Many vegetarians and vegans do not like to buy ready-made, industrial sweets in the store. And for good reason: such treats may contain chemical additives – including those not listed or veiled on the package – or full of sugar.
Even dried fruits seem to be a useful sweetness! – often contain chemical additives, including sulfur compounds. If dried fruits (for example, dried apricots, dried cherries, prunes) are bright and shiny, they definitely “cheated” with them. This makes them less attractive to vegans and vegetarians.
Honey is also a rather controversial product. Some believe that this is the result of the exploitation of bees. Indeed, the conditions for keeping bees may differ in different apiaries. If you want, without going into the details of the process of obtaining sweets, to completely exclude the exploitation of animals “from your diet”, then industrial milk and honey, and therefore sweets or desserts with their addition, are not for you. You can buy these products from individual, small producers – farmers – who value their bees, cows, and treat them ethically. If desired, it is not difficult to check the conditions of management in such micro-companies personally – just come to the farmer to get acquainted and see. The conditions of keeping a cow are visible, as they say, to the naked eye. With bees, it’s a little more complicated – but you can indirectly determine by the beekeeper: if a person is thievish, everything is said about him in the village, then he probably saves on bees, and they often get sick and die with him.
It is clear that in the case of store-bought sweets, such almost detective “ethical checks” do not pass. The only sure way to please yourself and your family with truly safe sweets is to either purchase high-end vegetarian products labeled as “health food” and “humane treatment of animals.” Or better yet! – make your own sweets The second method is not as complicated as it might seem – and certainly not as expensive as the first! If you decide to make vegan, vegetarian sweets at home – and even if in the end it turns out that you spent not a penny at all on the ingredients – you are still 100% sure of their contents. And that in the sweet taste of candy there is no subtle bitterness of exploitation of our mooing or buzzing friends.
Surely everyone knows how to cook burnt sugar at home. This, one might say, is the simplest ethical vegan (sugar is made from sugar beet or sugar cane) sweetness of our childhood! Today we will talk about more refined – but at the same time affordable, not so difficult to manufacture and, most importantly, healthy vegan and vegetarian sweets. All recipes below are without milk, honey and sugar.
1. Raw Vegan Dried Fruit Balls
We will need (for 2-3 servings):
- half a glass of a mixture of dried fruits: apples, prunes, dried apricots, raisins (these dried fruits can be prepared at home);
- half a cup of pitted dates,
- a glass of different nuts: walnuts, cashews, hazelnuts, almonds, you can add sesame seeds;
- half a teaspoon of orange or tangerine zest (can be removed from fresh fruit).
- 50 g cocoa butter;
- 6-7 tablespoons carob
- sweetener: stevia syrup, Jerusalem artichoke syrup, or another (to taste).
Preparation:
Mix all ingredients except cocoa butter, carob and sweetener in a blender.
Roll the resulting mixture into balls, roll in coconut flakes.
Put cocoa butter in a water bath and melt to a liquid state, stirring constantly (do not boil!). Pour carob and sweetener into it, mix thoroughly.
Dip each ball in semi-liquid “chocolate glaze”, put on a plate and refrigerate.
- When the chocolate has set, serve.
2. Vegan Popsicles:
We will need (for 2 servings):
- Two ripe bananas (with brown dots on the peel);
- 10 dates;
- 5 large grapes (pitted or pitted)
- Other fruits cut into slices: tangerines, kiwi, mango – this is for decoration, to taste.
Preparation:
Slice bananas. Put in the freezer for 2 hours (strongly, until the “stone” state, it is not necessary to freeze);
At this time, soak the dates in water for 1-2 hours (to soften);
Get bananas, if very hard – let stand for a few minutes in heat (they will soften);
Mix and grind dates, bananas, grapes in a blender;
Put in a vase (s), put in the freezer for 30-45 minutes – everything will seize;
Take out, arrange cups in rosettes, decorate with fruit slices, mint leaves, etc. – ready!
2. Vegan “milk” chia seed pudding
Chia seeds, placed in liquid, swell – even more than flax seeds – so they can “ferment” any drinks. Chia seeds are very nutritious. Based on them, you can prepare hearty and healthy vegan breakfasts.
We need:
- 50 g oat flakes;
- 0.5 liter of cold water;
- One banana;
- 3 tablespoons of chia seeds;
- to taste – Jerusalem artichoke syrup, dates or other useful sweetener;
- to taste – vanilla powder;
- pieces of fruit: orange, tangerine, kiwi, persimmon, melon, etc. – for decoration.
Preparation:
- Pour oatmeal with cold water, let it brew for 15 minutes;
- Grind in a blender. It will turn out a liquid resembling cream;
- Add chia seeds, stir with a spoon into the liquid. Let it brew for 2 hours at room temperature – or leave overnight in the refrigerator.
- Grind the banana in a blender until puree.
- Add banana and sweetener(s) to our pudding. We stir with a spoon.
- Add pieces of fruit for beauty. Let’s put it on the table!
And now let’s briefly return to what we started talking about useful and not very sweets: dried fruits. Can you make your own dry fruits? Yes. Is it difficult? Not! You can use a special dehydrator (sold as a double boiler), or an oven, or even … the sun!
It takes a long time to describe the process of preparing dried fruits in nuances, we will analyze only in general terms the different methods, according to the principle of drying:
1. In a dehydrator. You can choose hot or cold blowing, so if you want, you can make “raw” dried fruits that have not been exposed to high temperatures. After laying the fruit, the dehydrator does not require attention. In addition to dried fruits, by the way, you can cook dried vegetables (for soups), mushrooms, raw vegan bread (including those based on sprouts) in it.
2. In the home stove oven. The disadvantage of the method is that the process will take 5-8 hours. Slices of apples are laid out on parchment paper, the oven temperature is 40-45 degrees (dried fruits come out almost “raw food”!). In general, also a simple method. The only thing is that it will be hot in the kitchen all day.
3. In the shade or in the (morning and sunset) sun. The slowest and most time-consuming method, because slices of apples must be strung on threads and hung or laid out (preferably in nature), and both take up quite a lot of space. But adapting, and having space, and it’s not difficult. So, some people dry apples on threads on the balcony (almost like underwear!), in a bathhouse in the country, in the attic of a country house, etc. In nature, you have to cover apples with gauze – so that flies and ants do not spoil the product! Drying will take about a week.
It is clear that you can dry not only apples of different varieties, but also pears, cherries, currants, even gooseberries: you just have to tinker a little, or buy a dehydrator. But on the other hand, we get a 100% healthy, ethical, tasty product without “chemistry”.
In preparing the article, materials were partially used, including those from the sites: “” and “”.