Super power snacks

By Shellie Lynn | January 26, 2018 |

Imagine you can choose between two snacks. Both are crunchy and tasty. One of them will make you stronger, happier and fuel your brain power. The other will make you weaker, slower and more reduce your immunity.

Which Snack Would You Choose?

Store-bought and packaged snacks, chips, crisps, cookies and candy are snacks that sap your power despite our thinking they boost energy with a “sugar high”. They are hard to resist. It can be hard not to choose them. They are fun, and hit the taste sensors! But they are often full of sugar and chemicals that cause havoc in your body and destroy your health.

The good news is that snacks can be fun and tasty too while still being healthy. Even better, they are full of vitamins and other great things you need for a strong body and mind that ages gracefully.

Fun Fruit

Fruit is the ideal snack. First and foremost, it tastes great! Also, there are so many different fruits to choose from: Apples, grapes, cantaloupe, raspberries… There are even fruits you’ve probably never heard of or tried, like star fruit, durian, and jackfruit.

When you eat fruit for a snack, you can count on it giving you energy. This is because fruit is made of natural sugars. Natural sugar isn’t like the chemically laden bad sugar that can give you cavities. Fruit’s sugar is like nature’s energy reserve created specifically for your body.

Fruit is also full of vitamins such as:

Vitamin C (boosts your immunity)
Vitamin A (increases eyesight and skin health)

If you aren’t crazy about the fruit you’ve tasted so far, head to the farmers market and try some new fruit that is in season. Did you know there are indoor farmers markets in the winter?

It can be hard to find fresh, seasonal fruit in the winter (depending on where you live). Another option would be freeze-dried fruit. It does come from a package (unless you make your own) but is minimally processed and a good substitute when fresh fruit isn’t available. Check out this option.

Victory Veggies

Veggies can be hard to love because on their own they can seem bland and tasteless. But did you know that there are more than 400 different kinds of vegetables? Surely you can find a handful you like in all of those!

Veggies are the goldmine for nutrition and make for some pretty delicious snacks.

Here are a couple of good things veggies have plenty of.

Protein is what your body is made of—your muscles and your hair. You need it to grow. And you can get it by eating veggies, like beans and broccoli.
Fiber keeps everything inside your digestion in check and your body working like it should. It also helps you to feel full. Veggies are chock full of it.

Did you know you can make fries with sweet potato?

Here’s a recipe you might want to try.

Sweet Potato Chips

Ingredients:

1 large sweet potato (yam)
2 teaspoons olive oil
1/4 teaspoon salt

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (180 degrees C). Wash the sweet potato slice it as thinly as possible. Try to keep all your slices the same thickness so they’ll bake evenly. Soak them in water for about 10 minutes. You can make perfectly thin slices with a spiralizer. Check it out here.

Pat your slices dry and put them in a bowl with the olive oil. Toss them with a fork until they’re coated.

Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and put a cooling rack on top of it. Lay your sweet potato slices on the cooling rack and sprinkle them with salt. Put the whole tray in the oven.

Bake for 40 minutes to an hour until the chips curl up a bit and just turn brown a little. Enjoy!

You can adapt this recipe with any root vegetable. Try beets and parsnips too.