Recently I tried out the protein bar offering from Rise Bar. Rise Bar is a California-based company dedicated to making a variety of food bars. While I only tried the protein bars, they offer many other varieties as well.

With so many protein bars to choose from, it can be hard to know which to pick.

If you’re like me and you don’t want a host of ingredients you can barely pronounce, you can eliminate about ninety percent of all protein bars. Once you do that, the question comes down to taste, texture, and protein content.

Rise Bars offers four different kinds of protein bars, each as delicious as the last.

Almond Honey

The Almond Honey flavor has just three ingredients: almonds, honey, and whey protein isolate. That fact alone was pretty awesome to me. The ingredients are combined into the perfect proportions to create a soft, not too chewy bar with a great texture.

It tastes exactly the way you would think – like almond butter, which I personally love, sweetened by honey, which I also love. This one is a big hit for me, and has the highest protein of the bars I tried at twenty grams for a sixty-gram bar.

Crunchy Carob Chip

With almonds as a base, and sweetened this time by agave, this bar also contains carob, crisp rice, and whey protein isolate. There are no actual carob chips, so the crunch comes from the rice, but the flavor is out of this world.

You have to like carob, of course, because the bar is very carob-y. If you’re not familiar with carob, it has a flavor similar to chocolate. This bar boasts the second highest protein at seventeen grams, and also the highest fiber at five grams.

Lemon Cashew

This bar has a base of cashews instead of almonds and is sweetened by coconut nectar. The protein in this one is pea protein and the bar is suitable for vegans. The flavor is finished off by lemon extract, which you get a waft of as soon as you open the package.

This was the softest of the bars, and it pretty much just melts in your mouth. Although I love cashews, I wasn’t sure how I’d like them with the lemon in a bar, but it worked delightfully.

Sunflower Cinnamon

For a change of pace, the base of this bar is sunflower seed butter, sweetened again with coconut nectar. The protein is pea protein, and suitable for vegans just like the Lemon Cashew.

The rest of the flavors come from both cinnamon and vanilla. I found the vanilla extract to be a bit strong, but it does complement the cinnamon and sunflower flavors nicely.

Texture and Flavor

The texture and flavor of each bar was consistent and always pleasing. Having been in the supplement and fitness industries for over a decade and a half, I’ve tried more bars, powders, and pills than I could possibly count.

Rise Bars are definitely top rung when it comes to flavor, quality, and consistency. Bottom line, you won’t find a better tasting bar.

The only real issue I have with Rise Bars is the sugar content. It isn’t extreme, and it comes from organic sources where possible, but it is still sugar.

The sugar content of each bar is between twelve and thirteen grams. Again, not terrible, but save it for post-workout or a snack if your sweet tooth is getting to you.

If you like protein bars for their convenience and flavor, do yourself a favor and get a box of the Rise Bars. You’ll see that they are a cut above the rest.

Rise Bars are available for $27.99 – $28.99 at Store.RiseBar.com.

The post Rise Bars (Product Review) appeared first on Breaking Muscle.

Last week I reviewed ProBar’s Bolt pre-workout fruit chews, but they weren’t the only snack I had the pleasure to try. ProBar has a whole line of products that are chock full of quality ingredients, but without skimping on the taste. ProBar Core protein bars are no exception.

In line with the rest of their offerings, most of the ingredients in the Core bar are organic. In case you missed it last week, ProBar is a Utah-based company that prides itself in providing products founded in values and quality. All of their products are created using sustainable, organic ingredients often sourced from whole foods. All of their bars are gluten free as well.

Each bar has about twenty grams of protein, which is a decent amount considering the bars are not huge. The bars don’t offer just protein, though. They also have roughly 32g of carbs apiece, about half of which is sugar. Not terrible, but not great if you’re avoiding sugar. The bars are definitely best for after your workout when the carbs will be best utilized. Each bar also boasts four to six grams of fiber as well as a good amount of omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids.

The bars have a dry and crispy texture, which I prefer to chewy and sometimes sticky bars. Each bar contains a layer of crisps under a layer of the primary flavor, all dipped in chocolate. Each has the slightly processed taste that almost all protein bars share due to the protein powder and concentrated nutrients, but the ingredients themselves are generally higher quality than you’ll find in other bars. The taste didn’t bother me in the least, but is worth mentioning.

The bars come in four different flavors. Here’s what I thought of each one:

• Cookie Dough: While I can’t say it tastes anything like cookie dough, it has a fairly generic but delicious flavor.
• Peanut Butter Chocolate: This one tastes a little more like its namesake than the cookie dough flavor, but has no actual peanut butter in it. It still tastes good, and is certainly peanut-y, but don’t expect a major peanut butter flavor.
• Brownie Crisp: Despite the prior two not living up to their names, this one has about as strong of a brownie flavor as you can expect from a crispy protein bar. It also has a deep chocolate flavor, which I appreciated since I’m a dark chocolate fan and prefer lightly sweetened, high-cocoa chocolate. The flavor is probably due to the fact that cocoa appears three times on the ingredient list and chocolate appears once, much to my delight. Chocolate fans like myself can’t go wrong with this one.
• Mint Chocolate: You can smell the mint in this bar as you open it. It tastes like a big, crispy Andes after-dinner chocolate to me, and I mean that in the best way possible. This one also has the biggest layer of flavor over the crisps, making it slightly softer. It is probably my favorite of the bars.

The major source of protein in these bars is soy, and they contain flax lignans as well, which may be a turn-off for some people. Consider the ingredients prior to purchase.

All in all, these bars are a strong offering by ProBar. With good flavors, good texture, a good blend of nutrients and quality ingredients this is an excellent bar for people who are not avoiding soy.

ProBar Core bars are available for $2.99 for one or $33.53 for 12 at Shop.TheProBar.com.

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