Vegan, sugar free, gluten free Date Truffles

Diwali, one of India’s biggest festivals, is right around the corner. Known as the festivals of lights, Diwali celebrations generally last 5 days, with Indians all over the world celebrating it in their own special way. Diwali signifies the triumph of good over evil, light over darkness.

Diwali is kind of like the Indian Christmas, with the days preceding Diwali marked by people cleaning their houses, lighting it, shopping new clothes and buying gifts/sweets for friends and family.

I had read somewhere that there is actually a scientific reason behind the cleaning of houses before Diwali. Since Diwali is celebrated somewhere between mid-October to mid-November, right after monsoons end, the cleaning makes sure all the germs and infestation that monsoons brought with them get eradicated with the whitewashing, and other pre Diwali cleaning activities. In fact a lot of Hindu traditions that we follow blindly these days are backed with a very logical reasoning that we are not aware of. Growing up, Diwali for me meant new clothes, lighting candles and diyas, putting lights up, cleaning every nook and corner of our rooms because else the Goddess of wealth, Lakshmi won’t pay our house a visit, going to the Gurudwara to light candles and then bursting crackers at home.

I, being terrified of crackers, would just just burn the sparklers and be happy while my dad and brother would burst the more scary crackers. As we grew up and realized how terrifying the noise is for animals (we had a dog who had the toughest time during Diwali), besides the air pollution that crackers cause, we stopped bursting crackers altogether. Just to continue a little tradition we celebrate Diwali now by lighting a sparkler or two, and maybe an anar for fun. Besides that we just light the house and distribute sweets to our loved ones. And eat good food and lots of sweets!

Generally we would always get sweets from the market during Diwali, but I remember when I was in class (grade) 7th-8th I decided that Diwali I will make all the sweets that guests coming to our home get treated to. So I made sugar donuts, a chocolate marble barfi and some melting moment cookies, the recipe for which I from a Singaporean cookbook my mom had. As far as I remember everything was delicious or at least my parents made me believe it was. I never helped my mom in the kitchen with anything but I did have these bouts where I would decide I want to cook  or bake something, and since these were rare occasions they somehow always turned out pretty good. This year we will not be celebrating Diwali by distributing sweets since we lost our grandmother in May and its our way of paying respect to her departed soul. But I do have a guilt-free diwali sweet recipe to share with you today.

I had the pleasure of sharing this recipe on The Society a few days back and you can check the post out there as well. For a print friendly version of the recipe, you can scroll down.

Whether you choose to make this for your family or as gifts for your friends on Diwali or just to have as a post workout treat (yup, these would be perfect for that too) these date truffles are great. They are also high energy and nutritious with iron and minerals rich dates, antioxidants from cocoa and the many benefits of nuts. Being gluten free, vegan, sugar free make these truffles even more inviting.

As mentioned on The Society there can be many variations to the base recipe given below. Swap the nuts used below for either hazelnuts, pecans, or peanuts and the recipe would work just as well. You could also change the soaking liquid by adding lemon zest or orange zest instead of the cream cheese oil I added. Plain vanilla essence would also add a nice touch. For a more indulgent touch, dip the rolled dates in melted dark chocolate. The variations are endless and the results can be equally amazing!

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Vegan, sugar free, gluten free Date Truffles

 

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Serves: 10-12

Ingredients

Coconut Almond Date Truffles

• 12 dates, soaked in warm water with 1 tbsp rum for 10-15 minutes
• ⅔ cup almonds
• 2 tbsp cocoa
• 1 tbsp honey (or agave nectar for vegans)
• ½ cup unsweetened dessicated coconut

Date Walnut Truffles

• 12 dates, soaked in hot water with 2 tsp coffee for 10-15 minutes
• ¾ cup walnuts
• 3 tbsp cocoa (or in this case if you do not mind adding sugar I generally put 1 tbsp cocoa and 2 tbsp drinking chocolate- makes it a little creamier)
• A drop of Lorann’s cream cheese oil (you could add vanilla essence instead)

Instructions

1. Deseed the soaked dates and keep them aside to dry a bit.
2. In a food processor, process the almonds until they turn into small pieces. Add in the cocoa and coconut and process a little more until they make a fine powder.
3. Add in the dates and honey, and process until it all comes together.
4. Oil your hands slightly with coconut oil and shape small balls. Roll them in sprinkles or desiccated coconut.

(Note: I used my digital scale and weighed each ball to 18 grams before shaping.)

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