Healthy Desserts with Surprising Ingredients

No one really wants to give up dessert when they choose a healthy lifestyle. Desserts are often high in sugar, fat and carbs, while also being nutritionally void, so we’re advised to skip them if we can, or replace them with fruit. But what about boosting the nutritional value of desserts while reducing processed sugars? That’s where these delicious recipes come in! Each one of these recipes contains a VEGETABLE surprise. Enjoy!

Sweet Potato Brownies (V, GF)

These are, in short, incredible. This recipe calls for the larger, more expensive Medjool dates, but I’ve made them with regular dates and they are so deliciously textured. I use brown rice flour instead of buckwheat flour and honey instead of maple syrup and get wonderful results every time. They’re rich, fudgy and sinful feeling without using any processed sugar.

 

Chickpea Blondies (V, GF)

These are good. Dangerously good. As in I ate the entire pan by myself in 2 days good. The best part is they’re not overly sweet, and there’s something really satisfying to me about the slight graininess of the finished product. It feels like it’s loaded with sugar while being totally natural. As usual I subbed out the maple syrup for honey and used regular non-vegan chocolate chips. I’d love to make these again next week but to be totally honest with you I don’t need a binge food just lying around the place. They’re THAT good.

 

Not Quite Banana Bread (GF, DF)

I adore parsnips. They’re sweet and floral and might just be perfect for dessert, and apparently during WWII bananas were scarce and housewives used parsnips as substitutes! Maybe I can adapt this to be pure parsnip bread someday. This recipe is dairy free and gluten free but not vegan as it does contain eggs. Although perhaps flax eggs could be substituted to convert this recipe to full vegan. I haven’t given this recipe a shot yet but I’m super excited about trying it!

Cauliflower “Rice” Pudding (Paleo, GF, DF)

I need to try this, for serious. Growing up, rice pudding was a regular staple in our house. My Gran’s rice pudding was always warm and rather thin, spiced with cinnamon, and often made with raisins. But rice pudding made from CAULIFLOWER?! Is there anything cauliflower can’t do? This rice pudding does contain egg to form the custard, but it’s dairy free. And it sounds SO GOOD. Can’t wait to try it!

So there are tons of interesting vegetable dessert recipes out there that are healthy for you to try! I even left over a beet cake because honestly I don’t like beets very much, but a quick Pinterest search will reveal plenty!

Even when eating healthy, you CAN have dessert!