Nut Free No Bake Lactation Bites

January 10, 2022

Nut Free No Bake Lactation Bites are a great make-ahead healthy snack idea for nursing moms! Made with ingredients that support lactation, these no bake bites will help you stay energized as you feed your baby!

Nut Free, Soy Free, Dairy Free, Egg Free, Gluten Free option

Disclaimer: This post is sponsored by SunButter. Thank you for supporting the brands that make the Chelsey Amer Nutrition blog possible!

With baby number two joining us this month, I figured it was time to start prepping some SNACKS! When I was pregnant with Lex I really didn’t prep any food in advance. We had the luxury of living in New York City, where you could get ANYTHING delivered at any time of day.

Now that we live in the suburbs, we’re not quite as lucky. Plus, knowing from experience, breastfeeding hanger is real! I got sooo hungry when I was nursing Lex!

The past few weeks I’ve been stocking up on some of my favorite snacks to keep on hand, including these Nut Free No Bake Lactation Bites!

These Nut Free No Bake Lactation Bites are…

Delicious
Easy to make
The perfect snack
Nut free
Allergy friendly

What are lactation bites?

When I was pregnant with Lex I heard a lot about “lactation bites” and “lactation cookies.” In case you’re not familiar with these products, they exist to help:

energize nursing moms, and…
help boost milk supply

Breastfeeding is a demanding process that requires women eat an additional 500 calories per day (on top of a woman’s baseline caloric needs)! For new moms especially, it can be quite difficult to fit in these calories while taking care of a newborn.

Therefore, there are many companies that create products to help nursing mothers, including companies that make lactation bites and lactation cookies.

As someone with nut allergies, however, I was never able to try any of these products. Therefore, I thought ahead now that I’m almost due with my second baby and made my own no bake lactation bites that are nut free.

What ingredients help boost milk supply?

“Galactagogues” are substances (herbs, foods, medications) that help support milk supply. There are herbal galactagogues, like fenugreek, and foods that are known to boost your milk supply.

Some of the most well-known food galactagogues include oats, brewer’s yeast, garlic, barley, green leafy vegetables, and more. Although these are considered “well-known,” the research is inadequate to prove they directly boost milk supply.

However, one of the most important parts of stimulating your breast milk supply is to ensure you’re eating enough calories. If adding some of these foods helps ensure adequate calories, then great!

That’s another reason why I love these no bake lactation bites. They’re a quick snack, when likely all you have time for with a newborn is a quick bite.

Can non-nursing humans eat lactation bites?

Sure… why not?! The truth of the matter is that there are no ingredients in these bites that are “bad” for non-lactating men, women or children. I’d just omit the Brewer’s yeast because it’s expensive and not necessary if you’re not trying to boost your milk supply.

Ingredients You’ll Need to Make Nut Free No Bake Lactation Bites

You only need 6 ingredients to make these no bake lactation bites, including…

Oats
Flaxseed
Brewer’s yeast (omit if you’re not nursing!)
Organic SunButter
Dates
Chocolate chips (optional, but recommended)

Oats are the base of this recipe. As a popular galactagogue, oats are common in lactation bites to help boost milk supply. Honestly, all whole grains are known to help boost milk supply anecdotally, although scientific research does lag. I love adding oats to this recipe because they also have fiber, which is helpful postpartum.

Ground flaxseed is another popular ingredient in lactation bites because they’re a known phytoestrogen, helping support milk supply.

Brewer’s yeast is probably one of the “stranger” ingredients I’ve used in a recipe. It’s not the traditional yeast packets that you use when baking bread. It’s used to make beer. Brewer’s yeast is rich in chromium and B vitamins and has been known to help boost milk supply, but again, formal research is lacking. I’ve had to order Brewer’s yeast online. If you can’t find it you can totally skip it in these bites and they’re still a great snack (breastfeeding or not).

If you’re making these bites as energy bites (not for a breastfeeding mom), skip the Brewer’s yeast. The remaining ingredients are nourishing and make a great healthy snack.

Organic SunButter adds healthy fats to this snack so they’ll actually keep you full for more than 5 minutes (which if you’ve never experienced breastfeeding hanger, you know is nice!). Plus, it adds great flavor! I purposely skipped the sugar when choosing to use Organic SunButter because it’s not necessary with the dates (see below). I stock up on Amazon here.

Dates add natural sweetness without added sugar. Not to mention, they’re chock full of nutrients like fiber, magnesium, and even iron.

How To Make Nut Free No Bake Lactation Bites

This recipe could not be easier to make! Add all of the ingredients to a food processor and pulse until combined. You should easily be able to mush the dough so it sticks together and you can roll it into balls.

You may need to pause to scrape down the sides of the container occasionally to ensure all the ingredients are incorporated evenly.

Help! My batter looks kinda dry…

If the resulting batter looks a tad dry, there could be a couple of reasons:

Your dates aren’t fresh and *moist* enough
You mis-measured your oats or SunButter

But no worries, there’s a quick fix – simply add some water to the batter until it moistens up enough so you can scoop it into balls and roll together. I used about ¼ cup of water total, adding it just one tablespoon at a time.

How to Store No Bake Lactation Bites

Depending on when you make these lactation bites, you can store them one of several ways…

First, if making them for immediate consumption, leave them on the counter or in the fridge (I like them cold).

If you’re making them several weeks in advance, I suggest freezing them. Then you won’t be as tempted to eat them before you’re nursing and you’ll actually prep them in advance (unlike myself who ate an entire batch before giving birth! Hey… dates are good for labor, have you heard?