Cereal Bars

25Oct/09Off

Cereal Bars

How to make Strawberry Cereal Bars?

I truly love the Special K Strawberry cereal bars, i tried to search for a recipe but nothing came up, does anyone know anything to help me out? If you dont know what these bars are, there the same thing as the market pantry ones from target! Thank you for your answers

Step 1: Go shopping, buy your supplies.
This recipe will make one batch, or about 20 bars

1 Box (about 7 cups) - Strawberry Special K Cereal
1 Cup - Sugar
1/8 - 1/4 Cup - Powered Milk (gives it that breakfast cereal taste)
1 Cup - Light Corn Syrup (one jar is about 1 1/2 cups)
1 squeezable icing - Not at all healthy, but gives a nice appearance
1/4 - 1/2 Tablespoon - Artificial strawberry flavoring
1/2 bag - Dried cranberries

Now, I should explain a few things about ingredients ...

Corn syrup is liquefied sugar. It's loaded with carbohydrates. Following this recipe, you will make breakfast bars that are AS healthy as "Special K" bar (which is not healthy at all). You may modify this recipe, but the less syrup you use the less sweet your bars are. Also, the sticky consistency of the syrup makes these easy to press into bars. Using less syrup will give you crumbling bars. Some have suggested using honey ... which wouldn't taste well here. Also, if you go with honey, check the label. If you are buying the cheap stuff, the chances are it's mostly corn syrup anyway. The bottom line is: I would not suggest using less than 3/4 cup of corn syrup for this recipe.

Splenda is expensive, and may have health risks! You can really use Splenda as you would sugar, and in this recipe you will never taste the difference. In fact, you could cut back and use less than I did - because the cereal is all ready infused with a good deal of sugar right out of the box.

Cranberries? Yes. Have you ever checked the ingredients on the name brand bars? They use strawberry flavored cranberries. Note that you will be more than doubling the amount that they put into the commercial bars - and these are very good for you.

Powered Milk? It's not really required. I would suggest only using a small amount, if at all. It's well worth it for that hint of a milky taste in the final product. Use too much, and your liquid process will turn into a meringue.

Artificial Flavoring This too can be skipped all together. It will run you about $3.00 for a small bottle. If you use it, use it VERY sparingly. The flavor comes loose when it hits the sugar. Do NOT use any more than 1/2 a Tablespoon. This was an experiment on my part, and I thought the final product was very tasty with the added flavoring.

Icing on a healthy bar? It's pure sugar. If you don't want to use it, you don't have to.

Step 2: Gather the tools and equipment
You will need the following tools:

A large counter or table space (preferably both)
COOKING SPRAY (do not skip this, you WILL regret it)
A big mixing bowl (that will hold 7 cups)
Measuring cup
Small pot (smaller is less to clean)
A wisk
Wooden spoon, or spatula
Teaspoon measure
Big knife
Two aluminum pans. (Large one for the product, small one for the processing)

WARNING - Anything involving corn syrup will turn your kitchen into a sticky mess. Whenever possible, clean your pots and utensils IMMEDIATELY after you are done using them.

Step 3: Creating the glue
Assuming you have only one measuring cup ... you had better do things in this order.

1) Measure out 1 cup of sugar, and dump it into a cereal bowl. Set it aside.
2) Measure out 1 cup of corn syrup, and put it into your small pot.
3) Dump the sugar on top of the syrup, and turn on the stove.

You need to keep the heat between low, and medium. If you start to boil the syrup, you will end up making butterscotch or caramel flavoring (neat, but bad with strawberries). Once the syrup starts getting hot, get your wisk and start mixing the concoction together. If you jump in before the syrup is hot, you will end up with a ball of dry sugar in the middle of your wisk.

If you are going to add strawberry flavoring, I would add that to the pot now.

If you are going to add dry milk, you can add that to the pot now as well.

Keep wisking! If it starts looking foamy, you may have used too much dry milk. That's all right. It will still taste very good, it's just no fun to cook. If you start seeing bubbles, lower the heat!

While that is heating up - get a sink full of soap and hot water. You will need it.

Step 4: Get your dry goods ready

Spray down the inside of a large mixing bowl with cooking spray. Trust me.

Dump the entire box of cereal into the mixing bowl. This should equate to about 7 cups. You can measure it out of you are that concerned. But your measuring cup is probably full of sticky syrup in the sink.

Stir in your cranberries. About half a bag is good. When you are eating these bars, you think you are eating strawberries. Notice that the cereal uses real freeze dried strawberries. I hate those, but they taste great in these bars.

Watch that sticky stuff on the stove, don't let it start boiling.

Step 5: Add it all together
When hot, this glue stuff is like water. It will begin cooling almost immediately though, so have everything lined up and ready.

1) S