Four High Protein, Low Sugar Yogurt Recipes for Snacks and Breakfasts
It’s 3:00 PM. Do you know where your snack is? I certainly do. It’s currently being shoveled into my mouth, and with zeal.
These days, getting tons of protein into my diet is more important than ever. According to my midwives, I need to eat between sixty and eighty grams of protein every single day. That is a LOT of beans, people. I know. I measured them out one day to see what it looked like.
I would be lying if I told you that all of my proteins were plant-based these days. Unfortunately, I have had to cheat on my mostly-vegetarian diet more than I’d like. Even so, I make a point to seek out and supplement as many meatless proteins as I can. One that I rely on pretty frequently is high protein yogurt.
Conventional yogurt tends to have around eleven grams of protein per cup. While that is OK, I like to get a little more punch per bite, so I usually opt for Greek yogurt, which has about 17g per cup, or Icelandic yogurt, which boasts an amazing 18 grams per cup.
The other thing I keep an eye on is how much sugar my yogurt contains. To put things in perspective, being on a low sugar diet means that you shouldn’t really have more than 20 grams of sugar per day. A package of fruit flavored yogurt could have that much or more in just one serving! To keep my sugar intake in check, I go for plain yogurt most often. Some brands offer honey or vanilla flavors that aren’t too packed with sugar, but I find that sweetening the yogurt myself helps to control the levels much more efficiently deliciously.
So, once you’ve decided what type of yogurt to eat, how do you dress it up to make it more exciting? If you are my husband or my sister-in-law, Jenn, you don’t. Those two enjoy plain yogurt enough to eat it as-is. I guess you never know until you try it. For me, plain yogurt just doesn’t cut it. It’s too sour, and too dry tasting for me. I usually drizzle on a tiny bit of honey to make it more to my liking. If I need something a bit more indulgent, I prepare one of the following recipes, or just sprinkle some low sugar granola on top.
(A note on granola: I’m not crazy about most low sugar, high protein granolas out there. They can sometimes taste like oat-flavored rocks. I recently discovered a few really good ones from Kind. My flavor of choice right now is Peanut Butter Whole Grain Cluster
Peanut Butter Honey Yogurt
Ingredients
- 1 cup plain yogurt
- 2 tablespoons natural peanut butter (unsweetened)
- 1/2 – 1 teaspoon honey
Instructions: Mix all three ingredients together until totally smooth. Top with granola if you are feeling the love.
PB & Chocolate Yogurt Parfait
Ingredients
- 1 cup plain yogurt
- 2 tablespoons natural peanut butter (unsweetened)
- 1/2 – 1 teaspoon chocolate syrup
Instructions: Layer the ingredients in a small cup, peanut butter on the bottom, then yogurt, then chocolate sauce.
Honey Berry Yogurt
Ingredients
- 1 cup plain yogurt
- 1/2 – 1 teaspoon honey
- 1/4 cup fresh berries
Instructions: Mix the honey and yogurt together, then top with berries.
Cinnamon Nutty Honey Yogurt
Ingredients
- 1 cup plain yogurt
- 1/2 – 1 teaspoon honey
- 1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
- 2 tablespoons chopped almonds
Instructions: Mix the honey, cinnamon, and yogurt together, then top with almonds.