Hey Love Vitamins,

Today I’m going to share with you something that I’ve really been enjoying making lately… my own homemade energy balls!

So what’s an an energy ball?

Basically, it’s a lot of dense healthy calories packed into a little ball, so when you need some quick energy to power through your day (without relying on caffeine), you can just have one of these and you’re good to go.

I personally like to eat them either before or after a workout to make sure I have all the energy I need to really smash it.

Energy balls can contain all sorts of things… you can get creative, but stick to healthy whole foods. Dates and nuts are often the basis.

Mine include dates, nuts, coconut flakes, coconut oil, pumpkin protein powder, and cocoa powder. Here’s a visual:

So let’s get down to how to make these tasty little babies.

Before I go on though, I should warn you that you do need a pretty good food processor to pull this off with any great ease. And one with a fairly big bowl, at least 9 cups.

You CAN do it by hand by chopping everything up and forming it into a ball when it’s chopped enough to stick together. You know, if you’re a glutton for punishment.

I had to do this once when my old food processor died in the middle of this endeavour, and… uh… yeah. I bought a new food processor ASAP.

Anyway, basically, you just throw an approximation of the following into the food processor bowl and hit chop:

(Makes about 12 large balls)

• 2 cups pitted dates (soaking them in warm water 10 minutes beforehand to soften them up will help if your food processor is not super tough)
• 1/2 cup raw cashews
• 1/2 cup raw almonds
• 1/2 cup raw unsweetened coconut flakes
• 4 heaped tbsp raw cocoa powder (optional, but excellent for chocolately goodness)
• 1/2 cup pumpkin protein powder (optional, but why not)
• 1 tbsp melted virgin coconut oil
• 3 to 4 tbsp warm water

Process for several minutes until everything is super chopped, the oil starts coming out of the nuts, and everything’s getting sticky and clumpy. If you’ve been going at it for several minutes and it seems like the mix is too dry, add 3 to 4 tbsp of warm water.

You also might need to stop every once in a while to scrape down the sides to make sure it’s an even blend.

Just do whatever you can to get that stuff chopped and sticky. Like so:

Once that’s done, just scoop it out and start rolling & shaping it in your hands into golf ball sized balls, and that’s it. Voila!

Now I wouldn’t advise going crazy with these. They are pretty sweet, and taste alarmingly like dessert, so it can be tempting. Natural sugars are better for your skin than refined sugar, but you should still be cautious with consuming too much.

So I advise only having at most one of these per day, preferably as a snack when you’re doing something active to burn up all that energy!

Personally, I like to store them in my freezer, that way I can’t just gobble them down. It means I have to consciously decide when I’m going to have one, because I have to remember to take it out of the freezer beforehand.

This also doubles as prevention of hungry husbands or roommates from decimating them when you’re not looking.

Enjoy! 🙂 And don’t forget, if you want hundreds of extra skin friendly meal & snack recipes, check out my Naturally Clear Skin Bootcamp program!