Coconut And Cherry Flapjacks {Easy Recipe}

Coconut and cherry flapjacks. Mmmmmmm! My kids used to love a flapjack in their lunchboxes or waiting for them after school as they bounded through the door and these coconut and cherry flapjacks make a rather yummy change from the usual gooey original flapjacks I generally make as our regular go-to's.

Coconut And Cherry Flapjacks

Flapjacks are one of those snacks that loads of us remember form our childhoods. I think they're the earliest thing I remember cooking away in my Grandmas AGA and honestly, I've been hooked ever since :)

Maybe it's the smell of sugar filling the house is it's cooking or the having to wait for them to cool before we were allowed to tuck in, whatever it was, those memories stuck with me!

I've been giving my own kids flapjacks as snacks since, well, since I've had kids. I didn't used to make them myself, instead I'd buy them ready made (I know, don't judge me!!). I think I assumed that it was a hassle or the kids wouldn't eat them. I had no idea how easy they were to make until we started eating Clean or how easy they were to adapt and make in a whole load of different flavors.

These coconut and cherry flapjacks are a newer variety to us but adding a little bit of shredded coconut gives these a very kid friendly slightly different take on a regular flapjack recipe.

Shredded coconut adds sweetness to these flapjacks and so I've reduced the amount of maple syrup - my go to for a refined sugar free sweetener - and of course fresh cherries add some sweetness all of their own.

More Healthy Snacks

• Healthy flapjacks for kids
• Chocolate flapjacks
• No bake date slice
• Clean eating apple slice
• Gooey apple flapjacks
• Healthy apple pie mug cake
• Fresh orange loaf cake

Fresh And Frozen Cherries

As much as I love frozen cherries and always keep a stash of them in the freezer for smoothies, desserts and a whole host of other things, you really need to use fresh cherries in this recipe.

Frozen cherries contain too much water to be good in these flapjacks, and you'll end up with a soggy flapjack if you try and use them. And I'm not convinced anyone likes a soggy flapjack!

Where I live we have a pretty narrow window for buying fresh cherries that are locally grown or even grown in my country, if you're somewhere hotter than I am (lucky you!) then you may have more time to buy them fresh and locally grown.

You can of course buy imported fresh cherries all year round.

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How Long Do Cherry Flapjacks Last?

After these have been cooked cooled and sliced up, you can keep them in an airtight food container and they'll stay fresh for 2-3 days. You don't need to keep these in the fridge, they're better kept out of the cold, and the flavors develop over the day or two after you've made them.

I don't advise freezing these flapjacks for the same reason I don't recommend using frozen cherries, the water content will become too much for these snacks and you won't get the sweet gooeyness of a fresh flapjack!

Easy Lunchbox Snacks

Oatmeal snacks feature heavily on out diet and not just for snacks but in breakfasts too.

Oatmeal is one of the higher protein grains and so it tends to keep you fuller for longer so if I can replace the flour in a snack recipe with no real difference to the end recipe or as in the case of flapjacks simply use the oats, then I like to.

While I often have flapjacks hanging about the house waiting for hungry kids to hunt them down, I usually use these as morning break time snacks for the kids at school. Because they're higher protein than say, a slice of cake, they stop the rumbling tummies little ones can get and keep the kids going until they can tuck into their lunch!

And of course it goes without saying, while the kids are at school and you have a quiet house they're also a very acceptable morning snack with a cup of tea...for US!

How To Make Coconut And Cherry Flapjacks

Ingredients

• 1¼ Cups Oatmeal
• ⅔ Cup Butter
• ½ Cup Shredded coconut
• 3 Cups Cherries Fresh, pitted, halved
• 3 tbsp Maple syrup 100% pure
• 2 tbsp Coconut sugar

Instructions

• Heat your oven up to 190f or 350c and line a square 8 inch tin with parchment paper and then rub the paper with a little butter to stop the flapjack sticking
• Put the oatmeal and shredded coconut in a large mixing bowl and put it to one side
• On the stove melt the butter and coconut sugar in a small pan over a really low heat, stirring it to make sure it doesn't burn
• The the melted butter and sugar off the heat and stir in the maple syrup and then add this to the coconut and oatmeal mixture and combine it really well making sure all the oatmeal and shredded coconut is covered in the butter mixture
• Stir through the halved cherries (gently so they don't break!) and then scoop the flapjack mix into the lined tin
• Using the back of a spoon, push the mixture into the pan so it's compacted and flat on the surface
• Bake the flapjack for 15 minutes until golden on the top and then take it out of the oven
• The flapjack will harden up as it cools, so wait until it's cooled before cutting it into slices. To get a neat cut, turn the flapjack over and cut in from the underneath up :)

Coconut And Cherry Flapjacks Recipe