In fact, manufacturers are increasing their usage of nuts and seeds in the snack products they offer.

Since nuts and seeds are rife with protein and fiber, it’s only natural that a wholesome snack be filled with those items. According to an article in PreparedFoods.com, The Journal of American College of Nutrition[1] found that consumers who ate 0.25 oz. of nuts per day had four fewer pounds of mean body weight and 0.8 in. smaller waist circumference.

But, nuts and seeds can’t always stand alone. Most snack manufacturers of bars, trail mix, granola and cereal need a glue or sweet flavor to bind these items together. That’s where honey comes in.

Special K’s Honey Nut Cereal Bars include both crunchy nuts and honey in every bite. Almonds, peanuts and other tree nuts are the main components of the bars.

For those who like to snack more with their hands, Biena Foods provides consumers with Honey Roasted Chickpea Snacks. Real wildflower honey mixed with sea salt blends sweet and salty together. Tropical Foods’ Buffalo Nuts line now includes Honey Roasted Buffalo Nuts mixed with buffalo wing flavor.

And, for granola lovers who enjoy granola on the go, back to Nature Foods offers granola clusters with roasted almonds and flax seed, sweetened with honey fruit and cane juices. Since researchers say that consumers find almonds the most essential nut, this granola mix is a great way to satisfy nutty needs.

These bars provide many nutrients in each serving including Vitamins A, C, and D, calcium, phosphorous and many more.

Founded in 1992 in Santa Barbara by a group of sport enthusiasts, Balance Bar bases its products on the 40-40-30 Nutrition Principle to provide long lasting energy and stabilized sugar levels. The company aims to create balance and make nutrition easy and delicious with its energy bars.

Ingredients: honey, protein blend (soy protein isolate, whey protein isolate, partially hydrolyzed milk protein isolate, calcium caseinate, casein), fructose, glucose syrup, peanut butter (peanuts), sugar, water, fractionated palm kernel oil, roasted soybeans. Contains less than 2% of cocoa (processed with alkali), dextrose, lactose, soy lecithin, salt, maltodextrin, natural flavor, tocopherols added to protect flavor, soybean oil.

Want to see what other snacking products contain honey?

• Bakery On Main Coconut Cashew Truebar
• LARABAR Uber Roasted Nut Roll Bar
• thinkThin Mixed Nuts Crunch Bar

Made without any trans fats or high fructose corn syrup, it consists of all-natural ingredients that provide important Omega 3s and fiber in each serving. This delicious snack also is available in apple cinnamon, Hawaiian and cranberry orange flavors.

With 10 years of experience, Flax4Life is a family owned and operated bakery located in Bellingham, Wash. that prides itself in making delicious, nutritious and gluten-free products. As many of the family members have gluten intolerance, the bakery aims to continually come up with new and exciting flax based, gluten-free products.

Ingredients include honey, ground flax seeds, rolled oats, unsulphured unsweetened banana chips, unsulphured and unsweetened coconut, water, evaporated cane juice, expeller pressed safflower oil, natural vanilla, cinnamon and sea salt.

Want to see what other snacking products contain honey?

• Stonewall Kitchen Honey Mustard Pretzels
• Bachman Honey Wheat Pretzel Splits
• Nabisco Honey Maid Grahams Honey Fresh Stacks

Honey’s usage level may be limited as a glaze in cookies and crackers due to its moisture content and hygroscopic nature. A usage level of 10% to 20% honey in glazes is typical. For most cookie or cracker applications, use milk and light colored honeys because they do not mask the flavor of spices, fruits and nuts.

Ingredients include honey, unbleached whole wheat and pastry flours, brown sugar, butter, milk, vanilla, baking soda, salt and cinnamon.

Polly Brown was a former pastry chef in Washington D.C. and created her own line of artisanal baked goods. Her baked goods are made with no preservatives and wildflower honey. She wanted to create a cookie like the ones from her childhood that were not too fancy and just tasted great.

According to research in Infant, Child & Adolescent Nutrition, children who start their day with a breakfast containing cereal tend to have lower body mass indexes and less chance of being overweight than those who eat other breakfasts or skip breakfast.

Kevin B. Miller, Ph.D., a senior nutrition scientist at Kellogg Company’s W.K. Kellogg Institute for Food and Nutrition, says that a serving of cereal and milk provides children with protein, fiber, calcium, Vitamin D and potassium.

According to an article in Drug Store News, a cereal breakfast, even ones that are presweetened, provides children a convenient, nutrient-dense and great-tasting way to start their day.

For children who love the great taste of a presweetened cereal to start their day, honey is the perfect sweetener. Honey is all-natural and provides 17 grams of carbohydrates per tablespoon, which is a great boost of energy for children at the beginning of the day.

Cereal manufacturers have recognized the convenience of presweetening cereal with honey. Kellogg’s Honey Smacks cereal is a honey-sweetened puffed wheat cereal with packaging geared toward children. Honey Smacks are also a source of Vitamin C, Vitamin D and Vitamin B12.

Post’s Honey Bunches of Oats offers 12 varieties of cereal blends all containing honey. Their Labels for Education campaign is geared toward adults getting kids to eat a healthier breakfast by collecting UPCs redeemable for free educational merchandise.

Honey Nut Cheerios by General Mills not only includes 12 vitamins and minerals, calcium and whole grains, but it also has a great online ad campaign featuring Buzz the bee and several bee-centered games.

Breakfast never tasted so sweet.

1. KIND Bars

Making a showing at both Expo West and the Dr. Oz show, where nutrition expert Heidi Skolnik recommended the bars, the entire KIND line includes honey, whole nuts, spices and fruits. A new Yale study showed that snacking on two KIND bars a day helps to suppress your appetite and reduce overeating—sounds like an ideal snack to us.

2. Barenjager Honey & Bourbon Liqueur

Our office taste test won us over, making this product No. 2 on our list. The taste of whiskey married with the smooth sweetness of honey made for a great drink for any occasion.

3. Kinnikinnick Foods S’Moreables Graham Style Crackers

Not only are these gluten-free, they are wheat-free, dairy-free and casein-free—a great comfort to know America’s favorite campfire snack can be enjoyed by all.

According to Global Industry Analysts Inc., world snack food sales will top a third of a trillion dollars by 2015. Consumer demand equals more choices than ever before, with manufacturers working to meet increasing need.

FoodProcessing.com says that both health and indulgence are key needs of the snacking consumer, therefore different ingredients are battling for attention. The magazine lists cheese, bacon and spice as top ingredients on the indulgence side and chocolate on the sweet side. However, it’s a whole different came for ingredients once a healthy choice demand is called into play.

Nuts cover all ingredient needs, according to the magazine. They are high-energy, contain essential fatty acids, dietary fiber, phytochemicals, vitamin E, and are an excellent source of protein, calcium, iron and zinc.

Three examples of snacks with both nuts and honey are KIND Bars, which are made with honey, whole nuts, fruits and spices; Quaker’s True Delights Honey Roasted Cashew Mixed Berry Granola Bar, which contains zero grams of trans fat and is a great source of fiber, calcium and iron; and Kellogg’s Special K Cereal Bar Honey Nut, which is designed for the on-the-go snacker who needs a quick breakfast or meal replacement.

Salty and sweet flavors combined in one snack also is on the rise, and honey lovers can get the two for one deal with these great snacks:

thinkThin Mixed Nuts Crunch Bar combines the sweet flavor of honey with the saltiness of peanuts, almonds and cashews. LARABAR’s Uber Roasted Nut Roll Bar marries sweet and salty with honey, almonds, cashews and sea salt headlining the top flavors. Varieties include Apple Turnover, Bananas Foster and Cherry Cobbler.

Kinnikinnick Foods Inc.’s founder Ted Wolff Von Selzam was looking for a new career in the late 1980s. He began making bakery products for the Farmer’s Market in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada and was asked to make gluten-free items. As his own store grew, U.S. food distributors began calling and the Internet made it possible for more people to buy the products. Now Kinnikinnick’s gluten-free products are sold throughout North America.

Want to see what other products contain honey?

• http://www.bakingwithhoney.com/snackingwithhoney/2011/12/rise-bar-crunchy-honey-almond-breakfast-bar/
• http://www.bakingwithhoney.com/snackingwithhoney/2011/03/quaker-true-delights-honey-roasted-cashew-mixed-berry-granola-bar/
• http://www.bakingwithhoney.com/snackingwithhoney/2011/02/kelloggs%c2%ae-special-k%c2%ae-cereal-bar-honey-nut/

It is an excellent source of dietary fiber and protein. Rickland’s entire line of Greek yogurt granola bars include honey: Blueberry Acai, Cherry Almond, Toasted Coconut, Cranberry Almond, Orchard Peach, Peanut Butter and Strawberry. Rickland Orchards saw that people were mixing Greek yogurt with wholesome foods like granola and fruit, so it took a strained Greek yogurt coating and blended it with roasted nuts, granola and fruit and transformed it into a bar.

Want to see what other products contain honey?

• Larabar Uber Roasted Nut Roll Bar
• Journey Bar Coconut Curry
• Thinkthin Mixed Nuts Crunch Bar