You can break the various ingredients in the flapjack down by purpose, and the banana was used as a binding agent (rather than butter, which obviously adds loads of fat in, which isn't ideal). I did some reading around, and saw a suggestion that baked sweet potato could be used as an alternative. Sounds a tad weird adding baked potato into flapjack, but it was the best I could come up with, so I gave it a go. It actually worked really well, with a good consistency and taste.
I can't seem to find it online, but I use a swiss roll tin from John Lewis that is exactly 30cm x 20cm, and (rare for cake tins) has sharp corners. It is literally my favourite traybake tin, as you get a good clean edge, and it's easy to measure and cut neatly. I chop this up into 20 slices (10cm x 3cm) and wrap each one in foil-backed paking parchment. I've put the nutrition breakdown below, however if you do 20 slices each bar is just shy of 200 calories each.
I'd like to do some other flavours for this. I watched a short video on how SIS make their energy bars (I don't like them, the texture is far too chewy, and can be incredibly hard in cool weather). I'd also like to knock the fat down a little more, and add some more protein in, so thats a project for the coming year!
Cherry, Chocolate and Almond Flapjack - Recipe
- Grease and line a 30cm x 20cm swiss roll tin with baking parchment
Ingredients
- 50g unsalted butter
- 25g caster sugar
- 150g fructose sugar
- 50g golden syrup
- 200g condensed milk
- 2 sweet potatoes / 150g baked sweet potato (see recipe)
- 1 large egg
- 400g rolled oats
- 100g flaked almonds
- 50g dark (50%) chocolate drops
- 50g dried cherries
- ½tsp salt
- ½tsp almond essence
1) Take the 2 sweet potatoes, and prick all over with a fork2) Place on a foil-covered baking sheet, and place in the oven
3) Turn the oven to 200'C, and bake the sweet potato for an hour (just to confirm, the hour includes the time the oven takes to warm up)
4) Remove the sweet potatoes from the oven, and turn it down to 160'C5) Cut the baked sweet potatoes in half, and scoop the soft flesh out into a bowl
6) In a large saucepan, place the caster sugar, fructose sugar, golden syrup, butter, and 150g of the sweet potato. Also add the salt and almond essence.
7) Place over a low heat and stir until everything is melted together and smooth (you don't want it to boil)8) Remove from the heat, and stir in the condensed milk.
9) Beat the egg slightly, and also add into the bowl.
10) Stir in the oats and flaked almonds, stirring thoroughly to ensure everything is coated.11) Leave the mixture to cool a bit. While this is happening, chop the dried cherries into smaller pieces (I normally do in half or in third, using scissors...this means that it is more evenly spread throughout the mixture)
12) Stir in the chopped dried cherries and chocolate drops (now the mixture has cooled a bit they shouldn't melt too much)13) Scrape into the prepared swiss roll tin, and using a spatula push into the corners, and flatten the surface. Ensure the depth is the same all over the tin.
14) Bake in the oven for 20 minutes. It should just be browning at the edges
15) Remove from the oven and leave to cool on a wire rack. Once cool place in the fridge to chill, ideally overnight (this makes it much easier to slice neatly).16) Chop into 20 bars (10cm x 3cm), and wrap each one in foil-backed greaseproof paper. It's worth doing neatly, as it makes it easier to eat on the go.
17) Store in the fridge for upto 2 weeks (like it ever lasts that long).