Quest Bars

The world of bars is a very competitive one because there are so many choices on the shelf. Protein bars specifically all aim to provide athletes the nutrition their body needs to sustain activity. With more of a focus on heath in the media it has become more and more important to be able to read your protein bar label and not have it made up of junk and a bunch of chemicals. I've heard a lot of talk of Quest Bars from the fitness community and given that they are gluten-free I felt I had to try them. Now recently I have turned away from bars as a meal replacement for me and have been eating other healthy options, but I still like to have one or two bars in my purse just in case, especially when traveling. With some trips coming up I was hoping that the Quest Bar could be a new companion however that will not be the case.

While the flavor variety is quite compelling it seems that one of two ingredients do not agree with me and make my tongue tingle and my lips slightly swell. Lo Han Go, a natural sugar from a plant, newly popular sugar replacement ingredient for low sugar bars, and IMO Fiber. I first experienced this while eating the cinnamon roll bar and I thought perhaps this was just a side effect of the flavor and the Stevia. Overall the flavor was decent; it kind of tasted like raw cinnamon roll dough; very rich, slightly grainy and very soft. I was eating it slowly for my morning snack and decided to stop eating it about half way through the bar. It took until 8 o'clock that night for my tongue to feel normal again.

I need to know if this was a fluke so in the confines of my own home on the weekend I had two bites of a different flavor and waited to see if my tongue felt funny again- yes it did! I packed the rest of the bars up and I gave the rest of them to a fitness buddy who I knew would enjoy them. It really was a shame because besides for these two ingredients that were responsible for my tingling tongue, everything else in the ingredient list was very clean. They almost had the consistency and taste of a raw bar, except this fiber replacement that they're using is definitely not natural. I did a little research and while this IMO can come from a few natural resources, it seems to also be very chemically manipulated and can be derived from wheat. If they were using psyllium husk in their bars instead I would be completely happy with them, but regardless of what made my tongue tingle, I strive to eat only things I can pronounce and know what they are. 

Chickpeas and Dark Chocolate

I never would have thought that chickpeas and dark chocolate would be a good combo but The Good Bean has proved me wrong. I had heard this company had done out with fruit and no-nut bars but hadn't seen them on shelves until now. A gluten free, nut free bar with a good amount of protein and fiber is right up my alley so I bought a few to add into my breakfast mix.

The chocolate berry is made up of chickpeas, dark chocolate, and red and blue berries, (plus some other miscellaneous). The fat content is really low at 1gram because it has no nuts, but still packs 5 grams of protein in a nice little 140 calorie package. And I'm sure a big plus, if you're adventurous enough to try it, you don't know you're eating chickpeas.

Taste of Nature

I have been eyeing these Taste of Nature bars at Costco for awhile, but of course, when you have not had a bar before, or any gluten free product for that matter, you don't want to end up with a bunch of product that tastes like, well....crap, right? I had looked at the product online after one of my outings to Costco and saw that not all of the flavors are gluten free, but the ones that are, they're tasty.  They sort of remind me of the granola bars I ate before I was gluten free: firm but chewy. The perisan pomegranate garden is my favorite but they don't really have much to offer me. I like to have all my calories count and while they do offer some iron, they are more empty calories than anything.