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Luxury spas and retreats are fun. After all, who doesn't like a great massage?

This type of travel is good for our physical well-being and also for our mental health - especially if we learn new behaviors that we can practice at home.

Over the years when I've visited spas, I've collected recipes that I can easily prepare in my own kitchen.

Here is one of my favorites:

Reduced Fat Carrot Peanut Butter

Ingredients:
peanut butter (smooth) 1/3 cup
carrot chunks, boiled    1 cup

Directions:
Blend the peanut butter and boiled carrot chunks in a food processor.

Nutritional analysis, single serving (1 T)
calories - 26
net carbs - 2 g
protein - 1 g
fat - 2.74g
saturated fat - 1g
cholesterol - 0
sodium - 31mg
fiber - 1g

You can make this spread even healthier by using salt free peanut butter. In this case, the sodium would be 0 mg.

I frequently eat this carrot peanut butter at home, and it's also an important ingredient in my standard road-food menu - along with Ak-Mak crackers, organic red grapes, and dry roasted unsalted almonds.

I thank Red Mountain Spa in St. George, Utah for sharing this recipe.

I enjoyed my stay at this spa resort and highly recommend it to anyone who wants to hike and bike among beautiful burnt orange mountains and sample unusual Native American therapies.

Click here to read "Between a Rock and a Soft Place" and other articles I've written about spas.

Photo credit: ADAMS / HANSEN STOCK PHOTOS.