Carrot Cake Energy Balls

Cooking with Jane, Recipes,

This week we decided to try something completely different and transform our sweet handful of carrots into sweet little snacks! It was fun to really stretch out the goodness of the carrots by putting them into these energy balls. And while we were at it, we got to use some of the Horton’s maple syrup we ordered through Root Radical’s online store! The Palestinian Medjool dates that Emily sells through the store could also be used in this recipe, but we had other dates we wanted to use up (plus those dates are so special and delicious, you might just want to eat them solo). I’m excited to have these snacks in the freezer – they’ll be a nice dessert for a salad-based lunch (we’ve been having a lot of those!) to help make the meal feel a bit more filling.

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Carrot Cake Energy Balls

This recipe comes from The Conscious Plant Kitchen, and is vegan and gluten free.

Ingredients

  • 1 cup carrot – peeled chopped
  • ½ cup walnuts
  • 2 tablespoons ground flaxseed
  • ⅔ cup shredded coconut
  • 1 cup oats – instant or rolled oats
  • ¼ teaspoon fresh ginger
  • 2 teaspoons cinnamon
  • ½ cup soft pitted dates – Deglet or Medjool
  • ¼ cup almond butter – or peanut butter next time we might even try with tahini!
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla
  • 1 tablespoon maple syrup – optional add if you want the balls sweeter

Instructions

  1. Place the peeled, chopped carrots in the bowl of your food processor with the S-blade attachment.
  2. Pulse a few times until it forms tiny pieces of carrots. Set aside in a bowl.
  3. In the food processor bowl again (no need to clean it!), add all the dry ingredients and blend on high speed until the nuts, oats, and coconut turn into a fine ground/flour. It shouldn’t take more than 1 minute.
  4. Add the almond butter, vanilla, maple syrup (optional, only for a boost of sweetness), the carrot pieces from step 1, and the soft pitted dates. If your dates are slightly dry, soak them in hot water for 10 minutes before using them in this recipe. Drain well before adding to the food processor to avoid adding water.
  5. Blend on high speed again until it forms a sticky dough.
  6. Scoop out dough and roll between your hands to form golf size balls. You should be able to shape about 16 balls.
  7. Roll each ball into unsweetened desiccated coconut.
  8. Place each ball onto a plate covered with parchment paper.
  9. Refrigerate 15 minutes to firm up if desired or eat straight away. Freeze for long term storage, or keep in the fridge for up to a week.