Watermelon Popsicles: Vegan and Paleo Dessert

🥣 Ingredients and Notes

Watermelon: You’ll need 2 cups of cubed watermelon as part of the popsicle base which also brings natural sweetness to your homemade popsicles.

Strawberries: Organic strawberries paired with the watermelon juices bring a nice fruity flavor without any artificial preservatives, dyes, or fake flavoring.

Kiwi: I use 2 kiwis to help bring more texture and make the green layer to these delicious homemade watermelon pops. If you don’t have kiwi you could opt for lime juice.

Coconut Milk: I chose to use full-fat coconut milk. The full-fat milk helps add a little creaminess to your popsicles and creates the white layer in between the green and red.

Vegan Chocolate Chips: These add a bit of fun and texture to the popsicles and mimic the look of watermelon seeds. You can also choose to use raisins instead.

📋 Step by Step Instructions

Step 1: Cut and cube watermelon. De-stem and cut strawberries into quarters. Using a food processor or blender, blend the 2 cups of watermelon and one cup of strawberries together until smooth. Pour mixture evenly into four popsicle molds, about ¾ of the way full.

Step 2: Sprinkle chocolate chips evenly among the four molds. Using a popsicle stick gently push the chocolate chips into the molds, evenly distributing them.

Step 3: Freeze for one hour or until set. While the first layer is freezing mix ¼ cup of coconut milk with 1 teaspoon maple syrup.

Step 4: After an hour in the freezer check that the first layer has set. If so, pour the second layer of coconut milk evenly among the four molds, about 1 tablespoon per mold.

Step 5: Freeze for one hour or until set.

Step 6: While the second layer is freezing, cut the outer layer of the kiwi off, and chop it into small chunks. Blend with 2 tablespoons of coconut milk.

Step 7: Once the coconut layer is set, pour the kiwi layer on top. Freeze for one additional hour or until set.

❓ FAQS

Why are these watermelon popsicles healthy?

The sugar in these popsicles is natural sugar from the fruit itself. You can sub the chocolate chips for raisins, or leave them out completely to make these popsicles healthier. They also contain healthy fats from coconut milk. If you’d like to reduce the fat and calories you can substitute light coconut milk. One healthy watermelon popsicle equals about 2 servings of fruit!

How do you pick the perfect watermelon?

If you want a sweeter watermelon, pick one that has a lot of webbing, also called sugar lines, for a naturally sweet treat. Oval watermelons are more watery and round ones are sweeter.

How do you get popsicles out of the mold easier?

Using silicone molds helps make your popsicles easy to remove. However, if you’re still having trouble try these tips.

You must make sure that your popsicles had sufficient time to freeze first. Then once they’re completely frozen, run the outside of the mold under cold water for a few seconds. This should help loosen the pops. Hold the stick and wiggle back and forth a bit to pull them out while running the mold under cold water. Don’t use warm water or you could risk melting your treats.

💭 Expert Tips

Make sure you allow enough time for each later to freeze completely before pouring the next later. This will help keep the layers clean.

In this recipe, you can replace the chocolate chips with raisins to mimic the look of seeds, or leave them out entirely. You can also leave out the kiwi and coconut milk layers and just do the watermelon strawberry layer for a quicker turnaround.

Substitute light coconut milk to reduce the calories and fat.

This kiwi peeler does an excellent job of removing the peel without wasting any fruit.

This strawberry huller and watermelon slicer make hulling strawberries and cubing watermelon a breeze. Or you can get this fruit peeling set that includes the kiwi peeler, strawberry huller, and watermelon slicer, along with six more fruit-slicing tools.