Blueberry Breakfast Bars

I have a coworker who absolutely loves blueberries. She is retiring this week, and I wanted to make her a blueberry treat before she left. I adapted this recipe for Blueberry Breakfast Bars on The Kitchn, with the original recipe coming from the Whole Grain Mornings cookbook by Megan Gordon.

My version uses quite a bit of substitutes and including using sprouted spelt flour instead of whole wheat flour because I could not find my whole wheat flour when I went to make these (I guess I need to clean out my pantry!) I also have more blueberry filling in my version, and used a different sized pan. Be sure to check out the original version on the kitchn to see if you prefer their method!

Ingredients:

Blueberry filling:

• 4 cups fresh blueberries, divided
• 1/4 cup natural cane sugar
• 3 tablespoons unbleached all-purpose flour
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
• the juice and zest of 1 lemon
• 1 tablespoon water

Crust:

• 1 cup rolled oats
• 1/2 cup original wheat germ
• 3/4 cup sliced raw almonds
• 1/4 cup raw sesame seeds
• 1 cup sprouted spelt flour (or whole wheat flour)
• 1/2 cup packed light brown sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon kosher salt
• 3/4 teaspoon baking powder
• 1 large egg, beaten
• 8 tablespoons (1 stick) cold unsalted butter, cut into 1⁄4-inch cubes, plus more for greasing the pan
• 3 to 4 tablespoons ice water

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. Butter a 9×13-inch pan and set aside.

 

To prepare the filling, add 3 cups blueberries, 1/4 cup sugar, 3 tablespoons flour, vanilla extract, the juice and zest of 1 lemon, and 1 tablespoon water to a large pan.

Heat over medium, stirring until the mixture begins to break down and forms a bit of a sauce, about 5 minutes.

Remove from heat and stir in the remaining 1 cup blueberries. Set aside.

 

To prepare the crust, pulse the rolled oats, wheat germ, almonds, and sesame seeds in a food processor until they form a chunky, mealy texture, about 30 seconds.

Add the sprouted spelt flour, packed brown sugar, cinnamon, salt, and baking powder. Pulse a few times to combine.

Add the egg and butter cut into chunks.

Add the ice water slowly through the top of the food processor while pulsing to combine, until it begins to clump together.

Add about 2/3 of the crust mixture to your buttered baking pan, pressing down to form an even crust.

Pour the berry filling onto the crust and spread evenly.

Sprinkle the remaining crust mixture on top, evenly covering the blueberry mixture. You don’t have to press down on it, it will bake into an even crust on its own.

Bake at 350 degrees until the top crumble is golden brown, about 30 minutes. Let cool completely in the pan.

Slice into bars (I got 10 bars out of this recipe). If wrapped and kept at room temperature, the bars will keep for 3 days.

These turned out beautifully! The top crust remained pretty crumbly, so I’d suggest eating these with a fork despite them being labeled as “bars.”

I loved the ratio of crust to filling. The blueberries that were not cooked beforehand really kept their shape and added a nice texture with the sauce of the cooked blueberries. The bursts of blueberries were so tasty with this awesome crust! I couldn’t necessarily taste each component of the crust, but I loved the texture and resulting taste of the combined ingredients.