Bliss balls! Bliss balls that are nut free, gluten free and full of fibre and protein. Bliss balls that also taste so much like cookie dough you’ll be thinking about being a little kid eating cookie dough straight from the mixing bowl… or if you’re me, being an adult and eating cookie dough straight from the bowl. Basically my new favourite bliss ball.

These took more attempts than I’d like to admit to get right. I usually make mine using nuts and I really wanted to try something different this time (and have my housemate be able to eat them!), but the texture kept letting me down, they kept ending up too dry. These are also fructose friendly, meaning I didn’t use any dried fruit in them, however this also added to my texture problem. Then I omitted coconut oil for coconut milk and all my problems were solved. Plus a couple of dozen other adjustments but I feel that one was the really important one.

You can use cacao nibs, chocolate bits or just chopped chocolate in these but make sure it is 70% or higher in cacao to cut down on the sugar. I used maple syrup to sweeten as it’s gentler on my stomach than dates or honey but you could easily use this, or even coconut nectar. You would need a little less honey as it tastes sweeter than maple syrup. The amount of sugar per gram in maple syrup and dates is very similar, hovering around the 65% mark. Therefore you would need about 40g of dates, soaked in a little water if you wanted to use fruit rather than maple syrup to sweeten.

Ingredients

1 1/4 cups oats

1/2 cup coconut, desiccated

1 Tbs psyllium husk

1 Tbs flaxseed, ground

1/4 cup coconut milk

1/4 cup tahini

2 Tbs maple syrup

2 tsp vanilla extract (or seeds of 1 vanilla bean)

1/3 cup 80% dark chocolate chips/ chopped chocolate

1/4 cup extra desiccated coconut for rolling

Directions

Combine all ingredients in a food processor excluding the extra coconut and the chocolate. Blend until well combined and the oats have been broken down. Add the chocolate and pulse to combine.

Roll into walnut sized balls then coat in extra desiccated coconut. You might want to wet your hands lightly for the rolling.

Chill in fridge for 1 hour to firm up. Keep in a sealed container in the fridge for up to a week (if they last that long!).

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Tip: use the same 1/4 cup measure for the coconut milk and the tahini, measure out the coconut milk first, do not rinse it then measure the tahini, this will help the tahini slide out of the cup more easily!

– Make sure you use gluten free oats to make this gluten free if there is an allergy