Ah Summer!
Time for swimming, shorts and treats – especially treats. The challenge of course is finding treats that do not pound you with sugar and chemicals. After all, we want to still look great in those shorts.
Luckily this week we have an easy recipe for you to try. A surprisingly delicious, Dairy Free, Gluten-Free AND Sugar-Free Pudding. The best of all worlds and simple to do.
As you might remember, we’ve been experimenting with the Rotation Diet the last few weeks. (See our article HERE). The process led to us being playful with how to put together dishes using the foods associated with a given day of the rotation. The diet asks you to limit certain foods only on certain days. This encourages thinking outside the box to see what items might work together in new ways.
In the plan we laid out for day two (Check out the daily breakdown HERE) we had the idea to combine Hemp Milk, Chia Seeds and Dried Blueberries to make a pudding. Seems random? Well both Chia Seeds and blueberries have the jelling quality you want when making a pudding. Hemp Milk helps make it non-dairy. Throw it all together and you have tasty pudding.
Overall our experiment had great results. The Hemp Milk we used from an earlier recipe (Get that recipe HERE) and if you want this recipe to be truly sugar-free, make the Hemp Milk without the optional honey. If you need some sweetness, try using only a bit of banana in the nut milk recipe.
Chia Seed Pudding
This recipe serves 2 to 3 people.
1) To make the pudding, put about 1¼ cup hemp milk in a bowl and stir in 1/4 cup Chia Seeds and 1/4 cup dried blueberries.
(For a firmer pudding use just 1 cup. For a softer pudding use 1½ cups)
2) Stir well and put in the refrigerator for at least a couple of hours. Leaving it longer is fine.
3) The Chia Seeds expand, and there is pectin in the blueberries. Together, this causes the whole mixture to take on a pudding-like consistency.
4) You can vary the recipe by using a different nut milk, and by using a different dried fruit. The Chia Seed alone is enough to produce the pudding-like consistency.
5) Add a bit of seasonal fresh fruit on top before serving for a treat that is really special. Depending on what you use this can add more sugar to the overall dish. Blueberries have a low sugar content, so this is why we like them. Berries in general have some of the lowest sugar content of fruit and there are many choices out there.
Give the recipe a try and let us know what you think. We had some with our salad today and it made our lunchtime excellent. It’s as guilt free as dessert can be.
To your health.
