Apple butter sandwiched between two layers of oatmeal crumb crust. Vegan if made with vegan butter substitute
Prep Time10 minutesmins
Cook Time30 minutesmins
Total Time40 minutesmins
Course: Cookies and Squares
Cuisine: Baked Goods, Vegan
Keyword: apple butter, oatmeal
Servings: 16bars
Calories: 162kcal
Author: Trish | The In Fine Balance Food Blog
Ingredients
1cupwhole wheat flouryou can use all purpose flour as well
1cupold-fashioned / rolled oats
¾cuppacked light brown sugar
¼teaspoonsalt
½cupBecel plant-based butter, unsalted, meltedregular dairy based butter will also work, but of course the bars will not be vegan, choose unsalted
1cupapple butter or other fruit butters
Instructions
Preheat oven to 350 degrees and prepare an 8x8 baking pan by lining with parchment or coating cooking spray.
In a medium bowl mix together flour, oatmeal, sugar and salt. Stir well to mix evenly. Add melted plant-based butter and mix thoroughly. Oats should be evenly coated and mixture will slightly stick together, forming clumps.
Press slightly more than half of the mixture into the bottom of the prepared baking tin. Pressing to fill the corners and slightly packing down to form a crust. Spread the apple butter evenly over top of the bottom crust. Sprinkle the remaining oatmeal mixture over top of the apple butter. Gently press to flatten, but do too firmly or the oats will sink into the apple butter.
Bake at 350 for 30-40 minutes or until the oatmeal crust is golden. Remove from oven and allow to cool before slicing into squares.
Notes
This recipe uses ½ cup of vegan butter or one stick. You can substitute any other variety of vegan butter that you prefer or use melted coconut oil in its place. Coconut oil will add a slight coconut flavour to the bars. Of course, you could also use regular dairy butter if you are not concerned about whether or not the bars are plant-based or dairy-free.For sweetener, I used brown sugar. You can also use coconut sugar or organic cane sugar. Same amount. I like the flavour that brown sugar provides. Maple sugar would be lovely if you can get your hands on it. For the oats, I like old-fashioned, large flaked oats best. But if you only have quick oats, you can use those as well without any concerns. Do not use instant oats.