Who doesn’t love Trader Joe’s? That almond above is a Trader Joe’s dark chocolate covered almond dipped in sea salt and turbinado sugar. They’re insanely good, but dangerously addictive. You’ve been warned. I show you this picture because it looks more appetizing than the recipe I’m about to share. Larabar released a Peanut Butter Cookie flavor a few years ago. I was excited to try it but a little disappointed by the ingredients: dates, peanuts, salt. That’s it? I liked the simple and unprocessed nature of the bar but I wasn’t sure it would live up to the name. But after tasting it I was impressed. For only containing 3 ingredients, this bar was tasty and fairly reminiscent of a peanut butter cookie. However, I wouldn’t recommend that you go out and spend $1.50 for 51 grams of chopped dates and peanuts. What I do suggest is to follow my copycat recipe, called the Peanut Butter Cookie Nickbar. Using the nutrition facts and weight of the bar I was able to reverse engineer the precise quantity of ingredients necessary to concoct this energy bar. I’ve provided two methods below to measure out the ingredients so you can get the perfect ratio.
By Weight:
78g roasted unsalted peanuts
75g whole dates, chopped
pinch of salt
Or By Volume:
3/4 cup roasted unsalted peanuts
1/2 cup chopped dates (buy them whole, chop them yourself)
pinch of salt
* Note: Make sure to buy soft whole dates (Barhee, Halawy, Khadrawy or Medjool type)
Instructions:
1. If measuring by volume make sure your dates are chopped before you measure out 1/2 cup. If measuring by weight, coarsely chop the dates before or after weighing them, it doesn’t matter (The Law of Mass Conservation, remember?).
2. Process the dates in a food processor until a fine paste is achieved and pour into a bowl. Process the peanuts and salt until you get small chunks, this should only take a few seconds. Add the peanuts/salt to the bowl and mix together with your hands until well mixed. If the mixture is not sticking together, pour the mixture back into the food processor until it starts to clump together on its own (and see note below).
3. Shape into 3 equal bars, surround in plastic wrap and store in the fridge.
Additional Info:
Here is a picture of the Nickbar. Like I said, it’s not that pretty to look at, but it looks and tastes JUST like the Larabar version. Below that, I’ve included the nutrition facts for the Larabar which has been mimicked by the Nickbar.