I’ve always loved a good pudding. Thick, creamy, sweet… yum. I remember those Jell-o puddings powders in a box that my Mom would buy. What a trip to whip one of those up! Or the Hunts ones often found in kids lunch bags. Just peel back the lid and you are faced with processed creamy goodness.
Wait… how can processed and goodness go together? When it comes to our palette and tastebuds they sure can. Food manufacturers do exactly that – they create foods that are so incredibly, irresistibly rich and delicious that they tell our brains “I need this. This is good”. And yet after we indulge, our brains tell us something quite different: “Why did I do that? I feel gross – both physically and emotionally”.
While this chia seed pudding fruit parfait is definitely not a Jell-0 or Hunts pudding, it still offers thick, creamy, naturally sweet goodness. And when you finish eating it, you feel GOOD! No emotional defeat happening here.
This parfait also wears many hats – it’s a breakfast, a dessert, a snack, or a postworkout refuel.
And like the majority of recipes I share, it’s very quick and easy to prepare.
PUDDING
1/2 cup chia seeds
2 cups almond milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon cinnamon
2 large Medjool dates, chopped into tiny pieces
2 organic dried apricots, chopped into tiny pieces
- Stir together all ingredients, except peaches, in a bowl until well combined.
- Store the pudding in an airtight glass container (with a lid) in a refrigerator overnight.
- When ready to serve, stir pudding well follow the parfait instructions belwo.
FRUIT SALAD
There are no rules to making fruit salad, however I try to choose a variety of colours as it makes the salad more nutritious (more colours = more variety of nutrients) and more visually appealing. Usually the fruit salad is comprised of what I have on hand. This is what I used today:
1 small container blueberries
3 kiwis diced
1 pineapple, diced
1 peach, diced
2 mangos, diced
2 bananas cut into thin slices
MAKING THE PARFAIT
Layer 1/4 cup pudding, followed by a 1/4 cup fruit, followed by 1/4 cup pudding, followed by 1/4 cup fruit.
I’m sorry I didn’t measure the overall yield, but my guess is that it would make 8 parfaits.