Peanut-free Snacks

To make these addictive snacks, chef Jason Travi tosses canned chickpeas with flour, coriander and cumin, then fries them. He loves popping them into his mouth while he's watching football.

Yucca, sometimes called cassava, is a starchy root that grows in very warm climates and makes supercrunchy chips. To remove the tough outer skin, use a sharp, heavy knife rather than a peeler.

"I like the idea of making a healthy kind of potato chip that's not one of those packaged, dehydrated vegetable chips," Seamus Mullen says. He roasts kale with extra-virgin olive oil and garlic until it's crunchy.

F&W's Grace Parisi invented this smoky guacamole, then presented three ingenious ways to use it: in a soup, an hors d'oeuvre and a salad dressing.

This healthy take on the traditional chips-and-salsa combo is nearly fat-free and super-refreshing. The antioxidant-rich salsa is delicious served right after it's made, but the flavors meld nicely after a day or two in the refrigerator.

Justin Devillier upgrades classic Southern cheese straws with Sharifi's Iranian spices at his New Orleans restaurant La Petite Grocery. He sometimes swaps out the cardamom for equal amounts of ground coriander or fennel seed. "I've always assumed cheese straws originated in the Carolinas," says Devillier, "but that may be because my mother-in-law always brings them when she visits from South Carolina."

Rice-flake cereal, seasoned nori (seaweed flavored with sesame oil and salt), miso and wasabi come together in this light, munchable, Asian-inspired riff on Chex Mix.

Perfectly crunchy and spicy, these Sriracha-flavored pumpkin seeds are a great afternoon snack.

After rolling out this buttery dough, stamp out all different kinds of shapes (Ginna Haravon likes making animal crackers). It's important to chill the dough before and after rolling it out so the crackers are tender.

Warning: you might not be able to stop yourself from eating all of these sweet, oven-roasted chickpeas.

Gooey and luscious, this addictive starter is like a deconstructed broccoli quesadilla.

Besides the huge boxes of candy, movie theaters often turn popcorn--a fiber-rich food--into a sponge for fat. Grace Parisi adds a fiery kick to her healthier sweet-and-salty version of kettle corn by tossing it with whole red chiles.