What if you could create healthy versions of all your favorite unhealthy snacks? Many popular store-bought snacks are unfortunately packed full of sugar, salt or fat. However, by making your own snacks, you can control which ingredients go into them, making them tasty and healthy. Below are just a few recipes worth trying.
Potato Chips
Potato chips are easy to make oneself. They can be a great way to use up any potatoes you may have lying in your pantry. Russet potatoes tend to be the best option for getting that crispy texture, but you can use other potatoes too. The key to getting perfect potato chips is to slice them as thinly as possible - a mandoline slicer is often the best tool for doing this.
Place them in the oven for about 12 minutes until they turn golden. You can eat them while they’re still warm, although you may want to allow five minutes of cooling so that they’re not piping hot. You can find guides online on how to make homemade potato chips for more information on the cooking process.
You get to control exactly how you season them, which ultimately determines how healthy they are. Try to keep salt minimal, while experimenting with various other herbs and spices such as paprika and oregano.
Chocolate
Chocolate doesn’t have to be unhealthy. In fact, chocolate can be incredibly nutritious once you strip away the added sugar and dairy fat.
Milk chocolate is typically high in this sugar and dairy. Dark chocolate contains less milk and so isn’t as fattening, although store bought dark chocolate can still sometimes contain a lot of sugar. A great way to guarantee healthy chocolate is to make your own.
This dark chocolate recipe tells you everything you need to know. To keep it healthy, consider using alternative natural sweeteners like honey. You can also experiment with non-dairy milks.
Cookies
Cookies are a fun snack to bake with the family. Most store-bought cookies are unhealthy because they contain lots of sugar. They also tend to use processed refined grains, which have many of the nutrients removed.
For a healthy cookie recipe, consider using an unprocessed whole grain such as oatmeal or whole wheat. Opt for healthy sweet ingredients to add to your cookies such as dark chocolate chips and raisins. You can also mix in ingredients like honey, nuts, vanilla, cinnamon and ginger to add to the taste. This healthy oatmeal cookies recipe explains more.
Ice Cream
You can also make your own healthy ice cream at home. How do you make ice cream healthy? By going easy on the sugar and by using other milk substitutes to dairy heavy cream.
Almond milk is a great healthy milk option to use as a base for ice cream. You can mix this with peanut butter and bananas to give it that ice cream texture. Add a touch of honey and cinnamon and then freeze it. The result is delicious homemade healthy ice cream.
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