LÄRABAR: Carrot Cake and Banana Bread

Carrot Cake (Top) and Banana Bread (Bottom)

Have you heard of Lärabars? Lärabars were actually created by a person called Lara in 2000. According to Lärabar's website, they had considered many names for the bars, but everyone kept asking for "Lara's Bars". It was only in April 2003 that the first batch of Lärabars were available for sale. And one year later, by April 2004, a million bars had been sold.

These babies are immensely popular amongst the Paleo community and CrossFitters. Why? Because they are made entirely of fruit, nuts and seeds, and contain no wheat or gluten, and generally no added sugar. Most of these bars are 100% Paleo and act as great snacks (as long as you do not guzzle too many!).

I had the opportunity in Australia to try a few flavours, but have not been able to find Lärabars in Singapore. So when my cousin passed me two bars that she had brought from the US, I was excited to try them.

The Carrot Cake bar is made of carrots, dates, almonds, walnuts, raisins, pineapple and coconut. Whilst the taste of cinnamon spiced dates came through strongly, I could not taste the carrots so much. It was more like eating a cinnamon bar than a "carrot cake" bar. Not to say that it was not delicious!

The ingredients of the Banana Bread bar are just bananas, dates and almonds, so the taste of banana was much stronger. I liked that it contained more bits of nuts than the Carrot Cake bar, making the bar crunchier.

Between the two, I preferred the Banana Bread bar, but there are still so many more flavours to try and compare! I can only hope that the next kind soul coming in from the US will carry back somemore Lärabars for me!

You can find a full list of Lärabar flavors here. A box of 16 sells for between US$20 and US$25 on Amazon.