Healthy Popcorn with Peanut Butter Drizzle (dairy-free, sugar-free)

---

HEALTHY POCORN WITH PEANUT BUTTER DRIZZLE

An easy to make movie snack to cure your sweet and salty cravings

What’s better than an endless crunch of popcorn while watching your favorite movie or show? While popcorn is both convenient and can be surprisingly healthy, it’s also the most entertaining of foods. Hearing the kernels pop is almost as satisfying as popping bubble wrap.

My sister and I love nothing more than a good girls night with a romantic comedy and a massive bowl of popcorn on a cold winters night. While my go-to movie is Mean Girls, my usual go-to snack is plain salted popcorn. My sister loves peanut butter so much, so I decided to create this recipe for her as a new healthy movie treat (she loves it!!).

This recipe is dairy-free, refined sugar-free and gluten-free. But it’s still tasty, don’t worry!

WAIT, POPCORN IS HEALTHY??

Not only is this recipe like “so fetch!” it’s also surprisingly nutritious. Popcorn is a universal favorite for movie watching, and in the last few years the health industry has been picking up on it too. There are only 31 calories in one cup of popped popcorn with no added butter or oil, which means you can eat 3 1/2 cups of plain popped popcorn for only 100 calories – which is just so great if you ‘want to lose 3 pounds’ like Regina George on an ‘all-carb diet’. While I don’t actually recommend you go on an all-carb diet, I do recommend popcorn as a healthy snack every once in a while. Popcorn is also high in vitamin B, fibre, antioxidants, manganese, magnesium and polyphonic compounds. Who knew your favorite snack could be so good for you?

Popcorn is also a whole grain snack (when corn is harvested as hard seeds it’s considered grain, and then once it matures and becomes more tender, it’s considered a vegetable), it’s high in fibre and is really good for digestion. Studies have also shown that popcorn (when served without butter or excessive oil or salt) may also help to control blood sugar and help eliminate free radicals in your body, among other things. Which is just another one of the reasons why I love popcorn!

To create this special popcorn for my sister (combining her two favorite foods: popcorn and peanut butter), I’ve used 1/8 cup of popcorn kernels which translates to 3 1/2 cups of popped popcorn (around 100 calories) and sprinkled it with a pinch of sea salt. While salt has been given a bad rap lately, sea salt and Himalayan salt are arguably better for you than table salt. Sea salt is a natural electrolyte, and has many health benefits when used in moderation. Recent studies have even suggested that small amounts of the right kind of salt may even help regulate your sugar cravings.

Next, I’ve mixed together the peanut butter, maple syrup and almond milk in a small bowl until it’s completely smooth. I use unsalted and unsweetened peanut butter that has nothing added else added to the peanuts. You can use either dry-roasted peanut butter or raw peanut butter for this recipe – the only significant difference is the taste. Other minor differences researchers have found in raw versus dry-roasted peanut butter is that dry-roasted nut butter may contain slightly fewer antioxidants and vitamins, while raw nuts are sometimes susceptible to harmful bacteria – although usually not enough to cause illness. So in the end it really comes down to your personal taste and preference.

The maple syrup perfectly compliments the peanut butter flavor and adds just the right amount of sweetness. But the best part is, this snack is not even that naughty… with only around 230 calories per serving, this universal favorite just got even better.

POPCORN  WITH  PEANUT  BUTTER  DRIZZLE

Ingredients:

-1/8  cup  popcorn  kernels

-1  Tablespoon  peanut  butter

-1  teaspoon  maple  syrup  (or  honey)

-2  Tablespoons  almond  milk

-pinch of sea  salt to taste

(serves one)

Method:

-Use  an  air  popper  to  make  air  popped  popcorn  in  the  microwave.

-Season  the  popcorn  with  sea  salt.

-Make  the  sauce  by  mixing  the  peanut  butter,  maple  syrup  and  almond  milk  together  in  a  small  bowl  until  smooth.

-Drizzle  the  sauce  over  the  popcorn,  eat  and  enjoy!  (best  enjoyed  fresh)

MADE WITH LOVE BY LIEZL JAYNE XO

PS. WATCH ME MAKE THIS RECIPE BELOW

You can also see how easy it is to make this healthy popcorn recipe in my video below!

Photos and recipe by Liezl Jayne Strydom – for liezljayne.com