Cereal bars are useful for eating on the go. Parents pop them into lunch boxes as a healthier alternative to chocolate and sweets for kids and many of us take them into work to have with our morning coffee.

But are they actually that healthy? And is it worth spending the extra on the branded product? To find out, I tried granola bars from Aldi and Tesco plus an original Go Ahead bar from Sainsbury's.

The pack sizes were all different but each gave nutritional values per 100g so it was clear to see which was a better option health-wise. I also calculated which offered the best value to see if it was possible to save money on the grocery shopping.

Read more: My kids tried Müller Corners against Aldi's Split Pots and it will save me a fortune

Go Ahead Fibre Jacks

Go Ahead Fibre Jacks from Sainsbury's cost £2 for four bars, making them 50p per bar. Moist and fruity, these bars benefited from the raspberry flavour being not overly sweet. Made with 54 percent wholegrain rolled oats, syrup and six percent fruit flavour pieces, these bars were moreish.

And this was a bit of a problem as they were tiny! Each flapjack weighed just 33g, meaning the whole box weighed only 118.6g. Per 100g, which was almost the whole pack, they contained 11g of fibre and 6.6g of protein together with 6g of saturated fat and 24.2g of carbohydrate sugars. I gave them 3 out of 5 stars.

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Harvest Morn Crunchy Maple Syrup Granola Bars from Aldi

Harvest Morn Crunchy Maple Syrup Granola Bars from Aldi cost £1.19 for five bars. However, each packet contains two bars, weighing 42g, making the total weight 210g - almost twice the size of the Go Ahead box. It worked out to 24p per double bar packet.

These crunchy biscuits had a nice maple syrup and oaty flavour. However I found them too sweet to eat both bars. This was hardly surprising when I looked at the sugar content and found they contained 27.1g per 100g! That was more than two teaspoons of sugar for the two bars. Made with 62 percent wholegrain oat flakes, sugar, maple syrup, honey and molasses, you could see where the sugar content lay.

Per 100g, they contained 5.5g of fibre and 8.3g of protein plus 1.9g of saturated fat. This meant they contained half the amount of the fibre of the Go Ahead brand but an additional 1.7g of protein. They contained 2.9g more sugar but 4.1g less fat. I gave them 2 out of 5 stars.

Tesco Oat & Honey Granola Bars

Tesco Oat & Honey Granola Bars cost £1.20 for six bars weighing 30g each, making the total weight of the box 180g. This meant they cost 20p per granola bar. They were made with 45 percent oats, sugar, wholemeal wheat flour, desiccated coconut and honey.

These were more like a normal digestive biscuit than a granola cereal bar. They lacked flavour and felt cloying in the mouth. You definitely needed a drink with this one.

There was a slight honey aftertaste but not much. Per 100g, they contained 6.1g of fibre, 7.4g of protein, 11.8g of saturated fat and 18.2g of carb sugars. This was more fibre than the Aldi pack but still a lot less than the Go Ahead bars. There was more protein than the original brand and less than the Aldi ones.

These bars had the least sugar but almost twice the amount of fat. I found them disappointing and wouldn't bother buying them again. I gave them 1 out of 5 stars.

Product reviews

Overall verdict

So the Tesco bars were the cheapest and contained the least sugar but they tasted the worst. Both the Aldi and the Go Ahead bars contained quite a bit of sugar - although significantly less than you'd find in a Mars bar.

The Aldi bars had the most protein but the Fibre Jacks outdid the others when it came to fibre content. Per bar, the Fibre Jacks contained 3.6g of fibre, compared to 2.3g for the double Aldi pack and 1.8g for the Tesco bar.

Without doubt, the Go Ahead Fibre Jacks won in terms of their superior taste and texture compared to the other two. But then they were considerably more expensive. At 50p per bar, they were more than twice the price of the Aldi and Tesco alternatives and I'm not convinced they were worth the difference.

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