This Coffee Bean Bar Just Won The Food Network's Best Energy Bar
Moka Energy brought its coffee bean bar to the 2026 Summer Fancy Food Show, which the Rochester, New York company describes as its first trade show. Its booth was one of more than 2,500 on the floor. On October 13, Food Network named Moka's Caramel Cappuccino Coffee Bean Bar the Best Energy Bar in the 2026 Best of the Best Awards.
Food Network's editors walked that show floor and put Moka on a July list of 12 favorite finds. Three products from that list went on to win in October, which accounts for half of the six food and drink winners. The full awards list drew 25 picks from more than 260 products the network tested this year.
The October write-up praised the bar's "creamy texture and rich coffee flavor." Each bar carries 90 mg of caffeine from whole roasted coffee beans, which Moka puts at roughly a small cup of coffee.
Moka built the brand around the promise "All coffee. No chocolate." The chocolate comparison keeps following it around anyway. In Food Network's July write-up, editor Noelle Paredes credited the bar with "the decadence of a bar of chocolate, without the chocolate," and co-founder Tom Seymour told the Specialty Food Association that many show visitors "approached the booth expecting a traditional chocolate energy bar." Cocoa butter leads the ingredient list, and the caffeine comes from the coffee beans. The resemblance even carries into shipping. Moka's product page says summer orders ship two-day air with cold packs because the bars don't do well in heat.
The same editors are now asking brands to come to them. Food Network is taking entries for its first Best in Basket Awards, a new grocery award with winners announced in March 2027. Submissions close October 31, 2026, and entry is free. Products must be sold nationwide in the U.S., online or at a major grocery store, by that date, and brands need to be able to ship samples once the editors ask for them. Drinks, snacks, desserts, proteins, pantry staples, frozen and refrigerated foods, and condiments are all eligible, while alcohol is not. Each flavor needs its own entry, which would turn Moka's three-flavor lineup into three separate forms.
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