I’ve been trying to stick to our diet whilst Jim has been away but it is tough when there is no-one to guilt you into staying healthy. I have no will power. It’s official. I crave sweet things and my advent calendar chocolate is not getting me through these cravings.
When we first started the eating plan I popped to see the friend who put us onto it and she was eating coconut macaroons. I wasn’t allowed them at that stage (we were in our 2 weeks of cutting out EVERYTHING) but as soon as I started craving snacks remembered she was eating them and went about adapting some recipes. So here are my pretty much healthy (even paleo – if you leave out the chocolate – can you eat chocolate as a paleo person? I have no idea!) coconut macaroons. I’ve made a batch up for Jims return from India this week and I’m hoping he likes them, although I know his complaint will be that they don’t contain cherries!
Ingredients;
- 2 cups shredded coconut
- 3 egg whites
- 2 tablespoons agave syrup (instead of sugar or honey as we’re not eating either)
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- Chocolate to cover – I used about 50grams of chocolate we had left in the cupboard to add something a bit extra for the guys at work who aren’t on this plan but if you are really dieting they taste great without the chocolate too.
What you need to do;
- Preheat oven to 180 degrees
- Cover a baking sheet with parchment paper.
- In a large bowl, whisk together the egg whites and the agave syrup until they are quite frothy.
- Quickly add in the vanilla, don’t mix too much.
- Stir in the coconut and mix with a spoon until it’s all coated.
- Place mound shaped spoons of the mixture on to the baking sheet. They don’t spread so you can place them quite close together. I used my tablespoon measurement to get the little domes although they were a little hard to get out sometimes, but you could just roll them into balls with your hand I guess.
- Bake for about 15 until they are starting to go golden.
- Once cooked, put the baking sheet on a cake rack and allow to cool slightly.
- If you are covering them in chocolate, whilst the macaroons are baking, melt the chocolate. We don’t have a microwave so I bain marie it, but if you are using a microwave, make sure you don’t burn the chocolate.
- When the chocolate is melted, using a fork, drizzle chocolate over the coconut macaroons and leave until set.
- Try not to eat 5 in one go as that probably isn’t diet friendly!
This makes about 24 of the little spoon measures which are just the right size for a sweet fix.
These sound so good! I am currently in diet mode too, and finding creative snacks is pretty hard so I will definitely be giving these a try. Thanks for posting!
It is really hard to find diet friendly snacks isn't it! I've been searching Pinterest for them for ages.
Mmm they look yummy – I'm not dieting (yet!) but would scoff these anyway haha!
If you add more chocolate then i bet they'll be even tastier!
Ah they look so good! Me and diets don't get on so well, I like food to much (sadly!)
I've never got on too well with diets either, but I've dropped a whole dress size recently and feel LOADS better!
Oooh these look great – and I'd really like to hear more about the diet as I really need to do something about my way of living (lately have been downing pop and so on in an unsightly manner)