What are the best nutrition bars? It really depends on what you are looking for. Some would say that the best nutrition bars are the ones that contain all organic ingredients and at lest 20 grams of protein. Others would argue that the best nutrition bars are those that do not contain any sugar, have lots of fiber and contain protein from vegetarian sources.

Still another group, those who often describe themselves as “nutritional purists,” will claim that there is no such thing as the best nutrition bars, because, well, all nutrition bars suck.

What do I think, is there such a thing as the best nutrition bars? I think we can find a middle ground here. Sure, all organic ingredients are nice, and of course, the less sugar is in a bar, the better, but we have to remember about certain limitations that have to do with how different ingredients mash together. If you make a bar without any sweeteners, with a lot of fiber and vegetarian protein, it will taste like chalk.

In my mind, the best nutrition bars are homemade. I make my own bars. It is not hard and you have a compete control over what goes in your bars, which is very nice if you are a control freak like me. That said, my homemade bars are far from perfect, and I have a sneaking suspicion that I am the only person who likes them. Why? Because they still do not have that consistency that you find in bars that are professionally made.

Is all hope lost to find the best nutrition bars? Nope! As it turns out, you can build your bar and eat it too. Seriously, you can build your own bar – just like you would at home – but it will be made using the same professional equipment that is used to produce commercial food products.

Enter You Bar (youbars.com). They let you create your own custom bars with a pretty good selection of ingredients such as dried fruits, nuts, seeds, protein powder (milk based or vegetarian), grains, cereals, organic sweeteners, and nut butters as the base. And you can even give your custom made bars a name, which is pretty cool.

So does You Bar make the best nutrition bars? Almost. What is missing is an option to select a sweetener that minimizes its impact on blood sugar levels. While you can select organic agave nectar, which they claim has a low Glysemic Index, it would be nice to have an option to select something like Erythritol.