10 min to make, easy, healthy chocolate covered banana popsicles that your toddler or bigger kids will love. They will love dipping the frozen bananas into melted chocolate and then covering them in ground nuts. Fun for the whole family resulting in an easy, healthy summer popsicle.
With the hot summer days, I wanted to make a healthy yet delicious frozen snack. And also one that doesn't require that much work. Because I also want to nap (dreams, yeah)
This easy frozen chocolate banana popiscle recipe is super easy and one that your toddlers will love.
Why we love it:
- Only 3 ingredients
- Only 10 min to make
- Healthy popsicle recipe
- Easy popsicle recipe that your kids can get involved
- Involves melted chocolate - who doesn't love that?
- healthy snack idea for toddlers
Jump to:
Ingredients & Nutrition
- Banana - this is a big feature in many of our recipes (like a ton of them... we really like to sweeten food with banana or include any banana alternatives in majority of recipes). The older the banana, the sweeter the taste. With one banana here we make 2 popsicles.
- Dark Chocolate - you could use milk chocolate of course but my general opinion is to try and give kids a taste of healthier types of food as much as possible so their palette gets used to better (nutritionally speaking) ingredients. Here we used 70% dark chocolate. But, you can use one with more or less. When buying dark chocolate you want to buy one with low sugar content and as few additives as possible.
- Hazelnuts - I love hazelnuts, mostly because they remind me of Nutella (we often make this version of a healthy Nutella at home). You can use a different kind of nut but hazelnuts have this distinctive taste that goes so well with chocolate.
Step-by-step instructions
1. Peel and cut 2 bananas in half (this is for 4 popsicles). Place the popsicle stick in the cut-up end. If you can, use a compostable or reusable stick. We use reusable ones that we got with these silicone popsicle molds.
2. Freeze the banana halves for about 3 hours. I just place them as they are on a plate and put them in a freezer. Some recipes would say to wrap in plastic or foil but I haven't found that necessary and I try to limit my use of disposables.
3. After 3 hours, chop up hazelnuts into tiny pieces (either by hand or using a food processor) and spread them out on a cutting board. The tinier the better to minimize choking hazards.
4. Melt your chocolate. Fill a pot of water halfway. Take a bowl and put 8 oz (230 g) of dark chocolate in it. Place the bowl on top of the pot of water and bring the pot to boil and then reduce to low/medium heat. The chocolate should start melting. Don't melt your chocolate directly in a pot on the stove or it will almost certainly burn and ruin your chocolate!
5. Set up your popsicle making station. Remove the bananas from the freezer. Place the bowl of chocolate next to it and the board with chopped nuts (as shown in image above).
6. Dip the bananas in chocolate and roll the hazelnuts. Once the chocolate has melted take your bananas and one by one, roll them in the chocolate and then quickly...
7. ...over to the hazelnuts so both the chocolate and the hazelnuts cover half of each popsicle.
Melted chocolate will firm up fast on a frozen banana so it is important to do each one quickly so you get the hazelnuts stuck on their too.
And then they are basically ready! Yay!!!
Enjoy!
FAQ
Toddlers can have popsicles from just about the time they start weaning - depending on the ingredients. But I really wouldn't offer them before they are able to hold them for at least five minutes and really understand how a popsicle is eaten. And that happens at about the age of 18 months.
To minimize choking fears make sure that the nuts are finely chopped or if allergic you can completely omit them from the recipe.
This will depend on what type of chocolate you use. Majority of dark chocolate (>70%) is dairy-free but make sure you check the label to be 100% sure.
Nutrients-wise, dark chocolate that has at least 70% cocoa powder is the best chocolate to use. However, it does have a kind of bitter taste so might not be the best option for kids. I would advise to start with 70% and see how your kid tolerates it and then if needed decrease the % until you get to that sweet spot.
Possible Variations
- Use milk chocolate – this will make the popsicle also very delicious but because of a higher sugar content I would make sure I give this to a child at least 3 hours before bedtime just to be sure you avoid any sugar rushes that may result in an eventful bedtime. Or if you are sure that your child doesn't have issues in tolerating sugar in the late afternoon, don't worry about the timing.
- Different nuts - some roasted/salted peanuts would be delicious here. And pretty much any nut you have on hand will work.
Tips
- Be fast - once the chocolate has melted you need to be very fast to roll the banana in the nuts as the chocolate dries/hardens very fast on frozen banana
- Freezing bananas - make sure when you freeze them they don't touch each other as otherwise it will be very difficult to separate them
More summer snack recipes for toddlers
If you've tried this recipe for kids then rate the recipe below and leave us a comment!
Recipe
Frozen Chocolate Banana Popsicles
EQUIPMENT
Ingredients
- 2 bananas
- 8 oz dark chocolate
- ½ cup chopped hazelnuts
Instructions
- Peel and cut 2 bananas in half (this is for 4 popsicles). Place the popsicle stick in the cut-up end. If you can, use a compostable or reusable stick. We use reusable ones that we got with these silicone popsicle molds. (scroll above to the see the step by step instructions with pictures)
- Freeze the banana halves for about 3 hours in a container or plate. Some recipes would say to wrap in plastic or foil but I haven't found that necessary and I try to limit my use of disposables.
- After 3 hours, chop up hazelnuts into tiny pieces (either by hand or using a food processor) and spread them out on a cutting board. The tinier the better to minimize choking hazards.
- Melt your chocolate. Fill a pot of water halfway. Take a bowl and put 8 oz (230 g) of dark chocolate in it. Place the bowl on top of the pot of water and bring the pot to boil and then reduce to low/medium heat. The chocolate should start melting. Don't melt your chocolate directly in a pot on the stove or it will almost certainly burn and ruin your chocolate!
- Set up your popsicle making station. Remove the bananas from the freezer. Place the bowl of chocolate next to it and the board with chopped nuts (as shown in image above).
- Dip the bananas in chocolate and roll the hazelnuts. Once the chocolate has melted take your bananas and one by one, roll them in the chocolate and then quickly...
- ...over to the hazelnuts so both the chocolate and the hazelnuts cover half of each popsicle.
- Enjoy straight away or pop them in the freezer until ready to be eaten.
Notes
- Be fast - once the chocolate has melted you need to be very fast to roll the banana in the nuts as the chocolate dries very fast on frozen banana
- Freezing bananas - make sure when you freeze them they don't touch as otherwise they will be very hard to separate
- Nutrition calculation is an estimate. The calories will be less because some chocolate won't be used up.
Nutrition
If you've tried this or any other recipe on the blog, then please rate it and leave us a comment below!
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