These delicious Homemade Keto Protein Bars are a no bake recipe that's low carb, sugar free, gluten free and nut free as well! Just 5 minutes of prep time to make a perfectly healthy no-bake energy bar for a grab-n-go snack! Just 5 total grams of carbs or 3 net grams of carbs per serving and 6 grams of protein per bar!
Homemade Keto Protein Bars
When it comes to low-carb bars, I love them all; creamy, salty, chewy, nut filled, coconut filled, etc. I'm all in, but especially if it's chocolate flavored.
But I'm not all in when it comes to sugar. Making a dark chocolate candy bar for just the sake of snacking wasn't my plan here. If I'm going to have a low carb snack I want it to include a high protein amount, with healthy fats, no artificial sweeteners or added sugar and of course low in grams of net carbs to fit into my low-carb diet.
The Best Low Carb Protein Bars
Most store bought keto protein bars on the market today contain nuts. Often they include either almond flour or almond butter or cashews or some form of nut butters.
I love that we can now find so many delicious keto protein bars online, but when you have a nut allergy or your child or spouse does, it makes it impossible to purchase most granola bars and low carb keto protein bars available.
When you're eating a keto diet and even a low carb diet, getting in a good amount of protein and healthy fats will help with satiation.
Keeping the carbs low, these bars have a total of 5 carbs with dietary fiber at 2 grams. If you count net carbs, these have 3 grams per serving. If you are also tracking calories, one of my keto protein bars has just 150 calories.
The great thing about my keto protein bars is they do not need refrigeration making them easy to grab and go!
Nut Free Keto Delicious Recipes
This recipe came out of a little desire for my youngest to have some nut-free, chocolate gluten-free protein bars that were homemade knowing exactly what was in it.
If you've not followed me for very long you might not know my youngest has a tree nut and peanut allergy.
It's been a few long years of struggle trying to find anything store bought that didn't cause a reaction for him. My desire has always been to make most of the recipes on my blog nut free for him.
I'm particularly proud of these little healthy protein bars. They have great texture and a smooth creamy fudge feel in your mouth.
Have you ever had a Nestle crunch bar? Well, these low carb bars have a slight crunch to them coming from the grounds sunflower seeds and remind me of those crunch bars. Having some difference in texture really makes this a satisfying snack.
I try to use sunflower seeds often as a wonderful replacement for what most nuts do in a recipe. Some other recipes you might like:
- Coconut Flour Bread
- Grain Free Nut Free Sunflower Seed Bread
- No Bake Coconut Flour Chocolate pie crust
- Keto Magic Bars
- Coconut Lime Bars
HOW TO MAKE KETO NUT FREE BARS
This is a super simple recipe to make at home! To view exact measurements, nutritional information and print recipe please scroll down to the bottom of the blog post for the recipe card.
Simple Ingredients Needed:
Sunflower seeds -Make sure to purchase raw and unsalted
Sunflower seed butter or tahini which is ground sesame seeds
Chocolate protein powder- My favorite protein powder is the Jay Robb brand as it has very few ingredients and no junk or artificial ingredients.
Swerve confectioners sweetener -See my Sweetener guide & Conversion chart to swap this with another low carb sweetener.
Butter- Having your butter soft or room temperature will give you the best results when combining in food processor. Coconut oil could also replace butter.
Optional Coating: ½ cup sugar free chocolate chips and 1 tablespoon butter
Directions
How to Make your own protein bars at home;
Place all keto-friendly ingredients into a food processor and blend until smooth. If you don't have a food processor, use a sharp knife and chop the sunflower seeds as best you can.
Scrape down the sides of the processor and blend again until it looks shiny and slightly wet. You could try placing all your ingredients into a blender but you may need to do that in batches since there isn't much surface area.
Taste and adjust sweetener if needed.
Spread batter into a parchment lined 8 by 4 inch loaf pan. I have tried these in a square 8 by 8 baking pan, but for me I felt the bars were a bit too thin for my liking. I prefer using the loaf pan instead for nice height.
Use the sides of the parchment paper over the top of the batter and then you can press it down to flatten evenly without getting your hands dirty.
Refrigerate for 30 minutes. Slice into 8 bars, then cut these keto protein bars in half to make 16 bars.
If using optional coating, melt sugar free chocolate chips and butter in microwave for 1 minute or on the stove top. Stir until smooth and no lumps.
Drizzle sugar-free chocolate on top of the bars and/or dip the bottom half of the bars into the melted chocolate and lay on a parchment lined baking sheet.
How to Store Keto Protein Bars
This picture makes me think of those 3 Musketeer bars from when I was a kid. But the recipe today doesn't have that light and airy texture as a 3 Musketeer would have. These are dense with a slight crunch and complete fudginess through and through.
Whether you're just having a craving for chocolate or need a little afternoon pick-me-up or simply want a treat, these allergy friendly protein bars are the perfect thing!
Store them in an airtight container on your counter for up to 5 days or in the fridge for up to 2 weeks or freeze for a month and thaw whenever you like.
Swapping Ingredients
If you don't have nut allergies in your family you can sub the sunflower seeds for any nut of choice you like. You can also replace the sunflower seed butter with any nut butter you like.
If you don't have Swerve, you can use another confectioners style keto sweetener. I'd recommend Monk Fruit or Allulose.
You could also just choose a sweetener you enjoy, add a small amount then taste and adjust to your liking. Here's my sweetener guide and conversion chart.
Butter can also be replaced for the coconut oil to make these dairy free keto protein bars.
Low Carb Easy Keto Protein Bars
Low Carb Keto Chocolate Protein Bars (Nut Free)
Ingredients
- 4 ounces sunflower seeds raw, unsalted
- 4 ounces sunflower seed butter or tahini
- 2 scoops chocolate protein powder or 75 grams
- 3 ounces unsweetened cocoa powder
- ¾ cup Swerve confectioners sweetener
- ¼ teaspoon salt
- 8 tablespoons butter softened or coconut oil
- Optional Coating: ½ cup sugar free chocolate chips and 1 tablespoon butter
Instructions
- Place all ingredients into food processor and blend until smooth.
- Scrape down sides and blend again.
- Taste and adjust sweetener if needed.
- Spread batter into a parchment lined loaf pan.
- Refrigerate for 30 minutes.
- Slice into 8 bars then cut bars in half to make 16 bars.
- Freeze for 30 minutes if you are planning on making optional coating.
- If using optional coating, melt chocolate chips and butter in microwave for 1 minute or stove top. Stir until smooth and no lumps.
- Dip the bottom half of the bars into the melted chocolate and lay on a parchment lined baking sheet. Drizzle more chocolate on top of bars if desired.
- Storage: Refrigeration is not needed and these can stay on your counter in an airtight container, but in hot summer months it is best to keep them refrigerated.
Notes
Nutrition
About Brenda
Brenda Bennett is a certified Nutritional Therapy Practitioner, certified Sugar Detox Coach, certified Keto Coach and certified Life Coach. She has been Sugar Free & Refined carb free for 17 years and has written 2 cookbooks, Sugar-Free Mom, and Naturally Keto and her 3rd book The 30-Day Sugar Elimination Diet, is a four part program to help you detox from sugar, eliminate cravings, balance blood sugar and lose weight all while eating a delicious, nutrient dense whole foods. Meal plan offers two tracks to follow, low carb or keto. She is the founder of the Sugar Free Fresh Start course and Sugar Free Tribe weight loss membership. Learn more.
Tania
Hi Brenda!
What types of protein are most suitable for keto and baking.
What should I look for? I’m in Canada, so, brand choices are different.
Thank you for all your wonderful recipes!!
Brenda
I just look for minimal ingredients, no sugar and I purchase whey protein as I think that is the best.
Linda K.
I made these the other day and just did some research on chocolate protein powders. I didn't realise that there are so many choices. I purchased mine at the Bulk Barn in Canada. The ingredients are listed as: Whey protein isolate (milk, contains soy lecithin) cocoa, skim milk powder, salt, silicon dioxide, sucralose. I'm not sure if this would be a good protein powder to use and if there are better ones. Maybe this would be too much sweetener with the sucralose in the whey protein and the Swerve in the recipe.
Brenda, hope you can help me out.
Brenda
Yes I would not recommend the sucralose as these bars would be very sweet. The protein powder I linked to and use in the ingredients is from Jay Robb which has minimal ingredients and fillers.
Linda Kundrik
Thanks for getting back to me, Brenda! I just bought a lot of the sucralose protein and would hate it to go to waste, as it wasn't cheap. Could I cut down on the Swerve without altering the recipe too much, before I get the right stuff?
Thanks, Linda
Brenda
Yes
Lara
These are great for school snacks, thank you Brenda! I was wondering if I could replace the cocoa powder for an organic raspberry or strawberry one to change flavour?
Brenda Bennett
Sounds like a great idea!
Jillaine Tagatz
Can any protein powder be used in pave of the one listed?
Brenda
Sure
Eileen Pappas
I only have vanilla protein powder. Can I use that & possibly increSe the amount of cocoa powder? What would you suggest?
Maxine H
I use a chocolate protein powder from home bargains. It's great.
Lori
These are one of the best things I have ever eaten in 3 years keto. I make a batch every 2 weeks or so. Taste so indulgent and are so much better than any of those bars you can buy in the stores like Atkins or others!
Paul Sanders
Hi, I make 8 Tbsp (half a cup) of coconut oil only 105g, not 162g.
See http://www.coconutoil-online.com/Volume_to_Weight_Conversion_Table.html
J
The nutritional information says 1gram = 159 calories. How many grams does each bar turn out to be (assuming the 16 servings)?
Thanks
Brenda
I've got to edit that, my recipe plug in went wonky and converted all serving sizes to 1 gram on every recipe and I have over 600!
Barbara Allman
Hello! I made these last night with some minor changes. I don't like to use that much coconut oil as things usually come out overpowered by it....plus I only had 3 tbsp left, so I added the 3 tbsp coconut oil, 1 tbsp duck fat (happened to have from cooking a duck), and 1 tbsp ghee. I also used the brown sugar Sukrin plus some truvia plus some Swerve. Oh yes, I also added a couple of small squares of melted 72% chocolate. OMG, these are so good! Going to take some snowshoeing with me today for energy! Thank you!
Tannaz
I made them too and they were great but they keep melting
Riley
Hi,
My roommate made these and they are delicious! I want to make a batch of my own but am wondering if there is a way to increase the protein (and decrease the fat if possible) without altering the final product too much. Any suggestions?
Thanks!
Brenda
Sorry I've not made any alterations to this recipe, that testing will have to be done on your own. Please let me know if you try it and how it works for you.
Jeska
Hey Riley, I'm wanting to increase protein and lower fat too. Did you ever find a good adjustment?
CHRISTOPHER
Hi there:
Mine melt at room temp. Too much coconut oil?
JP
Hi,
Theses are good, but a quick warning. Quest protein power contains cross contamination from nuts (tree and possible peanuts). So, while these bars don't have nuts in them the ingredients are certainly not safe for people with nuts allergy. This is a good choice for those without a nut allergy.
Nadieh
Looks Delicious! Just wondering how long one can store these, in and outside the fridge. Any experiences with taking them with you on long days away?
Brenda
They don't need refrigeration and will stay good for at least a week. If you are away and can keep them refrigerated that would be better especially if in a warm climate.
wendy ball
Good Morning - I want to make these bars for my hubs and I however he is allergic to coconut products - so what can I use in place of coconut oil? Also we don't have the powdered sugar replacement here in our town's natural food stores - so what else can I use - splenda? truvia? I should be able to find the sunbutter, but if not can peanut butter be used? Thank you for your time.
Brenda
Peanut butter can be used, butter can be used in place of coconut oil and I would suggest using less of whatever sweetener you prefer. Both Splenda and Truvia may be sweeter than my sweetener so add half the amount than taste it and decide if you need more.
Abby
WOW... thank you so much for this recipe... g'kids have nut allergies & they are going to love these !!