Bushwalker's Date and Oat Slice
A dense home-baked bar built on dates, oats, and seeds. Bake a tray, cut twelve, carry them all week.
- calories
- 270
- weight
- 2.2 oz
- cal / oz
- 123
- protein
- 5 g
- serves
- 12, scales
- prep
- 20 min
- cook
- 0 min
- total time
- 20 min
- water
- none
- cost
- $
Calorie and protein figures are my own estimates, good enough for planning a food bag and not meant as precise nutrition data.
- Snack
- No cook
- Backpacking
- Day hike
- Thru-hike
- Bikepacking
- Vegetarian
- Dairy free
- Nut free
- Eat in the bag
- Pre-mix at home
- Shelf stable
- Basic
Ingredients
| Pitted dates | 1 cup, chopped | |
|---|---|---|
| Sodium bicarbonate | 1 tsp | |
| Boiling water | 1/2 cup | home kitchen only, not carried |
| Rolled oats | 2 cups | |
| Plain flour | 1 cup | |
| Processed bran | 1/2 cup | |
| Wheatgerm | 1/4 cup | |
| Sunflower seeds | 1/3 cup | |
| Pepitas | 1/3 cup | |
| Sesame seeds | 2 tbsp | |
| Dried apples | 1/2 cup, chopped | |
| Dried apricots | 1/2 cup, chopped | |
| Brown sugar | 1/2 cup | |
| Vegetable oil | 1/2 cup | |
| Honey | 1/3 cup | |
| Cinnamon | 1 tsp | |
| Nutmeg | 1/4 tsp |
Method
- At home: put the chopped dates and the bicarbonate in a bowl, pour the boiling water over, and leave it ten minutes. The dates collapse into a paste that binds the whole slice.
- Stir the oil, honey, and brown sugar into the date mush while it is still warm.
- Add the oats, flour, bran, wheatgerm, seeds, dried fruit, cinnamon, and nutmeg. Mix until there is no dry flour left. The dough is stiff. Use your hands.
- Press it hard into a lined 9x13 tray. Press harder than feels necessary or it crumbles when you cut it.
- Bake at 350F for 25 to 30 minutes, until the edges darken and the middle is firm to a press.
- Cool completely in the tray, then cut twelve bars. Cutting warm gives you a tray of gravel.
- On the trail: unwrap and eat. No stove, no water, no pot.
This is a home-oven job that pays off on the track. The dates are the structure: soaked with bicarbonate in boiling water, they break down into a sticky paste that holds oats, bran, and seeds together without eggs or butter. Leaving out the egg and butter matters, because it means the finished slice sits in a hot pack for a week without going off.
The oil and honey carry the energy. Oats and bran alone would be dry and slow to eat; a half cup of oil turns each bar into a real block of calories you can chew while walking. Press the mixture into the tray hard and let it cool all the way before cutting, or you carry crumbs instead of bars.
Packing
Wrap each bar in parchment and pack them upright in a rigid container or a side pocket. They keep about a week in warm weather and longer in cool. Loose in the bottom of a pack they turn into crumbs you eat with a spoon.
Variations
- Swap the apples and apricots for sultanas or dried mango, one for one.
- Chopped almonds or walnuts in place of the pepitas, if nobody in the group has a nut allergy.
- Cut sixteen smaller bars for day walks instead of twelve big ones.
https://www.bushwalkingnsw.org.au/food