I frequently make up a recipe myself without weighing or measuring ingredients and without baking. I use dates, maple or coconut palm syrup, peanut butter, rolled oats, roast almond and optional seeds / dried fruits.

I have the same thing happen with mine and my kids won’t eat it like that

Maybe you need to add more honey to bind it together better

Have you checked out the recipes on here? Mouths of Mums and its participants have posted lots of scrumptious recipes, have a look, see what you can find. If that fails, good old Google, you’re bound to find recipes on there. Keep trying til you find one you like and one that works

I would say the ratio for wet-dry is wrong, although some places will call for it, your measuring can be different from there’s. Play around, find a recipe that you like, then note what seemed to go wrong when baked and fix it, either a little less wet or dry products or other way around.

I just had a thought. Is it possible that you aren’t packing the mixture down firm enough before putting it in the oven. If it is crumbling there is also a chance the mixture is in fact dry not wet.

You could possibly add more oats or other cereal. My Mum used to use a recipe with weetbix crushed. It had two eggs in it and no honey. The eggs bind it together. Don’t cook it for too long or when it is cold it will go really hard. Mum used to cook it until it was cooked through but still bubbly on the top. Maybe the mixture isn’t binding the nuts iand that’s why it always crumbles. You definitely need to chill in the fridge before slicing it. Depending on the ingredients it is also suitable for freezing.

I was thinking after its made you could put a bit of honey or golden syrup to hold it together.

Honey is a great binder to make them chewy?

Think of all the fruit crumbles you could make!

This is my in to Musli car recipe, we are Tree Nut free due to allergies and my daughter’s school is out free so it has no nuts in it but is totally changeable with fruit, seeds and nuts and I have also added dark choc chips as long as the total quantity is about the same. You could also reduce or swap sugar also.

Easy Muesli bars
Ingredients
2 cups rolled oats
1 ½ cups rice bubbles
½ cup craisins
½ cup sultanas
½ cup desiccated coconut
1/4 cup pumpkin seeds
1/4 cup sunflower seeds
150g butter, diced
2/3 cup honey
1/3 cup caster sugar
Method:
Preheat oven to 180°C. If using fan-forced, 160°C.
Grease a lamington pan or one of similar sizing and line with greaseproof/baking paper.
Mix the oats, rice bubbles, craisins, sultanas, coconut, pumpkin seeds and sunflower seeds in a good sized bowl.

In a saucepan put your butter, honey and sugar and heat to melt the butter stirring to combine all ingredients, simmer until mixture becomes more syrupy and a honeycomb colour. Remove this from the heat.
Stir the liquid gradually into the dry ingredients and when well combined, spoon into your lined tray. Press this mixture down well and able in your oven for about 20mins.
This should be golden brown and odds to book in the tray before removing to slice. Store in an airtight container.

Have you tried including a mashed banana to help bind the mix. The muesli bar will still have a chewy constancy and should be kept in the fridge but I find it works very well.

Thanks for all the responses. I’m going to try some of these suggestions over the weekend and see what works.

It will be interesting to see the other answers . In a recipe that states a certain amount of flour sometimes you may need a little bit more or a little bit less. Different brands of flours have different absorbency rates. For example if the mix seems a bit dry you may need to add a little more melted butter or milk so the mix is not as crumbly. Also press the mix very firmly into the container. Hope this is helpful.

Wet ingredients usually help hold them together.
This is my recipe that I get the kids to help me make, it’s a bit bland but it’s simple and even great for 1 yr olds too. For older kids I add choc chip or shredded coconut for some extra flavour.
https://kazkreations.wordpress.com/2014/08/23/oatmeal-and-banana-bars/

I always have the same problem and will be following this with interest as I had given up trying!

Terrific answer mom109463! Very Helpful!

Most muesli bars need something to bind them together which is where the sugar comes in, a lot use butter and melt the sugar, this acts as a binding agent, you can use butter and honey as this will do the same thing, raw sugar or brown sugar are also good alternatives, but as they have a lot of dry ingredients they need to be bound together, I found that if you google Taste recipes, and put muesli bars in the search bar there are heaps of recipes, a lot use dried fruit, eg apricots, sultanas etc, these also help bind the ingredients together, it is really trial and error especially if you are trying to cater to a special diet, but I really recommend the TASTE website for recipes that are tried and tested and Australian so the ingredients are easily available. good luck

I would make the mixture ‘wetter’.

I would be adding some more honey or liquid to the mix