It can be so hard to find healthy snacks at Christmas time. These healthy gingerbread chickpea blondies tick all the boxes. Made with chickpeas and nut or seed butter, they're packed full of protein making a delicious and nutritious snack.
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I have made chickpea blondies before - and my chickpea and peanut butter blondies are really popular with my kids. When I was brainstorming ideas for healthy Christmas snacks I just knew that these were the perfect contender for a festive adaptation. And I was right. In fact I think that these healthy gingerbread blondies are even better than the original version.
What is a blondie?
A traditional blondie is a lighter version of a brownie. It'll be made with eggs, sugar, butter and flour and could be flavoured with vanilla.
A chickpea blondie on the other hand is quite a different beast.
Chickpea blondies are much healthier. Instead of using flour, eggs and butter you use a simple tin of chickpeas and some nut butter.
These blondies are free from eggs and dairy making them suitable for vegans. They're also refined sugar free, although they do contain maple syrup.
I have tested several different versions of these blondies. For the maximum ginger taste I like to add a couple of pieces of stem ginger, chopped up finely, with a tablespoon of syrup from the jar. This obviously adds a little refined sugar to the recipe so do leave it out if you prefer - they are still delicious.
I like to make these with sunflower seed butter so that they're suitable for my son to take to school in his lunchbox.
It can be hard to make healthy bakes without using nuts so if you're looking for nut free lunchbox ideas I've got 20 here.
Baking with sunflower seed butter
There's only one problem with using sunflower seed butter and that is that the natural chlorophyll in the seeds reacts with the raising agent and turns the blondies green in the middle once they've cooled.
This doesn't seem to happen if you put them straight in the freezer and adding a splash of lemon juice is said to help too - I'll experiment with my next batch.
I did quite a lot of online research about this and despite the green appearance they're totally fine to eat. If this puts you off then use nut butter instead.
Do you need any special equipment to make chickpea blondies?
You will need:
Where can you get sunflower butter?
I used Meridian sunflower seed butter* - you can buy this on Amazon or in some health food shops. If you'd like to make your own sunflower seed butter then My Fussy Eater has a great and very easy sounding recipe.
Can you freeze chickpea blondies?
Another great thing about these healthy gingerbread chickpea blondies is that they can be frozen. I've been adding them to my freezer stash for lunch boxes and last minute treats.
I just take them out of the freezer in the morning and they're fully defrosted by lunchtime.
Pin healthy gingerbread chickpea blondies for later
Other posts you might like:
- 15 best vegan cookbooks (over on my vegan food blog cookveggielicious.com)
- cooking gifts for kids
- healthy chickpea cookie dough
- nut free coconut snowballs
- healthier Christmas rocky road
- or one of my other Christmas recipes
How to make healthy gingerbread chickpea blondies:
Healthy gingerbread blondies
Ingredients
- 75 g oats
- 400 g tinned chickpeas drained and rinsed
- 170 g jar of sunflower seed butter or nut butter see note above about sunflower seed butter
- 75 g maple syrup
- 2 tsp ground ginger
- 1/2 tsp baking powder
- 1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
- 2 pieces of stem ginger chopped (optional)
- 1 tbsp syrup from the jar of stem ginger optional
Instructions
- Pre-heat the oven to 180°C (fan)/200°C/gas mark 6.
- Grease a 20cm square baking tin and line with non-stick baking paper.
- Place 75g oats in your food processor and grind until you have a rough, flour-like consistency.
- Add 400g tinned chickpeas, 170g sunflower seed butter (see note above), 75g maple syrup, 2 tsp ground ginger, 1/2 tsp baking powder, 1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda, 2 pieces of chopped stem ginger and 1 tbsp syrup from the ginger jar (optional). Pulse until well combined.
- Scrape out into the baking tin and smooth the top.
- Bake for 20 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the centre comes out clean.
- Allow to cool in the tin and then cut into squares.
HAVE YOU TRIED THIS RECIPE?
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Martha Johnson
Do you use the chickpeas and the aquafaba in the can or only the chickpeas?
Mandy Mazliah
Just the chickpeas
Kat (The Baking Explorer)
I've not tried chickpeas in blondies before, but now I am officially intrigued! They sound yummy with the gingerbread flavour and maple sweetness.
Mandy Mazliah
You have to try it to believe it I think - they really do work well!