Banana Oat Bars

Sometimes, I feel the need to make something "healthier" or at least more nutritious and also, I love oat bars. They are perfect for breakfast or as a snack. These oat bars are soft and not too sweet, they are just as much as they need to be. The recipe is coming from my favorite Greek pastry chef and maybe the most famous one in Greece: Stelios Parliaros. He makes all kinds of things from easy to very difficult. I love making his recipes because they always have a perfect balance of everything and some flavor combinations I wouldn’t think about.

This recipe is a really easy one. The original was with mashed strawberries, but my ripe bananas needed to be used instead. They made a great couple with the chocolate chips and I bet they would be also great dipped in chocolate.

Chewy Flapjacks

When I first tried flapjacks I didn’t really care about them. But then I ate once more and once more and every time I liked it more and more. I had only tried the ones that you can find in the supermarket so, I decided to learn how to make them on my own. I read some recipes and I saw that the main idea was 1 part sugar, 1 part butter, 1 part syrup and 2 parts oats. So, I gave it a try with Lorraine Pascale’s recipe  and the result was these delicious, chewy bars. I like that they are sweet because they remind me a little of baklava that I miss here! I kept it simple for now because it was the first time I made them but I think I will experiment more with these treats because we absolutely love them! They are great to pair with a cup of  hot black coffee.