Weekend Treats:: Banana Cream Protein Bites

Hot weather means sitting by the pool, sipping on a nice cold iced tea, and indulging in some cool summery treats. Am I right?! Now, relaxing and enjoying yourself is great, but the most amazing thing in the world is when you are able to combine with your love of sweet treats and comfort foods with your goal to be a lean, mean, gym-slaying machine. 

If it's one food I look at and instantly think: summer! It's a heavenly refreshing banana cream pie with the amazing layer of cool whip, chilled bananas, those amazingly sweet crunchy Nilla wafer toppings, all drizzled with some finely sliced almond slivers. 

Mouth watering yet? It's okay, mine is too

And my mouth was watering the other day when I was at an event and had to politely turn down a slice of this gloriousness...I do have goals here (no matter how tempting the dessert)! 

In any case...being me means that the minute I saw this dessert, my mind instantly started thinking of different recipes and tricks to make this into a fun, healthy, goal oriented snack that everyone can enjoy. In the past I've made some bomb banana cream protein shakes, a Quest Bar recipe: mini banana cream pie's in a quest bar "crust", and a full-on clean banana cream cheesecake. No, I'm not crazy... I just really like banana cream things and also creating healthy treats!

Even though I've loved creating all the recipes in the past (they all turned out exceptionally well!), I really wanted to try something new. Since I've also been on a little bit of an "energy bite" kick lately, I decided to try and combine the two ideas and make a banana cream protein bite! Perfect for a quick breakfast or a pre/post workout snack!

Directions:

1. Soften cream cheese in the microwave (30-60 seconds) 
2. With a mixer, whisk the cream cheese, vanilla extract pudding mix, protein powder, splenda, and almond milk until it's nicely blended. 
3. Chop up the banana and blend it into the mixture until smooth
4. *skip this step if you are using oat flour* Put the Nilla wafers into a zip-lock bag and crush them into a fine powder (as you can see in the pictures, I got a little lazy with this step) or place them into a food processor and blend into a flour. 
5. Add the Nilla flour into the mixture until it is dense enough to be rolled into bite-sized balls
6. Roll into balls, place on parchment paper in the refrigerator to harden.
7. Remember, these contain dairy so they must be stored in a cool dry place

Enjoy! 

Ingredients: 

-1 cup fat free cream cheese

-1 packet sugar free fat free banana pudding mix

-1 scoop banana cream quest protein

-1 banana (looking back, I probably should've used two bananas for thickness purposes)

-1/4 cup unsweetened vanilla almond milk

-1 cup sweeter of choice (I prefer splenda)

-1 tsp vanilla extract

- 3/4 box of mini Nilla wafers OR 1-2 cups oat flour (personally, for health reason's I would've opted for the oats, but I chose to use the Nilla wafers because I wanted them to taste more authentic...and I'm not the one eating these). 

Macros per ball: 11 carbs, 3 fat, 4 protein 

*What I would've done differently: Next time I make these, I will also add in a cup or two of fat free cool whip! I think it would make them a lot more fluffy and delicious. For this batch, I wanted to keep them just a little lower in sugar since they are trying to be healthy and we had already added in the Nilla's. Overall, this makes for an awesome pre or post workout carb source that's pretty low in both sugar and fats! 

Keep an eye out, because I also make an amazing banana cream protein shake that I will be sharing sometime this summer!

Xo, Kels