The little seed that DOES!

Happy Humpday everyone,

Hope your week is going fabulous! Mine is going pretty well, the usual really! Yet, lately my mind has been racing with project ideas and career plans and so I've been doing a lot of thinking. I need to stop thinking and start doing as life won't wait for me. I'll let you know what's circulating in my mind soon:) Ive been listening to a lot of goal-making and positive thinking material lately. Actually right now I'm listening to Tony Robbins' book Awaken The Giant Within and its powerful stuff but only if I decide to use it...and I plan to:) Do you listen or read about motivations speakers, positive affirmations, or the law of attraction? I never did before but lately I've been gobbling it up and I think its helped my to be more driven and know that I can do whatever I want in life.

Anywho, I wanted to share with you some goodies I made and which seed made it all possible.

You know this glorious plant as the sunflower. I absolutely love sunflower plants! They are huge, come in a variety of colors (ever seen the purple ones?), and they produce one of my all-time favorite seeds to eat.

I remember taking the seeds out of the sunflower head as a kid and eating them right out of the shell. I plan on growing some sunflowers in my garden this year so maybe I can bring that memory to life once again:) Sunflower seeds are real powerhouses of nutrition. Brigitte Mars states in her book Rawsome that sunflower seeds are rich in zinc (men, eat up if you want to protect that prostate). They are also rich in B-Complex vitamins, and linoleic acid. Medicinally, sunflower seeds are hard workers as they are an antioxident, diuretic, expectorant ( promotes discharge of fluid from the respiratory tract), and nutritive. Here is a list of some other facts about these powerful seeds:

• Made up of 22% protein
• The high high B-Complex vitamin content makes them excellent for strengthening the nervous system and for building up the kidneys
• The linoleic acid content helps to reduce cholesterol
• Considered a tonic for the eye because they decrease light sensitivity and prevent eye degeneration
• They lube up the intestines
• Increase sexual vigor in men and women (last but definitely not least:)

Yet, some of the reasons why I truly love this seed are because they are available in most grocery stores, most of the time you can get a raw version, and they are relatively inexpensive compared to most other nuts and seeds.

So, when I ran out of cashews for a recipes I wanted to make..I gave this little seed the benefit of the doubt!

I make Averie's high raw Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Balls often....err..twice weekly? So, earlier this week I really wanted them but I only had half of the required cashews. As I wasn't going to go without, I used sunflower seeds for the rest of the nut/seed base. The result was fantastic! I think I will even make them like this from now on. They weren't as smooth as the all-cashew version but I like me a little crunch.


Oh baby these were good! Again, Averie knows how to rock the little bundles of goodness. Check out all her other little bundle (ball) recipes. So now you know..substitutions are A-okay in this recipe.

For another Averie creation, I decided to make my own sunflower seed butter to use as a replacement for the peanut butter in her no-bake peanut butter chocolate chip PROTEIN balls. Long title, easy recipe:) I followed the simple directions from Gone Raw for making the sunflower butter ( I basically just wanted to know how much oil to add). I didn't add any salt or agave to it as I was going to use it in recipes that were going to be sweetened anyways. I also added only 2 tablespoons olive oil instead of flax oil.

It turned out pretty good considering I only have my low-powered food processor. I probably should have added more fat but I wanted to experiment with less. So, using this butter instead of peanut was still pretty descent, although not as creamy as the peanutty stuff is famous for. The balls were pretty good but I used a protein powder that was flavored and so it was a bit overpowering. I can't wait to try these again with a neutral powder and a more fattened sunflower seed butter...I think this might be my new thing.

OOooh so good. Those chocolaty chippers really make these! What a delicious way to eat your protein.

And going way back to last week, I made another recipe from Meghan's 5 Days Healing With Everyday Superfoods tutorial. Meghan calls them Super Love Seed Treats and I absolutely do feel the love with these treats. I don't know if you have seen them before, but remember those round browny/orange sesame covered treats that you see in Chinese markets? Those round treats that was basically sesame seeds set into sugar? Well, the taste really reminds me of these love seed treats. I loved these! So simple to make and they turned out delicious even without the cacao and goji berries.

mmmm...chewy goodness with just a slight crunch!

So, do you like your sunflower seeds? I sure hope so because you are missing out otherwise!

PS Julia of Sassy Kitchen is having a sweet giveaway so head on over to her blog and check it out!

PPS Canadian Natural Mama is having a sweet giveaway of an awesome T-shirt from Zen Threads. (PS this is for Canadian and US residents, in case you were wondering)

Have a great rest of your day:)