Sesame and nuts ladoos/sesame seeds and nuts energy balls - No sugar added

Ladoos, i am fan of these cute round balls and have quite a few ladoo recipes in my kitchen. They are pretty easy to make and they are totally versatile. Make them with sugar and ghee, jaggery and ghee. If you don’t want sugar, make it with dates and nuts, want a vegan ladoo, try using the natural fats in the seeds. Roll them into cocoa, coconut, ganache and the list is endless.

When i chose the theme of festival cooking for this BM, the first dish I made was these ladoos or energy balls, the fancy name for them.

I wanted to make the traditional maharastrian tilgul/sesame ladoos and also Mawa-ladoo. So one nice evening, I got my sesame seeds ready , but somehow, got lazy. I stored the roasted seeds in a box on the counter, but 1 cup reduced to ¾ cup just in 2 days, as I just kept popping more in my mouth, some in my dishes, i love roasted sesame they got that earthy taste and not to forget the calcium.

Finally I made these ladoos the next week of roasting the seeds. And no, they don’t need that much resting time😆. Jokes apart, this is, one quickie snack or a wonderful edible gift for your loved ones or just for yourself. They are power packed with energy and also that taste, your tongue needs for your intelligent mind, to accept that you are enjoying a sweet treat .

The below ingredients makes around 2 dozen balls, depending on the size you roll them, mine is a wee little smaller than a Ferero Rocher. Go ahead and try them, and let me know how you liked it!

Ingredients

¾ cup White Sesame seeds

½ cup almonds and cashews, together

15-18 no’s dates, I have used mejdool variety, pitted

⅓ cup desiccated coconut

5 pods of cardamom

3 no’s cloves

½ teaspoon cinnamon powder

4-5nos candied Ginger

1-2 tablespoon chia seeds (optional)

¼ cup of chopped pistachios, roasted

Method

In a wide pan, take the sesame seeds and dry roast in a medium flame. The seeds must get nice and toasty. Keep the flame simmer while roasting. Take care not to burn them. Remove the roasted seasame seeds into a flat plate.
In the same pan, dry roast the nuts and then the coconut, keep them aside once done.
Let the roasted items cool well. While the nuts and seeds and cooling, let us get the dates ready. Remove the seeds of dates and chop them roughly. This will enable the dates to blend easily , when we grind them together with the rest of the ingredients.

Now take the sesame and nuts into a Mixer and pulse them together. Once they are roughly powdered add the chopped dates, Coconut, cardamom, cloves and ginger to it and pulse them all together until they all come together as a single mass.
The fats in the seeds and nuts help to bring them together. Once done, transfer it to a flat plate, add chia seeds and roughly chopped pistachios to this and mix roughly and make small balls out of the mixture.

Store them in an air-tight container,In the refrigerator. I prefer the refrigerator as they contain coconut. Enjoy them whenever you feel like having a sweet treat.

Check out the Blogging Marathon page for the other Blogging Marathoners doing this BM