Recipe: No Bake Chocolate Peanut Butter Pretzel Bites

If there's one thing I know my husband thinks is ridiculous about me, it's my food combinations. I'm not someone who likes to stick to traditional combinations and I love combining flavours and textures and colours to create something delicious. I also love recreating classic combinations in weird ways - but Jesse is a strict traditionalist. 

Take for instance, Banana Bread Baked Oats - it's one of his favourite breakfast recipes, but I can't call it Banana Bread Baked Oats to him because he can't wrap his head around the idea of calling something banana bread when it isn't actually banana bread. Same goes for our Healthy Banana Breakfast Cheesecakes - he loves them, but I can't call them "cheesecake" because you just can't eat cheesecake for breakfast... or put banana in it. 

A month or two ago, I had a big bag of gluten free pretzels and a big bag of peanuts that needed to be used up - so I decided to combine the two plus chocolate for the ultimate raw bite combination!

Jesse was kept in the dark until they were finished because I knew he'd be skeptical if he knew it was one of my random creations. 

But it wasn't really that random. 

Chocolate covered pretzels = yum 

Peanut butter and chocolate = yum

Raw bites = yum

Combine all three = deliciousness level 23053934921035

So I got to creating and in a few minutes I had a brand new creation for Jesse to try. I took one of my raw bites into him in his office on a plate, set it down and told him to try it.

Jesse: Err, what's this?
Kristy: A raw bite... just try it, it's good

Jesse: But what flavour is it?
Kristy: Delicious? Just try it, trust me 

And try it he did and for a moment, I thought the deliciousness was lost on him until he said ".......if you want to eat any of those you better hide them right now.... those are gooooooooooood".

I revealed my secret squirrel combination and Jesse decided that chocolate, peanut butter and pretzels need to be combined more often because this was the best raw bite combination ever and he's been asking for them ever since.

So let me share the recipe with you so that you can try them for yourself! >> 

Chocolate Peanut Butter Pretzel Raw Bites
makes 14 large bites or 2 dozen bite sized bites
low fat, gluten free, no-bake, vegan, egg free, dairy free

270g (about 2 cups) dried or medjool dates

15og (1 cup) roasted peanuts, salted or unsalted

25g (1/4 cup) unsweetened cocoa powder

1 tbsp maple syrup 

70g (~1 cup) gluten free pretzels 

• In a food processor, process your peanuts until finely crushed.
• Remove your peanuts from your food processor bowl and set aside in a separate bowl*.
• Add your dates to the food processor bowl and process until chopped and the dates begin to form a ball, about 2-4 minutes of processing depending on your food processor. 
• Next, add in your peanuts, cocoa and maple syrup and process until combined.
• If needed, add a couple of teaspoons of water to allow your mix to come together.
• Add in 2/3 of your pretzels and process quickly to combine with your other ingredients.
• Add in your remaining pretzels, pulsing quickly to lightly chop your pretzels, leaving crunchy chunks of pretzels. 
• Roll your mixture into balls by squishing the mixture together (if your mix isn't coming together you may need to add a teaspoon or so of water) and then placing your formed bites onto a plate. 
• Chill in the fridge to firm up or eat as is! We prefer ours in the fridge as it makes the dates deliciously chewy.
• Store in an airtight container in the fridge for up to three weeks or freeze in an airtight ziplock bag where the bites will keep for months.

*This isn't completely necessary. Our old food processor could handle both the dates and peanuts together in one, however, we've found our current food processor struggles (and a lot of our recipe testers experience the same problem so we've provided an alternative!) with processing both. 

But tell me, do you like trying out different combinations of foods - or are you a traditionalist like Jesse?

What's the weirdest food combination you've tried?

I'm always trying weird combinations, but some of my favourites are Nutella and Goat Cheese, Coffee and Salt (the minister of our church who is also one of our friends suggested this and I haven't looked back since!) and lots of different sweet/savoury or salty/sweet combinations.