These EASY Healthy Carrot Cake Oatmeal Breakfast Bars make a quick on-the-go breakfast, snack or wholesome dessert! Made with zero refined sugar and drizzled with a delicious maple cream cheese frosting.
Calling all carrot cake lovers! You are going to love this cozy and delicious healthy carrot cake bar recipe. I originally shared this recipe back in 2017, but over the years I’ve had a few complaints that the bars were too crumbly and fell apart. SO I have tested and re-tested this recipe a few times, made some tweaks and I’m LOVING how they turned out! I found that using quick oats instead of rolled oats helped hold the bars together more, making them more cake-like while still holding their shape. Made with wholesome ingredients and the maple cream cheese drizzle on top is literal icing on the cake!
Why You’ll Love this Recipe
- These healthy carrot cake bars are super easy to make all in one bowl!
- Made healthier with whole grain oats, a heaping cup of carrots and zero butter or added sugars. Drizzled with a luscious cream cheese frosting!
- Enjoy these bars as a grab-and-go breakfast, as a midday snack or even healthy dessert bars.
- Perfect for Easter brunch and packed with a whole cup of grated carrots!
Ingredients You’ll Need
- quick oats – I used Bob’s Red Mill quick-cooking oats, just make sure they’re certified gluten-free if making GF bars. I don’t recommend using old fashioned rolled oats in this recipe as the measurements would be off since quick oats are packed more tightly when measured out.
- oat flour – this helps make the bars lighter and pairs perfectly with the oats. See notes below on how to make your own oat flour. You could also use 1 to 1 gluten-free flour, whole wheat flour or all purpose flour. I do not recommend almond flour or coconut flour in these bars.
- baking powder – acts as a leavening agent to help the bars rise.
- carrots – you’ll need one heaping cup of shredded carrots, about 2 medium carrots. Shred carrots using a box grater or food processor. Pre-shredded carrots from the grocery store will work too.
- eggs – adds protein and gives these bars their fluffy texture and height.
- coconut oil – for additional moisture and fluffiness! Feel free to substitute with another type of oil if you prefer or even butter.
- sweeteners – I used a combination of maple syrup and cane sugar to naturally sweeten these bars without using any refined sugar. You could also use honey, coconut sugar or other natural sweeteners.
- vanilla extract – extra boost of flavor.
- warm spices – a combination of cinnamon, nutmeg and salt
Feel free to add in some fun mix-ins such as raisins, chia seeds, chopped walnuts, pecans or any other type of nuts that you prefer. You could even sprinkle them on top of the maple cream cheese glaze for a delicious treat!
How to Make Carrot Cake Oatmeal Bars
- Mix ingredients. In a large mixing bowl, whisk together the oat flour, quick oats, baking powder, cinnamon, nutmeg and salt. In a separate medium bowl, whisk together eggs, maple syrup, cane sugar, coconut oil and vanilla and whisk until well-combined. Pour the wet ingredients in with the dry ingredients, add in the shredded carrots, and mix until just combined.
- Bake the bars. Pour the carrot cake batter into a prepared 8×8-inch baking pan lined with parchment paper. Bake in the oven at 350 degrees F for 25 to 30 minutes. Until edges are golden brown or a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Let the carrot oat bars sit for 5 minutes then remove from pan and let cool completely on a wire rack.
- Make cream cheese frosting. While the bars are cooling in the baking dish, add cream cheese, maple syrup, milk and vanilla extract to the bowl of a stand mixer (or you can use an electric hand mixer) and whip on high until smooth. Feel free to add in more milk one teaspoon at a time until you have your desired creaminess.
- Prepare bars. Drizzle the healthy cream cheese frosting over the bars once they have cooled and cut into 16 pieces. Enjoy!
How to Make Your Own Oat Flour
To make your own oat flour, you simply take old fashioned rolled oats (or instant oats) and blend them in your food processor or blender for about 60 seconds until they resemble a fine, powdery flour – and that’s it! You can of course just buy your own oat flour at the store, but this method saves you money and the flour will last up to three months in your pantry. The ratio for oat flour is one cup of oats = one cup of oat flour so it’s pretty easy to measure out.
Prepping and Storage
To Store: You can keep these carrot cake oatmeal bars stored in a sealed, airtight container or wrapped in plastic wrap for up to 5 days in the fridge. I like to store them in a single layer to prevent messing up the cream cheese frosting.
To Freeze: These healthy bars freeze really well too! I recommend freezing the bars individually and just pulling them out to thaw as needed. When ready to eat, just pop them in the microwave for 30 to 40 seconds or simply thaw out at room temperature. These will keep in the freezer for up to 3 months for the perfect snack!
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More Bars You’ll Love
- No Bake Almond Butter Granola Bars
- Dark Chocolate Almond Butter Bars
- Blueberry Oatmeal Breakfast Bars
- No Bake Chocolate Pumpkin Bars
- Healthier Pumpkin Bars
- Homemade KIND Bars
More Desserts You’ll Love
- Healthy Carrot Cake Cupcakes
- The BEST Flourless Chocolate Chip Brownies
- Healthy Chocolate Chip Cookies
- Fudgy Zucchini Brownies
- Peanut Butter Oatmeal Cookies
Hope you all enjoy these Carrot Cake Oatmeal Breakfast Bars! If you love these as much as we do, please leave a ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ star rating below and don’t forget to tag me on Instagram using the hashtag #eatyourselfskinny! Follow for more healthy recipes!
Carrot Cake Oatmeal Breakfast Bars
Ingredients
Dry Ingredients:
- 1 cup quick cooking oats
- 1/2 cup oat flour
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 1 tsp cinnamon
- 1/4 tsp nutmeg
- 1/4 tsp salt
Wet Ingredients:
- 2 eggs
- 1/4 cup coconut oil, melted and cooled slightly
- 1/4 cup maple syrup
- 1/4 cup cane sugar
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 1 cup grated carrots
For the Frosting:
- 3 oz cream cheese
- 1 Tbsp maple syrup
- 1 Tbsp milk of choice
- 1/4 tsp vanilla extract
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
- In a medium bowl, whisk together quick oats, oat flour, baking powder, cinnamon, nutmeg and salt. Set aside.
- In a separate bowl, whisk together the eggs, melted coconut oil, maple syrup, cane sugar and vanilla. Stir until well-combined.
- Pour the wet ingredients in with the dry ingredients, add in the grated carrots, and mix everything until just combined.
- Pour the oat mixture into a prepared 8×8-inch baking dish and bake in the oven for 25 to 30 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.
- Let the carrot cake bars sit for 5 minutes then remove from pan and let them cool completely on a wire rack before cutting. If you cut them too warm, they may crumble easier.
- While the bars are cooling, add cream cheese to a small bowl and heat in the microwave for about 30 seconds. Add in the maple syrup, a tablespoon of milk and 1/4 teaspoon of vanilla and whisk together until smooth. Feel free to add more milk a teaspoon at a time until you get your desired consistency.
- Slice the bars into 16 pieces and drizzle the cream cheese frosting over top, enjoy!
Video
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
Mine were also pretty crumbly, especially on top. I used unsweetened silk almond milk which I don’t usually use so would def use sweetened next time. Thanks!
These look so good! Would it be possible to substitute flour for the oats? Also I love how there is no refined sugar included; I am trying so hard to eliminate all refined sugar from my lifestyle!
I’m always on the lookout for healthier morning snacks for my relatively picky toddlers that “don’t make mama fat(ter)”, so this is going in my test pipeline. My kids don’t recognize breakfast cereal. Yet. My 4 year old actually thought the colorful boxes in the cereal aisle at Kroger were toys. (Oh yay, I’ve done ONE thing right. The other things that go into raising kids remain to be judged when they’re older. Eeps.)
P.S. I love that commenter “Amaryah” said she used a “flax egg”. I looked it up, and it’s just as easy as it sounds, and I even keep flax meal on hand! A friend and her family is vegan, so being able to do substitutions to make something sweet for a playdate snack is always greatly appreciated. It’s easy enough to go savory, sweet is challenging, as my sweetener of choice is honey, and my friend informed me that unless certified vegan, regular white sugar has been bleached with bone meal. I had no idea.
I made these today for the first time and OH MY GOSH are they amazing!! Mine too were a bit crumbly, so I served them in a small dish with a fork! Love this easy recipe, thank you!
I just made this recipe yesterday and they tasted super yummy! The taste of carrot cake was spot on and I loved the cream cheese frosting too. I’m normally not a big fan of frosting but I really liked this frosting because it didn’t have the overwhelming taste of powdered sugar since it used maple syrup for sweetener instead which I much more prefer. I used a mix of maple syrup and light golden blue agave syrup since I was running out of maple syrup and it turned out great. For the milk I used some unsweetened almond milk since that’s what I had, but since my milk was in the fridge, when I added it to the coconut oil mixture, the coconut oil instantly turned into its solid form because of the cold milk. I didn’t mind so much but it did mean I had coconut oil clumps throughout my batter. I tried sticking my batter bowl in the preheating oven to help melt the coconut oil clumps so that they would mix in better and that seemed to help but I don’t think it was a big deal. If you want to avoid this result then just make sure your nut milk is at room temperature when you add it to the recipe. I baked this in a muffin tin and it made 12 muffins. I baked them for 35 minutes and they turned out perfectly fine, but I’m sure that since they were in muffin tins then I probably could have baked them for less time but in the end it wasn’t a problem since they weren’t burnt or anything when they came out of the oven. The muffins were more on the chewy side because it is mainly oats as the base, rather than cake, but it wasn’t a problem, just something to keep in mind since they aren’t going to turn out cake like, more so just like softened oats texture. I still think they tasted super good though, and I shared them with my friends and they all really liked it too, so I highly recommend this recipe! 😋👍🏼
Are the rolled oats the quick-cooking kind?
No I used old fashioned rolled oats 🙂
Like another poster mentioned, they look cakey in the photos provided but mine looked nothing like that. They were oaty and pretty chunky + fell apart easily/hard to cut clean. They still taste delicious and the cream cheese icing was divine. I think I’ll try to use half oat flour and oats next time to achieve that cake like consistency. Thanks for the fab recipe I have a 7 week old at home that doesn’t give me too much time to eat proper lol.
Made these today and they taste great! However, mine turned out very crumbly and difficult to cut into bars because they keep falling apart…. Any suggestions?
Hmm I’m not sure why they turned out so crumbly for you, I’m sorry to hear that! I would try adding an extra egg in with the batter, I’ll test this out soon and see how they turn out! 🙂
I wonder if I could substitute apple sauce for the coconut oil?
Yes I’m sure you could! Please let me know how they turn out 🙂
16 servings out of 8” x 8” pan, is that correct?
Yes 16 square bars 🙂