German Chocolate Torte

My favorite dessert has always been German Chocolate Cake. Since Ryan and I have gone "primal" I have been trying out different desserts so that I can continue to share my baking with my friends and family. About a month ago, I ran across the blog, The Food Lovers Kitchen. I found this recipe and immediately bookmarked it with the intent of making it for my birthday, instead I made brownies. Today, I decided to tackle this recipe. It wasn't very hard at all and it tastes incredible.

The recipe uses coconut flour which is extremely low carb. If you click the down arrow next to the serving amount you can decrease the serving. I made 6 servings. I used a mixture of stevia** and honey to sweeten the recipe.  I have included the changes I made below. I hope you give the dessert a try!

Make the recipe!

Instead of	I used
Pecans	Walnuts
Chocolate chips	Baker’s Chocolate (sweetened slightly with stevia**)
Palm Oil	Coconut Oil
Maple Syrup	3 tbs honey and 1/4 tsp stevia**
Salt	I left this out.

**A note about stevia.

-Make sure that the stevia is the real thing, otherwise it will not be as sweet as the stevia I use. Vegetable inulin is a bulking agent, so it is not as sweet as pure stevia. Also, some stevias are sweetened with dextrose and other sweeteners. I buy my stevia from the bulk section of HyVee. The stevia bottle says, Stevia rebaudiana which is just the name of the stevia plant. It is so much sweeter than the bottled stevia options that have additives to them. About 1/2 tsp of pure stevia is equivalent to 1 cup of sugar.

Mini Pumpkin Pies

Ryan told me that he wanted a pumpkin pie for his birthday, so I set to work to make a gluten free pumpkin pie sweetened with stevia. My first attempt had way too much stevia in it but my second attempt was just like...pumpkin pie. :) Ryan and I decided to make mini pumpkin pies so that we could share them easier. We had friends over for dinner tonight and this is what we served them for dessert. They went back for seconds! Give this a try. :)

Makes one 9-in pie or 24 mini pies

Crust

150 g Almonds ground

100 g cashew

2 tbs honey

3 tbs butter

1. Place nuts in a blender and finely grind.

2. Melt butter

3. Stir ground nuts, butter, and honey until evenly distributed.

4. Press mixture into bottom of muffin tins (or one 9-in pie dish)

Bake crust 7 minutes.

Pie Filling

1/4 teaspoon Stevia*

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/8 teaspoon Salt

1/4 teaspoon Pumpkin pie spice (powdered cinnamon, cloves, ginger, nutmeg, and allspice)

1 teaspoon Vanilla

2 Large Eggs                                               

1 can (15 oz) Pureed Pumpkin**

1 cup Whipping Cream

1. Mix stevia, cinnamon, salt, pumpkin pie mix in small bowl. Beat eggs in large bowl. Stir in pumpkin, vanilla, and stevia-spice mixture into beaten eggs. Gradually stir in cream.

2. Pour into pie shells.

3. Bake at 300° F; bake for 20 - 25 minutes. Mine did not set all of the way before the crust began to brown too much so I removed it and let it cool. The pie thickened for me while cooling.

* (Make sure you have real stevia or your pie will not be sweet enough. We buy our stevia from the bulk section of HyVee because the precontainered stevia that we had found has added fillers (vegetable inulin, dextrose...ect) so then more of your "stevia" will be needed to make the pie sweet enough.)

**(Make sure you buy pureed pumpkin and not pureed pumpkin pie mix-the pumpkin pie mixture has sugar already added.)

Vegetarian Thai Pizza

Ryan and I had extra ginger root around the house and we decided we needed to use some of it. I google recipes that had ginger in them and I found a blog titled, Oh My Veggies. I had never found this blog before in my search for recipes but I am so glad that I did today. This Vegetarian Thai Pizza is absolutely scrumpcious.

I did not have some of the ingredients that this recipe called for so I substituted. The substituations I made are below. I thought that too much sauce would be made if I followed the recipe exactly.

Instead of	I used
3 button mushrooms, thinly sliced	1 baby bella mushroom
1/2 c. peanut butter	1/4 c. peanut butter
1 tbsp. rice vinegar	1 1/2 tsp apple cider vinegar
1 garlic clove, minced	1/4 tsp minced garlic
1 tbsp. brown sugar	1 1/2 tsp raw honey
3/4 c. shredded mozzarella cheese	1/4 cup mozzarella cheese
1/2 red pepper, sliced into rings	1/2 anaheim pepper

I have an allergy to gluten so I used a premade gluten free crust from HyVee.  The brand of crust is Udi's. Ryan and I love that crust! Each package comes with 2 crusts.

Give this pizza a try! It is wonderful!

Click here for the recipe!

Anne P's 5 Minute No Bake Peanut Butter Granola Bars

Hello!

Ryan and I have been trying recipes that we have found on many other blogs. You wouldn't believe how many bloggers include a gluten free section in their blogs. One of our favorite blogs to find recipes on is fANNEtastic food. The blogger, Anne P., has shared some great gluten free recipes that I have enjoyed making.

Monday, I made Anne's 5 Minute No Bake Peanut Butter Granola Bars with a few changes since I did not have all of the called for ingredients. I used just 1/4 cup of honey and 1 table spoon butter in place of the brown rice syrup. The bars did not stick together for me which may have been caused by my substituation.  Other than the crumbliness of the bars, they were delicious. In fact, Ryan and I ate them in less than 48 hours...oops.

We decided to make more on Wednesday but we wanted to try something different to see if the granola would stick together better. Again I added 1/4 cup honey in place of the brown rice syrup but I also added 3 tbs butter and 1.5 oz unsweetened bakers chocolate. Also, instead of storing the bars in the refrigerator, I have placed them in the freezer. The bars are still crumbly but they are holding together better today than my attempt on Monday. I think they are great as a frozen treat. I think I will try Anne's recipe exactly as it is written next time. I hope you all give Anne's recipe a try because it was delicious! :) Enjoy!

Try Anne's recipe here!