A couple of months ago I set myself an ‘eight weeks no refined sugar’ challenge. It just so happened to be my sister’s birthday right in the middle of those eight weeks. Consequently, I was looking for a recipe to use for a sugar-free cake/cookie or anything baked so I won’t be the only one eating some fruits while others stuff their face with baked goodies. I read through a couple and I quickly realized that a lot of them are quite complicated or have pretty bad reviews. But I did learn a few things.. substituting a lot of the sugar with dates seems to be the main idea. Also, there are quite a few recipes requiring no flour and coconut oil instead of butter. Well, that sounds at least healthy-ish, doesn’t it?
On my sister’s birthday, I started my little experiment and just combined all the tips I have read online to a recipe which I, admittedly, was pretty sceptical about. But you know what? It turned out absolutely delicious. Yes, the calories for these brownies are still quite high but they are sugar, dairy and flourless… a good start to healthier baking if you ask me.
Even my family enjoyed them so much that they reached for more even though there were other, and most importantly sweeter, alternatives available.
Before I go into the recipe you should consider that even though they are delish, if you do not like dark chocolate and you prefer the taste of really sweet milk chocolate you should maybe add some sugar. Of course, this is optional though.
You will need:
- 250g pitted dates
- 4 Tablespoons of unsweetened cocoa powder
- 3 eggs
- 80 ml of coconut oil
- 1 teaspoon of baking soda
- 200g of unsweetened baking chocolate or sugarfree chocolate
- (I used a German brand called Xucker)
First, you should preheat the oven to around 180°C. While it is preheating pulse the chocolate, cocoa powder and the baking powder in a (strong) blender or food processor. Afterwards, you pulse the dates together with the eggs and coconut oil until everything is pretty much blended. Mix these two parts and place the batter into a brownie baking dish which should be around 20x20cm.
The brownies should bake around 20 minutes but it depends on your oven. Try not to overbake them though. And enjoy!
