I have been experimenting with baking without adding a sweetener like honey. This recipe uses dates as the only sweetener. Using honey more sparingly decreases sugar cravings, reduces calories, and it saves money. When I first started SCD I found myself buying honey all the time. I also started getting a little tired of the taste of honey.
This is a small serving recipe. You can double it if you want more, but a lot of times I don’t want to have leftovers. I want to move on to something new. This will serve two to four depending on your serving size. Since it wasn’t too sweet, it also works for breakfast.
Filling Ingredients:
5 Medjool dates – chopped
1 tbsp butter
1/4 tsp sea salt
1/4 + 1 to 2 tbsp of water
1/2 tsp vanilla
2 large granny smith apples
2 tsp lemon juice
1 tbsp coconut flour
1 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp ginger
Topping Ingredients:
1/4 cup almond flour
1 tsp cinnamon
1/8 tsp sea salt
1/2 cup chopped walnuts
3 tbsp cold butter – chopped
Preparation:
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees
- Peel, core and chop or slice apples (I like them thinly sliced)
- Toss apples with lemon juice in a medium mixing bowl
- Add dates and 1/4 cup of water to a small saucepan
- Bring to a simmer and stir until dates begin to break down
- Continue stirring and smash dates to mix them with the water
- Add 1 tbsp butter
- Add 1/4 tsp sea salt
- Simmer and stir until dates begin to darken
- Add 1 – 2 tbsp water as needed to keep a sauce consistency
- When sauce darkens to a dark amber color and looks a little shiny remove from heat
- Stir in vanilla
- Allow to cool a little before mixing with apples
- Mix the rest of the filling ingredients with the apples
- Stir in date carmel
- Add mixture to lightly buttered 8 x 8 baking dish or you can use two 4 x 4 dishes
- Combine all topping ingredients to a mixing bowl
- Combine with butter to make pea-size lumps
- Pour evenly over apple mixture
- Bake for 35 minutes – until apples are soft
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I know the SCD sweeteners are honey, fruits, or saccharin , so my question is theoretical and ONLY if one does NOT have a serious intestinal disease like Chron’s, but instead a milder case of irritable bowel syndrome.
Erythritol and other alcohol related sweeteners are illegal, but if one wants to use one of these 2 natural sweeteners:
1. stevia: a leaf, that in it’s pure form is too expensive but in a good price range has 3g per tsp of erythritol.
2. monk fruit: a fruit but also has 4g per tsp of erythritol.
Buying erythritol itself to use as an artificial sweetener has 4g per tsp of erythritol.
The equivalent to 1 Tbsp sugar of the above is:
1. stevia: 1/4 – 1/8 tsp
2. monk fruit: 1 Tbsp
3. erythritol: 1 Tbsp
So, the quantity of erythritol in stevia one would use in a recipie is much less than if one uses monk fruit or straight erythritol.
Question:
If stevia is a natural leaf and the quantity of erythritol is so small, why couldn’t one use stevia (plus a bulk filler like bananna, pumpkin, etc) in conjunction with honey in a recepie?
For SCD I have to stick with the sweeteners outlined in Breaking the Vicious Cycle to call it an SCD recipe. Anytihng outside the diet is a personal choice. For some other sweeteners work for them and have successfully added to the diet.
Going further into IBS diet choices, if one follows SCD and FODMAP, erythritol is not on either diet so I’d say no to that choice.
Sucrose is not on SCD, honey is not on FODMAP. A trial on both these is warranted for me.
Saccharin is good on both diets.
Work in progress.
thanks