Health Warrior

Chia Bars.  Protein Powder.  "Mug Muffins".  All healthy.  All loaded with protein.   Dairy free, soy free, gluten free, non GMO, low sugar.  Those are the products that Health Warrior makes.  Yeah, not exactly things I gravitate towards, with the exception of the suspicious sounding "muffins", as I do love my baked goods.

And yet I tried their entire product line, during a time when I was trying to incorporate more protein into my diet.

I can't say I'll be getting more.

Protein Muffins

"Breakfast muffins ready in a minute."

Sounds too good to be true right?

"Health Warrior’s new Protein Mug Muffins are a warm, spoonable muffin with 12g of plant based protein and only 6g of sugar. They are made from superfoods like sorghum, pumpkin seeds, flax seeds, and almonds. Plus, they are dairy free, soy free, gluten free, non GMO and contain no stevia or sugar alcohols."

Healthy muffins, high protein, no crap, variety of flavors, and ready in a minute?

Yup, to say I was skeptical is an understatement. 

"Ready in a Minute"

They come in a variety of classic muffin flavors: blueberry, banana nut, double chocolate, and peanut butter chocolate chip.  I tried them all.

Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Mix + 1/4 Cup Water.

The instructions are simple, all the same, but do require a 1/4 cup measuring cup.  This is "baking" after all, and I knew from reading reviews that eyeballing the amount is not recommended.

Step 1?  Add 1/4 cup cold water.

Chocolate Peanut Butter: Mixed.

Step 2?  Mix well.  Again, I knew from reviews to do this right: mix *well*.  Put some energy into it.

Step 3?  Microwave for 45 seconds to 1 minute.

Mine seemed a touch wet (instructions warned it might be), so I did the additional time.

Chocolate Peanut Butter: "Baked".

Step 4?  Let stand 2 minutes.

So, "ready in a minute", not exactly, but certainly less than 5 minutes.  Easy, but, requires *some* precision.

One baked, it looked ... um ... interesting.  I expected it to rise up and well, look like a muffin in some way, which it clearly did not.

But I'll admit my creation smelt good.  Lovely aroma of peanut butter. But it certainly didn't look like a muffin, and I was still curious about the whole "spoonable" aspect.

Chocolate Peanut Butter: Melty Chips.

The first one I tried was the chocolate peanut butter, the one I was most excited for.  

I dug in.  Melty chocolate chips were studded throughout.  This was a good thing.

But a muffin this was not.  It was not even really a bread ... it is very hard to describe the texture.  I guess, imagine what a gluten-free, dairy-free, etc, etc microwaved creation would be like, and you probably can figure it out.  Kinda dense, not fluffy, kinda crumbly, but not like a muffin ... it was odd, really.  

The peanut butter flavor was there, although not as intense as I was hoping.  The aroma was stronger than the taste, but I could taste peanut butter, which I liked.  I didn't taste too many odd things from the variety of flours (sorghum, almond, tapioca) and proteins (fava beans, pumpkin seeds, flaxseed).  I liked the little melty chocolate chips.  It was almost ok.  Although "ok", with a very strange texture.

But what I haven't mentioned is the dominant taste.  An odd sweetness.  Sure, they don't use Stevia, and don't use regular white sugar, but primary flavor was just an odd, odd, sweetness.  I think this must be from the monk fruit extract?  They also use brown sugar, but it wasn't what I was detecting.

I could get past the texture, unique as it was, I could even enjoy the peanut butter and the chocolate, but ... I couldn't get past that strange sweetness.

Also, it was just a bit ... boring.  I know it is a healthy breakfast item, so it doesn't need more, but for me, it did.

I added my favorite hot fudge (shhh, don't judge!  I wanted to add more chocolately element and mask the sweet!) and I added whipped cream, and I did actually sorta enjoy it this way.  Warm baked thing, melty bits of chocolate, peanut butter and chocolate combo, a la whipped cream?  Was it healthy now?  Nope.  Was it vegan now?  Nope.  Was it breakfast?  Ha.  But I liked it, and it did have more protein than my normal breakfast ...

I almost added butter (it *is* a muffin after all), and would consider that with the other flavors.

Update Review:
I tried another a few weeks later, again trying for breakfast, and finding it too ... boring.  Again I wanted stronger peanut butter and chocolate, and the texture was so odd, but really, it needed something added.  So I added.  I added a bunch of chocolate ganache, a few disks of white chocolate, and a bit more of my favorite peanut butter.  Warmed it all up.  Now it had lots of chocolate and peanut butter, both really melty, and more sweetness.  And I put whipped cream on top.  I actually quite liked it, but, I had added quite a bit at this point, and, uh, definitely was no longer eating a guilt free breakfast.

I think these might be well suited for dessert.  Warm, with ice cream, more like a chocolate peanut butter cake, could work much better? Or maybe just with fudge and whipped cream as I did for breakfast ...

Banana Nut: Mixed.

I moved on to the next flavor.  Banana nut.

While stirring, I noted that I certainly didn't smell banana, and I didn't really see or feel many chunks of banana ...

I stirred it well, and it really did come together a nice batter consistency.  Into the microwave it went for a minute.

Banana Nut: Cooked.

After a minute it still did seem wet, so I let it go the extra 15 seconds as advised.  Still looked a bit wet, but I decided to give it the 2 minute rest time, and went to make my coffee and see what I returned to.

Banana Nut Muffin: Baked!

This one actually came out the best, texture-wise.

It extracted from the cup in one piece, and, actually kinda did look like a flatter, denser style muffin.  Or mini cake I guess?

The texture really wasn't bad - it wasn't strangely wet, it wasn't dry.  Sure, it wasn't a crumbly muffin, but I knew not to expect that at this point.  A warm, dense but moist cake.  Not bad.

The taste though ... banana haters did not need to fear.  This didn't taste like banana much at all.  Honestly, I didn't detect *any* banana to it.  There were a few tiny chunks of nut, I guess, almonds say the ingredients, but again, so few it wasn't really noticeable.  Almond was an odd choice, normally a banana nut muffin would have walnuts?

It mostly was just very, very boring, lacking any flavor I wanted.  It still had a bit of a funky flavor, I don't mind the strange flavor from the flours, but the sweetener still got to me.

While it was warm, I slathered a chunk in copious amounts of butter, and it was significantly better that way.  I spread chocolate ganache on another, and that was considerably better too.  And the final chunk I spread on warm melty peanut butter.  Also better (although a bit too dry).

I salvaged this one, but didn't want another.

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Blueberry

Next up was the blueberry.  Classic muffin flavor.

Well, it had little tiny bits of dried blueberry.

But without something like chocolate or peanut butter to add any real dimension, it was just the odd texture, odd flavor, and ... lacking.  Adding *copious* amounts of butter added a little something, but, this just wasn't a winner.

My gluten-free low sugar friend also didn't like it, and he is used to foods that are like this ...

Chia Bars: "The 100 Calorie Real Food Bar."

"With only 100 calories and 3g of sugar, Chia Bars are the perfect fit for your healthy lifestyle. They're made with real, plant based ingredients that fill you up without weighing you down. Plus, they're dairy free, gluten free, soy free, and non-GMO."

Ok, so, pre-warning: I hate chia seeds.  I just find them bitter, and a odd flavor that I can't ever get over.  And I *loath* them when made into slimy chia pudding.  So I fully admit that this product is not one that would ever normally appeal to me.

The bars come in some very tempting sounding dessert flavors, not just simple Dark Chocolate (or Dark Chocolate Cherry, Dark Chocolate Peanut Butter), or Caramel Sea Salt, but also Strawberry Shortcake and Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough.  And in fruity varieties, not just basic fruits like Banana Nut or Apple Cinnamon, but also tropical flavors, Coconut, Acai Berry, Mango.

But I know better.  Good sounding flavors do not change the makeup of the bars, and, I suspected these would go the way of most other nutrition bars, no matter how good of flavors they have.  I was given one to sample though, so, I had to try it, right?

Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough.

I had the chance to try the chocolate chip cookie dough, made with the base of white chia seeds, brown rice crisps, and rolled oats, bound together with cashew butter and chicory root fiber, and sweetened with brown rice syrup.  And then, yes, some chocolate chips, vanilla, sea salt, etc.

I actually wanted to like this.  I almost liked it, in fact.

The texture wasn’t that bad, it was clearly a healthy protein bar with a kinda mushy base to it, but I liked the crunch from the chia seeds, and it broke apart nicely.

I liked that I could see, and nearly taste, the little chocolate chips.  It held promise of the “cookie dough” flavor it was.

But … underlying it all was a horrible, horrible bitter taste that I just couldn’t shake.  So close to being good, and far better than I expected actually, but not the right thing for me.