I love creating oatmeal bar recipes for breakfast, and depending on the season, I make my vegan blueberry oatmeal bars or apple oat bars. But I wanted a lovely, vibrant red breakfast bar this Christmas, so I adapted two of my previous recipes to create these vegan raspberry crumb bars. Honestly, they come out so perfect and are so easy to make, either with fresh or frozen raspberries, that you can make them all year long. The texture of crispy toasted oat with coconut oil, maple syrup, and the sweet baby jam in the center delivers the best tasty breakfast ever that tastes like dessert!
Ingredients and Substitutions
The main ingredients you need for this recipe are pretty basic.
Old-Fashioned Rolled Oats – you can also use quick oats instead. Make sure you use gluten-free certified oats if you can’t eat gluten. Oat Flour – read how to make oat flour if needed. Maple Syrup or any liquid sweetener you love, including agave syrup and coconut nectar. While you can swap maple syrup for brown sugar in the jam, you can’t do that in the oat layers. Coconut Oil – or melted plant-based butter or any other oil like olive oil Cinnamon is a must for flavor Vanilla Extract or almond extract are both great to balance the bitterness of the raspberries Fresh Raspberries – or frozen raspberries, no need to thaw the fruits but this option releases more liquid, and therefore, you need to cook the jam longer to avoid a runny filling. Chia Seeds is the jam thickener, you can replace the seeds with cornstarch if you prefer Almond Extract or more vanilla extract if you don’t like this flavor.
How To Make Perfect Oatmeal Breakfast Bars
These raspberry oat bars are the easiest breakfast bars simply because the oatmeal batter that you are using for the bottom layer, is the same you use for the bar crumble topping. Tip #4: When the bars are still hot, sprinkle chocolate chips on them. The chocolate and raspberry combination is fantastic. Or cool down the bars, and then serve with a drizzle of vegan royal icing recipe or a dust of powdered sugar. Tip #1 : The trick here is to set aside a good amount – about 1/2 cup – to use as a crumble later in the recipe. Step 3: Place the pan in the fridge to let the bottom layer set while making the jam. Tip #2: Always remove the saucepan from the heat before stirring the vanilla and almond extract, or they evaporate, and you will lose all their flavors. Step 5: Spread the jam on top of the bars. Tip #3 : make sure you rub the oat batter between your finger tips, above the jam to create tiny pieces of crumb and don’t try to cover all the top of bar to let some of the juicy jam visible. Step 7: Serve the raspberry oat bars plain or with some toppings.
