Raw Bites

I'll see your poker chips and 

raise you a tasty snack.

Fruit and nut bar success! Unlike my last attempt at the raw food snack bar cookie thing, I ditched recipes and followed my instinct. Turns out, it's pretty sharp. Or, that making this kind of thing is so ridiculously easy, you'd really have to be over-thinking it to screw it up... 

I had a bunch of seedy, nutty odds and ends that needed using, so I combined their powers into the following recipe.

Make Room fer Raw Bites (raw, vegan)
makes 2 cups of paste, variable servings

1 Cup dried dates, pitted and soaked for about 30 minutes 

1/2 Cup almonds 

1/2 Cup rolled oats

1/4 Cup raw pumpkin seeds

1/4 Cup sunflower seeds

1/4 Cup sesame seeds

small handful macadamia nuts

1Tbsp coconut oil 

1-2 Tbsp vanilla

1. Put all ingredients in a high speed blender and blend on a low to mid setting. The tamp will only get you so far on this one, I had to stop that blender and scrape the sides several times.
   
   (I typically like my fruit-nut bites with a lot of texture, but if I was going for a smoother consistency, I'd grind the nuts and seeds into a meal or flour before blending. This would also be a good idea if you look around your kitchen and don't see a high speed blender.)


2. Once everything is mixed into a fairly homogeneous paste, form the paste into little bite sized pieces with your hands. I got 27. You could also make balls, bars, really any shape. Got a cookie cutter? Go crazy.


3. You can eat them right away, or chill in the fridge for a couple hours first. Store in fridge or freezer. I see a lot of recipes that recommend separating each bite or bar with plastic wrap or some such, but I never bother.

This recipe is one of dozens (hundreds? thousands?) that you could make: experiment with other dried fruits instead of the dates or use a nut butter; sub your own favorite nuts and seeds; add chocolate, shaved coconut, or other flavorings; make it savory rather than sweet. Here are some tasty looking recipes from Counter Culture Living. Here are some more from 100 Days of Real Food.

Take THAT, added salt and sugar, preservatives, and unnecessary soy!

Surprise, it's Granola!

I’ve made my own raw food bars/ snacks a couple times and really enjoy having them around. I found a neat, customizable recipe at choosingraw.com (really, I should just change the name of this blog to the choosing raw fan club). I misjudged the amount of time the ingredients needed to blend, though, so when I should’ve pulled a pan of gooey but sliceable fruit-nut-paste stuff out of the fridge, I got a bunch of crumbles. Crumbles! Fortunately, I found that the mix was still super filling and tasted amazing atop yogurt with blueberries or with almond milk as a kind of muesli cereal thing. Success!

Happy Accident Granola (raw, vegan-able)

makes about 4 cups

1 Cup almonds, raw 

1 1/4 Cup quick oats 

1/4 Cup chia seeds 

1/4 Cup raw sunflower seeds 

Pinch of sea salt 

2 tsps cinnamon 

1 Cup goji berries 

3 tbsp coconut oil 

1 Tbsp agave nectar 

3 Tbsp honey (for a truly vegan variation, just use agave nectar) 

2 Tbsp ground flax seed

Blend to desired consistency and refrigerate. This will also do fine in the freezer.

I’ll try fruit bars again (with more blender patience!), but I’ll also be returning to this easy, happy-accident granola very soon.