Date and coconut bars with nuts

Kaja wrote to me today to say you’ve been waiting for recipes. Her recipes! And there I was hoping to let you fast for a bit, what with Lent just starting, and rustle up something delicious at the weekend.

But no, Kaja has some exceptionally Lenten bars for you, sweet and packing a million calories. Sigh. Words fail me. Over to Kaja, then. Luckily she’s observed a little Lenten restraint with the word count :p:

“Here’s the latest version of my carb bars for the gym. I’ll just say that they turned out exceptionally – yes, exceptionally – tasty (several people said so). So good I’m running out of scale to rate my confectionery on… And they’re even healthier, because there’s no added sugar (because dates, and those two bars of chocolate have absolutely, positively no fat – sorry, sugar – in them; I reckon the only Lenten ingredient here is the water – note from Prymitywna Kuchnia) or fat!”

At a glance: 

Preparation time: about 20 minutes if you’re well organised

Serves: I got 10 small bars (so, enough for two – note from Prymitywna Kuchnia)

Calories: it’s all healthy ingredients, so don’t bother your head about the calories either

Ingredients for Kaja’s latest bars:

• 200 g dates
• 2 tablespoons of water
• 50 g desiccated coconut
• 100 g hazelnuts
• 50 g flaked almonds
• 2 bars of dark chocolate 

Method (classic Lenten fare, sigh):

Toast the hazelnuts in a frying pan. Let them brown well so the skins start coming away on their own. Take the nuts out of the pan and remove the remaining brown skins (rubbing them in a tea towel works well). You can skip this part and use raw hazelnuts, but I think toasted ones just taste better. Put the toasted, skinned nuts and the flaked almonds into a food processor and pulse into small pieces, not powder. Tip into a large bowl and add the coconut.

Put the dates and water into the processor and blend to a smooth paste, about the consistency of a thick fruit preserve. Scrape the date paste into the bowl with the dry ingredients and mix thoroughly. All that’s left is to transfer everything to a baking tin lined with baking paper and press it down firmly. How thick you want the bars is up to you.

Now the coating. At the moment the mixture is quite loose; you couldn’t eat it without cutlery. For the bars to hold together, you need a coating on both sides!

Melt the chocolate over a water bath (bring water to the boil in one pan and set another on top with the chocolate in it). Spread half the chocolate over the top of the bars. Put them in the freezer for a few minutes, just long enough for the chocolate to set. Take them out and lay them chocolate-side down on a sheet of baking paper. Now cut the slab into bars with a long knife, but don’t pull them apart yet! We’re cutting now because the chocolate might crumble later. It’s just easier this way. Lift the whole thing back into the tin on its paper and spread the remaining chocolate over the top (the cut side, which used to be the bottom).

Put it in the freezer for a few minutes. Take it out and put the slab on a board with the cut side facing up and the uncut chocolate coating underneath. Cut along the existing lines. Of course you can skip the stages and cut the whole thing once it’s coated, but I’m afraid the chocolate on top might shatter as the knife goes in.

All done! Enjoy!