What I have here is a recipe for the most amazing toddler bedtime snacks!
Let me go back a little bit. When trying to wean Orson off of bedtime bottles of milk, I’d worry “That’s such a loss of calories. Is he really eating enough to replace the milk? Will he wake up in the middle of the night from hunger?” I began searching for relatively healthy toddler bedtime snacks, just for a little caloric bolus before bed.
Nova eventually got to jump on the bar train as well. And with two toddlers who can sometimes decide against finishing their dinner…well, it’s nice knowing that they at least won’t be going to bed starving.
The Cost of Sticking to Bedtime Routines
“Bars” have become a bedtime ritual in our household. For over a year, we’ve had Plum Organic Jammy Sammys and nut butter bars, Cerebelly from time to time (so expensive!), Happy Tot Organic bars, and were on a Beech Nut 5-ingredient oaty bar kick there for a bit. We’ve tried to choose semi-healthy bars that we could feel good about. However, we’ve been reluctantly buying them as of late for a couple reasons.
They. are. so. expensive. Especially when you’re having to buy enough bars for TWO toddlers to have one almost every night before bed. You do the math on our toddler bedtime snacks, it’s just too much. Even getting the Beech Nut bars: $9 for a box of 15 bars. Between two toddlers, that’s good for about a week. So I’m going to spend almost $40 for toddler bedtime snacks per month? No thanks.
Ain’t No Rest for the Sugared
Some of these bars are also just more processed and sugary…even the “healthy” ones. It’s like a little natural fruit sugar before bed isn’t gonna kill you, sure. Reading the nutrition labels on the Jammy Sammy bars, you’ll see that, organic or not, there are added natural syrup sweeteners. And I’ve tried some of the morsels Nova leaves behind (because instead of always eating her bars, she likes to crush them into a pile of crumbs on the floor…yay…). They just aren’t that good.
My desire is to give my toddlers some toddler bedtime snacks that will be satisfying without leading to a massive sugar crash. I don’t want to give them toddler bedtime snacks that will interfere with restful sleep. I want them to be easy to make, simple to store, delicious, and budget-friendly.
Enter: Bedtime Bars.
These are DELICIOUS. They are nutrient-dense, packed with flavor, and easy to throw together. That is, unless you’re like me, a masochist, and enjoy letting your toddlers “help” bake them. Otherwise, they come together super quickly. Added plus? Nova has never left a crumb behind!
Toddler Bedtime Snacks
Bedtime Bars
Equipment
- 1 Food Processor/Blender
- 1 Stand mixer optional; I transferred from Blender to Mixer so that my dried fruit and seeds would remain intact for texture
- 2 11 x 17 Cookie Sheets
- 1 Rolling Pin
- 1 Knife
- Parchment Paper
Ingredients
- 3 cups Old-Fashioned Oats
- 1 cup Unsweetened Coconut shredded
- 2 cups Spinach raw
- ½ cup Almond Flour
- ½ cup Honey room temperature (or maple syrup if child is under 1 year of age)
- ½ cup All-Natural Crunchy Peanut Butter room temperature
- ¼ cup Cacao Powder
- ½ T Cinnamon
- ¼ tsp Salt fine
- ¼ tsp Baking Powder aluminum-free
- 2 tsp Pure Vanilla Extract
- ¼ cup Dried Cranberries optional, opt for no sugar added
- ¼ cup Dried Blueberries optional, opt for no sugar added
- ½ cup Pepitas roasted and lightly-salted
- 3 T Chia Seeds
- 2 T Whole Flax Seeds
- ½ cup Applesauce unsweetened
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 325℉. Line two cookie sheets with parchment paper.
- Blitz the oats, shredded coconut, and spinach in the food processor/blender. I use this Food Processing Blender and pulse the mixture until it's coarse and well-combined.
- Transfer the well-blitzed mixture to the bowl of a stand mixer with paddle attachment. This is the one I use. Add the remaining ingredients, with the exception of the ½ cup of applesauce. Mix well.
- Once well-incorporated, add in the applesauce and mix until the batter resembles cookie dough. If it's still too crumbly, you can either add in a little more applesauce or a splash of water. It should stick together without falling apart.
- Portion out about half of your dough mixture and place on a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper. Cover the top with parchment paper and roll out the mix until it's about ¼" to ½" thick. You can also press out the dough with your hands, but I found rolling it out to be easier and more time-efficient. Use a knife to score lines on your bars where you want to break them apart. On average, my bars are about 1" by 3½".
- Bake for 18 minutes. Allow them to cool on the pan, break them/cut them along the score-lines while still somewhat warm, then transfer them to a wire cooling rack if you have one. While baking, prep your second cookie sheet and repeat the steps with the second half of dough.
- Enjoy some warm, and/or, once they've completely cooled, store in an airtight container for a week or so at room temp or keep them in the fridge for a couple of weeks. We keep ours in reusable Stasher bags for maximum freshness and longevity!
