Healthy Desserts: Chocolate Covered Bananas

Our Spring Break is over! I’m not sure if I’m excited about that or sad, maybe a little of both! It’ll be nice to have the house to myself again during the day, but sometimes, it’s just sooooo quiet! I mean sometimes that’s a good thing right? BUT, sometimes, you know I start talking to myself, well really the dogs, but ya know they don’t talk back, and I’m pretty sure if people heard me I’d be committed!

Which in a weird way brings me to today’s post. Chocolate covered Bananas! In my freshman psychology class our professor told us that a banana a day keeps the therapist away! Bananas have tryptophan, an essential amino acid that gets converted into serotonin (the feel good brain chemical). How much it helps or how much banana you have to eat I’m not sure however it’s a great excuse to eat these Chocolate Covered Bananas anyway!

Here’s what you’ll need:

Bananas

1 cup Chocolate chips (the darker the better for you)

Toothpicks

Here’s how you make it:

Peel and cut Bananas in half. Stick a skewer into the center of the banana. 
Meanwhile melt the chocolate either in the microwave at 30 second increments or over a double boiler. Dip the  Bananas in the melted chocolate, and set them onto a wax paper lined cookie sheet. Store in the freezer. Serve frozen!

Enjoy

Healthy Desserts: Energy Bites

In my never ending quest to find a sweet treat that is not only good for you but tastes good as well, I found a bunch of recipes for energy bites. I'd had a version of these before, but I'd never made them myself. All I can say is YUM! Really these are super simple to make as well! Most of it is stuff that you probably already have in your Pantry. The other great thing about this recipe is that it is completely customizable to you and your families tastes.

They are great because they only have about 200 calories and they give you 5 grams of protein, per serving. A serving size is 2 Bites and the recipe makes about 24 Bites.

You can add different things to up the health factor like chia and flax seeds, use different nut butters to change the flavor up, or add in dried fruits to give it a little something extra! Whatever you like really can go in these.

Here's what you'll need:

1 cup Oats

1/2 cup Peanut Butter

1/2 cup Pumpkin Seeds

1/3 cup Honey

1/2 cup Chocolate Chips (I used Mini Chips)

1TBSP Chia Seeds

1tsp Vanilla

Here's how you make it:

Combine everything in a mixing bowl until all the ingredients are incorporated. Let cool for 30 minutes. The scoop out and roll into 1 inch balls. Store in an airtight container in the refrigerator.

Healthy Desserts: Black Bean Brownies

Part of my New Years Resolution is to continue eating healthier, so I thought I would include a healthy dessert recipe and a healthy meal recipe once a month on the blog. I decided to go with Dessert first as this is my biggest weakness! Nothing ruins a day of eating well like a 3 pm Chocolate craving, for me anyway!

I chose Black Bean Brownies as my first healthy dessert recipe! There are a lot of different recipes out there but they are all petty similar so I compiled my recipe based on them.

I really really REALLY wanted this recipe to work and it did sort of. The brownies are moist, they look great, BUT they still taste like BEANS! Yech! I think I will keep this idea and work on it a little. I've included the recipe so you can try it for yourself but just know IMO they still need work! If you do make it and make adjustments let me know how it turns out! I think basically they need 2 things MORE CHOCOLATE and the beans need to be smoother!

Here's what you'll need:

1 can Black Beans, rinsed and drained

3 TBSP Coconut Oil

3 Eggs

1/2 cup Cocoa Powder

2/3 cup Brown Sugar

1/2 tsp Baking Powder

1 tsp Vanilla

1/2 cup Chocolate Chips

Here's how you make it:

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Spray and 8 in baking pan with Cooking Spray. Put the Beans into a food processor and process until smooth. Scrape down the sides and add in the remaining ingredients except for the Chocolate Chips. Process again and combined. Then stir in 1/4 cup of the Chocolate Chips. Spread the Brownie mixture into the prepared pan. Place remaining Chocolate Chips on top of the mixture. Bake for 20-25 minutes until a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean.

Enjoy (or not😉)