Best Healthy Oat Crunchies
It’s back to school this week. Time for packing lunch boxes and meal prepping for the week ahead. If you’re looking for the Best Healthy Oat Crunchie Recipe that’s crisp on the edges and slightly chewy in the centre, this is the recipe to make. South Africa’s favourite crunchie recipe gets a healthy-ish remake with wholemeal flour, coconut oil and omega-rich seeds. I sweeten the mixture with honey and natural cane sugar. Honestly, they’re the best healthy seeded oat crunchies I’ve ever made.
Ingredient swaps to make Healthy Crunchies
These healthy oat crunchies are as good as I remember my mother making but with a few tweaks. I’ve used a combination of butter and coconut oil in the recipe, a sort of 50/50 compromise that helps include the nutritional benefits of coconut oil, without sacrificing the flavour that only butter offers. I’ve replaced the golden syrup with honey. You could of course use maple syrup too. A good oat crunchie is quite irresistible, especially with midmorning tea or late afternoon pick me up. Do give them a try. I think you’ll love them.
How to make a Healthy Crunchies
The method is quite simple, and after making it a few times, you’ll hardly need the recipe.
Melt the butter and oil, sugar and honey in a saucepan. To that, you whisk in the bicarbonate of soda water and wait for the frothy honey butter to foam and splutter.
In the meantime, add all the dry ingredients to a mixing bowl and stir in foaming honey butter mixture. After pressing the oat mixture into a baking tin, it’s into the oven to bake until golden. Then cool, slice and store.
Best Healthy Oat Crunchies
- 80 g butter
- 90 g coconut oil
- 110 g natural, brown cane sugar
- 60 ml (1/4 cup) honey
- 100 g desiccated coconut
- 200 g whole rolled oats
- 70 g wholemeal flour
- 70 g cake wheat flour or white spelt flour
- 1.25 ml fine salt
- 35 g (1/4 cup) pumpkin seeds
- 35 g (1/4 cup) sunflower seeds
- 30 ml (2 tablespoons) sesame seeds
- 2.5 ml bicarbonate of soda
- 40 ml cold water
Preheat the oven to 170º C. Grease and line a 28 x 18 cm baking tin with parchment paper. Place the butter, coconut oil, sugar and honey in a saucepan. Bring up to the boil, stirring from time to time until the sugar is dissolved. In the meanwhile, combine all the dry ingredients in a mixing bowl. Dissolve the bicarbonate of soda in the cold water and add to the honey butter.
The hot mixture will foam up and froth so watch that it doesn’t boil over. Pour the hot liquid into the dry ingredients and mix thoroughly. Press the biscuit mixture firmly into the baking tin and smooth over with the back of a spoon. Bake for 35-40 minutes until golden and cooked through.
Set aside to cool for about 5 minutes before cutting into squares. Allow to cool completely in the tin before placing on a wire rack to air.
If you love a sweet little something to go with your tea, oat cookies in particular, here are a few favourites.
Anzac biscuits by Ottolenghi and Helen
13 Comments. Leave new
Hello Di
I made these yesterday and they are truly scrumptious. However, I seem to battle to find a tin that measures 28 x 18cm, so I used my baking tray but they seemed to be spread too thin and broke up into odd sized pieces not squared like yours. They were yummy though especially with the drizzle topping. Do you have any tips or advice on what I should do next time around?
Kind regards
Marie Duarte
Sure Marie-Anne. When baking, the size of the tin is quite crucial as this determines the required baking time. If the tin is bigger than specified, the biscuits will be too thin and require a reduced baking time. It’s best to leave these crunchies to cool and firm up before cutting with a smooth bladed knife to prevent breaking up.
Yummy! These came out perfectly!!!! Thanks for the recipe!
You’re so welcome, Zoe. I make them often and we still love them. My girls’ favourite.
Quick question, are they meant to be hard coming out of the oven or must the be soft and will harden???
Hi Chris. It really depends on how you like them. Some would say, a little chewy is best. I like them with a bit of chewiness in the middle and more crisp on the outside.
Once they cool, they’ll definitely firm up and become more crunchie. If you prefer them with more of a biscuity snap, maybe add 5 minutes more to the bake time. Hope that helps. Let mw know how they turn out.
Hi, I would like to make these but don’t have wholemeal
flour or coconut oil, any suggestions what I could substitute with?
Hi, I would love to make your recipe but I am on a dairy-free and gluten free diet. Any suggestions for adapting it would be highly appreciated!
Hi Oana. I haven’t made it completely dairy-free or gluten-free before, but here’s what I would do to adapt it.
Make sure the oats is certified gluten-free. For the flour, I’d substitute half the flour with almond flour and the remainder, I’d divide between oat flour and gluten-free white flour or rice flour.
Using a combination of different flours will balance the flavours well. I’d replace the butter with coconut oil, about 150ml coconut oil in total should do. I hope this helps. Please do let me know if you manage. Kind regards Di
Hi would like to try the crunchies but dont have coconut oil – is there something I could substitute.Thanks
Hello Muriel. You could use all butter if you like. The flavour will be delicious and rich. Alternately, I’d use olive oil, not extra virgin though as it will be a little overpowering.
Hi there,
Love these crunchies! Wondering if I can make a big batch and freeze them?
So glad you love them too, Nyika. I haven’t frozen them before but I’m sure it will be successful. Once defrosted, maybe pop them back into a 170 C preheated oven for 3 minutes.