Fruit Oat Crumble Bars

Adjust your baking rack, place it on the middle panel and preheat the oven to 180 C

In a bowl, start by mixing the dry ingredients: oats, flour, salt, castor sugar and brown sugar

Cut the cold butter into manageable cubes and add the cubed butter to this dry mixture

Coat the cubes of butter well with the dry mixture

Working quickly, press each cube and flatten it with your hands, continuously coating with the dry mixture to prevent the butter from melting

Mix and rub in the butter in the dry mixture till it resembles pea sized bits of butter

The mixture should come together when clumped but break apart and crumble at the same time

Line an 8 x 4” cake loaf tin with parchment paper, make sure the edges of the parchment are jutting out so it makes it easier to pull out the bars

Place 2/3rds of the mixture in the tin, (reserve 1/3rd for the topping), Press down the mixture evenly in the tin till it is tightly packed down

Bake this base for 20 minutes in a preheated oven

Store the rest of the mixture in the refrigerator while the base is baking

In a separate bowl mix the berries with the chia seeds, lemon juice and cornstarch

If using frozen berries, thaw them and bring them back to room temperature (get rid of the excess liquid)

Coat the berries super well with the cornstarch, if they break down while mixing it’s completely alright

After the base has baked for 20 minutes, top it up with the raspberry chia mixture

To the remaining crumble mixture, add chopped fresh/dried rosemary and spread the mixture evenly on the raspberry layer

Bake for another 30-40 minutes until the top is golden brown

Take the bars out of the oven, let them cool for 3—4 hours (you can refrigerate it once it cools down to room temperature)

Once cooled, cut into 8 equal squares and enjoy!