These are perfect for anyone with a sweet tooth who also wants to cut down on sugar and processed foods. All totally natural ingredients here and two of these should satisfy any post-lunch sweet cravings or keep you going during full on exercise sessions. They’re also a great source of iron and potassium (from the apricots).
These are taken from Jamie Oliver’s Everyday Super Food book, but I’ve been flexible with one or two of the ingredients as Manuka honey costs a small fortune and puffed brown rice isn’t that easy to come by where I live!
Makes about 18 | 15 mins
Ingredients
- 100g cashew nuts (unsalted)
- 20g sesame seeds
- 20g puffed rice (unsweetened)
- 80g dried apricots, roughly chopped
- 4cm piece root ginger, peeled and grated
- 2 tbsp clear honey
- 1 tsp syrup from jar stem ginger
- 1/2 tsp mixed spice
You will also need…
A food processor or blender
Method
- Toast the cashews in a dry, non-stick pan, for a couple of minutes, tossing occasionally, then decant on to a plate to cool. Do the same with the sesame seeds (put them on a different plate). I should say, this first bit is pretty much optional – having read the recipe too quickly, I completely missed it, but the results were absolutely fine nonetheless, so it’s up to you whether or not to bother.
- Take 40g of the cashew nuts and blitz them to a fine powder then put on a plate or shallow bowl.
- Place the remaining cashews, the sesame seeds, apricots, and puffed rice in the processor and blitz for a few seconds to chop things up. Add the grated ginger, honey and spice and blitz again, until it starts to come together. You’ll need to stop a couple of times and scrape down the sides and make sure everything gets fully processed.
- Finally, add the stem ginger syrup and do one final blitz. The mix should by now have come together as a rather sticky mess.
- Wet your hands and start rolling the mix into small balls. Jamie says you’ll get 24, but I got 18 and wouldn’t have wanted to make them any smaller than that.
- Drop them in the cashew mix and roll them around to coat fully. These store well for up to 2 weeks in an airtight container in the fridge, but they’re not likely to last that long!
cookachew.com 