These warm spring days brings back my cravings for parfaits and since I am on the lookout for healthy desserts Strawberry Chia Amaranth Parfait tops my dessert list and substantially satisfies my sweet taste buds.
Talk about health and nutrition…. This parfait is made up of almond milk, super food chia, and good carbohydrate amaranth grains in puffed form for crunchy bites and antioxidant strawberries. I can’t ask for more…. This is a delight to eat and so hard to resist that even while capturing in my lenses I was constantly licking this Strawberry Chia Amaranth Parfait.
To increase the sweetness of fresh strawberries and reduce the sourness I soaked them in some maple syrup and blended half of them in a blender. On the other hand I heated a sauce pan and combined almond milk along with the blended strawberries and boiled. Immediately I added chia seeds into it and within a minute the mixture started thickening. I allowed it to cool down. This gave me enough time to puff all the amaranth grains to my satisfaction which added to the crunch to this parfait.
Now, in a serving glass/bowl, added the first layer of soaked strawberries, then generously added the cold strawberry chia mixture, sprinkled lots and lots of crispy amaranth grains, topped with soaked strawberries again (because I love chewing on fresh fruits) and garnished with slivered almond.
What’s next? Just dig into it and relish every bite of this cool and luscious dessert. I saved some for my breakfast next day and I was on top of the world because I was eating dessert for breakfast 🙂 . I am soooo happy to share this healthy dessert with you all. Enjoy!!!!!!
Strawberry Chia Amaranth Parfait
Prep Time: 10 minutes
Cook Time: 5 minutes
Total Time: 15 minutes
Serves 4
Per Serving 342 calories
Fat 12 g
Carbs 54 g
Protein 9 g
Ingredients
- 3 cups chopped strawberries
- ¼ cup maple syrup
- 2 ½ cups unsweetened almond milk
- ¾ cup chia seeds
- ½ cup puffed amaranth
- 1 tbsp. slivered almond (optional)
Instructions
- In a mixing bowl combine chopped strawberries with maple syrup and let it soak for a minute.
- In a blender, blend ½ of the strawberry mix and keep aside the rest of the soaked strawberries.
- In a saucepan combine almond milk and blended strawberries and bring to a boil.
- Add chia seeds to the pan and cook for couple of minutes stirring continuously. As soon as the milk starts to thicken cook for another minute and turn off the flame. (Do not overcook).
- Let it cool in the refrigerator until ready to use.
- In a serving glass place the soaked chopped strawberries (about 1 -2 tbsp.). Spoon the cooled chia strawberry mix on the chopped strawberries (depending on the size of the glass).
- Top it with puffed amaranth generously for the crunchy bites.
- Finish it with more soaked strawberries and slivered almond.
- Repeat the same process with rest of the servings.
- Serve immediately and enjoy.
Notes
To puff amaranth – heat a nonstick pan properly (temperature of the pan is important to get the maximum puffed amaranth or else it will burn without popping). Put 1 tbsp. of dry amaranth grains into the hot pan and the moment it starts to pop cover it. Take it out in a bowl and repeat the same process for the rest of the amaranth grains.
Amaranth grains can be popped ahead of time and stored in an air tight container at the room temperature to maintain its crunchiness.
Feel free to add more maple syrup according to taste. For me this sweetness was perfect.
Yummy!! I love chia pudding, it’s such a versatile snack or breakfast!
Yum! This looks delicious. I would’ve never thought to add amaranth. Genius!
Thank you Carley. By adding Amaranth I made it a complete meal. 🙂
I love chia seed pudding so I’ll be trying this one out, I’ve never heard of Amaranth (the UK is always behond on foodie trends!) Pinned for later 🙂
I love parfaits but have never used Amaranth. Thanks for the recipe! Gotta try it out.
This sounds super delicious and heart healthy. =) Do you think this recipe would work with freekeh? I have some in the pantry, and I would love to use it up. Thanks for sharing this fabulous recipe.
I have not tried with Freekeh. Go ahead and give it a shot and let me know how it turned out. Might be a nice variation. 🙂
Going to give this a try it looks so good, and I know my husband would love it.
Looking forward for your feedback 🙂
This looks so tasty. I am a big chia fan.
Hello Gunjan,
Another great and healthy recipe. However I don’t like the idea of heating my fruit because it kills all the nutrients. Can you suggest an alternative please?
Thanks. X
Well the quantity of cooked strawberries are not significant. It should not affect the nutrient part as much but if you still don’t want to cook strawberries you can just follow all the steps expect for cooking the blended strawberries. Just cook almond milk and chia seeds together and add sweetener to it. While assembling the parfait just increase the quantity of raw strawberries soaked in maple syrup. The parfait may taste slightly different from the original version. Hope this helps.