Living in Southern California my entire life, I grew up going to Palm Springs every Easter with my family. Every trip to palm springs always included a quick stop by the date gardens in Indio to get a date shake. Since you guys know I love “healthifying” comfort foods, today is the day for a Lightened Up Date Shake. Traditional date shakes consist of full fat vanilla ice cream, whole milk, and dates. My recipe still consists of 3 ingredients, but adds up to nearly a fraction of the calories! Plus it’s vegan, gluten-free, lactose-free, paleo, and low-fat!

A traidtional date shake adds up to:
Calories: 626
Fat: 25.3g
Sugar: 77.5g
Fiber: 4.5g
Protein: 13.2g

And my Lightened Up Date Shake totals:
Calories: 330
Fat: 1.25g
Sugar: 57.5g (all natural unrefined sugar)
Fiber: 8g
Protein: 3g

Not all sugars are created equal. Say a candy bar (refined sugar) has the same amount of sugar as a banana (natural sugar). They process through your body completely different. Whole fruit has a lot of fiber, which actually slows down your body’s digestion of glucose, so you don’t get the crazy insulin spike (and crash) that candy causes. That also means your body has more time to use up glucose as fuel before storing it… as fat.

That’s the #1 reason why I love using Medjool Dates as a sweetener in baking and other recipes versus regular table sugar!

Lightened Up Date Shake
Serves 1

3 Natural Delights Medjool Dates, pitted
1 frozen banana
1/2 cup unsweetened original almond milk
1/2 tsp vanilla extract

Remove pits from dates. Blend blend blend until smooth and creamy!

Tip: To make this more filling as a meal replacement, try adding 1/4 cup of dry rolled oats to the blender!

Huge thank you to Natural Delights for supplying the dates for this recipe!