Snack Bars

These honey-flavored cereal bars with puffed rice and toasted oats make a great substitute for store-bought energy bars. They can be made with almost any mix of nuts and dried fruit.

These bars have a nutty, streusel-like topping and a crisp shortbread crust.

This delicious homemade grown-up version of Fig Newtons calls for adding red wine and anise seeds to the jammy fig filling. The crust gets even more tender the day after baking.

Karen DeMasco's crumbly soft, jammy-sweet bars travel well, so they're ideal for school bake sales. She says, "They are quick to put together with pantry staples, and everyone seems to love them." They're delicious made with any flavor of jam, as well as the raspberry preserves called for here.

These chewy, nutty, white-chocolate-dipped sweets are a little bit granola bar, a little bit trail mix. Pastry chef Luis Villavelazquez wanted to put his own imprint on the portable snacks, so he added a twist: a good dose of spicy black pepper.

The crunchy, almondy topping for these clever bars is loaded with vitamin E. The filling is chewy like caramel and is full of vitamin C from the orange.

These oat bars, packed with fruit and nuts, are like delicious granola made to go.

These gingery, nutrient-packed bars use only natural sweeteners like brown rice syrup and natural cane sugar. "Brown rice syrup has a nice, round flavor that doesn't give you the jolt of sweetness that processed sugars do," Heidi Swanson says. The recipe itself is very versatile: "Once you get the hang of the technique, you can swap in all kinds of other nuts, spices and dried fruit."

These delightful nut bars, inspired by a recipe from Ken Oringer's mother-in-law, are both gooey and crisp. Oringer sometimes adds a pinch of curry powder to the caramel because, he says, "I like for people to bite into these and wonder what the spice is. I love that element of surprise."

Marcia Kiesel always bakes these cookies at home and packs them for camping. They're excellent for snacks while hiking and they're also good for breakfast. A granola with raisins will add a pleasant chewiness.

This berry filling is tart and fruity, and superbly balanced by the crisp, buttery shortbread crust.