Favorite Chia Pudding Recipe (3 Ways!) | Feasting on Fruit (2024)

My favorite chia seed pudding recipe with just the right ratio and ingredients for ultra creamy texture – for dessert, breakfast, or a make ahead snack!

Hello January.

Hello post-holiday back to normal life time. Still chilly but less everywhere cheery time. Still having fun with food but less frosting and sprinkles time. Still need snacks but make it snappy time.

A.k.a. chia pudding time.

Happy new year/month/week all at once, friends.

I will not be giving up a single thing this month. There will be baking and sugar and probably more gingerbread because that still sounds yummy and this cake deserves a round two. There will of course be fruit-sweetened recipes, but I do those year round. There will be healthier treats and chocolate too. Hell I may even eat extra ice cream to make up for all the neglected pints the rest of the internet is giving up.

Tastebuds don’t understand it’s suddenly a new year so cookies = over and veggies = on deck. Bodies don’t work like that, at least not mine and not happily. I don’t regret a single cookie I ate last month and I won’t regret a single cookie I eat this month (because yes there will be cookies!). I don’t feel the need to balance out the holidays with with nothing but green smoothies and zoodles now. I crave a continuous balance of both. You know what makes a nourishing, colorful, whole foods dinner taste the best? A 4pm cookie snack beforehand so my sweet tooth is content and ready for real food.

Yeah yeah, I know – balanceis the mostcliche and overused word of January. But it’s true. I for one don’t want to be ravenous for ALL THE THINGS by January 29th, so I’ll take my sugar and non-whole foods all month long please.

I didn’t know that was going to turn into a mini rant. But sometimes when it feels like we are swimming upstream it helps to shout extra loud, even if only for our own conviction.

On to this seedy stuff though.

After a five days of minimal computer time last week, I was out of my recipe flow. I had a lot of ideas, but none of them were jumping and shoutingPICK ME! from the list.

So I ditched the list, consulted the fridge, and realized that I have been making chia pudding non-stop for weeks now in JUMBO batches without sharing my (dare I say) perfect recipe/ratio. I’ve made more than a dozen batches by now, so thoroughly tested is an understatement here.

My problem with 75% of chia pudding recipes out there is texture – since when doespudding meansoup? Chia pudding should stay on the spoon in a bite-shaped blob. Toppings should not sink in. A straw should feel very inappropriate.

This recipe has THE texture – thick and creamy and layers in jars like a dream. Because of two things:

1. A 4:1 ratio of liquid to chia seeds. So 1 cup liquid to 1/4 cup chia seeds, which is a tiny bit higher than most.
2. A mix of canned coconut milk and almond milk (or any milk in a carton). Coconut milk solidifies when chilled, so a mix of both makes it thick but not too thick. Just the perfect pudding texture.

Sweetening. The coconut milk is naturally sweet, so you don’t need much. I use 2 tablespoons of maple syrup per batch, and one batch easily makes 3 servings. You could also blend in a couple of medjool dates, or use honey or agave instead. I’ve even made the vanilla version with no sweetener before, and with fruit on top it’s still very yum.

Optional protein. I typically make mine with 2-4 scoops of collagen peptides added in (which makes it extra frothy!) Skip if vegan, or add a couple of scoops of vegan protein powder instead. Protein powder does make the pudding thicker so consider adding an extra 1/4 cup milk.

Flavors. Maybe I do make chocolate chia pudding approximately every single time. Maybe I don’t. But you can mix it up with all kinds of additions – cinnamon spiced, maca boosted, peanut butter instead of protein powder, apple juice instead of milk, berries blended in…

My three personal favorites are vanilla, matcha, and chocolate. Vanilla because it goes with all the toppings, matcha because I’m obsessed, and chocolate because chocolate. Oh, and when I say chocolate I mean SALTED chocolate. Add a generous pinch of salt to your next batch of chocolate chia pudding and you’ll see why it’s the one I make again and again.

Make multiple servings at the same time. Check.

Store in matching glass jars. Check.

Take photo for instagram. Check.

Feel like my life is more organized even though really it’s just my snack life and I still have a two foot tall pile of empty boxes in my living room to recycle, my closet is vomiting a confusing mix of winter and summer clothes, and yesterday I found a spoon in my freezer I didn’t even know was missing. Not gonna lie, kinda check.

This is as close to #mealprep as I’ll probably every be.

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