Amaranth Raw Chocolate balls

After popping some amaranth for my niece it gave me the idea to add it to my raw chocolate dessert I often make.  These raw super powder chocolate balls are one of my favorite healthy desserts/food.  

I made a few alterations and additions from my usual recipe. 

You can find the recipe by clicking my previous blog with photos here~~~> Coconutty-frozen-banana-chocolate-balls

Here are the ingredients I used for this recipe:

• 1/2 cup of raw cocoa powder 
• 1/2 cup carob powder
• 1/2 cup almonds
• 1/4 cup Pecans
• 1/4 cup walnuts
• 3/4 cup sunflower seeds
• 1/4 cup melted coconut oil
• 1 heap tsp organic raw Lucuma powder
• 2 heap tsp organic raw Maca powder
• 1 tsp dear antler powder 
• 1 heap tsp Mucuna powder
• 1/2 tsp Shilajit powder
• Himalayan salt (a pinch in 3tbs of warm water...to use a tbs of the water)
• 9 dates
• 1/4 cup almond milk
• 1 raw vanilla bean
• 1 frozen bananas chopped up into bite size pieces
• amaranth (if you haven't tasted popped amaranth...it tastes like popcorn!)

Recipe:

The recipe remained the same as the previous blog.  Blended all the nuts, and mixed in all the powders. I blended the almond milk and the vanilla bean seeds with the dates into sweet paste. I then added it to the dry ingredients, along with the coconut oil and mixed it well with my hand. Because the mix was a little sticky, I let it sit in the fridge for half an hour.  It firmed up a bit because of the coconut oil that is a solid at temps under 75 degrees F. Being winter, my coconut oil remains a solid in the kitchen, so I put the glass container in a bowl of hot water to slowly melt as much as I need. At that point it was easy to mold into the balls, and sticky enough to roll in the amaranth and coconut flakes. 
I made 4 variates. One plain, just rolled in coconut flakes. One plain rolled in popped amaranth (see blog about it here~~~> amaranth), one first rolled in amaranth then coconut flakes (I gave them one more roll to make sure the coating stays, and the last with frozen banana pieces inside rolled in coconut flakes (I didn't re-roll them which is why they appear whiter).

 The chocolate balls covered in amaranth on top half and the ones with both amaranth and coconut on the bottom half

 

The plain chocolate balls on the left side, and the banana filled ones on the right side

 An amaranth coated one

 One coated in both amaranth and coconut flakes

           The banana center chocolate ball...looks much like the plain ones but bigger

Amaranth & Sea Vegetable recipe

I was so excited to make a dish using Amaranth for the first time, and incorporating the extra nutritional punch wish sea vegetables! I was even more delighted when I loved the finish product!

Ingredients

1/4 cup Amaranth grain

3/4 cup filtered water

1/2 onion

1/2 red bell pepper

1 small zucchini

1 small ripe tomato

garlic powder

onion powder

ginger (I used paste)

cumin, black mustard seeds

about a tsp of coconut oil

some coconut milk

pinch of Himalayan salt

Recipe

To cook the Amaranth- I put 3/4 cup of water and the 1/4 cup of Amaranth on high heat until it boiled, then lowered the heat to let it simmer for 20 minutes...or until water is almost all gone. Taste to determine if it's ready. Hard to describe it, it becomes tiny firm/soft little balls, very yummy. 

To cook the stir fry- I heated the coconut oil and black mustard seeds until they started popping, then added the onion.  After letting the onion cook for a couple minutes I then lowered the heat and added the tomato and a minute after all the spices. Stiring a couple minutes and then added the zucchini and red bell peppers. To better cook the zucchini I added some organic coconut milk for mositure.  I covered it a couple minutes, then let it cook uncovered for the last couple minutes, tasting the zucchini and red peppers until cooked to my liking. And it was ready:)

I then topped the dish with sea vegetables.  The prepackaged see vegetables I bought came in sea salt for preservation, so I thoroughly rinsed them, then soaked them for 10 minutes. I just topped the dish with the raw sea vegetables. When I first opened the package I instantly imagined myself in the ocean! I haven't spelled the ocean in a Lonng time, flooded me with memories...so yes smelled exactly like the ocean...which made me a little nervous about how it would taste, but it wasn't overwhelming at All mixed in the dish after being rinsed and soaked. I loved it!

 1/4 cup of Amaranth- when uncooked they are a very hard small seed

 Add 3/4 cup of water and simmer for 20 minutes or until water disappears

 When done the water will disappear and you are left with soft firm testure

 Yum- I could eat it alone and enjoy it.
It is high in protein, vitamin B5 (pantothenic acid), iron, phosphorus, zinc, copper, and magnesium. This serving gives me 7g of protein, 21% of my daily iron and 5g of fiber. 

Close up...small little beads

The Topping

Rinse off the packaging sea salt

 Soaked the sea vegetables

Amaranth

Amaranth ~ Ancient Grain of the Aztecs 

Recently I have been exploring new sources of protein and superfoods to replace other lower nutrient dense foods, to get as many nutrients as possible per food. Since giving up wheat (gluten) I have gained an interest in gluten free whole grains, and amaranth is one of them that I have recently purchased, after learning about its protein content from the Dr. Oz show. The video above shares most of all it's wonderful nutrients. I will be trying several recipes in the near future, so look out for them:)

Having just had my breakfast smoothie, I was super excised to try something with the amaranth right away after looking up online how people eat it. One of the really interesting things I learned is that amaranth can be popped like popcorn...and tastes like a miniature popcorn too! So I decided to pop some and here is how it turned out...Not all of it popped like videos I saw (which literally popped out of their pans!) but wow it was still delicious! I planed to just taste it and save the rest, but it was so good I kept eating it til my tiny bowl was all empty. Some add alil salt or whatever they usually put in their popcorn for flavor, but really, it is unnecessary, it has so much flavor on its own. It also has this really light crunchy texture that I loved.

 Starts out as a very small hard light yellow seed (I bought these at my local co-op store)

You then heat up a pan (with no oil...I would Not recommend using a Teflon pan like i did! I just couldn't find any other pan at the time). Once the pan is nice and hot, throw the seeds in, and shake constantly. They will then start to pop pop...pretty fun to watch.

Mine didn't all pop, nor did they dance high in the pan (using a different pan might have helped) but regardless the seeds that did not pop tasted soo delicious, light crunchy and toasty flavored:) I was super happy with the results.

Made a wonderful snack:) Some eat this as a cereal...adding a little almond milk and nuts, others eat it plain (as I did) or with popcorn seasoning. You can see the popped seeds....the little white balls. Next time I make this I will be sure to use a metal pan, not a Teflon non-stick pan (that should actually never be heated without anything in it! the pan fumes could kill a small bird)