No-Bake Coco Natto Bites
Makes: 12 bites
Prep Time: 70 minutes
Cook Time: 0 minutes
These Coco Natto Bites were created after an all-day natto tasting event in Portland, Oregon. We were staying with our good friends Claudia and Jeff. After the tasting, Claudia was convinced that she needed to incorporate natto into her diet and she wanted to do it through an enjoyable bite of something, preferably on the sweet side. The idea for these bites began late that night as a riff on her favorite no-bake coconut bliss balls, and over several iterations they morphed into these tasty treats. If you want to consume some natto every day and don’t know where to begin, start here.
Ingredients:
4 tablespoons Freeze-Dried Non-GMO Natto, reconstituted
6 ounces coconut butter
¾ cup cacao nibs
½ cup coconut flakes
¼ cup unsweetened cocoa powder
4 tablespoons tahini
4 tablespoons honey
¼ cup plus 3 tablespoons white or black sesame seeds (see note below)
¼ teaspoon salt
Instructions:
1. Place the natto on a cutting board and coarsely chop.
2. Combine the coconut butter, cacao nibs, coconut flakes, cocoa powder, tahini, honey, 3 tablespoons of the sesame seeds, and the salt in the bowl of a food processor. Pulse several times until well combined.
3. Add the natto and pulse three or four times to incorporate well.
4. Place the remaining ¼ cup sesame seeds in a shallow bowl. Scoop out rounded tablespoons of the coconut mixture and form into balls. Roll each ball in the sesame seeds to coat. Place the bites in an airtight container and set in the refrigerator to harden for at least 1 hour. Enjoy. If you don’t eat them first, they will keep for 2 weeks in the fridge.
Excerpted from Miso, Tempeh, Natto, and Other Tasty Ferments by Kirsten Shockey and Christopher Shockey. Used with permission from Storey Publishing.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Kirsten K. Shockey began fermenting foods over twenty-five years ago on 40 acres of wooded hillside which grew into a teeny-tiny organic food company—when fermented veggies were NOT hip. She realized that her passion lay in the desire to both teach people how to ferment and push this culinary art to new flavors, so she and her husband, Christopher, wrote a book, Fermented Vegetables, that changed her trajectory. Now her day job is helping people to make, enjoy and connect with their food she can be found writing about life and fermentation at fermentingchange.substack from her home in the mountains of southern Oregon. Kirsten is an award-winning author of 6 books and co-founder of The Fermentation School, a women-owned and women-led benefits corporation supporting the voices of independent educators to empower learning and build culture.
