Chocolate Protein Pudding

I feel like I’m always looking for “healthy” dessert options. I realize fruit would be the perfect “healthy dessert” but really? Fruit? That’s no fun! I need something a little more…dessert like. Fruit’s healthiness is just too obvious. I need something that could go either way: it could be really bad for me…or relatively healthy…but it tastes so good I can’t tell! Obviously, I’m not the only one out there looking for this miracle dessert considering all the health food alternatives to ice cream, cookies, etc.

I usually go through phases with desserts. Sometimes I say, “Forget the health foods! I’ll just get real ice cream and have less of it.” That sounds like a perfect plan but in reality, I end up having more than my husband (like 5 scoops). Plus, I’m usually the one scooping the ice cream so half the time it doesn’t make it to the bowl, just goes directly into my mouth so who knows how many scoops it actually is!

Then there are the “healthy” ice creams or yogurts like Skinny Cow’s. I really like Skinny Cow ice cream, sandwich bars, etc. because they actually taste like ice cream, but have pretty good nutrition stats. The issue with Skinny Cow’s and others like it (like Weight Watchers brand) is that they are expensive. I’ve never tried Weight Watcher’s ice cream bars but looked at them today in the store and they were $7 dollars for a pack of 6! Skinny Cow’s are slightly cheaper, but not by much. So these are the kind of items I can’t exactly afford on my budget.

Vitatops are a similar deal. I really like Chocolate Vitatops. Smear a little peanut butter on top and I am good to go. Considering they’re a “health” food, they have a great taste, very similar to brownies but obviously with way less sugar and calories. But Vitatops are expensive too. They’re around $5-6 dollars for a pack of 6 (I believe). Why do I like all of these expensive items! It kills me!

I also went through a pudding and jello phase. I really like chocolate pudding so for a while there, I was buying the sugar free puddings. The jello’s are pretty good too. They’re obviously much lighter and the sugar free versions only have ten calories. They’re definitely cheaper than ice cream and satisfy my sweet tooth. So, this past week I decided to make my own pudding with the boxed chocolate sugar and fat free pudding mix. In order to make it more Body for Life friendly, I added a couple scoops of protein powder just to give it a little more substance.

BFL Chocolate Protein Pudding

(adapted from here)

• 1 box fat free, sugar free chocolate pudding mix
• 2 cups skim milk
• 2 scoops protein powder (I used chocolate)

This is super simple. All you do is mix everything together, then whisk it for about 2 minutes or until it looks like pudding!

I thought this tasted great! It pretty much tastes exactly how it should: like pudding. Mixing protein powder into foods can be risky because sometimes they leave a funky aftertaste but I didn’t notice it in the pudding. Obviously, you can use 1 scoop instead of two if you think your protein powder’s a little overbearing.

Hopefully, this will be a regular in our dessert rotation! It’s good, healthy, and much cheaper than its’ alternatives.

Do you have to have dessert every night? How do you keep it healthy?