Doesn't that pile of cocoa and coconut look delicious?

I know, I know.. no post for 4 days! I am a sucky blog host. And I have been promising a post on Larabars for a while now and not delivered. So here it is!

When reader Brynith contacted me to ask my opinion on Larabars, I chuckled to myself and put on my immediate skeptic hat to go start debunking some corporate health food. I was pretty surprised with what I found.

First off, what is a Larabar?A Larabar is basically a packaged health/energy/candy bar that you can find in most health food stores now.  Their website is www.larabar.com

I grabbed my list of naughty chemicals that most processed foods have and went over to the Larabar website to begin debunking.Wow, was I in for a shock. All of the Larabars had about 6 or less REAL FOOD INGREDIENTS and nothing more! No sodium dicophizonate or cabrodetrohypropolyne. No sugar, cane juice, evaporated cane juice, organic evaporated cane juice, pygmy fair trade organic evaporated cane juice… oh well, you get the point.

An example larabar has the following ingredients:
Pecan Pie Bar: Dates, Pecans, Almonds
No that’s not a typo… those are the three ingredients.

Pro’s:
-As you can see, the bars all have whole, real food ingredients. They are all healthy ingredients too, consisting mostly of nuts, unsweetened fruits and spices like cinnamon.

Con’s:
-The base of all of the bars are dates. This can make the bars kind of high in natural sugars. Most of the bars are in the 20′s gram range for sugar. Still, natural sugar kicks the crap outta refined sugar any day.

-The bars are small. Way smaller than I expected once I saw them.

Final Verdict? For an already made/ready to buy snack, these bars are a great option. I would stick to the bars that are lower in natural sugar and don’t contain concentrates (Pecan Pie, Cashew Cookie, Banana Bread, Ginger Snap, Apple Pie, Chocolate coconut). I would still prefer a much more filling bar based on nuts myself. I make a pretty good one that I will post for everyone very soon. But for a ready from the store product, I applaud Larabar. Definitely a step in the right direction!

Have you tried Larabars? What is your take on them?