I’ve always been a fan of dense chewy freezable (but eatable right out of the freezer) macaroons and truffles…. In the past, I always made the standard raw food community blond and chocolate macs, but I just reviewed that old recipe and discovered that it has an entire cup of maple syrup in it. In the old days, I didn’t flinch at that….now, it makes my blood curdle just a little bit.
Therefore, I decided to start from scratch because I knew if I tried to just sub in a dry sugar substitute or add stevia instead, the texture wouldn’t work at all and the macs would never stick together (note: the macs I made turned out more like truffles so I changed their name!). Peanut butter just really seemed to be the most logical (and delicious) glue for the new macs to be born in my kitchen. Other than that…I worked with what I had, and also made additions as I went along (almond flour) based on the texture and taste of the batter.
Super Dark Chocolate Peanut Butter Truffles (A close cousin to the macaroon!)
Gluten free, grain free, dairy free, no sugar added…but really delicious!
Mix together (I used a KitchenAid mixer w/ paddle attachment):
1 cup dried unsweetened coconut flakes
1/2 cup cocoa powder (I used Hershey’s Special Dark–it’s half Dutch processed and half unprocessed)
2 Tbsp coconut oil
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp liquid stevia
2 Tbsp sweetener of your choice (I used ZSweet, but maple syrup would be great too—just taste as you go and adjust the amount accordingly)
1/2 cup almond flour
2/3 cup peanut butter
1/2 tsp sea salt
Mix all ingredients until well combined. Use a mini scooper to arrange on dehydrator trays and dehydrate at 115 for several hours. I intended to leave them in for 15 hours or so, but a couple of them started to melt, so I took them out after about 6 hours. You’ll want to taste one occasionally—technically they’re done when crisp on the outside and chewy on the inside, but the peanut butter makes them pretty soft while they’re warm (cool one down a bit before you taste test it!). They don’t really get “crisp,” but just firm up a bit—the dehydrator step is unnecessary if you’re going to keep these in the freezer!
I’m so happy with these plain, but I thought they could be just a bit prettier and more interesting with frosting.
I'm 99% sure you could put these straight in the freezer and skip the dehydrator part--I only left them in the dehydrator for a few hours because a couple of them started to melt. I anticipated them being a different texture than they ended up being---and I was pleasantly surprised!
So I made a glaze and drizzled it over the finished product.
Peanut Butter Glaze
Remember “magic shell?” ….well, this is just like that in a peanut butter flavor. I’m not sure how I never used this before—it’s super easy!
1 Tbsp coconut oil, melted
2 heaping Tbsp peanut butter
1/4 tsp vanilla stevia
Stir until mixed. Drizzle over truffles….or pour onto ice cream or mix into yogurt….or eat with a spoon (I may or may not have tried it that way) …this stuff is great, and I’m sure I’ll use it for many things!
News/Notes:
Chalk up another win for aloe juice as a remedy for acid reflux! In other words….Down with Acid Blockers! A client reached her one-week mark of being off acid blockers today, with a shot glass full of aloe every morning, she’s had zero acid reflux. Just thought I’d tell you that since I’m excessively happy about it.
I just walked about 8 miles. I couldn’t stop–it was so nice out, and after my mom dropped out (to go eat dinner) after an hour I just kept going. Call it procrastinating (I have several discussion posts to do tonight in my classrooms), or whatever you want, but it was a great day to just walk till the sun went down.
How is your week so far?
Pin It
