Move over Fig Newton

A few years ago when I decided to become vegan, my friend Suzanne pointed me to the blog of her sister in law, www.greenbeane.blogspot.com.  On this blog is where I discovered these little gems.  I hadn't made them for a while but decided to bring them to my church small group on Sunday night and they were a huge hit. Since they all got eaten up, I made them again today so I could have them all to myself.  They are packed with tons of healthy and nutritious foods, but be warned, this is not a low calorie treat. I made 30 little heart shaped bars from one batch and each little heart contains about 85 calories, so eat 2 or 3, even when you are tempted to eat all 30. The greatest part about this is you don't have to cook anything, just throw all of the ingredients into a food processor and shape as you please.

 A couple notes about modifications I made:
The recipe calls for maca powder, I've never added it nor have I substituted anything for it, I leave it out altogether. It's a great super food so if you have it on hand use it, but don't buy it just for this recipe, it's pricey.  I ran out of cacao nibs so the last two times I substituted with a tbsp of raw cacao powder. I tried adding agave on Sunday but it was messy and totally unnecessary. I always use black mission figs, they are the sweetest fig.  Today I only had 10 mission figs left so I threw in a few Turkish figs, it worked out fine. Use Medjool dates if you can.  They are softer and sweeter than regular dates. I use sweetened coconut flakes even though the recipe calls for unsweetened. Finally I never soak the nuts. A good food processor eliminates the need for that.

For the recipe click Fig Bars