Nut-Free Date Balls

There are a lot of date ball recipes floating around the blogosphere, but the vast majority of them feature nuts as an essential ingredient in the recipe. In this version, I’ve replaced the nuts with sunflower seeds, which seems to work perfectly.

My Certain Little Someone calls these, appropriately, “Snowy Balls” because I roll them in coconut.

Snowy Nut-Free Date Balls

1/4 cup sunflower seeds

1/2 cup dried dates

1/4 cup raisins (or dried cranberries or dried cherries)

1-2 tsps coconut oil

1-2 tsps orange zest

drizzle of vanilla extract

1/3 cup desiccated coconut

Grind the sunflower seeds until fine in a food processor. Add the dates and raisins. Process until the mixture begins to hold together; adding coconut oil 1/2 tsp at a time until you have achieved the desired consistency. Add orange zest and vanilla. Roll the mixture into 1″ balls; roll each ball in the coconut. Refrigerate to set (or you can enjoy right away, but they’ll be kind of soft); and keep leftovers in refrigerator.

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