Guest @AmandaFlower Peanut Butter Protein Balls #giveaway

MADDIE DAY here, delighted to host my uber-talented friend, Amanda Flower! Her new Truffle Trouble, the tenth Amish Candy Shop mystery, releases at the end of this month, and two lucky commenters will win an audiobook version of Gingerbread Danger, book nine in the series. Amanda brings us a recipe for peanut butter energy balls, something I'm sure she needs in order to write ten (or however many) books a year AND provide a home with her husband for many needy cats.

Take it away, Amanda.

In the name of research for the Amish Candy Shop Mysteries that have been a part of my life for over ten years, I eat a lot of candy. It’s research. It’s work. Don’t judge. However because of that, sometimes I want something sweet that I can at least claim is good for me.

If you are like me, you have seen the seemingly sudden craving for protein all over the place last couple of years. The love or protein is all well and good. However, I am always a vegetarian and sometimes a vegan, so there are challenges to get the protein that people keep telling me that I need. A girl can only eat so much tofu.

So one sweet way that I add more protein to my diet is with these energy balls. They are sweet, delicious, and a great pick me up during the afternoon slump. I should note that I make my with peanut butter and peanut butter chips, but if you have allergies to nuts, you can use any kind of nut butter or sunflower butter instead. Also, the sky is the limit on the kind of chips. I just love peanut butter. Another addition you can make to the recipe is adding protein powder if you are really want to up your grams per day.

Bailey King from the Amish Candy Shop Mysteries would certainly approve of this recipe because she is a woman on the go. With all the jobs she juggles plus solving multiple murders a year in Ohio’s Amish Country, she needs to keep her energy up. I could definitely see her adding these to her offerings at Swissmen Candyworks. She is going to need more offerings too after her wedding and the murder that occurs in during the reception at her candy factory! You can read all about it in Truffle Trouble, the tenth novel in the Amish Candy Shop Mysteries, releasing on March 31^st.

Peanut Butter Energy Balls

Ingredients

·       1 ¼ cups old fashioned rolled oats

·       ½ peanut butter

·       ¼ cup chia seeds

·       ½ cup walnuts

·       ¾ cup peanut butter chips

·       2 tablespoons of maple syrup

·       ¼ teaspoon salt

·       ½ teaspoon vanilla extract

Instructions

·       Mix all ingredients in a bowl.

·       Refrigerate for at least thirty minutes. It makes the balls easier to roll.

·       Roll balls to the desired size.

Enjoy and store in the refrigerator.

Readers: How would you change this recipe to make it your own? I'll give a copy of the Gingerbread Danger audiobook to two lucky commenters (be sure to leave your email address).

Amanda Flower is a USA Today bestselling and three-time Agatha Award-winning author of over fifty mystery novels. Her novels have received starred reviews from Library Journal, Publishers Weekly, and Romantic Times, and she has been featured in USA Today, First for Women, and Woman’s World. Her first Emily Dickinson Mystery, Because I Could Not Stop for Death, was an Agatha Award winner and Mary Higgins Clark Nominee. Her first mystery featuring the Wright Brothers, To Slip the Bonds of Earth, was an Agatha Award and Ohio Book Award winner. A former librarian, Flower and her husband own a farm and recording studio, and they live in Northeast Ohio with their adorable cats.

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/authoramandaflower/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/amandaflowerauthor/

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