Everyday Energy Bites

3K

Everyone loves something sweet after a meal. My daughter’s favorite choice lately is Freshii’s Energy Bites. Even when we go eat at Frankie We Salute You, an amazing local plant-based restaurant that has outstanding desserts, she will sneak next door to buy a box of power balls for dessert.

Instead of only enjoying them on occasion, she and I decided to recreate them at home. We have omitted the honey and added in a few extra hits of goodness! I mean, why not increase the nutritional value of every bite you feed to your family?! 😉

Freshii claims the balls have only 5 ingredients, but when you search the ingredients online, it turns out that they conveniently omit the 6th ingredient, which is sunflower oil.

On their website, they show each ball coming in at 140 calories with 7 grams of sugar and 9 grams of fat.

Why this recipe is so great.

I figured out the nutritional value of our Energy Bites on a recipe nutrition calculator website called VeryWellFit.com. (Which is very cool by the way.)

Our Everyday Energy Bites come in at 87 calories each, with 3.5 grams of sugar and 5.2 grams of fat per ball, so substantially less.

More important than overall calories, our Everyday Energy Bites contain hemp seeds and flax meal (so you can get a dose of omega-3s). They contain no added oil and only 2 tablespoons of maple syrup for 22 balls! Yet, they still taste like the real thing. 🙂 You could even go so far as to switch out all of the chocolate chips for craisins or raisins, but let’s not get crazy here!

The recipe at Freshii contains oats, peanut butter, honey, chocolate chips and sunflower oil. The Energy Bites we came up with contain: oats, peanut butter, craisins, chocolate chips, hemp hearts, flax meal, maple syrup, vanilla extract and a pinch of salt.

We have been regularly ordering take-out from our favourite restaurants in order to support them during this pandemic. I cringe when I think of our favourite restaurants offering plant-based foods (such as Naked Cafe, Frankie We Salute You, KB&Co, Renegade Kitchen and The Salty Caramel Kitchen), shutting down after they have worked so hard to build themselves up! So, if you are able to support them in any way, please do. Our world needs more, not less, of these businesses right now!

We hope you enjoy these little energy bites! They only take a few minutes to whip up, don’t require any baking and keep well in the fridge. They are perfect to take with you on a hike or to the beach or just to indulge in whenever you need something sweet.

One recipe makes 11, so I figure why not double it… they won’t last long let me tell you. In fact, around our house, we have to hide them!

Everyday Energy Bites

Print

Serves: 11 balls Prep Time: 10 minutes Cooking Time: no baking required no baking required

Nutrition facts: 200 calories 20 grams fat

Ingredients

• 1/2 cups rolled oats (quick or regular)
• 1/4 cup peanut butter (smooth or chunky)
• 1/4 cup dark chocolate chips (use half craisins or raisins if you like)
• 3 tablespoons hemp hearts (save 1 tablespoons to roll the balls in)
• 2 tablespoons flax seed meal (ground flax seeds)
• 1 tablespoon maple syrup
• 1 1/2 tablespoons water
• 1/4 teaspoon vanilla
• a pinch of salt
• 1 tablespoon coconut flakes to coat (optional)

Instructions

1. Place all ingredients in a small bowl and mix well.  
2. Using your hands, roll approximately one tablespoon of batter into a ball. 
3. Roll the ball in a tablespoon of hemp hearts or coconut to coat. 
4. Store in a sealed container in the fridge. 

 

www.thevibrantveggie.com

Notes

~ Make them gluten free by using gluten free oats. ~ If you don't like peanut butter, try almond butter, or another nut or seed butter of choice.

If you enjoy these Everyday Energy Bites, you might also like my Peanut Butter Chocolate Power Balls and my Cosmic Cookies!