Coconut Peanut Butter Balls
Peanut butter, oats, and coconut pressed into balls that ride in a pocket and get eaten cold.
- calories
- 210
- weight
- 1.4 oz
- cal / oz
- 150
- protein
- 6 g
- serves
- 12, scales
- prep
- 15 min
- cook
- 0 min
- total time
- 15 min
- water
- none
- cost
- $
Calorie and protein figures are my own estimates, good enough for planning a food bag and not meant as precise nutrition data.
- Snack
- Dessert
- No cook
- Backpacking
- Canoe / raft
- Day hike
- Bikepacking
- Vegetarian
- Eat in the bag
- Pre-mix at home
- Shelf stable
- Basic
Ingredients
| Creamy peanut butter | 3/4 cup | the stiff shelf-stable kind, not natural-separated |
|---|---|---|
| Honey | 1/4 cup | maple syrup works the same |
| Unsweetened coconut flakes or shreds | 1/2 cup | |
| Quick oats | 1/2 cup | |
| Hemp hearts | 1/4 cup | |
| Chia seeds | 1 tbsp | |
| Chopped nuts, raisins, or chocolate chips | 1/2 cup | peanuts hold up in heat better than chocolate |
| Salt | a pinch | skip it if the nuts are salted |
Method
- At home, stir the peanut butter and honey together in a bowl until they are one thing.
- Add the oats, coconut, hemp hearts, chia, add-ins, and salt. Stir until nothing is dry.
- Judge the texture. Sticky enough to hold a shape, not wet. Add oats or coconut a spoonful at a time if it slumps.
- Roll into 12 balls and chill them for an hour so they set.
- Pack them cold and eat them out of the bag on trail. No stove, no water.
This is a fat-and-sugar brick with enough structure to survive a pack. Peanut butter and honey are the binder; the oats, coconut, and hemp hearts are filler that soaks up the excess oil so it does not leak. Chia seeds do the same job on a smaller scale, pulling in loose moisture over the first hour and firming the whole batch up.
The original is a boat-galley snack that lives in the refrigerator. On trail it does not get one, so the ratio matters more: keep it on the dry side of sticky at home and it will hold through a warm afternoon instead of turning into paste. Made stiff and packed cold, these last about a week out of a fridge, longer in cool weather.
Packing
Chill hard before packing, then load into a rigid container or a doubled freezer bag. In heat they soften into one lump, which still eats fine with a spoon but will not come apart into balls again.
Variations
- Swap a quarter of the oats for ground flax or almond flour to cut the carb load.
- A scoop of protein powder takes each ball to around 9 g of protein.
- Drop the nuts and chocolate and use raisins for a nut-free-ish version — the peanut butter still rules that out, so use sunflower seed butter if allergies are the point.
https://svsabado.com/no-bake-coconut-peanut-butter-balls