Energy Bars, Part II

Last week's column -- "Energy bar musings, 2006" -- was a subjective overview of a handful of energy-bar offerings I've been field testing as of late. There was little reportage or fact-hashing in the column. It was a taste test, as I said up front, nothing much more or less.

This week I'm taking the opposite tack on the selfsame subject, relaying pure information and straight objectivity on the five types of energy bars I ran past my tongue last week. Not a single pesky opinion of my own here. Just the nutritional nitty-gritty, and all things quantitative on the carbs and sugars and fats and secret ingredients that make these bars what they each individually are.




Hammer Food Bar

First in line, Hammer Nutrition LTD's namesake Hammer Food Bar comes in two flavors -- Chocolate Chip and Almond Raisin -- and the company (www.e-caps.com) touts the bars as being 100 percent natural with no refined sugar or artificial ingredients. They are certified organic, kosher, dairy-free and made with stuff like almond butter, date paste, flax, quinoa, Belgian chocolate, wheat and barley grass juice.

The 1.7-ounce Hammer Food Bar contains 220 calories, about 25 grams of carbohydrates, about 10 grams of protein, and 9 grams of fat. They are $2.49 apiece.




Lara Bars

Containing a total of just two to six ingredients per bar, the Larabar wins the minimalist's award. The company's (www.larabar.com) Cashew Cookie bar, for example, is made ever so simply with just two ingredients: Dates and cashews. That's it.

Fruits, nuts and spices are the only ingredients the company employs. All the bars -- including Lemon, Apple, Cherry Pie, Cinnamon Roll and Ginger Snap, to name a few of the 10 flavors -- are 100 percent raw and unprocessed. No sweeteners or nutritional supplements are allowed.

Larabars cost $1.70 and vary slightly in weight and nutritional makeup. Average bar weight is 1.8 ounces, and most bars contain around 220 calories; 25 grams of carbohydrates; 3 - 6 grams of protein; and about 10 grams of fat.




ProBar

Next up is the ProBar, an unbaked granola-bar-type package made with constituents like pumpkin seeds, brazil nuts, corn flakes, hemp seeds, almonds, apples, oat bran and crisp brown rice. The company (www.theprobar.com) eschews the term "energy bar" when referring to its product, which comes in Original Blend and Whole Berry Blast. Instead, ProBar LLC markets its namesake nuggets as "whole-food nutrition bars."

ProBars weigh 3 ounces each and cost about $2.75. They contain about 380 calories with 18 grams of fat, 50 grams of carbohydrates, and about 9 grams of protein.




HOOAH! Bars

HOOAH! bars, a product created by the U.S. military, contain "a mix of complex carbs, simple carbs, lipids, and proteins," according to Mark D'Andrea, president of D'Andrea Brothers LLC, the bar's distributor. This mix, says D'Andrea, was created to deliver a slow, continuous conversion of glycogen to glucose that helps provide steady energy while delaying the onset of fatigue.

Soy and whey protein, as well as 17 vitamins and minerals, are included in the HOOAH! bar (www.hooahbar.com), which comes in Chocolate Crisp, Peanut Butter and Apple Crisp. The 2.2-ounce bars, which cost $1.49 each, have about 270 calories, 40 grams of carbohydrates, 10 grams of protein, and 9 grams of fat.




Big Sur Bars

Finally, Big Sur Bars (www.bigsurbar.com) come in Original, White Zest and Blind Date flavors. They include ingredients like pecans, almonds, raisins and coconut as well as butter, eggs, honey, vanilla and baking soda.

The $3 Big Sur Bars average more than 100 grams of carbs and 8-10 grams of protein. They are the heftiest snack by far in this review, with each 5-ounce bar containing about 27 grams of fat and nearly 700 sweet and gooey calories.

Energy Bar Musings, 2006

My current obsession with adventure racing has me eating a lot of energy bars. Out in the woods, running and biking and bushwhacking for hours on end, I may consume eight or 10 bars in a day. Cashew cookie, carrot cake, lemon, chocolate brownie, cherry pie and cocoa mole. All the flavors of the rainbow in my pack. Field testing, as it were.

But, if I may admit, I don't even really like most energy bars. Many of my climbing and adventure racing cohorts, indeed, have sworn off the "energy food" genre altogether, relying instead on beef jerky and cheese and sandwiches and Fritos. Raw and unfettered calories, they say. Eat real food, they tell me.

Still, I eat energy bars. They are convenient if nothing else. They don't turn sour or rot, even after days on the trail. They're condensed energy, highly packable. They're fast and easy. They fill the gut.

After eating energy bars for years and years on multiple continents and in various stages of adventure-induced delusion, excitement, paranoia and exhaustion, only one thing really matters to me: Flavor.



Lara Bars

Now, to name names, there are a few good-tasting energy bars on the market. ProBar (www.theprobar.com) comes to mind. Larabars (www.larabar.com), which are vegan concoctions that come in a dozen unusual flavors, are also above average.


Big Sur Bars


Number one in taste during my recent test was the Big Sur Bar (www.bigsurbar.com). These hearty creations have a chewy oatmeal bottom and yummy chunks on top, including pecans, almonds, raisins, chocolate chips and coconut. They taste nothing like an energy bar. They're more of a desert than anything. They taste like the bars my mom used to make in aluminum pans. (Seven-layer bars, I believe she called them.)

Big Sur Bars come in three flavors -- Original, White Zest and Blind Date -- and all are good and exceedingly filling. I can rarely eat a whole Big Sur Bar without saving some for later.

I recommend Big Sur Bars for hiking, backpacking and mountaineering. However, the gooey, 5-ounce bricks each contain about 700 calories and are way too filling and dense for eating while pushing your aerobic limits.

The Hammer bar, made by the supplement company Hammer Nutrition LTD
(www.e-caps.com), was not as tasty as the Big Surs, but it was better than many of the traditional energy bars I've eaten over the years. The company made the bar for its constituency of endurance athletes who appreciate things like alkalizing protein, "healthy" carbohydrates, phytosterols, sterolins and phyto-nutrients -- all of which this bar embodies. (However, no refined sugar or artificial ingredients are included.)

Hammer Nutrition offers two flavors: Chocolate Chip and Almond Raisin.
The bars have a soft, moist texture, as almond butter and date paste are used as the base.



HOOAH! Bars


HOOAH! bars were created by the U.S. military in the late '90s and are now marketed by a company called D'Andrea Brothers, LLC. They seemed kind of gimmicky to me at first. But after a few bites my cynicism evaporated.

Essentially, HOOAH! bars (www.hooahbar.com) are like PowerBars, with that same gritty-rubbery texture and a similar shape and size. But they taste, actually, pretty darn good. They're kind of sweet, but not too sweet, and they have a bit of a greasy aftertaste. Sounds strange, perhaps, but HOOAH! has hit the spot for me during two recent adventure races.

In the end, you can gush about chemical composition and carbohydrate magic -- as energy-food companies often do -- but if a bar doesn't taste good, you're not going to eat it. If you don't eat it, you're going to hit a wall or bonk. You're going to lose the race. You're going to retreat from the mountain face. You need to eat something out there or else you're not going to make it.

Thule Load & Go Organizers

Thule Inc., maker of automobile racks and exterior cargo boxes, has a new line of products to aid with gear management inside your vehicle. The company's (www.thuleracks.com) Load & Go products include specialized boxes, bags and containers to keep your gear -- and your groceries -- organized and easily accessible.

Load & Go products range in price from $15 to $100 and break down into three categories. The Go Packs, which are the Load & Go items made for hardshell rooftop cargo carriers, are essentially large nylon duffle bags. They are boxy and big -- with 3,800 cubic inches of capacity -- but shaped to fit the curves inside cargo carriers from Thule (though they work in similar boxes from Yakima and other companies as well).


Thule GoPack

The $30 Go Pack Cube comes in four colors and has a shoulder strap and a luggage tag to denote the cube's contents. ("Ski Boots," for example.) Go Pack Nose, also $30, is the same product, just with a slopped side to accommodate the nose end of a cargo carrier box. And the Go Pack Mesh, which has mesh sidewalls and a $40 price tag, is made to stow wetsuits, beach toys, kayak skirts, towels and other moistened goods.

All Go Pack products have zipper pockets and waterproof fabric on the base in case you set your luggage in a puddle.

Category No. 2 in the Load & Go series is all about trunk management. The $75 Go Box, made for "gear, groceries, and odds and ends," as the Thule promotional material puts it, is a rigid open-top bin. It has multiple pockets and slots and a healthy 4,000 cubic inches capacity. Its cousin, the $60 Medium Go Box, has 3,000 cubic inches capacity; the Go Bin, a pocketed 2,100-cubic-inch version, is $50.


Thule GoBin

The top-of-the-trunk-line Go Box Express has wheels, padded handles and a zip-top closure. It costs $100 and will tote 4,500 cubic inches of gear. All Go Box products have anti-skid pads on the bottom to keep them in place during transit.

While the Go Boxes are nice for managing trunk flotsam, they are pricey for what you get: Essentially a giant Trapper Keeper folder for your gear.

Last in the Thule Load & Go line are three esoteric "cabin management" products, including the Litter Bin, a $20 trash container that attaches to a seatback headrest. The Console Caddy, which fits between the front two passenger seats in the middle console area, has pockets and dividers. It costs $15. Thule suggests storing cell phones, MP3 players, and other small accoutrements.


Thule Atlantis

Finally, the Side Seat Organizer is just what it seems: an organizer unit that attaches to the side of a seat (with webbing buckle straps). It has three pockets, one with a mesh top, one with a zipper and the third with a rigid plastic sheath for, I assume, sunglasses, garage door openers and other automobile miscellany.

Bic Yakka Kayak

Bic Corporation, the ubiquitous France-based maker of lighters and ballpoint pens, has a division that sells surfboards, windsurfing rigs, kiteboards and, unbeknownst to me, a line of recreational kayaks. Bic Sport (www.bicsport.com), as the division is called, this year debuted a kayak line designed for boaters with limited storage space.


The Bic Yakka Kayak

The company's Yakka kayaks, which include three models, are nearly identical boats with rigid plastic hulls and inflatable sidewalls. For storing and transporting the Yakka kayaks, Bic Sport added hinges to the middle of the hull, letting you fold the boat in half and tuck it away in the bed of a pickup or, perhaps, your closet in a cramped city apartment.


Easy turning in the Bic Yakka

Made for urban dwellers and other people looking to take some of the hassle out of owning, moving and storing a normal 10-foot-or-longer kayak, the sit-on-top Yakka boats fold down into 59 x 30 x 15-inch packages that weigh about 50 pounds. The boats come equipped with handles and a wheel on one end to provide a means to move the packed-up boat around.

In my tests, the Yakka 120 model was easy to set up, requiring just a couple minutes to unfold the boat, pump up the sidewalls and position a bar that adds rigidity to the hinged hull. On the water the boat went straight and turned easily, though it was no speed demon. My friends on the river that day, sitting in sleek touring boats, were literally miles ahead of me after an hour of downstream paddling.


This boat folds at the hull...

But despite its lack of speed, the Yakka 120 was stable and fun. It has foam padding for a seat and integrated foot braces. The boat, which is 9 feet, 4 inches long and about 30 inches wide, would be perfect for fishing or just tooling around a lake on a lazy summer's day. First-time kayakers and kids would be good candidates for the Yakka as well.


A practical boat for urbanites...

Bic Sports claims the boat can handle flat water and up to class II whitewater. I paddled a swelling Mississippi River in late April with the boat. Fast currents and strong eddies were easily negotiated in the craft, though I am an experienced whitewater kayaker.

The other Yakka iterations -- the Yakka 80 and Yakka 120 Explorer -- are identical boats, though with different weight limitations and color schemes. All Yakka models retail for $599 apiece. Accessories, including paddles, dry bags and padded seatbacks, are among the available Yakka accoutrements.