What's All the Fuss about Hemp + Hemp Seed Bliss Balls

Ok, when I mention the word hemp, I bet you think of marijuana, hippy flower chicks and a psychedelic pattern. yep, it is all that and more…BUT take a look in your local health food shop and you will see hemp is popping up everywhere, sold as seeds, milk, oils, flour and protein powders.

Hemp is becoming mainstream with thanks to changes to the Food Standards Code permitting the sale of low-psychoactive hemp seed as a food in Australia. I love adding hemp seeds to add to my super healthy white chocolate hemp seed cookies or smoothie and the oils and protein powders are awesome in baking.

Seeds from the plant, cannabis sativa, are nutrition packed and contain all the essential amino acids and essential fatty acids necessary to maintain healthy human life. Apparently, no other single plant source has the essential amino acids in such an easily digestible form, nor has the essential fatty acids in as perfect a ratio to meet human nutritional needs. A big wrap isn’t it!

Now I know what all of you are thinking..”Does it make you high?”, well no, no it doesn’t. Hemp is a legal cousin of cannabis, which contains only minute amounts of the drug ingredient tetrahydrocannabinol or THC for short. Typically, hemp contains below 0.3% THC, (while cannabis grown for recreational use can contain anywhere from 2% to over 20%) which isn’t enough for any physical or psychological effects.

Hemp seeds can be eaten raw, ground into a meal, sprouted, made into hemp milk, prepared as tea, and used in baking. The fresh leaves can also be consumed in salads. As I mentioned I add the seeds, use the flour and oils for bakes such as my Hemp Cookies along with some chia seeds and it gives the biscuits a lovely nutty, soft textured taste. And the kids love them!

So, even though hemp seeds have been around for century’s and are very environmentally friendly due to it requiring few pesticides and no herbicides, it is nice to have the options of adding these ‘superfoods’ to our diets.

Hemp Seed Bliss Balls

INGREDIENTS

1 cup rolled oats
1/2 cup almond meal (or coconut flour)
5 dried figs
1/4 cup warm water (more may be required with coconut flour)
1/4 cup hemp seeds
1 tsp vanilla bean paste
1/4 cup dried cranberries
.
Process together, roll in balls and fridge or freeze in sealed container to set.