Taking a road trip usually means two things when it comes to food: gas station stops for snacks and McDonald’s for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. While a bag of BBQ Lays and a bottle of Pepsi is a tasty snack, and a double cheeseburger and fries from McDonald’s tastes like heaven in grease form, both make you feel like a gross, bloated mess afterward. Have no fear, though. There are ways around this. Make the following healthy homemade snacks your friends and say goodbye to road trip food babies forever.
1. Zucchini Chips

Photo by Kirby Barth
Zucchini chips are a go-to if you want all of the saltiness and crunchiness of a potato chip, but less of the unhealthy stuff that comes with them.
2. No-Bake Protein Balls

Photo by Keni Lin
Homemade protein balls are delicious, and they end up rivaling some of your favorite store-bought protein bars such as Quest, Clif, and Luna. Plus, much less added sugar (and lots more peanut butter).
3. Baked Kale Chips

Photo by Alex Tom
Damn Spoon, back at it again with the homemade veggie chips.
4. Turmeric Roasted Chickpeas

Photo by Kristine Mahan
If you’re into high protein foods AND superfoods, this is the recipe for you. Chickpeas are packed with protein (aw yeah muscles), and turmeric is qualified as a superfood due to its anti-inflammatory and nutrient-dense properties.
5. Sriracha Popcorn

Photo by Erica Coulter
Spice up your road trip with this popcorn. Make sure you bring water – for the kernels AND the sriracha afterburn.
6. Granola

Photo by Sydney Segal
Granola is crunchy, sweet yet salty, awesome goodness. Homemade granola is like all of that on steroids.
7. Fruit by the Foot

Photo by Robert Arrasate
The nostalgia is so real. These do have sugar in them, but its to taste and I bet you could replace it with Splenda if you wanted to.
8. Salted Caramel Truffles

Photo by Katherine Baker
“Healthy” and “truffles” in the same sentence? It seems too good to be true, but thanks to us foodies at Spoon, we bring you the impossible-made-possible.
9. Apple Chips

Photo by Sitong Chen
Damn Spoon, back at it again. But with fruit this time. You gotta change it up sometimes.
10. Granola Bars

Photo by Alex Tom
If you’re feeling like granola itself is too messy for a car ride, use this granola bar recipe instead.
11. Parmesan Edamame

Photo by Elyse Belarge
This recipe rivals the chickpea recipe above. If you love cheese like I do, you may want to go with this one.
12. Trail Mix

Photo by Lucy Rubin
Trail mix is like treasure in food form. You think you’ve eaten all of the M&Ms (which are the best part of trail mix, always), and then you find the actual last one and savor that bad boy.
13. Chocolate-Dipped Apricots

Photo by Anika Schaedle
Always say yes to anything that involves chocolate. These are great because they’re customizable – you can switch up the kind of chocolate that you use, as well as the topping.
14. Dark Chocolate Bark

Photo by Amanda Shulman
Again, never say no to anything involving chocolate.
15. Salt and Vinegar Swiss Chard Chips

Photo by Kristine Mahan
Damn, you did it again… make them like this.