So, it’s the middle of the day or the afternoon, your stomach starts rumbling, and all you can think of is having a well-deserved snack break.
What do you usually reach out for?
Let’s be honest: In most cases, you probably won’t raid your shelves for a healthy snack.
It’s easy to gravitate towards high-calorie and high-sugar snacks to keep the hunger at bay as soon as you can, and seeing as the idea of a tasty snack has become synonymous with sugary chocolate bars and convenient bags of crisps, you might think that a balanced, healthy snack would not be enough to keep you happy and satisfied.
But the truth is that healthy snacking has come a long, long way since celery sticks and uninspired pieces of fruit, especially when it comes to healthy vegan snacks: think vegan dark chocolate, lightly salted tortilla chips with mashed avocado or guacamole, homemade sweet potato chips, rice cakes with almond butter, or even a simple trail mix full of delicious dried fruits and antioxidant-packed sunflower seeds.
If you want to treat yourself and opt for a not-so-healthy vegan snack instead, you’ll have even more choices: vegan cream cheese bagels, white vegan chocolate, dairy-free biscuits, and vegan-friendly and gelatin-free sweets can be found in any major supermarket nowadays.
When hunger strikes, finding a great snack to rely on when following a vegan diet can be as easy as heading over to your local corner shop — but that doesn’t mean that your plant-based snacks are giving you the long-lasting, balanced nutrition your body and mind need to thrive!
So, what makes for a good vegan snack?
While you don’t have to reach out for a healthy snack every time you hear your belly rumble, you’ll definitely get a lot more out of your snack break if you choose balanced vegan snacks instead.
Now, keep in mind that the word balanced doesn’t necessarily mean low calorie: Calories are nothing to fear, after all, as they simply represent the yummy energy we need to power our bodies and stay full and satisfied through the day!
A balanced snack is simply a nutritious snack, containing slow-release carbs for sustained energy, high protein levels and healthy fats for long-lasting satiety, plus plenty of vitamins and minerals for promoting heart, bone, and brain health. These nutrients will keep you full and help you maintain your energy levels as you go about your day, so you won’t have to reach out for that emergency chocolate bar to avoid feeling peckish at work or at school!
In a way, we should think of vegan snacks the same way we think of our square meals, making sure to incorporate a mix of both macronutrients (low GI carbs, protein, and healthy fats) and micronutrients, including vitamin C, vitamin B complex, iron, magnesium, and other essential nutrients.
The next thing you should look for when picking the perfect treat for your post-lunch slump is, of course, a satisfying taste you’ll be looking forward to.
In the end, if your vegan snack of choice is not a tasty snack, it will take all the motivation in the world to choose healthy, balanced vegan options every single day and stick to your diet plan without feeling like you’re making a sacrifice!
The bottom line is if it tastes great, you won’t feel like you are missing out on animal products or nutritionally void junk food, making healthy living feel delicious and effortless.
There are plenty of vegan snacks that combine the nutritional benefits of classic health food with the delicious flavours of your go-to comfort food: Think peanut butter sandwiches, low sugar granola bars, energy balls, dark chocolate, roasted chickpeas, and delicious vegan yogurt with oats, fresh berries, and brain-healthy nuts!
Snack bars that tick all the boxes, Hiya contains: flaxseeds, melon seeds, and poppy seeds for giving you filling, brain-healthy fats, plus chickpea flour for a complete source of plant-based protein.
Hiya bars are different in that we have moved away from the fruit and oat-based granola bars you might be used to so we could use a completely different base, mixing coconut oil with chickpeas and health-promoting seeds to help you get through the day.
We use all-natural, vegan-friendly ingredients to make a delicious healthy bar that just calls for a cup of tea!
Our snacks come in five fabulous flavours, and everyone has their own favourite: cardamom, cinnamon, fennel, ginger, or (the evergreen favourite among chocolate lovers) cacao. We are proud to say, we have won Great Taste Awards for fennel and cacao!
And if you want to unleash your creativity in the kitchen and make sure only the best vegan-friendly ingredients are going into your daily snacks, why not try making delicious vegan snacks yourself?
Here are some of our favourite vegan snack recipes to help make a dairy-free, vegan-friendly lifestyle as easy as picking up a bag of crisps:
A really easy healthy vegan snack that doesn’t really require any planning is a piece of fresh fruit with some peanut butter or any other nut butter. This is a healthy choice as you can get some of your daily plant protein from the humble peanut and it is dairy-free and gluten-free – simple and delicious.
Another easy and healthy go-to vegan snack is hummus (and a perfect match with carrot sticks or broccoli/cauliflower florets). The great thing is that all types of hummus are vegan. If you want to be adventurous you can make this simple recipe at home. All that you need is a can of drained chickpeas (a delicious plant-based protein, a tablespoon of olive oil, and either tahini (sesame paste) or one large tablespoon of sesame seeds.
If you would like to add some more flavour you can throw in some caramelised red onions. Whizz all these ingredients in a blender and voila, you have your homemade hummus. This will keep in the fridge for a few days. Such an easy snack with all-natural ingredients, gluten-free, free from any additives, and to top it off it has a great flavour as it is so fresh!
Another one of our favourite go-to snacks, and highly recommended for those of you with a sweet tooth, is a fruit smoothie. Super simple – you need a cupful of frozen berries or any frozen fruit, a cupful of coconut milk or any other nut milk or non-dairy milk, a teaspoon of peanut butter and some cacao nibs.
This will give the smoothie a real chocolate chip taste, and so a real must for all of you with a sweet tooth or anyone who just loves chocolate. Lastly, add in a scoop of a plant-based protein powder, vivolife.co.uk have a wide selection for vegans.
1 tbsp oil
1 tsp cumin seeds
2 tsp of nigella seeds
2-3 green chillies, chopped
1 large onion, finely chopped
2 garlic cloves, finely chopped
3cm piece of ginger grated
200g chestnut mushrooms, sliced
200g tinned chickpeas
1 large carrot, grated
1 tsp garam masala
150g brown lentils
300ml water
100g walnuts and cashews, roughly chopped (optional)
200g red kidney beans (tinned)
Handful of fresh coriander, chopped
250g gram flour
75g semolina
1 tbsp oil
1 tbsp lemon juice
½ tbsp sugar
Pinch of salt
½ tsp turmeric
For the topping/ ‘tadka’
1 tbsp oil
1 tbsp curry leaves or coriander
1 tbsp mustard seeds
1 tbsp sugar
2-3 green chillies chopped
100 ml of water
Preheat oven to 180ºC/ gas mark 4. Line a loaf tin with greaseproof paper. Heat oil in a large frying pan, add cumin seeds, onion, nigella seeds and chillies. Let onions brown and then add garlic and ginger. Cook through for a couple of minutes. Add sliced mushrooms, grated carrot, chickpeas and kidney beans. Stir in lentils and add 300ml of water. Cover and bring to boil then simmer on low heat until all water has been absorbed and the mixture is fairly dry. Chop the nuts (optional) and coriander and add to mixture along with garam masala. Mix through and leave to cool for approx 1 hour. Once cooled, spoon the mixture into the loaf tin and press down into the tin. Cover with foil and bake for 20 mins, then remove the foil and bake for a further 10–15 minutes until firm when pressed gently. Allow the loaf to cool in the tin for about 10 mins then turn out onto a serving board or a plate and slice into lovely thick pieces.
Makes 2 portions:
1 Cacao Hiya bar
80ml coconut milk
40g oats
70g peanut butter (or any nut butter)
120g mixed frozen berries
2 tbsp maple syrup
1 tsp baking powder
Preheat the oven to 180C/165 Fan/gas 5. Put equal amounts of frozen berries into two soufflé ramekins. Then put all of the other ingredients into a blender. Blitz this for 30 seconds. Pour the mixture into the souffle ramekins, and bake in the oven for 25 minutes. Serve with a cup of tea or coffee whilst it is still hot. Enjoy!
If any of these recipes didn’t quite satisfy your sugar cravings, you can always try and make some energy balls. These are perfect with a cup of tea or mid-morning when you just need something to get you through to lunch, and they also work for those of you looking for that sugar fix! Again, very simple to make. In a blender put in 2-3 tablespoons of peanut butter (or nut butter of your choice), add some vegan chocolate and a mixture of nuts, like almonds or brazil nuts, add some dried fruit like apricots or dried mango.
Lastly add 2-3 tablespoons of agave syrup (a sugar alternative) and whizz all of these ingredients in the blender, until they become sticky and gooey. Remove the mixture into a tray and roll it out into little energy balls. Put these in the fridge to harden and store (they should last up to a week in the fridge). These are actually surprisingly healthy!
These were just a few recipe ideas for healthy vegan snacks but if you are still wanting to eat some junk food, you can always eat some vegan chocolate or vegan ice cream as a sweet treat. Or for more savoury treats, there is a lot of different flavoured vegan cheese now or you can reach for the bag of sea salt crisps or chips fried in vegan oil. There is now so much to choose from!
An excellent site for artisan food is yumbles.com, where you will find a great variety of vegan treat ideas to satisfy your sweet tooth… let us know how you like it!
