With just 5 ingredients and some ice, you can make the most rich and delicious tahini date shake with coffee. Thick, creamy, and so delicious!
Hey happy weekend! I’m out of town visiting Iowa Farm Sanctuary and speaking at their annual spring event. I haven’t travelled to the Midwest United States in a long time, so I’m excited to be back. This is also my first visit to a farm sanctuary ever! Really excited to hang with some happy animals and to take in a change of scenery.
As an experiment recently, I tried making a tahini shake rather simply with just ice and a substantial amount of tahini and wow! It was so rich, creamy and decadent. I couldn’t get over it. It gets so frothy and lush. This makes total sense though because every time I make tahini sauce, I use ice cold water to really enhance the creaminess. Throw some strong coffee and caramel-like Medjool dates into the mix and you’ve got something seriously special. This is my new favourite treat. If you like this, you might also like my Tahini Shakes with Cinnamon & Lime or any of my other vegan smoothie recipes.
Here’s a couple links that caught my eye this week. Catch ya back here soon!
-If you’re into books about leadership and life lessons in general (like I am), you may want to take up Ryan Holiday’s method of finding new books.
-Turkey produces 70% of the world’s hazelnuts for companies like Ferrero (the company behind the massively popular Nutella spread), Nestlé and Godiva. Concerns of child labour, grueling and dangerous working conditions, and especially vulnerable Syrian refugees abound with the nut’s harvest. If you partake in hazelnut products from these companies, or if you eat food in general, you need to read this story.
-“…it has grown increasingly clear that allowing young, mostly male technologists to build largely unregulated, proprietary, international networks might have been a large-scale, high-stakes error in judgment.”
-Oh look! Another new Instagram feature that’s designed to keep you on the app even longer and that also conveniently makes them even more money.
-“I want to ask the bartender why he responded to my drink order with a question about what I do for a living, just loudly enough to be heard by everybody around us, so they’d know what I’d experienced. But, as many black diners know, being in a dining space can often mean choosing between being ignored, interrogated, or assaulted.” On the overwhelmingly white male-ness of restaurant critic culture.
-Gene Baur is a seminal voice in the vegan movement. In this Forbes article, he discusses the momentum behind plant-based meat and what is driving this shift in consumer consciousness.
-And also relevant: Beyond Meat was the first plant-based meat company to become publicly traded this week. They surged to 135% in their IPO debut, which is kind of bonkers. “There’s a sense that there’s a movement going on that’s much bigger than any one company.”
-My friend Lily is giving away an amazing skincare e-book for free! She’s a wealth of natural beauty and self-care knowledge, and I love that her simple skincare methods will only set you back about $10 total. Find the e-book here.
-Sign me up for these fudgy sweet potato brownies IMMEDIATELY.
Ridiculously Good Tahini Date Shake with Coffee
Ingredients
- 1 ½ cups ice
- 3 tablespoons tahini (See notes)
- 2-3 very soft Medjool dates
- ½ teaspoon vanilla extract
- pinch of sea salt
- ½ cup strong coffee
Equipment
Notes
- The ingredients are quite minimal here, so I’d recommend only using really good tahini since it forms the backbone. You want it to be pourable and mellow tasting. I love Soom and Seed + Mill brands.
- If you don’t like coffee, use the same amount of any non-dairy milk that you like.
- The dates need to be soft or else you’ll get a smattering of little baby date chunks in your last sip. If yours aren’t super juicy, cover them with boiling water for at least 5 minutes and then drain.
Instructions
- In an upright, high speed blender, combine the ice, tahini, dates, vanilla, salt, and coffee. Blend this mixture on high until smooth. Pour the tahini date shake out into a glass and enjoy immediately.
Oh my! No fresh dates, so soaking some now. Can’t wait!
This shake sounds so good! I would love to visit a farm sanctuary. Enjoy your time in Iowa with the animals!
Made it! So good :) I added a tiny bit of cacao powder because why not? Haha ✌thanks!
This sounds amazing! Love tahini and dates, what a great combination, I can’t wait to try it.
I am psyched to try this shake out tomorrow! Why did I never think of coffee + tahini!
I, too, swooned over those Golubka Kitchen brownies a few days ago, and made them in a pan as opposed to muffin tins and they turned out so fudgy and decadent and SO close to cheesecake-y that I intend to make them again this week; make them, stat!
Hi Meghan,
We are so happy to hear that you loved the brownies! Never thought about them in that way, but you are so right, they are very cheesecake-y after being refrigerated :)
OMG this drink looks unbelievable! I so wish I could handle coffee just to try this but will definitely be trying it with a chicory ‘coffee’ or some other Dandy Blend-ish thing. Thank you so much for the brownie shout out <3
So I don’t love halva but with the coffee and tons of ice in this the tahini tastes amazing. Sooooo creamy and frothy.
I am weirdly not a lover of halva either, even though I love sesame everything. I think it’s just too sweet for me? So glad you enjoyed this though!
-L
Just popped over to your site for the first time in a while and am excited to see this! Trying to figure out how I’m going to eat 6 dates a day during my last trimester of pregnancy (supposedly helps with labor onset/speed) and this looks like the answer (maybe with decaf, maybe not…). I haven’t tried the boiling water method, but I’ve had luck before blending the dates and liquid first, then adding the other ingredients.
Just wanted to say this shake is amazing! I have already made it three times. I did add a frozen banana and a little protein powder to make it more of a breakfast :) Also thank you for the recommendations for tahini, I ordered the Soom brand and it is delicious!
Tahini and dates are TO DIE FOR together! This must taste like a smoothie from the heavens above. I’ll definitely use decaf coffee because I am SUPER sensitive to caffeine. Other than that, this smoothie would probably become my new obsession!
This was incredible! I’ve had it for breakfast the past two days :0 – it is super creamy and delicious. Thank you!
This is superb! My new favorite summer treat- thank you A side note to those of you who are avoiding caffeine or coffee I tried this with capomo and it was almost as yummy as the real thing.
That’s a great tip! Thank you for sharing.
-L
This might just be the BEST THING EVER. (And I read a ton of blogs, recipes, etc, and I cook a lot). So when I say this is top for summer recipes, for me, that says something! It is a heat wave of the realest kind in Chicago today, I made a quick batch of tahini and blended this up (for the 5th time this month) and it is as good as ever! I have shared this recipe with my Mom (she made immediately and loved it), my sister, and about 7 friends who all rave over it. Thank you SO MUCH for this! Amazing!
What a delicious idea! It’s a little like a coffee ice cream milkshake.
What I’ve done is make up portions of the ingredients (all except the ice) in little jars, so in the morning all I have to do is dump the jar into a blender with ice (and the dates get to soak for at least one night). This will definitely be repeated many times, so thank you!
This is SOOOOO GOOD Laura – greater than the sum of its parts! I added a little vanilla lucuma protein powder (the one you recommended) and I’m in love. Will be making this over and over again!
This tasted like a Samoa cookie. Heaven in a glass. Thank you!
Oh my! This is soooooo delicious.
Love the flavor of this shake! I only had one issue and that the liquids began to separate after I blended everything together. I wonder if this has to do with the type of tahini used? I also used a Ninja (bullet type) vs. a full sized power blender…both may have contributed to the separation. Curious if anyone else experienced this? Maybe just me, lol.
Have to say this is an absolutely stunning drink. It tasted so delicious and exceeded my expectations! So creamy and a great balance between savory and sweet.
My first sip I was like hmmm interesting, second sip: ouuu I like it, Third sip: yummmmmm.
It really grows on you. I used Nuts to You tahini which isn’t as good as soom but much easier to find in Canada. So I had to add a splash of maple syrup, and used 4 old medjool dates, and espresso with a splash of water. Thanks for the recipe Laura!
Wow, so simple yet SO good!