No-Bake Trail Mix Cereal Bars
A nutritious spin on cereal bars, No-Bake Trail Mix Cereal Bars are loaded with healthy ingredients but still have the sweet treat taste that kids love. Perfect for the lunch box and super simple to make.
I can smell it…can you? The sweet smell of school busses rumbling down the road. Squeaking doors opening and closing….with the sweet sound of silence wafting through the air. The new school year is about to begin. It’s happy and it’s sad….summer’s over but a new year is about to begin. New friends, new clothes and new traditions.
And if you haven’t noticed….Box Tops for Education has quietly returned to the school shelves. I’ve been piling up my cart with everything Box Tops, especially the Bonus Box Tops. This year, schools are facing more budget cuts than ever and every little bit helps. Enlist your neighbors, friends and families to collect their box tops for your school and help out with some of the costly expenses not covered by the school budgets. We leave a little box in our newspaper slot (since we no longer receive a newspaper) to collect box tops from our neighbors that don’t have school age kids. It’s definitely a team effort so why not reach out to those that would normally throw them out and send them to school in a huge accordion file (like I did back in the day when I walked up hill to school each day with no shoes…not true..but you get the gist.)
And while you’re at it….pick up a box of Multi-Grain Cheerios and make these uber fabulous No-Bake Trail Mix Cereal Bars to pack in your kids lunch boxes….or your own lunch box. They’re loaded with banana, sunflower seeds, flaked coconut, dried cherries and…of course, Cheerios. All held together with a marshmallowy coating, they are super addictive and totally healthy. Minus the marshmallow but we all need a sweet treat every now and then. They also make a great breakfast treat alongside this tropical smoothie! Ready in just 10 minutes and gone just as fast.
Get the Recipe: No-Bake Trail Mix Cereal Bars
Ingredients
- 5 tablespoons unsalted butter
- 6 cups marshmallows
- 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
- 2 cups Multi-Grain Cheerios
- 1 cup chopped dried banana
- 1 cup chopped dried cherries
- 1 cup chopped unsweetened coconut flakes
- 1 cup unsalted sunflower seeds
Instructions
- Line a 9x9 baking pan with parchment leaving a 3 inch overhang and set aside.
- In a large bowl, mix together the Cheerios, banana, cherries, coconut and sunflower seeds. Set aside.
- In a large saucepan, melt the butter over medium heat. Stir in the marshmallows and stir constantly until the marshmallows are completely melted. Pour the mixture over the Cheerios mixture and stir to coat. Pour the mixture into the prepared baking pan and press down with your hands to form an even layer (this works well if you coat your hands with butter or cooking spray). Allow the mixture to cool completely and then remove by pulling the bars out of the pan with the parchment and transfer to a cutting board. Cut the cereal into 12 bars and wrap individually before storing at room temperature in an airtight container. Bars can be stored up to 5 days.
This is a sponsored conversation written by me on behalf of General Mills®. The opinions and text are all mine.