Who are these chocolate protein pots for?

First thing first, they are not necessarily the best if you are early on in your recovery. Protein is great but if you are supposed to be eating three meals, two desserts and three snacks, you don’t want tons of protein because it’ll fill you up and make things more difficult for you.

This is for people who are struggling to get more protein in, either because their needs are very high, or perhaps because they are vegetarian.

I’m not vegetarian but I don’t eat a lot of meat or fish and, as a result, my meals can be a bit low in protein. Sure, I could use protein powder but I am yet to find one that I like the taste of.  I don’t like the artificial taste of the sweeteners and I don’t enjoy the unflavoured ones, which are either too “milky”, “grainy” and generally “eeeky”.

Protein bars are not my favourite because they are super processed, sickly sweet and pretty expensive. They can be useful when out and about but they are not something I’d use everyday.

Now, I always tell my clients that a meal is the overall food eaten at one sitting and if your main meal doesn’t contain a lot of protein, you can just add some more by having another course. Make your “dessert” the protein rich part of your meal.

 

Where is the protein coming from?

The protein in there comes from Greek yoghurt and also peanut powder. This is a bit like a protein powder but without artificial sweeteners (yes, I’d rather have sugar) and without the nasty taste. It’s essentially peanut powder with some of the fat removed thereby concentrating the fibre and protein. Don’t even think of having this instead of peanut butter, it won’t taste nice! If you remove the fat from peanut butter what is even the point? Just see it as a not so processed protein powder.

Of course, I could just use Greek yoghurt as my dessert but I sometimes get bored of yoghurt and I have a bit of funny relationship of English yoghurt, I’m sorry but the French ones just taste better!

Anyway, these chocolate protein pots are extremely easy to put together and even easier to eat, so give them a go a tell me what you think.

 

Chocolate protein pots ingredients:

• 700g Greek yoghurt (I use Total 2%)
• 100g chocolate (I use dark)
• 60g peanut butter powder (I use PB Fit)

 

Method:

Melt the chocolate over a pan of boiling water.

Meanwhile, mix the yoghurt and peanut powder in a blender.

When the chocolate is melted, add to the yoghurt, mix and blend again.

I sometimes add ¼ cup hot water to loosen the mixture and make it easier to divide into my pots.

This is enough for six pots chocolate protein pots. Per pot, it will provide you with 16.5g protein while being tastier and much cheaper than a protein bar.

Note: If you don’t like the sound of the peanut powder you could also leave it out but change the ratio: 800g yoghurt and 100g chocolate – I sometimes do that if I have run out of the powder. This would still give you 13g protein.

I used to called these “breakfast cheesecakes” but I don’t like the name anymore. Firstly, I don’t tend to eat them for breakfast only (although you could) and secondly, it gives the impression that these are “healthy” mini cheesecakes. In fact, it gives the impression  that they are so healthy you could have them for breakfast when the actual truth is that most nutritionists, including me, wouldn’t advise you to break your fast with cheesecake. I suppose you could have cheesecake for breakfast, although it probably wouldn’t set you up for the day in the best way. Having said that, there are quite a few good elements about cheesecake such as lots of protein and calcium for example.

I don’t like the new name either to be honest, but that’s the best I came up with and feel free to pitch me better names. 

As cumbersome as it is, the name does reflect what they are and what they were designed to do for me though. I wanted something high in protein that wasn’t meat or just eggs so I fell back on yoghurt but I struggle a bit with yoghurt sometimes. It might sound strange but I never got used to “English yoghurt”, “French yoghurt” tastes different. Anyway, sometimes I don’t fancy yoghurt but I need more protein because I don’t eat a lot of meat and this is how this recipe was born. 

My little cakes are reminiscent of the  “Käsekuchen” , or baked cheesecake, my German uncle used to make, so we’re back to the cheesecake idea.

People often ask me about protein and a lot of my clients are drawn to protein bars but I’m not always keen on them. First, they are extortionately expensive! They are also really processed and in as much as I’m not fanatical about everything being “natural”, I think it makes sense to reduce our exposure to ultra processed food (UPF). My final and perhaps most important issue with them is that they often contain a type of sugars, which don’t get absorbed by the body, called sugar alcohols (they have nothing to do with the alcohol we drink by the way). They are useful to food manufacturers who want to reduce the sugar and calorie content of their products, precisely because the body doesn’t absorb the said sugars. However, they can exacerbate digestive issues and cause bloating in some people, especially when consumed frequently and/or in large quantities (by large quantities I don’t mean tons, a couple of those bars for some would be enough to cause digestive unease). Given that most of my clients, disordered eaters, suffer with their digestion and bloating, those bars aren’t my favourite. 

These little cakes are my solution to an easy, tasty, cheap and nutritious source of protein. Ok you have to make them but I tend to double the recipe and make 12, so it lasts me a week or so. They contain around 10g protein, 92mg calcium and only 4g of “real” sugar per cake. Aside from the cost of the electricity, they probably cost around £0.50 per cake, there’s no plastic, they are portable and they really do taste nice! I had to make some for my kids too, which is telling I think.

Ingredients:

• 500g Greek yoghurt
• 2 medium eggs
• 6 tsp. caster sugar
• 1 tbsp. vanilla bean paste
• 3 tbsp. semolina
• 1 tsp. psyllium flour (it helps avoid excess moisture)
• Frozen raspberries if you feel so inclined…

Method:

Place the yoghurt in a large bowl making sure to drain off any liquid beforehand. Add the sugar and vanilla and mix well. Beat the eggs in a separate bowl, whisk in the semolina and psyllium gradually so as not to form lumps, then add to the yoghurt mix.

Divide into 6 muffin cases and add a few raspberries, or anything else you want, on top.

Bake in a preheated oven for 40min at 150°C and leave it to cool before eating.

They work for breakfast, a light dessert, or an afternoon snack. I’m not sure they would freeze terribly well though so do eat them up!

I’m not vegan but some of my clients are. This recipe was specially designed for a client whose digestive problems require her to eat more fibre and who also can’t digest milk very well.

I wanted more fibre in her diet but in a gentle kind of way so as not to aggravate her sensitive gut. Sweet potatoes came to my mind straight away and so did dried fruit but I because I wanted to layer the sources of fibre throughout all her meals I decided that a dessert would be the perfect option.

This recipe only has six ingredients, is a doddle to make, is packed with fibre and other goodness and is to die for!

I quizzed my family after they had demolished their dessert and they had absolutely no idea that it contained sweet potato, which they normally hate – smug.

I’m actually not a huge fan of sweet potatoes either, I find them a bit errm too sweet… Now and again it’s ok but if you follow me on Instagram you will have noticed that sweet potatoes don’t feature a lot in my diet. I also do find them a bit too fibrous sometimes but this is exactly what I wanted here: sweet fibre! To get round the unpleasant stringiness of the fibre, I used my trusted Vitamix, which can blitz the fibre in such small particles that render them totally invisible, you end up with the smoothest chocolate cream but it’s full of fibre!

You probably could use the skin of the potato too and that would increase the fibre content but in all honesty I don’t really like it and I’m not prepared to eat something I don’t like.

Don’t try to cut corner and have “light” coconut milk, it won’t taste as nice and will decrease the fibre content dramatically. Light coconut milk is actually only 25% coconut while full fat one is 60% coconut…

Although this wasn’t the aim, note that this dessert is also free of added sugar (not sugar-free mind).

 

Ingredients:

• 500g sweet potato raw
• 400g coconut milk
• 6 Medjool dates
• 60g unsweetened cocoa powder
• 1 tsp. vanilla bean paste
• 1 pinch of sea salt

 

Method:

Soak the pitted dates in warm water and while they soak bake the sweet potato in the oven until tender.

When the sweet potato is cooked through, peel it and add it to your Vitamix along with the rest of the ingredients – do drain the water from the dates first.

Blitz at a high speed, I use the smoothie function and find it works well.

Divide in 6 pots and refrigerate until set.

Each pot gives you 8g of fibre, not bad for a dessert!