I’ve been trying to make healthier foods lately but it doesn’t always work out too well. Sometimes they actually taste healthy….like, in a bad way. It’s pretty depressing. Sometimes you just want to munch on a handful of artificially colored and flavored gummy worms, or a giant stack of waffles covered in high fructose corn syrup, but….that’s bad. You shouldn’t do that (often). I haven’t gone full fledged healthy with this recipe for healthy protein bars but it’s still pretty freakin’ healthy. Healthy! (one more time for kicks). 

Unless you are competing in a fitness competition or something, I don’t see a problem with adding a smidgen of “not so healthy” to any healthified food. In this case, chocolate chips! Yay! I actually really love these healthy protein bars. They taste somewhat healthy but not like lettuce with no dressing. They have a consistency like cookie dough, which is awesome, and they taste almost like the real thing.  I used dates which added a good amount of sweetness, peanut butter which is delicious, mixed nuts and chocolate chips. After I mixed them up in the food processor, I pressed them into a pan and refrigerated them before cutting them into bars. I gave them to the girls the next morning and called them breakfast bars. They corrected me and called them cookies. Cookies! I win….