On any given trip to the grocery or specialty food store, you can’t help but notice all the different health bars that are getting more and more difficult to classify; energy bars, protein bars, wellness bars, fitness bars, nutrition bars…or whatever you choose to call them.
Each boasts its own health and nutrition claims, making you wonder how they can cram all that stuff into a little bar that’s supposed to be a healthy dietary choice.
And while I’m the type who will at least try most of them out of curiosity, I’ve increasingly found that the healthier the bars claim to be, the worse they tend to taste.
But that’s not the case for a line of wellness bars from Attune Foods, a San Francisco company that has incorporated probiotic bacteria into its products. Probiotics (as well as prebiotics and other good bacteria) are a current nutritional trend that promote healthy digestive and immune systems. Attune claims its bars have five times the live active cultures found in yogurt, and contain less sugar than most yogurts.
While some so-called health bars I’ve tasted are “just okay,” (or at least not nasty enough to spit out), Attune’s bars taste really good. Marketed as probiotic wellness bars, their fruit flavored granola bars are natural tasting, with a soft, chewy texture that leaves you wanting more. The fruit flavors include strawberry, wild berry, lemon and mango peach.
Attune also makes several chocolate probiotic bars that are thinner than the granola varieties, and deliver the classic “snap” you find when eating a properly-tempered, premium chocolate bar. The chocolate flavors include chocolate crisp, dark chocolate, mint chocolate and blueberry vanilla.
Nutritionally speaking, Attune’s chocolate probiotic bars range from 80-100 calories, while the granola varieties have 170. None of them have more than 10g of sugar and total fat ranges from 6-8g. You can review all the Nutrition Facts here.
Unlike most energy or wellness bars, Attune bars need to be refrigerated to safeguard the probiotic cultures. They can, however, be kept unrefrigerated long enough for you to take them on the go.
If I had one negative comment about Attune (and it’s minor), the granola bars were a bit sweet for my personal taste, but not so much that it ruined the experience. If you’re wanting to take in probiotic cultures as part of your health regimen, I found Attune bars to be a good way to make that happen.
