A Health Nut’s Guide to Sweet Tooth Foods

“Healthy desserts”

This phrase normally may send  shivers down your spine. I have friends who ask in horror when I make delicious, presumed “fatty” desserts:  “What did you do to my favorite chocolate chip cookies?”

What do I exactly do? I make them just a little bit better by focusing on three “sinful” staples in my kitchen — eggs, butter, and sugar — and substitute their healthy counterparts.

To understand the role of each ingredient in baking, I consult articles written by Stephanie Jaworski, creator of Joyofbaking.com, who has 4.5 million visitors check out her delectable ideas annually.In her article ‘Eggs’, she explains that they provide “leavening”. She advises readers that they “add color, texture, flavor, and richness to the batter.” She advises that beaten eggs add “leavening agents” which will allow your creation to rise.  Eggs also act as a binder. The binding is what stops cookie dough from crumbling.

 Jennifer Iserloh, otherwise known as the Skinny Chef, sums up why eggs get a bad rap in her blog article ‘Are Eggs Bad for You’.  She states that “one large egg has six grams of fat, 213 mg of cholesterol, and 84 calories. That means that eggs are over 60 percent fat and one third of that happens to be saturated.”It seems like including eggs in every batch of cookies is not the best idea, then. What can I substitute for such an integral ingredient? Jeanette Bradley in ‘Half a Dozen Egg Substitutes”’draws attention to the creative alternates.

One example is flax seed gel. Flax seeds are ideal substitutes because they are – just like eggs – high in protein and fat, which acts as a strong binder. To make flax seed gel, all it takes is to mix two tablespoons of ground flax seed with three tablespoons of water. She recommends including the nutty flavored flax seed gel in whole grain foods like bran or corn muffins.

Other stand-ins include fruit purees, like bananas and applesauce. Some may be surprised by this; Fruit works?! “The pectin from the fruit acts similarly to fat, holding the air bubbles in the batter” Bradley says. She advises including an extra ½ teaspoon of baking powder along with an extra teaspoon of oil or butter to maintain the texture of the recipe. The best recipes to proxy fruit for eggs are denser, sweeter delicacies like muffins or coffee cakes.

As a typical rebel chef, I had to try this. I made chocolate chip cookies and substituted ¼-cup applesauce for one egg, along with the additional ½-teaspoon of baking soda. To give the batter more firmness, I added ¼-cup flour. The cookies came out a bit more moist in the center, but still had that lovable crunch!

For recipes calling for less than three eggs, Bradley proposes using a combination of baking powder, water, and canola oil. “Baking powder replaces the leavening provided by the egg; water and oil replace the liquid and fat that egg provides.” Add two teaspoons of baking powder, two teaspoons of water, and one tablespoon of canola oil for best results.

Butter is another menace in the baking world. One stick of butter, a typical amount for a recipe, carries 800 calories and 56 grams of saturated fat. Yikes! This being said, How important is this fatty and delectable ingredient?As it turns out, it is extremely important. Jaworksi in ‘Butter’ knows that, like eggs, “the creaming or beating of your butter or butter and sugar creates air bubbles that your leavener (baking powder or baking soda) will enlarge during baking.” Omitting something that essential will not create delectable cookies.

Then again, maybe it will. Lori Alden, in ‘The Cook’s Thesaurus: Fats”’ writes “in many recipes for quick breads, muffins, and cookies, you can reduce the amount of fat by about a third without seriously compromising the quality.”

Alden also names apple butter as a suitable replacement. “Apple butter can replace up to ¾ of the shortening [butter and shortening are interchangeable] in many recipes. Also, reduce sugar if the apple butter is sweetened; add with the liquid ingredients.”  Mix in apple butter with breads and muffins for a heavier dish. However, she writes, “avoid substituting oils for solid fats when baking cookies, cakes, and pastries; it will make the dish greasy and dense.”

For some dishes however, I can use olive oil as a stand-in for butter. Who knew? Carol Firenze raves about the benefits of olive oil in ‘Baking with Olive Oil Instead of Butter.”’ By using Olive oil instead of butter, cholesterol and saturated fat content of desserts is dramatically reduced.

“Because olive oil contains Vitamin E, it helps to naturally maintain the freshness of baked goods and creates moist biscuits and muffins.”  For ½ cup of butter (1 stick), she recommends ¼ cup and 2 tablespoons of olive oil.

Standing on the sidelines is butter’s silent sidekick: sugar. The sugar granules play an important role in creating fluffy cakes and smooth cookie dough; they “rub against the fat, producing air bubbles in the butter” clarifies Jaworski in ‘Sugars.’ I used to use brown sugar in my recipes instead of white sugar. Somewhere along the way, I was told it was healthier.“You can chalk that up to clever marketing or plain old simple illusion. In reality, brown sugar is most often ordinary table sugar that is turned brown by reintroduction of molasses”  breaks Anahad O’Connor in ‘The Claim Brown Sugar is Healthier than White Sugar.’

If brown sugar is not healthier, then what is? Elizabeth Warden RD discusses the merits of different sweeteners in ‘Natural Sweeteners, Which Ones Should You Use?’ She loves black strap molasses, as it is the only sweetener that includes very helpful levels of nutrients such as calcium, potassium, iron, selenium, magnesium, and manganese. Another front-runner is dark honey; the high levels of anti-oxidants help to keep our cells healthy.

Agave nectar is another possible substitute for typical sugar. The nectar has inulin, which “slows down blood sugar response to dietary sugar, and may be why agave doesn’t raise blood sugar levels as much as sugar and other natural sweeteners.” Warden states the only drawback with agave nectar is price; a small 8-ounce bottle can run up to ten dollars.

A granular sugar substitute is stevia, also known as “Truvia.” However, while it has been generally recognized as safe by the FDA, the Center for Science in the Public Interest “is concerned about animal and lab tests suggesting high doses of stevia may result in mutations that might lead to cancer” reports Warden.

“The real issue,”  Warden believes, “is the total amount of sugar…not the type.” With a little tweaking, we can lower the sugar in our kitchens, along with replacing eggs and butter with other, more interesting, substitutes.