thin as I wanted, and hold the filling through baking. The tops cracked a little, but I’m okay with that … it adds a little character.
These are so delicious. You could easily change the filling to homemade jam with a different fruit, store bough jam, peanut butter, Nutella (ohhh that makes me happy to think about), or whatever else you could imagine. You can do no wrong these delicious breakfast treats.
Copycat Nutri Grain Bars
Ingredients
Bars
- 3/4 cup almond flour
- 1 cup plus 1/2 cup all purpose flour
- 2 tbsp corn starch
- 1 cup old fashioned oats
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
- 4 tbsp unsalted butter melted
- 1/4 cup coconut oil
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 2 eggs
- 1/4 cup honey
- 1/4 cup milk plus 2 tbsp milk
Filling
- 3 cups frozen mixed berries
- 1 tbsp lemon juice
- 2 tbsp sugar
Instructions
Filling
- In a large sauce pan over medium-high heat, combine berries, lemon juice and sugar.
- Stir very frequently. As the berries soften, use your spoon to squish them a bit.
- Once mixture comes to a boil, use a thermometer to measure temperature. When the mixture reaches 220 degrees, remove from heat. This will take about 15 minutes.
- Allow filling to cool completely before using for bars.
Bars
- In a large bowl or base of stand mixer, stir together almond flour, 1 cup of all purpose flour, corn starch, oats, salt, baking powder and cinnamon.
- Once combined, add melted butter, coconut oil, vanilla, eggs, honey, and 1/4 cup milk. Beat until a soft dough forms, about 3 minutes.
- Form dough into a ball as best you can (the dough is very sticky), and cover in plastic wrap. Place in refrigerator for at least two hours.
- Flour a working surface with about 1/4 cup flour (I use a Wilton fondant mat). Using your hands, spread out dough as best as you can. Sprinkle top of dough with extra flour and roll to about 1/8-1/4" thickness.
- Cut dough into 4 inch by 4 inch squares.
Assembly and Baking
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Cover a cookie sheet with parchment paper or a silicone baking mat.
- Fill bars with about 2 tbsp of filling in the center of each square. Turn two sides of square in toward each other so that it makes a rectangle. Gently squeeze ends of the rectangle together to seal in the filling.
- Place rectangle seem side down on prepared baking sheet.
- Brush tops of bars with remaining milk. Bake for 15-18 minutes, or until bars are starting to turn a light golden brown.
Nutrition
Disclaimer: All nutritional information provided on this website is an estimate only and is not guaranteed.
Enjoy these Copycat Nutri Grain Bars? You’ll probably enjoy these other SugarSpicesLife recipes:
Blueberry English Muffins
Buttermilk Pancakes
Instant Pot Yogurt
Lemon Blueberry Granola
These look so delicious! I love treats like those – so yummy and healthy!
Thanks, Natalie!
I would like to make these for a camp that has a nut free restriction. Any thoughts on how I could maintain the great texture it looks like these bars have but without the almond flour. Coconut flour would be out as well. Thanks for any ideas. These look delicious.
That’s a great idea! I would try grinding up oatmeal to a flour, or maybe rice flour. You could also just use more regular flour, although it would be more like a pie crust texture. Let me know how it turns out if you try!
Loving this recipe!! Quick question, is 2 table spoons for the filling correct?
I’m so glad! And yes, 2 tbsp is what I use for the filling, but you can certainly adjust as you see fit. I know that times I have not been careful with folding, I’ve had some seep out the sides, but I’ve just wiped if off after the bars were cooled 🙂
these look fabulous! I have a bunch of homemade jelly I need to use up. Do you think I could sub that for the filling?
Yes, for sure! I have used regular jelly before and it worked well.
Super quick question… Would the filling recipe work with pretty much any fruit? For example… Apples? My all-time FAVORITE bar is the apple-cinnamon, and I just happen to have some apples that need eaten/used before they go bad. So I guess my question is: if the filling recipe above will not work with apples, do you happen to have a recipe? (Wink wink) 😀
Thanks,
Laura
Oh those are good. I will definitely try to make a recipe with that soon! And I haven’t made this with apples before, but I think you’d need to change the filling recipe a little bit. I would use 3-4 apples, add 3-4 tablespoons of water, and probably 1 tablespoon of cornstarch. Just a quick google search, this recipe looks like it could work well! https://www.crazyforcrust.com/homemade-apple-pie-filling/
My husband eats so many store bought bars. I made these tonight and we both love them. I plan to stop buying bars, or at least slow down. Thanks so much for sharing the recipe!
That’s great, I’m so glad you like them!Thank you for sharing! 🙂
These are yummy! On my first try, I was out of honey so subbed agave nectar, plus used whole wheat flour. They were delicious but the dough was super sticky and took constant back and forth in the freezer to finally get them to work. Really time-consuming. Second time I followed recipe exactly for the dough, and they turned out great. I did mango for the jam and added chia seeds. Would love to figure this one out with whole wheat flour. Maybe half whole wheat and half white flour next time. These are well worth making since they’re unique/… Read more »
I love your ideas, I might have to give the mango jam and chia seeds a try too – thanks for sharing!
Hi Lauren! I just made this recipe with half whole wheat and half regular flour and it came out great! I made twelve bars and baked for 16 minutes. They were delicious! I also used a little less milk. 🙂
Hi! Should I store this at room temp or keep them in the fridge?
I keep them at room temp!
How many days can you store them?
Hi, I have a question about the oats. Do we have to grind them finer before adding to the dough mixture or just leave them whole? Thanks!
Hi! I leave them whole. If you want to pulse them a few times you can but measure before you do. Hope you enjoy!
I wish there were photos of the assembly part. i am having a difficult time imagining this part and how it goes. Thanks
Does the coconut oil get added as solid or melt it first?
Melted!
I’m super excited to try these, how long do they keep for?
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