First Attempt at Protein Balls

Warning; I am going to be saying 'balls' a lot in this post, so please refrain from giggling, I am being serious people.

I've been trying to get back to the gym recently, and I've been seeing recipes for protein balls everywhere, so I decided to give one a go. I found a really simple recipe which I tweaked slightly, and luckily I had all of the ingredients. They turned out pretty good

Each ball has just over 8 grams of protein in it, which makes them perfect for eating on the go just before or after a work out.

This recipe below should make 8 protein balls.

Ingredients;

4 tablespoons natural peanut butter

2 scoops (50g) vanilla protein powder

4 tablespoons coconut milk

Sesame seeds

50g dark chocolate

Method;

Mix the peanut butter, protein powder, coconut milk and sesame seeds in a bowl. Once mixed it should form a dough like consistency. I rolled mine out into a snake shape so that I could split the mixture evenly up into 8, then I rolled them into small balls.

Heat the chocolate in a pyrex dish over a pan of boiling water. Once melted dip each of your protein balls in and coat with the chocolate. Place on a plate and pop in the fridge until cool. Et voila! They are done! 

It was such an easy recipe, I'll definitely be using this as a base to try out lots of different variations! Have you got a good recipe for protein balls you'd like to share?

Laura xXx

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Overnight Oats Breakfast Recipe - Apple, Raisins and Cinnamon

Today I want to introduce you to my new best friend, overnight oats!

This is now officially my favorite breakfast. If you haven't heard of overnight oats, they are basically  porridge without the hassle of cooking the oats. Oh, and it's cold instead of hot!  

You make up your oaty/porridge dry mixture and then soak them in milk (or a lacto-free version of milk. I use coconut milk), then you leave them overnight in the fridge. When you wake up in the morning your oats will be fully soaked and ready gobble down!

There are tons of recipes you can experiment with, but I am hooked on my first creation. Its an absolutely delicious apple crumble inspired recipe! If that sounds good to you, read on to find out the ingredients;

1 cup porridge oats
1 cup coconut milk
1/3 cup raisins
A small hand-full of goji berries
A squeeze of agave nectar
1/2 teaspoon of cinnamon
3 tablespoons of apple sauce

The secret ingredient is the apple sauce. I made a massive batch of this a little while ago. It was really simple, I just stewed down some apples in boiling water and then strained and mashed them.  I put some of this in the freezer, so now I just take out as much as I need to defrost a few hours before I make my overnight oats. If you don't have any to hand you can substitute a little bit of the milk for apple juice which gives it a bit of an apple tang.

I really like the way that soaking them makes the raisins and goji berries so soft. Usually I find goji berries a little bitter, but you barely notice them in the mixture for this recipe!

Do you make overnight oats at all? If you do what are your favorite recipes?

Laura xXx

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Healthy Ice Cream Recipe - Mint Choc Chip

For my birthday my parents bought me an ice cream maker! Yay! Then I found out I was intolerant to lactose. Boo!

I do love regular ice cream, especially Ben and Jerry's mint choc chip when I'm at the cinema! But I have always been interested in finding healthier alternatives. The base for this recipe is coconut milk rather than cream. So it makes it much healthier and also ideal for lactose intolerant people like me.

The Ingredients

3 frozen bananas
1 tin of coconut milk (chilled)
1 teaspoon of peppermint extract
1 avocado
Cocoa nibs (or a few chocolate chips for those of you that can or want to have milk)
Agave nectar or honey to taste

The Process

Mix all ingredients other than the cocoa nibs/chocolate chips together in a blender.  Stir them in at the end.  Then pop into your ice cream maker and follow the instructions for your machine. Mine took about 20 minutes. It is probably best to eat it straight away, as this will have the best texture. But I put mine in the freezer to save for later. You just need to give it a little while to defrost before you want to eat it.

If you don't have an ice cream maker you can still make this. You just need to use the old, 'stir it every hour' technique, and then keep putting it back in the freezer. Or you could use lolly moulds and make Ice lollies instead!

The Verdict

I think that this is one of those tastes that grows on you. I was a bit disappointed when I first tried it, but the more I ate the more I liked it.  Lets be honest, it is never going to taste the same as Ben and Jerry's.  Once you get that comparison out of your head it tastes pretty good.

I think I will be trying out some other flavours of healthy ice cream before making this one again, but I will definitely be bearing it in mind, and I am sure it will be making a re-appearance!

Laura xXx

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A Healthy Breakfast

I've discovered a delicious and nutritious new breakfast, so I thought I would share with you all. Basically it is raspberries and vanilla yoghurt with honey, along with a special mixture I concocted myself!

Instead of having cereal, which is full of bad sugars, I decided to make a naturally sweet treat.  In a blender I mixed a handful of dried medjool dates (pips removed), cashew nuts, sesame seeds, sunflower seeds, dried goji berries, honey and a little bit of peanut butter. I pulsed until it was all well blended. Then I placed the mixture in a tin and flattened out, then left in the fridge to cool. 

Thats it really! Its all ready for you to scrape some out and pop alongside your yoghurt and fruit. It will probably last in the  fridge for a couple of weeks.

The great thing about it is that it will turn out differently every time, and you can use whatever you have in your cupboard to make it. Rececntly I made another one using dried figs and lemon zest, but you could also use raisins, dried apricots or prunes, or anything else you fancy!

Laura xXx

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Grape Expectations - Grape Covered Chocolate Truffles

These might look like chocolate eggs, but in actual fact they are chocolate covered grapes! You know me, I like a healthy snack, and although the coatings of these might not be all that great for you, the centre certainly is!

I had a bit of a brainwave when I heard about people freezing grapes and eating them as icy snacks. I tried them and they were great! So I thought I would try to devise a recipe that turned them into mini chocolate ice lollys (without the stick). I had grape expectations for this experiment (grape, hah, see what I did there!?)

In actual fact I think these were much nicer when they had just been refrigerated rather than frozen. To get the best flavour you have to chew them quite quickly, rather than suck them. As you can imagine this is pretty difficult when they are frozen!

I started off the experiment by sending Chris to the shops to get me a bunch of grapes, and a packet of dark chocolate. Whilst that was being taken care of, I raided the cupboards to see what I had that would work as a coating.

I re-emerged with the following ingredients

• Hundreds and Thousands
• Sesame Seeds (my healthy option)
• Cocoa Powder
• Vanilla Sugar
• Cinnamon

The hundreds and thousands and the sesame seeds were ready to roll, but I mixed the cocoa powder, cinnamon and vanilla sugar together. I'm not quite sure how much I used of each, it was mostly cocoa powder, a bit less sugar, and then a fair sprinkling of cinnamon. 

Then I found some little dishes to put each topping in. A small deep bowl is preferable to a large shallow one. I also got out a large piece of baking foil to lay my finished grapes on.

Next I got on with melting my chocolate. The usual way of boiling a pan of water and sitting a pyrex dish on top, I popped in my broken chocolate and stirred until completely melted.

Now for the fun bit! I took my washed grapes, one by one, dipped them completely in the melted chocolate, then put them straight into my coating dish. I used a spoon to pour the coating onto the top. Then I rolled it around a bit until I was sure it was covered. You want the toppings to completely cover the chocolate, otherwise the melted chocolate will just stick to the bottom of the dish and make a mess. The cocoa powder one was easiest, I just had to shake the dish and the grape would roll around on its own.

I found it best to leave them in the dish to set for a moment, so I had a little production line going on where I would do one in each coat then remove it when I got back to the first one again. At this point I carefully removed the coated grape from the dish and placed it on my tin foil, and popped them in the fridge to cool for a little while.

I have to admit, these were a bit strange to get used to, but after I'd had a few ... yum! Chris and I devoured all of these during one episode of Game Of Thrones.

My favourites were the hundreds and thousands, weirdly they tasted a lot like a toffee apple! I loved the cinnamon kick in the cocoa ones, but you definitely had to chew them, if you sucked it you would just end up with a mouth full of powder. And the sesame seed ones are great too, they will be a perfect healthy treat. They say dark chocolate is good for you right!?

Ok, they were a little bit fiddley to make, but well worth it!

I think these would be really fun at a party. I would like to see peoples expressions as they eat them and  don't get what they are expecting! A good way to trick children into eating fruit also, no?  Although I never understand children who don't like fruit, particularly grapes, I loved them as a child!

I'm trying to think of some more topping ideas now. Can you think of any that would be good?

Laura xXx

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Wheat free, Sugar Free, Super Healthy Banana Bread!

Now that I am working from home, I am feeling the need for something to snack on. And I like cake, but I also like to eat healthily. Actually, one of the benefits of working from home is that there isn't a constant supply of doughnuts and cookies being brought in, which I then feel is my duty to eat!

Anywho, my solution to this snacking problem? Banana bread! A super healthy banana bread at that!  I have found recently that the foods we go through quickest are bananas and eggs. They can be used in pretty much anything can't they!? Chris has even been known to throw a banana in a curry! (I did not approve.) You may remember my Banana pancakes post which used solely bananas and eggs! Well here I have another recipe combining our two favourite ingredients.

I adapted the recipe from this blog. I really loved the idea it uses of adding cacao nibs, but I discovered that the pack I bought over a year ago had been polished off by Chris (how dare he!). So I opted for raisins instead.  

This recipe uses no sugar, is wheat free, and requires almost no butter! It can actually be completely butter free if you desire! So it's pretty darn healthy, and it tastes great too. You can find the full recipe here, but below are the ingredients I used for my version.

Ingredients;

1 cup wheat free flour blend
1/4 cup melted butter or coconut oil (I used half and half to get the best of both worlds!)
3 mashed bananas
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
4 eggs
1/4 cup agave nectar
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
A good handful of raisins.

What is your favourite healthy snack?

Laura xXx

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