This recipe is easy peasy.

I took these protein packed snacks on my walk this week and enjoyed them with a cup of rooibos tea. They are great way to have a little protein boost to keep you going between meals.

I usually make a batch and keep them in the fridge for those moments when I am cruising the kitchen looking for something, a little something……you know the time.

We open the fridge  looking for a little lift, or something to fill a hunger moment, or to tide us over till the next meal. It’s all too easy to stick our hands in the biscuit tin but DON’T. It spikes your blood sugar, upsets your insulin and feeds the sugar addiction.

I wrote that paragraph above before I found out that each date actually contains about 2.5 tsp sugar. This means that this recipe has 25 tsp of sugar, so think about the size of each ball, make 25 and each one has 1 tsp of sugar! Eat lots of these and you are eating lots of sugar.

If you would prefer almost sugar free snacks check out my Low Sugar Snacks post.

• 1 1/2 cups walnuts
• 1/4 cup desiccated coconut
• 10 pitted dried dates
• 1/4 cup coconut oil
• 1/4 cup cocoa powder.

• Using a food processor whizz up coconut and nuts till they are crumb like.
• Add the rest of the ingredients and whizz till you get a thick paste.
• Form into balls roughly the size of a walnut shell.
• Roll in cocoa powder or desiccated coconut and refrigerate.

Make sure your dates are soft, medjool dates are the best, but not always available or affordable so use what you have. If the dates you have are quite hard you may need to soak them in warm water to soften them. Remember to drain them well before use.

This recipe is very forgiving so you can try different oils and nuts and seeds depending on what you have available. Please note that brazil nuts are particularly oily so you can cut back on the coconut oil with them. You can also add any spices you might like, I love ginger or cinnamon. If the mixture is too soft add a little more of your dry ingredients till you get a good dough you can form into a ball and if it’s too hard add a little more oil, or sometimes I add a splash of homemade almond milk.

Experimenting with different flavours and textures as well as a variety of coatings means you can create your own delicious selection box, and no need to feel guilty when eating them!

Yum!

If you live locally and would be interested in learning how to make these please let me know. If there is enough interest I will arrange a short workshop to show you how.