This was a total hit in my house on Easter! Tasted extremely similar to your traditional recipe, without all the sugar and carbs! Wish I had made two, because it was GONE!
Ingredients
Cake:
12 Tbsp softened butter, or a stick and a half
3/4 Cup powdered monkfruit sweetener or equivalent (swerve, allulose, etc)
5 eggs (room temperature)
1 Tbsp molasses, totally optional and you might worry about the carbs but it only adds like 1 net carb per slice (if that) and it deepens the flavor so much. Trust me. Use it.
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 1/2 Cups almond flour
2 tsp baking powder
3 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp salt (I used pink Himalayan)
2 Cups grated carrots (I don’t have a grater, so I used a food processor, which was incredibly easy) measure loosely, don’t pack it!
1/2 Cup of crushed walnuts for your batter, and another 1/2 Cup for topping
Icing:
8 oz cream cheese, softened
4 Tbsp butter, softened
1 Cup powdered monkfruit or equivalent
2 tsp vanilla extract
3 Tbsp heavy cream (you can adjust to your liking, but I like a smoother icing)
Directions:
Cake:
Preheat your oven to 350 F, and grease two 9 inch round baking pans. Or if you have parchment paper, line with that. Much easier to get the cake out unscathed!
In a large mixing bowl, beat the butter and sweetener until smooth. Takes a few minutes. Once that happens, add in the molasses, vanilla, than one egg at a time. This ensures you won’t have any whites not combined.
Add in your dry ingredients SLOWLY to avoid a smoke bomb in your kitchen. Beat on low until well combined. Then fold in your carrots and nuts.
Add equal amounts of your batter to each cake pan. This batter is pretty thick, so it was really easy to separate them for once. If you’re OCD like myself, invest in a food scale.
Bake for 30 minutes, and let cool completely before even touching it.
Icing:
While the cake is in the oven, start your icing.
In a large mixing bowl add in your butter and cream cheese and whip it up until it’s nice and smooth. Then add in your sweetener. Then the vanilla. If your icing is the consistency you like, then you can 86 the whipping cream. I usually end up adding quite a bit, but I just go on looks and taste. So you can totally make it your own! Even if it gets too runny, you can add more sweetener in if needed. Don’t be afraid to make a mistake.
Once cakes are cooled, add icing how you like it, top with your remaining nuts, and enjoy.
I hope whoever is currently reading this is finding themselves well. I know some of us are scared for ourselves, our families, our children. However, we are all in this together, and we all need to keep pushing! This is such a weird time in all of our lives, and I just wanted to get some of my thoughts out here in the open.
If you’re new here, my name is Ashley and I started a low carb diet August 20th, 2019 and have stuck to it ever since! The hardest part was that I have the biggest sweet tooth imaginable, and I knew unless I learned how to bake low carb/keto friendly I wouldn’t be able to stick to my plan. So in October, I dedicated part of my life to making things I used to love having for dessert. I have so much fun doing what I do each day, and sharing it with all of you. I only wish I could post more, but life is a extremely busy chore!
At my heaviest, circa 2012-2013, I weighed 285 pounds. I didn’t know it at the time, but I had my first bout with depression. I went through a earth shattering break up. I cried myself to sleep for about a year straight. I know that seems utterly ridiculous, but when the first love of your life who was also your best friend for like 8 years breaks your heart, it may take awhile to recover. Everyone is different, but it took me a long time to get over. I turned to eating more than ever before, and I had found a job I loved and had money to blow on fast food daily. Looking back, I cannot believe I didn’t gain more than what I did.
I struggled with being overweight as a child since around 1999-2000 and up until now. (That’s a story for another day) Through all of those 20 years I would try diet after diet after diet with no results. However, at the end of 2013 I was determined to change. I was going to the gym like 4-5 times a week, eating low calorie and low fat, and lost like 30 pounds or so. Then as most of us know all too well, I fell off the wagon when summer came along. Gained a little bit back and was hovering at 260.
In July of 2017, I was up to 280, and I had enough. A wonderful new friend of mine was living her vegan lifestyle. She had been doing so for a LONG time and still is, and there is no doubt in my mind that she will continue that forever. She inspired me to try it as well. I seriously LOVED it! I stuck with it for a year and a half, lost 35 pounds. I don’t even remember why I quit, I think I just fell into the temptation of fast food again. It’s so hard.
I managed to stay around 245-255 after I quit, just because I was still working out here and there. I was still eating insane amounts of calories. For example, I would order a mexican pizza with sour cream, a crunchwrap supreme, a chicken quesadilla, and a large soda of some sort from Taco Bell. Somehow, I ate it all! That was roughly around 1,800 calories, just for dinner. I usually had fast food for breakfast too, and with that I was probably consuming close to 3,500 calories on the days I had fast food twice. (which was quite often, at least 4 times a week)
In July of 2019, my grandmother passed away. It absolutely crushed me, I will never forget how bad my mental health got. It took everything I had to go to work. When I would get home from work I would just lay down in my room for the rest of the day just crying, hating myself, and wanting to die. It got so bad in fact, that I finally went to a new doctor and shared my feelings with her. She officially diagnosed me with severe depression and anxiety. I always had a suspicion that I had anxiety, but I never knew how bad it actually was until I started taking medicine for it and started therapy. NEVER feel ashamed to get help. We are all worthy. Everyone is different, and medicine may not work for you…but even though I had a constant migraine for two weeks, once that cleared up I was a brand new woman. I only wish I had done it sooner.
In that same week that I was diagnosed with those, I also got yelled at by my doctor for high cholesterol levels, and my weight. That was enough for me to realize that I did not want to continue living the way I was. I decided I was going to get healthy for the last time ever. For the first time ever, I didn’t have a binge day. (that day that you eat everything you’re gonna miss before you start a diet) I started immediately. As if I could catch a break, that same week my brother was being deployed overseas. I was dealing with so much, I am proud to say I made it through.
So fast forward to present day, I am sitting at 208 while I’m writing this, even though I was 203 before they closed the gyms up due to COVID-19. This has been so tough. Working out at home is not easy in the slightest, and I never thought in a million years I would ever miss going to the gym every day. I am trying my best, but it is a struggle. Temptation is around constantly. Plus being unemployed right now, I swear all I do is nap and eat. Starting tomorrow, I am putting everything I have into getting under 200. I am so close, and putting it out there I feel like I have to hold myself accountable to do so. I have the eating down, it’s just getting off the couch to workout I have to change. Wish me luck!
If you’re still here, I appreciate you reading, and learning about me. I want to share more personal stuff in the future, because it is so freeing, and I’m not afraid anymore. I love who I have become, and who I plan to be. If you already know me personally, you know me a lot better now.
Dear COVID-19, please go away soon. I miss my friends, family, and the gym.
Tomorrow is my three month keto/low carb anniversary. In those three months I haven’t cheated once. I would be lying to you if I said I didn’t think about it though. What got me through, and continues to get me through, are keto friendly desserts. I had no issue getting rid of pasta and bread, but I am addicted to sweets! The first recipes I found were all from Joe Duff. Peanut butter cookies, ice cream, now banana muffins. If you’re not following him, give him a follow on IG or YouTube. He’s fantastic. Anyways, here’s the recipe and instructions:
There are quite a few different measurements in this recipe, so make sure you have a few mixing bowls, and plenty of measuring spoons and cups ready!
just short of 1 and 3/4 Cup of almond flour
2/3 Cup confectioners erythritol
1/4 Cup crushed walnuts (I didn’t have, I used peanuts)
1/2 Tbsp baking powder
3/4 Tsp ground cinnamon
pinch of salt
3 eggs
1/3 Cup of unsweetened vanilla almond milk (didn’t have, so i used plain unsweetened, and added 1 tsp of vanilla extract to it)
1 stick of melted butter
1/4 Cup full fat sour cream
1/2 Tbsp banana extract
1 Tbsp keto maple syrup
1 Tsp vanilla extract
Preheat oven to 350F.
Have a bowl for wet ingredients, and one for dry ingredients. In your wet ingredient bowl, add your 3 eggs, and whisk together until well combined. Add your melted butter, and the rest of the wet ingredients (including sour cream) to that bowl and whisk together until combined, and set aside.
In another bowl, preferably a larger size, add your dry ingredients (except walnuts) and whisk those together. I prefer putting my dry ingredients through a sifter. Since almond flour has a fat content, if needs to be froze or refrigerated or it can go rancid. In doing this, it can get lumpy and clumpy. To ensure the best results in baking, always sift those dry ingredients! Trust me.
Once dry ingredients are well combined, add in your wet ingredients to the dry ones, and fold ingredients in. Once a thick batter forms, add half of your crushed walnuts to the batter, then fold again.
Spray a cupcake mold pan with a non stick spray (I prefer olive oil spray) and add batter to the slots. This recipe can make 12 small muffins, or 9 large. Go big or go home, folks! Take the rest of your crushed walnuts amd sprinkle over the tops of the muffins.
Throw them in the over for 25-30 minutes. Let cool completely, and enjoy! Joe recommends keeping them in an airtight container in the fridge for a few days.
These muffins were so close to the real thing, with only 210 calories, and only 1.5 g of NET CARBS holy crap! So moist and delicious! I recommend cutting in half, microwave just enough to get them warm, and spread some butter on them. Great sweet snack, or a good breakfast alternative when you get sick of eggs!
Makes about 8-10 servings depending on your slices. Only 6 grams of Net Carbs per slice!
Oh. My. God. I have been making keto friendly desserts for only like eight weeks or so now, and I’ve made this three times already. It is an absolute hit, even with people that eat real sugar on a regular basis. I forget what recipe I found, and where, but I tweaked what I found, and I think it’s perfect. So, without further ado, here is my first official dessert recipe I’m adding here. The whole reason I started Not Without Sweetness!
Ingredients for crust:
2 tbsp of confectioners swerve (or erythritol)
2 tbsp of grass fed butter
1 cup almond flour
Ingredients for filling:
2 blocks of softened cream cheese (16 oz)
1 cup of confectioners swerve
1 cup of pure pumpkin puree (not pumpkin pie filling!)
2 large eggs
1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
2 tsp of pumpkin spice mix, or 1 tsp, and add a shake of each: ground nutmeg, ground ginger, and ground cloves. (this is what I do to give it more flavor)
Instructions for crust:
Preheat your oven to 325F, and spray a 9″ pie pan with non stick spray (I prefer an olive oil spray) set aside.
In a medium bowl, combine melted butter and swerve with a whisk until it has an even consistency. Then add in the almond flour, whisk together until the flour is evenly coated and has a crumbly texture.
3. Transfer mixture to pan, and press firmly into the pan as even as you can get it. I use the flat side of my measuring cup to do so. Then bake in the preheated oven for 10 minutes, then set aside to cool. Keep your oven on, and while you’re waiting for it to cook, you can prepare your filling.
Instructions for filling:
Make sure your cream cheese is all the way softened or it will result in a lumpy texture!
Add pumpkin puree and half of your cream cheese in and beat until smooth, then add in your other half of cream cheese. Once that is mixed well, add in swerve, eggs, vanilla, and spices. Beat until very smooth, and combined.
Pour into previously made crust, spread top evenly, and bake for 40 minutes. Remove, let sit for 20 minutes, then cover, and let chill in the fridge for at least 5 hours. That allows everything to set completely.
Top with whipped topping of choice, serve, and enjoy!
Found this recipe via Pinterest and it’s the perfect lunch! I even had it for dinner, and it hit the spot! Once again, everything came from ALDI USA. So yummy, hope you enjoy!
6 hard boiled eggs
thinly sliced green onion (about 4) avoiding the ends and tops
1/3 cup of mayonnaise
black pepper to taste
1/2tsp smoked paprika
crumbled bacon pieces (fresh or store bought)
cherry tomatoes halved
romaine lettuce leaves
Mash together the eggs as much as possible, the finer the better. Add in the rest of the ingredients and stir. Serve on the romaine leaves (don’t forget to wash them!)
