What are your favorite desserts? Traditional treats at the holidays, after school treats, or treats that your family made just because . . . do you remember them? Have you given them up because you’re trying to live a healthy lifestyle? There are so many healthy dessert recipes out there to discover and try. Maybe you will find your old favorites turned into healthier and lighter versions.
There are common trends in healthy baking. Many of the recipes suggest bittersweet chocolate instead of milk chocolate. Some suggest browning butter before using it in the recipe to enhance its richness; this can allow you to ditch full-fat cream cheese or other full-fat ingredients and still end up with indulgent more healthy treats.
Another way to avoid having to use full amounts of butter and oil in your favorites is to add other moist ingredients: zucchini, carrots, and apples add enough moisture and flavor to the recipe that you won’t need as much fat to get your best result.
Many people who make healthy dessert recipes use one-quarter cup of applesauce in place of an egg. Or, they also substitute applesauce for half or even all of the oil or butter requested in the recipe. You may want to experiment. Some bakers assert that oil in cakes is necessary, and that applesauce alters the consistency too much for their liking. Muffins, breads, bars, and such are fine with applesauce as a substitute. And some even make brownies with yogurt instead of oil.
Biscotti is known for being a somewhat healthy dessert anyway, but some take it even further and use whole-wheat flour, flaxseed, and almonds, and turn out award-winning biscotti.
In your search for healthy dessert recipes, you may come across a recipe that consists of only peanut butter, sugar (half of the sugar amount can be brown sugar), an egg, some baking powder, some vanilla, and some chocolate chips. Just those ingredients alone make yummy peanut butter chocolate chip cookies! Notice that there is no butter or oil used. These could be called a healthier version of traditional peanut butter cookies simply because the need for butter is eliminated. Impressive.
No need to deny yourself of your favorites; simply find new ways to make them!
