The demand for easy-to-eat snacks that are considered healthy — or at least less unhealthy than chocolate bars and potato chips — has been rising in recent years. Until a decade or so ago, nutrition bars/snack bars were predominantly purchased by weight-watchers and athletes; now, a broader spectrum of consumer has chomped into the nutritional bar category. One of the leaders in this category is KIND Snacks, founded in 2004 by Daniel Lubetzky with the mission of bringing more kindness into the world via a healthy snack (the company gives thousands yearly to support customer-generated projects that give back to the community).
From Walmart and Target to aboard Amtrak trains to convenience stores and gas stations to sports arenas, KIND has become a snack food juggernaut, crafting product with pronounceable ingredients, no trans-fats, nothing artificial, and available in more than 80,000 stores nationwide. Among the KIND products sold are bars containing nuts, fruits, spices, and honey; “grain clusters” better known as granola; soft-baked breakfast bars, and healthy grains bars made with a minimum of five super-grains.
Granted, a handful of actual nuts and/or a piece of fruit is the better choice than any snack bar, whether it’s full of highly processed ingredients or not, but KIND bars are yet one of the better choices on store shelves for a nosh with plenty of dietary fiber (20 g of whole grains per bar) and no scary sounding ingredients.
Below is a review of the newest KIND healthy grains bars flavors.
Flavor: Vanilla Blueberry*
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Super-grains: Oats, Millet, Quinoa, Amaranth, Buckwheat
Dietary Fiber: 2.5 g
Saturated Fat: 0%
Tasting Notes: Vanilla extract (not imitation) plus blueberry and other fruit purées lend a something-grandma-would-bake note to this mildly sweet, satisfying bar.
Flavor: Cinnamon Oat
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Super-grains: Oats, Millet, Buckwheat, Amaranth, Quinoa
Dietary Fiber: 2 g
Saturated Fat: 0%
Tasting Notes: A pleasant cinnamon aroma/taste combines with a balanced chew-crunch texture that is reminiscent of a warm bowl of oatmeal in bar form. A basically flavored snack, but basic in a good way.
Flavor: Dark Chocolate Chunk
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Super-grains: Oats, Millet, Buckwheat, Amaranth, Quinoa
Dietary Fiber: 2 g
Saturated Fat: 1.5 g
Tasting Notes: Something with such a delectable-sounding moniker should be, well, delectable. I appreciate that it’s not a cloyingly sweet overload like many chocolate-flavored nutrition bars, but the chocolate element is too understated. Also size of the chocolate pieces was closer to chips and not chunks.
Flavor: Salted Caramel
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Super-grains: Oats, Sorghum, Millet, Amaranth, Quinoa, Buckwheat
Dietary Fiber: 2 g
Saturated Fat: 1 g
Tasting Notes: Of the four bars, this one had the most muted flavor. The aroma of caramel was present, but missing was the confectionary creaminess of melted sugar and dairy.
*Each healthy grains bar is 35 g
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