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Kitchen Confessions: No Bake Hiker’s Energy Bites

I’ll admit it. I can easily be led down a Pinterest rabbit-hole at any given moment. Think of anything you’ve ever wanted to make, type it into the little search engine and voila! You have hundreds of versions of that very thing you were looking for. And who loves “options” or “adaptations” more than me?
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I’ll admit it. I can easily be led down a Pinterest rabbit-hole at any given moment. Think of anything you’ve ever wanted to make, type it into the little search engine and voila! You have hundreds of versions of that very thing you were looking for. And who loves “options” or “adaptations” more than me?

Now that winter and the bad weather has mostly left us behind, my latest obsession is making little energy treats to take with me on hikes or runs. Not only are these bite-sized treats a lot more economical than the pre-made treats you find at health food stores and grocery stores, but you can customize these little bites to suit everyone’s taste.

Another bonus of making these yourselves is that you don’t have to pretend to be a chemistry major when reciting some of the ingredients found in the pre-packed energy snacks: cyanobalamin, retinyl palmitate, tocopherols, pyridoxine hydrochloride or ergocalciferol to name a few. I’m going to go out on a limb and guess that some of these are vitamins? But let’s just say that if I have to Google a word because the spell-check doesn’t even know what it is, I probably don’t need or want it in my body.

So today I bring to you a mash-up of some of the recipes you’ll commonly find on Pinterest, or Google, or any other clean-eating focused Facebook page. This recipe travels really well, is not too melty, and a small little ball is literally a super boost of energy without all the garbage.

Try this and customize your own:

Ingredients:

1 cup rolled oats

½ cup unsweetened coconut flakes

½ cup all natural peanut butter

1/3 cup honey

½ cup flax seeds

½ cup mini chocolate chips

1 tbsp chia seeds

1 tsp cinnamon

1 tsp vanilla

¼ cup sliced almonds, roughly chopped and set aside in a little bowl

Other add-ins: dried fruit such as cranberries, dates, apricots, raisins, blueberries, goji berries, chopped nuts, carob chips, popped quinoa, whatever you want!

Line a platter or cookie sheet with baking paper and set aside. In a medium sized bowl, combine all of the ingredients except for the sliced almonds. The ingredients with come together into a cookie dough like consistency. Now it’s time to get your hands messy. Take out little portions of the dough approximately 1-2 tbsp and roll into balls – gauge the size by what you think you would want to carry with you and pop into your mouth! Not too big, not too small. Once you’ve formed the little balls, roll them in the chopped almonds to coat the outside and line the tray with them. Stash in the fridge for a couple of hours till they firm up.

Once your little bites of goodness are ready, you can individually wrap them in plastic wrap for easy grab and go, or you can store them in an airtight container in the fridge until you’re ready to chow down. They will last for at least a week if they don’t get eaten right away!