Dark Chocolate Walnut Cookies are in the Oven

Really excited to have a few I these bad boys in my belly in about 10 minutes time! 

The batter was surprisingly delicious, usually I am not a fan of almond flour batters, but this one is really good.

Chickpea Almond Butter Chocolate Cookies

This was my first food experiment using chickpeas.

I think it went pretty well, it created tasty and moist cookies.

My boyfriend likes them fully cooled, I like them both warm and cooled.

Before you can even really start making the cookies you will need to soak your chickpeas for about 12 hours. Below are before (left) and after (right) photos of my chickpeas.

Yup, your chickpeas do not look appealing right now... we are about to fix that! 

Procedure
1 1/4 cup of chickpeas
1 half bar of 90% cocoa chocolate (50g)
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 cup of warmed unsweetened, unsalted almond butter
1 teaspoon of baking powder
1 tablespoon of unsweetened almond milk (I used coconut almond milk)
2 tablespoons of Fry's Cocoa Powder
2 teaspoons of vanilla

*dash of salt (if you have unsalted almond butter, if you use salted then don't worry about it)

Procedure
1. Soak chickpeas in water for at least 12 hours. I added a teaspoon of almond extract to the mixture hoping it would soak in a little bit.
2. Preheat oven to 350F.
3. After your chickpeas have soaked drain them and put the chickpeas in a food processor.
4. Warm almond butter in the microwave for around 45 seconds.
5. Add all ingredients, but the chocolate bar.
6. While the other ingredients are mixing into one big ball of dough, chop up the chocolate bar into makeshift chocolate chips.
7. Once the ingredients are mixed into one big, even ball of dough (no chickpea lumps), move it into a medium bowl and hand mix in chocolate bits.
*If the mixture is not mixing well add another tablespoon of almond milk
8. Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper.
9. Make rounded lumps of dough (around an inch).
10. Press each lump down with a fork.
11. Bake for around 9 minutes.
12. Let cool for around 5 minutes.

Each batch should make about 18 cookies.

Nutritional Information To Come...

Low Carb Cookies & Cream Cake

Little, but mighty. 

I baked this cake the other day. I really, really liked it. It is small, but very filling. I baked mine in two layers, but you could make the mix in just one big cake. I really want to incorporate peanut butter with this cake in the future. I consider a slice of this cake a treat. It has about 7 carbs per slice and a ton of fat and protein. 

Side view

Ingredients
Cake
3 Cups of Almond Flour
3 Tablespoons of Sweetener
3 Tablespoons of Cocoa Powder
2 Teaspoons of Baking Powder
1/4 Teaspoon of Salt
5 Eggs
2 Teaspoons of Vanilla

Icing
1/4 Cup of Melted Butter
5 Oz of Cream Cheese
1/4 Cup of Whipping Cream
1 Teaspoon Coconut Oil
2 Teaspoons of Vanilla
1/4 Teaspoon of Cinnamon 
2 Tablespoons of Sweetener
3 Tablespoons of Cocoa Powder
1/4 Bar of 99% Cocoa Chocolate (I use Lindtt)

Prep Work
-Preheat oven to 350.
-Grease cake pan. 


Procedure
1. Mix the dry ingredients: Almond Flour, 3 Tablespoons of Sweetener, 3 Tablespoons of Cocoa Powder, baking powder and salt. 
2. Whisk eggs and 2 teaspoons of vanilla in a separate bowl. 
3. Add eggs mixture to the dry ingredients. 
4. Pour into greased pan (or pans).
5. My small oven baked the cake in 30 minutes. Keep an eye on it, this will vary (of course) by oven.

Make the icing while the cake bakes. 

6. Warm (but do not completely melt) cream cheese and butter together. Mix well. 
7. Add in teaspoon of coconut oil.
8. Add in 3 tablespoons of coca powder and 2 tablespoons of sweetener.
9. Add cinnamon and refridgerate. 

10. Allow cake to cool.

11. Ice cake and shave 99% cocoa chocolate over the cake. 

Inside.

Nutritonal Information (per slice, 8 slices per cake):
Calories: 460
Total Fat: 38.3g
Carbs: 13.3g
Fiber: 6.1g
Sugars: 3g
Protein: 15.2g

Keto/Low Carb Éclair

I had a really bad craving for eclairs and so I thought I would give making them a shot. Here is my first attempt at the recipe. I experimented with a few different ways to make them, the following is the recipe for my best of the batch. 

Overall,  I really liked them. I used home made low-carb vanilla pudding and used it for the inner cream, next time I am going to use low-carb pre made  pudding. You don't need too much pudding, maybe half a pack made from a mix. My homemade pudding (found in a separate blog post) was not think enough and leaked through the bottom. I froze them to avoid leakage. This recipe should make 12, mine are a little bigger than they should be. 

Ingredients 
1/2 Cup Butter (I used salted, if you do not use salted add 1/4 teaspoon of salt)
1 Cup Water
1 1/2 Cup Almond Flour
1/2 Tablespoon Of Cornstarch
4 Eggs
2 Cups Of Vanilla Pudding
3/4 Cup Heavy Cream
1/4 Cup Granulated Sweetener
3 Teaspoons Vanilla Extract
5 Squared Of 90% Cocoa Chocolate
2 Tablespoons Butter
1/3 Cup Sweetener
3 Tablespoons Of Hot Water

Prep Work
-Preheat oven to 400 degrees. 
-Grease a cookie sheet.

Procedure
-Combine 1/2 cup of butter and 1 cup of water in a medium saucepan. Bring to a boil, melt butter completely.
-Reduce to medium heat. Stir in almond flour, 1 teaspoon of vanilla and cornstarch. After a few minutes of brisk stirring reduce heat to low and let thicken. Remove from heat.
-Add eggs, one at a time. Mix completely.
-Put batter on cookie sheet in 1 1/2 x 4 inch strips. 
-Bake 10 minutes.
-Add more batter on the semi-firm top of each strip. Attempt to double it in size. 
-Reduce heat to 325 and bake for 15 to 20 more minutes. 
-Check on them, you want them to puff up and balloon. They will not end up being completely hollow on the inside.
-Cool on a wire rack.

For the filling:
-Beat the whip cream until soft peaks form. 
-Beat in 1/4 cup of sweetener and 1 teaspoon of vanilla.
-Fold whip cream into pudding. 

-Cut the tops off of the pastries once they have cooled.
-Spoon in filling and cover. Chill or freeze.

For icing:
-Melt chocolate and 2 tablespoons of butter in saucepan in low heat.
-Stir in 1/3 cup of sweetener and 1 teaspoon of vanilla. 
-Add water, one tablespoon at a time. 

-Drizzle or smooth icing over chilled pastries. I liked to seal the top back on with the chocolate icing. I then put mine in the freezer to make sure they stuck together. 

Nutrition (per eclair)
Calories: 315
Total Fat: 30g
Carbs: 6.6g
Fiber: 1.9g
Sugars: 1.1g
Protein: 6.2g