Boy, You've Got Some RAW BALLS!

It's ALL raw

At a meal where succulent grass-fed filet mignon, which barely needs to graze the grill to cook, and makes your mouth water from 9 feet away, takes second place, tonight RAW BALLS comes out the clear winner.  Ladies and Gentlemen....RAW BALLS!!!  (Yes, I just like to say raw balls.)

Helloooooo balls

My brand spankin' new sister-in-law, Lisa--

The nuptials in Aspen.  Best.  Wedding.  Ever.

sent me this recipe, informing me that it was super yummy but in need of a new name.  RAW BALLS just wasn't appetizing, but she's a southern lady.  Well this mutha thinks it's perfect.  "After dinner, I'll be serving Raw Balls."  "Did you enjoy the Raw Balls?"  "Have you tasted Leslie's Raw Balls??!"  Come on, how could you rename these little guys?

Ingredients:
Makes 12 - 16 balls

1/2 cup walnuts
1/2 cup pitted dates
1/2 cup raw cacao (the recipe called for raw carob or cocoa powder, but I used cacao because of all it's nutrients as a superfood)
1/2 cup maple syrup
1/2 cup almond butter
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/4 teaspoon fine sea salt
1/2 cup whole almonds
1-2 cups shredded unsweetened coconut

Place walnuts in a food processor and process until coarsely ground.  Add the dates and pulse until well combined with the nuts.

 

Add the cacao powder, syrup, almond butter, vanilla and salt.  Process until the mixture is thick and smooth.  

Add the almonds and pulse a few times until combined.  There should be some big almond chunks remaining.

Wet your hands with water or a little olive oil, and form the mixture into balls and roll in the coconut.  Place on parchment paper on a tray and store in freezer.

These balls are DIVINE!  All raw ingredients, never cooked, just chopped, mixed, rolled, and frozen.  They're addictive and perfect.   I did have a little problem with my food processor, to be perfectly honest.  When I added the cacao, syrup and almond butter, she just stopped.  Wouldn't budge.  I'm not sure why this was, as it didn't happen to Lisa, and I thought my Cuisinart could move through mortar, but that wasn't the case.  In the future, I would probably stir it manually at that stage, and chop the almonds beforehand.  The almonds ended up whole in my recipe because of this, and it still worked great, but I might futz around with it a little next time, and OOOOOOH there WILL be a next time!

"What's in that?"

"That's what!"

Have a look.  You know you want it.

ADDENDUM:  I made these again because, well, they're AWESOME, and we've had some dinner guests this week.  I used the food processor for the first step of combining the walnuts and dates, but then just mixed everything else by hand.  MUCH easier, especially on the kitchen appliances, which sounded like they were going to burn out.  And I prefer the almonds whole anyway, they add a delicious bit of crunch to these fudgey balls.  Make these already!!