Life Without Sugar – 5 Sugar Free, Quick to Prepare and Healthy Sweet Snack Ideas

Quite a few of our favorite snacks are sweet: chocolate bars, muffins, donuts and many more. They safe our life when we need energy quickly, and they just make us feel good. But an increasing number of people is affected by conditions like diabetes and overweight and therefore need to drastically cut down on sugar.

“A life without sugar – that’s impossible!” you may say. I also thought so. Until I gave this problem a serious thought and did some research. In fact, in our days it’s quite easy to live without sugar and still enjoy the greatness of sweet food. There are plenty of natural sweeteners on the market, most fruits are available during the whole year, either fresh, canned or deep-frozen, and you can find uncountable sugar-reduced or sugar-free recipes.
 
Here are some healthy snack ideas that can do without sugar added and still are indulgingly sweet:
 
Snack #1: Fitness Muffins
1. Mix 170 g flour, 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder, 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon and ½ teaspoon salt in a bowl.
2. In a second bowl, beat 2 eggs, 50 ml vegetable oil, 75 ml low-fat milk and 50 g honey until smooth. Add the egg mixture to the flour mixture and mix well.
3. Add 180 g chopped apple, 150 g grated carrot, 1 tablespoon fine coconut, 40 g raisins and 20 g chopped almonds and mix well.
4. Set 12 paper moulds into a muffin pan and fill them to 3/4 with dough.
5. Bake the muffins in the preheated oven on 180°C for about 25 minutes. Afterwards, allow them to stand in the pan for 5 minutes before taking them out.

I love these muffins for two reasons: Firstly, they are easy and quite quick to make. And secondly, you can keep them in a closed container in the fridge for quite some time. I once forgot about some muffins, and after a month they still tasted as juicy as when I just made them.
 
Snack #2: Fruity Yoghurt With Almonds 
Mix 125 g plain low-fat yoghurt with a handful of blueberries or quartered strawberries and a tablespoon of almond flakes. You may want to add a bit of cinnamon to make it more special.
 
Snack #3: Fruit Salad With Nuts And Mint
Cut a small apple into bite-size pieces and a small banana in thick slices. Cut a handful of seedless grapes in half. Chop 2 tablespoons of walnuts. Add 2 heaped tablespoons of oats and mix all the ingredients well. Create some exotic flavor with fresh or dried mint.
 
Snack #4: Banana Pineapple Shake
Cut a small banana in thin slices and blend it in your blender together with 125 ml of low-fat milk and 125 ml pineapple juice (100% fruit juice, unsweetened). It’s heavenly sweet and gives great energy too.
 
Snack #5: Banana And Oat Biscuits
1. Mash 2 ripe bananas until smooth. Add 1/3 cup unsweetened peanut butter, 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon, 2 tablespoons low-fat milk, 2 tablespoons honey (only if you need to sweeten it, otherwise you can leave it), 2 ½ cups rolled oatmeal and 1/4 cup flour and mix well.
2. Cover a baking tray with baking paper, place teaspoons of the dough on it and bake the biscuits for 10-15 minutes in the preheated oven at 350°C.
 
All of these snack ideas have no sugar added. Their sweetness comes either from honey or the fruit sugar. Both of these do way less damage to your body as plain sugar would, so you don’t have to feel bad at all enjoying these sweet snacks, even if you want to lose weight. And the great thing about using fruit as a sweetener is that you also get plenty of important vitamins. You see, it’s pretty easy to enjoy sweetness without sugar!