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Wednesday, September 19, 2012

The quest for low cal (yummy) baked goods

I LOVE baking.  It is relaxing and comforting to me.  Seeing I am refusing to completely stop baking to conform with my new calorie counting ways, I have been on the look out for low cal/ low fat baked goods that would fit well into the plan.  Perhaps I am asking too much, there are a million recipes out there that are low cal, but they use BOX mixes - not something that I condone.  I prefer to make all my baked goods from scratch.  

I have discovered that the key to the low cal/low fat recipes are sugar and flour substitutes.  Enter the Chocolate Chunk Muffins.  I have been stock piling sugar substitutes like Stevia and agave syrup for use in these recipes so today I decided to try the muffins out.  

Chocolate Chunk Muffins
1 3/4 cups Oats
3/4 c Cocoa
3 Egg Whites
1/2 c Unsweetened Applesauce
1 t Vanilla Extract
1/2 c Plain Yogurt (you can use greek or non fat) 
1/2 t Cream of Tartar
1 1/2 t Baking Powder
1 1/2 t Baking Soda
1 c Hot Water
1/4 c + 2T Stevia (or 1c Sugar Substitute such as Splenda)
1/2 c Chocolate Morsels 

  1. Preheat oven to 350.  Prepare 2 12-cup muffin tins
  2. Add all ingredients, save chocolate morsels, into a blender and blend till oats are finely chopped
  3. Mix in chocolate morsels by hand
  4. Pour into muffin tins
  5. Bake till tops slightly crack and muffin tops spring back
The recipe is pretty good, yet I still have a problem with the Stevia.  Sugar substitutes (all of them) leave a nasty after taste in my mouth.  The muffins are good, but I can't get away from that after taste.  I suppose I can deal with this batch seeing if you make 24 small muffins they are only 58 calories a piece, and if you make 12 muffins they are 116 cals, but I doubt I will be making them again.  Anyone have any suggestions for low cal HOMEMADE baked goods?  I am thinking I will just continue with my original plan, normal baked goods in MODERATION!



UPDATE:
I let the muffins sit for a couple of days (ever notice that a chocolate cake is so much better the day AFTER it was made?) and I have noticed that the bitter after-taste is less apparent.  Also they peel from the wrappers a lot easier - so I guess all in all this wasn't the complete failure I thought it was!  

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