Baking healthily?

[His_Ruby]

I really enjoy baking, but I avoid doing it because whatever I make gets eaten up within a day or two in our house. Which is unhealthy when I make my famous choc cake.

I’d love to bake more and am wondering if any of you have great-tasting recipes for healthier baking. I know about things like banana bread, zucchini muffins, which are great! But I’d love some ideas for cookies… cakes… etc.!

 

[EmBee]

Hah, well, these aren’t “healthy”, but I don’t feel as guilty after eating these as I would after eating my lemon poppyseed bundt cake (yummo!). They resemble granola bars and would probably be great to pack in little kids’ lunches. To make them healthier, you could use less butter (just enough to mold everything together) and be conservative with the brown sugar since the dried fruit & raisons are so sweet. Also, I only ever use one bottle of sesame seeds (it’s not quite a half a cup, but it’s plenty). I’m sure this recipe could be made into many variations with different nut/dried fruit combos, I just haven’t had the time to experiment (yet).

Sesame Apricot Bars

¼ cup (1½ sticks) unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 cup light brown sugar
1 egg, at room temperature
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup rolled oats
½ teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
½ teaspoon kosher salt
1 cup finely chopped dried apricots
½ cup golden raisins
½ cup toasted sesame seeds*

Preheat oven to 350° and lightly grease a 9x13in pan.

Place butter and sugar in a bowl and beat until smooth. Add the egg and mix well. Add flour, oats, baking soda, ground cinnamon and kosher salt and mix to combine. Add apricots, raisins, and sesame seeds and mix until everything is well incorporated. Place in prepared pan and spread evenly. Bake until golden brown, ~25minutes.

Makes 24 bars.

*To toast: spread out on a cookie sheet and bake at 300° for ~15min.

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[EmBee]

P.S. I hope you get more posts - I’m interested in finding some healthier recipes, too

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[Lil_M]

I was hoping for more posts too because all I know how to bake is stuff full of sugar and butter! There must be more disciplined people out there…?

I can recommend a great series of cookbooks - they are really humorous and have excellent recipes. My sister has them and they are fun just to read! They are titled Looneyspoons, Crazy Plates, and Eat, Shrink and be Merry.

amazon.ca/s/ref=nb_ss_gw?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=looneyspoons

 

[basilisk]

I’ve heard you can replace most of the oil in recipes with applesauce. If you use the unsweetened natural kind, that would be pretty healthy.

 

[dulcissima]

I don’t have a recipe, but just wanted to say that cookies made with whole grains do taste really good. My boyfriend is really into using whole grains and last month we baked a batch of cookies made with rye flour that were great. He just substitued it in for the white flour. His other tip is to reduce the sugar and boost the flavor (extracts or spices) when you are baking.