Who Knew Figs Could Be So Tasty?

A few months ago, I got some dried figs from our food coop. A fellow member was looking to split 25 pounds and I agreed to take some. She extolled the virtues of the mighty dried fig; excellent source of dietary fiber, has some calcium and iron. Getting the figs sounded like a good idea, but they looked so shrively and unappealing that no one wanted to touch them.

Thanks to The Garden of Vegan by Tanya Barnard and Sarah Kramer, this is a problem no more! Their recipe for Raspberry Fig Breakfast Bars is out of this world. I made it for the second time yesterday and served it to my parents and aunts while they were visiting. Now perhaps this is an unfair test since my mom and her sisters had a fig tree in their yard growing up, but they all loved it. My kids all loved it as well.

Its a little sweet for my taste so we cut the sugar from 1/2 cup down to a little over a 1/4 cup. Also the original recipe calls for using an 8 x 8 inch pan but I had good luck doubling the recipe and using a 9 x13 inch pan. This time I cheated and used store bought raspberry jam but last time I made my own raspberry jam using the strawberry jam recipe I mentioned back in June. I just substituted raspberries for strawberries.