Healthy 5 Ingredient Buckeyes.

Kicking off the start to football season 2017 with these healthy 5 ingredient buckeyes.

I don’t know if any of you follow me on Instagram stories, but if you do, then you may or may not have seen both my brother and my dad sitting on MY couch last week doing their NFL fantasy football draft picks. Don’t ask me why they chose my house to do their draft night, but the excitement over this whole fantasy football thing is kind of beyond me.

Don’t hate me, but I just do not get it. I mean, I get that it’s fun, and that’s cool and all, but man this group just takes it to an extreme. My brother, who never, ever, has a pen and paper in hand, had not only pen and paper, but a thought-out printed list of his draft pick players. Meaning he spent time writing up a list.

Like tell me, is this normal? Are your boyfriends, brothers husbands, maybe even girlfriends this into it?

They have a giant group text going with their fantasy league and I swear between the two of their phones the messages were constantly going off for at least an hour. And during this time I was sitting at my computer trying to work. Again, no idea why they were at my house (good internet? good snacks? no wife, kids, or girlfriends? combo of the three? Probably, but either way it reminded me that football season is here, and to me that always means that buckeyes are in order.

Growing up in Ohio, I’ve made, served, and eaten more than my share of buckeyes over the years. If you happen to be unfamiliar with buckeyes, you should probably familiarize yourself, because if you don’t, you’re missing out. Buckeyes are the unofficial dessert of Ohio…home to the Ohio State Buckeyes (the buckeye tree is also the state tree). Buckeyes (the dessert) are a pretty simple concept. Peanut balls, dipped into chocolate. AKA, the Ohio State way to eat a peanut butter cup. You gotta admit, as simple as the concept is, the combo of peanut butter and chocolate will just never be boring.

As I was working on recipes, and realizing I had almost nothing planned for game day, I decided that a healthy..ish buckeye was the right move. I wanted something creamy and delicious, but minus the processed sugars. So I created this recipe that’s so simple you could probably make it with your eyes closed.

OKAY. Don’t make these with your eyes close, but you get the idea…very simple recipe.

Hello to five of my favorite ingredients: creamy peanut butter, honey, butter, vanilla, and dark chocolate.

And yes, these do have butter. And yes, I am calling them healthy. <–it’s my kind of healthy. Roll with it.

Here’s the deal.

These buckeyes are loaded with protein rich peanut butter and are made with just FIVE ingredients.

My favorite part though? These require ZERO processed sugar, which I think is pretty awesome considering that a traditional buckeye recipe calls for about two and half cups of powdered sugar…I think you can safely say sugar coma.

On my first try at this recipe I omitted the butter completely, but after testing the recipe over and over, and having multiple friends and family members try them, we all decided that a little butter was needed. Sure these were still great minus any butter, but they were a little on the dry side.

So butter was added and we ended up with the perfect healthy..ish buckeye, that everyone loved, and was Game Day approved.

Seeing that yesterday was the official kick off to football season, followed by college football on Saturday, a full day of NFL on Sunday, and of course, all wrapped up with…Monday night football. I figured what better dessert than a buckeye!

SO, what does all this mean?

Let me tell you. Tonight you should probably make this pasta for dinner and while that’s cooking, do what my mom would do, and get started on dessert. Meaning, make these buckeyes and get them into the fridge before dinner is even ready so they can set up.

Then maybe enjoy some wine or a cocktail in the process.

Eat said pasta.

Then go on to devour your guilt free buckeyes…

Oooppps.

If your Game Day party dessert plate ends up on the lighter side just blame the kids, or the dog, or your significant other. Or maybe just double the recipe…yes, double the recipe, that’s definitely the better option!

And just like that your Friday is made…pasta, cocktails, and a Ohio State classic, but healthier.