The most popular post on my blog is by far my Home-made Protein Cookies. It far outshines the stats of any other post on Om Nom Ally, and I love that I’m not the only one that hungers for an alternative to the artificial (and expensive) protein snacks on the market.
So why a ricotta based chocolate protein brownie? It’s a high-calcium, high-protein, low-carbohydrate, low-fat, low-sodium musclefood. The perfect base for a protein-dense snack. A wholefood as well as a fermented food, ricotta means “recooked” and refers to the fermentation and cooking of leftover whey from cheese-making. The whey found in ricotta cheese is digested quickly and is high in BCAA’s, great for the post-workout hunger pangs.
If you like experimenting with protein powder in your baking you could use some in place of the almond meal or replace up to 1/4 of the flour to boost your muscle recovery further.
Packing a 9g protein hit per brownie, ricotta, almond meal and quinoa flour make for a pleasantly chewy and dense chocolate brownie. It’s also better to undercook than overcook this snack; the light texture of the ricotta creates a moist and almost gooey centre when enjoyed warm or at room temperature. You can also eat them straight out of the fridge (where they will keep for up to a week), for a chewier bite.
- 4 cups ricotta
- 6 tbsp cacao powder
- ½ cup coconut sugar (or any other unrefined sugar)
- ½ cup coconut oil
- 2-4 tablespoons milk of choice
- 1 cup quinoa flour
- ½ tsp baking soda
- 1 tsp baking powder
- ½ tsp salt
- 4 tbsp almond meal
- Additions: 1 tsp vanilla extract OR 1 tsp citrus rind OR 1 tsp peppermint extract
- Preheat oven 200C and line a deep, rectangular slice baking tray with parchment paper.
- Blend ricotta, cacao, sugar and oil until well combined. In a large bowl sift flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Pour almond meal and ricotta mix into flour bowl and stir well with a wooden spoon. Add milk by the tablespoon until batter reaches pouring consistency.
- Pour mixture into parchment lined baking tray, smoothing top with back of wooden spoon. Bake for 30-40 minutes, until brownies look dry and set on top and are pulling away from sides of tray - test firmness with a finger by pressing at edges or pierce with skewer. A few moist crumbs should be on skewer when removed.
Comments 11
Did you buy the quinoa flour, or did you make it yourself?
Author
Bought it, I’m not to sure how hard it is to make it. I work at a huge health food store so buying it is certainly easiest!
Ohhhh I definitely want to try these. If I wanted to make a simpler version of these, do you think using regular or whole wheat flour and canola oil?
Author
I hope you do try them, whole wheat flour would be a perfect option (I’ve recipe used spelt with great results) and canola would be an easy substitute for the coconut oil. Let me know how you go!
Do yuh think you can up the protein powder content to bring these bars around to 25-30g’s of protein a bar, and maybe adding plain greek yogurt in it somewhere and using like pumpkin spice or ground cinnamon to add some flavor to it? This recipe really helps yeah.
Author
I absolutely think you could make the protein amount higher – but I’m not sure about 30g per bar. I’ll have to get out my nutritional content tool and work out what the originals were – I’ll get back to you!
For whichever flour you use, reduce it a half cup and then I would probably try using 1/4 cup almond meal and 1/4 cup protein powder. The small almond meal amount I originally used was to give the brownies more structure. There was so much moisture from the ricotta that I wanted it to be a bit firmer. Almond meal of course has a good protein content, so using more of it and then protein powder would definitely give the protein content a boost!
In the weeks after that post I actually made a choc-orange batch that had fresh orange rind and juice and they were spectacular. I took them to work and they were wolfed down. I’ve also been wanting to make a choc-mint batch soon too as I’m out of snacks currently. I think cinnamon and pumpkin spice would make such a delicious combo, let me know how you go with it!
will do
Where do you add in the almond meal?
Author
Hi Leah, the almond meal is added along with the flour mix to the blended ricotta. Hope this helps!
These sound good. I love your post it pop up… thingies. So cool!
Author
Thankyou, I’ve been using them here and there on some posts, but too sure on if I loved them or not. I’m testing the waters with them still I suppose. I’m undecided if they are a bit too gimmicky?