Homemade Strawberry Oatmeal Bars!

Hello! How is your Tuesday so far? Mine has been good. It has been storming here since 2:00am this morning. We had severe thunderstorms and rain and now it is just lightly raining! We don't get too much rain here in S. California so I have really enjoyed this change of pace.

It seemed like a cozy day to bake so that is what I did. I based my recipe on this recipe. I am not vegan so I went ahead and made this recipe with an egg. I did make a few other minor changes to the original recipe. This is pretty healthy and has hardly any sugar in it at all. The kids loved these and I have plenty left over. I cut these into individual bars and individually wrapped these. You could freeze these too! I even caught the husband grabbing an extra piece on his way out the door today.

So here is what you will need For the Oatmeal base/crumbling for the top:
1.5 cups oats
1 cup whole wheat flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp sea salt
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 organic egg
1/2 cup + 2 tbsp earth balance - melted
2 tbsp almond milk - I prefer the unsweetened vanilla, but any kind will do even regular milk
1/4 cup Grade B maple syrup


For Strawberry Layer:
A heaping 2 cups of chopped strawberries. chopped into 1/2 inch pieces - or 1 cup of store bought jam
1/2 teaspoon corn starch
5 packets of Stevia in the raw -- OR 3 -4 tbsp sugar

Preheat oven to 350. Line a square pan with parchment paper. I let the parchment paper come up all the way on the sides. In a saucepan or medium sized pan throw in your chopped strawberries with a sprinkling of the 1/2 tsp of cornstarch and the stevia.

Be sure you add the cornstarch before turning on the heat - this keeps it from clumping up. Cook on low heat stirring every so often allowing the strawberries to sweat and soften. This might take a good 20 minutes or so. Once cooked you can mash it up and allow to cool. Set aside.



Now in a medium size bowl add your oats, flour, brown sugar, baking soda, and salt. Stir well. In a small bowl add your melted butter, 1 egg, maple syrup and almond milk and stir well. Add wet mixture to dry mixture and mix well.


Use half of this mixture to line the pan, pressing it flat like you would a crust.


Next pour the strawberry filling on top.

Then you will use the remainder of the oat mixture to crumble on the top.


Bake for 30 minutes at 350. Remove and let cool for 25-30 minutes before cutting or removing from the pan. Once cooled you can slice and wrap up and store in fridge.


You could also swipe the strawberry filling for pumpkin or apple butter :-) Oh the possibilities are endlessss I tell you....endless!