Vegan, gluten free & low histamine energy balls (No bake)
So lately I've been trying to adapt/reinvent a few of the recipes I've been cooking in the past, meaning before I found out about the histamine allergy thing.
One of these easy, delicious recipes is the energy balls. I used to make them with dates and cocoa. But now these are forbidden, because high in histamine.
This lovely, cloudy afternoon in Bucharest I took about half an hour to scour the Internet for energy balls recipes, that are vegan and low histamine. Of course I watched many and then I mixed and matched based on my inspiration and on what I had at hand in my kitchen.
I like today's version (so does @dragosroua ;) because they are not too sweet and are super easy to make. Of course you can add more or less of any of the ingredients according to your taste, this is just my suggestion.
Ingredients
1/2 cup soaked for a few hours & drained almonds
1 cup desiccated shredded coconut
3 tbsp chia seeds mixed with a bit of water until it becomes like a jelly
2-3 tbsp hemp seeds
2-3 tbsp carob powder
1-3 tbsp sweetener of your choice. I used honey, but you can use agave syrup or something else.
a pinch of salt
2-3 tbsp tahini paste
2-3 tbsp coconut oil
2-3 tbsp vegan milk of your choice
desiccated coconut & sesame seeds for decorating
You need a food processor to first shred the almonds. Then pour everything else in and process until you get a thick paste. If it's too dry, add a bit of vegan milk. If it's too liquid add more coconut flakes or carob powder.
Then form small balls with your fingers and roll them in either sesame seeds or coconut or any other ingredient of your choice. Keep in the fridge in an air tight container. Eat as a snack or when you crave something sweet.
Bon appétit!
Namaste
Hatha Yoga 200H teacher. Copywriter. Human Design Projector. My educational background is in communication and psychology. You can find me mainly on my blog at BeingRaluca where I write about communication, relationships, listening, sexuality and many more. Here on Steemit you may stay updated by following me @raluca.
Those look great, but I had no idea low histamine was a thing. I'll have to look into it some more, thanks for the tip.
Yeap, I didn't know this was a thing either, until I did some blood tests and I found out I have histamine intolerance. There's a ton of info on the web, apparently many people suffer from this issue.
I have a bunch of food intolerancies too (not sure which, still testing with the dietician) and have been on a bunch of diets to avoid certain foods. So I'm well acquainted with all these ingredients on your list.
The balls sound delicious! But the problem I found with recipes like this is that all the ingredients are about 2-3x the price of regular ingredients. Like almond milk, coconut oil ,etc. Super healthy, but only affordable if you have the income for it... which I don't :(
It's unfortunate because without these adjustments I'm suffering from these intolerancies pretty badly, affecting my productivity and thus income, but without additional income I can't get out of this spiral either. It's a catch 22! :(
I also found that once I started removing certain foods from my diet and eating 'healthy' instead, I would continuously lose weight and have significant lack of energy. It's really hard to eat enough when you are eating healthy... apparently there's lots of power in bad food, and not so much in healthy food. While weight loss might be good for many people worldwide, it's not for me, as I'm chronically underweight (related to food intolerancies - food doesn't get properly digested, thus no energy/weight gets added). The past month or so I have had to ditch the diets that I was on, in order to gain some weight again because it was getting dangerously and unhealthily low.
I can tell you one thing: After not eating 'normal' snacks and chocolate for about 2+ years, my mind was blown when I ate chocolate again. My god... this stuff is like drugs! There's way more going on than just the taste of it.... I think normally we are so hooked onto sugar and other pleasure-foods that we don't notice it, but if you've been off of those crap-foods and you eat it again after a long time, it's really noticable.
Sorry to hear you're going through food allergies as well. I also have the same issue with losing weight when I was already underweight. My doctor told me to eat more of what is allowed, but I agree it is a challenge. She also told me to not go the route of testing every possible allergy because most of the times these tests are not relevant. She suggested the elimination diet and then adding back gradually one food at a time to see which one causes trouble. I'm still on the elimination phase.
And yes, most of these healthy foods are way more expensive than the usual ones. I find it frustrating that gluten free stuff costs so much more than the regular. What I do is to make a lot of research and go shop where I find the best prices, either off line or online. And I try to buy in bulk or bigger packaging when possible as these have the best prices.
Wishing you to get better soon and to have enough money for your needs.
thanks!
Yes I had the elimination diet stuff too. I actually never quite got 'out' of it. I had some improvements when on it but once I started adding stuff, I quickly ran into problems again so I fell back to the eliminated list of foods. But the foods that are left are simply not that great and it makes for a super bland dish when you can't use 99% of herbs and spices (incl. onion, garlic, etc. which is in everything). I basically lived off of quinoa for a very long time, and have grown to hate it with a passion because of it. I used to call my evening dinner 'my daily slop' because it always involved the same handful of veggies and spices. Only so much variation is possible with a limited amount of foods
They sound interesting @raluca. I'm not fond of dates so I wouldn't miss them although I had no idea they were high in histamine, nor cocoa. 😊
Yeah, I didn't know about this either, until I found out about histamine intolerance.
It's surprising how many foods and drinks contain it @raluca. Presumably in minute levels. But looking at the size of the list I think it would be near nigh impossible to avoid all of them.
Good recipe, it looks simple and tasty. Thanks for sharing.
They look very delicious good work
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