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Vegan Chocolate Pudding (with a Secret Ingredient…)

[Oh no, not another one of those vegan chocolate puddings with a “secret healthy ingredient” that is definitely just avocado…]

Wrong!

[Then obviously it’s silken tofu…]

Nope!

This pudding has a secret ingredient you would never imagine. Shoutout to the One Ingredient Mom for first finding a similar recipe and sharing it with me. She told me it was oil free, sugar free, and made with a secret healthy ingredient that I would “never guess”.

I thought of avocado and tofu, but that definitely wasn’t it… The pudding was chocolatey, rich, the perfect texture, and incredibly sweet. I didn’t even believe her when she told me it was made with…

Sweet potatoes!

This pudding is crazy. 6 simple ingredients. No oil. No sugar. Healthy nutrient-dense sweet potatoes and cocoa. 2 minutes of blending is all it takes (once you’ve got some baked sweet potatoes). I’ve expanded on the original recipe to use coconut milk for a little extra richness and a few minor details, but the base is the same. Dates, coconut milk, sweet potatoes, and cocoa powder.

It honestly reminds me of those Jello pudding cups I used to have as a kid, and I mean that in the best way. 🙂 You’ve got to try it – I’m really curious to hear your thoughts in this pudding!

Makes 4 servings

Ingredients:

  • 2 cups baked orange sweet potatoes
  • 4-5 medjool dates
  • 1/3 cup cocoa powder
  • 1 1/4 cup light coconut milk
  • Pinch of salt
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla

Step One

Bake some sweet potatoes! You need about 2 cups, so that’s at least 3 (4?) medium sized potatoes, or even more of the smaller ones. Bake at about 375º F until they’re super soft.

Step Two

Pull the skins off the potatoes and discard them (not gonna lie, I just ate the skins as I pulled them off because they have tons of nutrients…) and add the potato flesh to a blender with all the other ingredients: 4 dates, 1/3 cup cocoa powder, 1 1/4 cups coconut milk, a pinch of salt, and a teaspoon of vanilla extract.

Step Three

Blend until smooth! The great thing is, this recipe is very flexible. Give the pudding a taste and adjust anything you’d like. If it’s super thick (unlikely), you can add more coconut milk. If you want it even sweeter, add another date. If you want it to be more chocolatey, add another tablespoon of cocoa.

Step Four

Finally, chill for at least an hour (especially if the sweet potatoes were still warm) and you can optionally top with a bunch of nonsense like I did (coconut whipped cream, chocolate shavings, strawberry, whatever).

NOTES

If you want to make this really low fat, you can use almond milk to cut down the calories at the expense of a little richness from the coconut.

As that coconut whipped cream recipe shows, you can take the solids from a can of full-fat coconut milk and whip them into a topping. The great thing is, you can make that topping and this pudding with the same can! Just follow that recipe to scrape out some of the solids, then shake the leftovers in the can to use as “light” coconut milk for this recipe.

27 Comments

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    • Hi Edie, Yes you could use a cooking method other than baking (boiling, I guess?) but something great happens to sweet potatoes when they are baked for 60+ minutes, they get extra soft and caramelized and I think that does help this pudding quite bit. Is the difference noticeable? I haven’t tried so I can’t say for sure.

  1. If I hadn’t just eaten a healthy chocolate mug cake (with a secret ingredient!)* I’d be making this right now! Looking forward to giving it a try another day.

    *not avocado/ not tofu

    • Thank you, Tiff! Although I have to give a shoutout to my mom for sharing it, and she probably got it from somewhere else, so there’s a lot of food geniuses behind this idea 🙂

  2. Sounds great. I do have one question. At first blush your hint about the coconut milk seems great. However, in my experience you need all of the solids to make a decent amount of whipped cream. Usually we use solids from two cans. How much of the solids in one can do you suggest we scrape off for the whipped cream and how much sugar (I uses confectioner’s) would I add?

    • That’s a good point… if you want a lot of whipped cream you’d need a second can, but this pudding is quite flexible so even just a little of the solids is good enough. I don’t usually use sugar in the whipped cream, but you can add as much as you’d like and it should still work!

    • It’s the one in the can. That can be confusing because there is a non-dairy coconut beverage in the refrigerated section, but this is the actual coconut milk in a can.

    • Ah, I see what you mean. Hmm, I hadn’t considered that. Yes, you could use a cooking method other than baking (boiling, I guess?) but something great happens to sweet potatoes when they are baked for 60+ minutes, they get extra soft and caramelized and I think that does help this pudding quite bit. Is the difference noticeable? I haven’t tried so I can’t say for sure.

  3. I must admit that I thought it was avocado at first Because I normally make my chocolate puddings with avocado But then when I read it’s sweet potato instead, it didn’t surprise me actually because I had used it as a “secret ingredient” before, to prepare a brownie. And it was amazing!! So I’m sure that this pudding it’s as well. Looking forward to try it!
    Talking about brownies and secret ingredients, do you know the recipe with black beans? Best recipe ever to prepare a brownie! You should check it out if you don’t know it yet
    P.S. By the way, you are my favourite vegan chef! I love your website, your app (Ingredients), your recipes, pictures… everything!! Congratulations for your fantastic work and for share it with the rest of the world!

  4. Hi,

    Thanks for such interesting recipes. In the vegan chocolate pudding recipe, you mentioned you enhanced someone’s recipe with coconut milk. Is that the kind that comes in a can or the kind you can drink like almond milk, coconut milk, etc?

    Can’t wait to try this out and many more, so thanks.

    NW

  5. Thank you! I just prepared this amazing pudding with almost all organic ingredients. I added 2 oz of organic unsweetened almond milk and sprinkled stevia-sweetened dark chocolate chips on top. I served it to my daughter who cannot stand sweet potatoes at 14 years old and she gobbled it up! This is a real winner!
    Quick question: how can I calculate the nutritional values for an app like Fooducate?

    • Hey Nicholas! Sorry I didn’t get back to you in time regarding your first question. That’s always a point of confusion – here I’m referring to the coconut milk in a can not the coconut flavored beverage sold by the milk.

      I’m so glad to hear it worked well for you!

      I’ve never used Fooducate, but I wrote a post about how to calculate nutrition info that you might want to check out: https://oneingredientchef.com/how-to-get-nutrition-facts/

      • Brilliant. Thx, Andrew! Btw, I worked as a sous-chef for a little while and I am always looking for new ways to eat healthy and prepare food fast. This pudding is now a staple for dessert. I tried the verywell calculator and really like it, so thanks again
        .

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