Enjoy the sweet without giving up your diet

If you have the belief that in healthy eating there is no place for sweets and desserts, you are totally wrong.

So to break that myth, I have decided to bring you this post where I am going to give you 5 healthy desserts and sweets , with their recipes so that you can enjoy sweets without giving up a healthy life. Remember that if you want to expand this recipe book and learn to enjoy sweet without worrying about sugar, you have the complete sugar course available at the academy.

1. Fruit skewers with 70% chocolate
2. Spelled crepes
3. Oatmeal Cookies
4. Homemade cocoa cream
5. Healthy ice cream

Before you start with healthy sweets

What has no place in a healthy diet are sweets, cakes, pastries and other ultra-processed products . Those will be excluded, since the ingredients used to make them are not of quality and a lot of sugar and saturated, trans and hydrogenated fats are added. Instead we will make these sweets ourselves in a totally healthy way. We will make use of homemade pastries.

And, despite the fact that if we can enjoy the sweet,  we should not do it daily , let me explain. Homemade pastries are a good alternative to processed sweets and cakes if they contain good ingredients, but it does not mean that the processing increases energy density (calories) and palatability (taste), so it must be taken into account so as not to make a c excessive consumption. 

You should not think that because it is homemade pastries it is a healthy food (although it is more so than its industrial version) or that for that reason it can be consumed daily. This type of preparation must have the consumption that corresponds to them that is occasionally and punctually : on someone’s birthday, at a celebration, holiday or any other day. Bear in mind that, in addition, it  probably displaces healthier foods that could be eaten instead, such as fruits or nuts.

Sweets that look healthy but aren’t

Next I am going to explain some sweets that we believe are healthy, but that are not, so that you can directly eliminate them from the list of healthy sweets and desserts.

Vegetable cakes: carrot, pumpkin …

Vegetable cakes such as carrot cake, no matter how much it has that name and one of its ingredients is a vegetable, is not a healthy dessert or sweet. Most of these cakes, in addition to carrots, contain: sugar, butter, creamy cheeses, white chocolate …

Cocoa creams 0%

The monkey even if she dresses in silk, she stays cute. Although it is a cream with fewer calories and less sugar, it is still a cream not recommended, as it is still high in palm oil. They have also replaced sugar with sweeteners, these being the first ingredient in the list of ingredients (remember that the list of ingredients is in order of content, that is, the first ingredient is the one that is in greater quantity) and remember that such and As the first Meta-Analysis published in April 2017 shows, the consumption of sweeteners is linked to overweight and obesity. This happens by looking at sugar as an isolated ingredient and not the whole of the product.

Wholegrain cookies, eco, bio, sugar-free, fat-free or any similar claim

All supermarket cookies  are discouraged. As healthy as they may seem, they sure contain sugar, sweeteners, fats, or are not really whole. Sugar, no matter how cane or very biological, is still sugar, so we should not consume it.

5 Recipes for healthy sweets and desserts

1. Fruit skewers with chocolate 70% cocoa or higher

This dessert you can consume daily, since you are consuming fruits with a little (10-20 grams) of chocolate, that the more cocoa, the better.

2. Spelled crepes

• Ingredients:
  • 250 grams of spelled flour
  • 500 grams of whole milk
  • 2 eggs
  • 1 tablespoon of olive oil
  • 1 pinch of sugar (optional)
  • 1 pinch of salt

• Elaboration:
  • Mix all the ingredients and beat until you get a homogeneous dough. 2. Let the dough rest for a minimum of 30 minutes before using it.
  • After the resting time, grease a pan with butter or oil and with the help of a ladle, pour a tablespoon of dough, making it spread well, turning the pan.
  • When it is golden and takes off from the sides, turn it over and brown it on the other side. Remove to a plate and repeat until the pancake batter is used up.
  • When they are ready, fill the crepes to taste or they can also be frozen. In the image: figs, banana and 90% chocolate. Even sweeter option: unsweetened peanut butter and banana.

3. Oatmeal cookies

• Ingredients:
  • 2 bananas
  • 60 grams of oats
  • Toppings to taste: cinnamon, raisins, cocoa nibs, grated coconut …

• Elaboration:
  • Mash the banana with a fork and mix it with the oats and toppings.
  • Make balls with the dough.
  • Put them on a tray and bake at 180 ° for 20 minutes.
  • Let cool and ready to eat!

4. Homemade cocoa cream (by @ pecosa75)

• Ingredients:
  • 120 grams unsalted roasted hazelnuts
  • 3 tablespoons pure cocoa
  • 6 dates
  • 150 ml semi-skimmed milk
  • 1 teaspoon of coconut oil (with olive oil it is too strong)

• Elaboration:
  • Blend the hazelnuts until they release the oil.
  • Incorporate the dates soaked in the milk and other ingredients.
  • Blend until everything is well integrated and you obtain a homogeneous mass.

5. Healthy ice cream (by @marta_oss)

• Ingredients:
  • Frozen banana
  • Greek style yogurt
  • Peanut butter
  • Cinnamon
  • Defatted pure cocoa

• Elaboration:
  • Blend the frozen banana until creamy. Add the rest of the ingredients and freeze.
  • To get a creamier texture, take it out after an hour in the freezer and stir.
  • The yogurt can be cow, goat, sheep, soy, according to preference. If it is Greek it will be creamier.
  • Before eating it, you can add a topping: nuts, grated coconut, more cinnamon …

conclusion

As you can see, you can eat desserts and sweets and eat a healthy diet. The message I want to reach you is:

1. It is always better to cook and make homemade preparations. In this way the consumption of ultra-processed products is displaced. Cooking helps to improve our adherence to the diet without eating unhealthy ingredients , it also connects us with the kitchen and raw materials, so we develop culinary skills and pay attention to what we eat.
2. However, we should not eat it daily. Because it does not mean that the processing increases energy density (calories) and palatability (taste). It can also shift your consumption of healthy foods like fruits and nuts.
3. A fruit will always be healthier and more recommendable than any homemade pastry.
4. Changing habits, eating healthy and following a healthy diet does not mean giving up sweets, celebrations or social life.