Tag: keto

Rainbow Cheesecake Bars

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Hello, friends!

I have made quite a few delights for Pride Month but wanted to make sure I ended the last week pride month with a NuNaturals recipe! This is a modified version of these cheesecake bars. I made them for Jon’s birthday and he enjoyed them immensely. I replaced the sugar with NuNaturals Monk Fruit 1:1 sweetener. This would have been keto, but I decided to use leftover mint girl scout cookies for the crust. 🙂

I pulsed the cookies in my food processor and added melted butter. Then I smushed it onto a parchment paper-lined square pan and baked it for 8 minutes at 350 degrees. The rest of the ingredients in the first picture made the filling (I only used the egg whites in this recipe and used the yolks for brunch later).

I have seen rainbow cheesecakes where there’s a layer of white cheesecake and then a layer of swirled rainbow cheesecake on top as a second layer. This recipe is lighter in part because they are cheesecake BARS, not a full cheesecake. So I did not use a white layer below and split all of the cheesecake batter into 6 cups to color.

One trick to lifting cheesecake bars is to have parchment paper to pull up. I have seen people bake with metal clips on and I plan to eventually. I don’t have any so these adorable chip clips from my mom helped keep things in place while I added the colors. I have seen people do blobs and swirl them. I wanted to make the rainbow colors stripes, but not in ROYGBIV order (they are in order, but they don’t start with red. Which is pretty pink. I digress…). Then I used a knife to swirl the edges of the colors to make it sort of tie-dyed. I think it looked pretty dope:

See that top piece of parchment that wants to fold in? It did while baking and ruined (what would have been) the perfect shot of the baked cheesecake. Here’s the full pic (followed by a cropped pic to soothe my ego):

You know what fixes blemishes like that? Whipped cream. And I just happened to have some leftover whipping cream in the fridge. I painted the inside of a pastry bag with rainbow colors then filled it with the whipped cream. Boom. Magic.

I should also add that this painting technique for piping also is shown off in this Instagram reel when I made these adorbs meringues. I used this recipe and once again subbed sugar for NuNaturals Monk Fruit 1:1 sweetener. You might say this post is full of monk fruit, food coloring, and merriment.

Happy Pride, y’all! I hope you enjoyed these recipes. I also wanted to share a little highlight of some of the treats I made this month (I didn’t share the Transgender pride flag cookies because I assembled them wrong for the picture. I did make sure to use the flag colors in the unicorns seen on the bottom left though):

As NuNaturals often inquires, Isn’t Life Sweet?

XO,

Espresso Keto Cheesecakes

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I think it is fitting that I am writing a post about caffeine-infused sweets, as I woke up at 5:00 a.m. today, apparently VERY excited to begin my week. 🙂

I previously made Keto No-Bake Cheesecakes, which I enjoyed quite a bit. There were two small differences that made it clear these were not baked:

  1. The texture of the no-bake cheesecake was not a “solid” layer
  2. The crust was also not a solid layer and these two mingled together once eating the dessert.

I wanted to make a baked keto cheesecake AND have the distinct layers I missed whilst eating the last dessert (Though I want to be CRYSTAL clear- if you don’t want to turn on an oven that no-bake cheesecake is delish! I just wanted the layers for the gram and the satisfying snap when a fork or spoon takes a bite of cheesecake).

Per usual, here is my IKEA Instruction Recipe Rundown (I used this recipe, but used NuNaturals 1:1 sweetener instead of Swerve):

The final product was cooled until ready to be refrigerated. I put it in the freezer so they would be easier to remove from the silicone molds. After they came out, I put whipped cream on them. This was the layered amazingness I was looking for!!!! I had to use up this shelf-stable whipped cream by the end of the month so I added some NuNaturals Vanilla Syrup and stevia to it.

I have an issue with garnishing. Like… I want to add more to things. So I have two examples of this below, both using the aforementioned keto whipped cream. First, I decided that these layered cheesecakes looked BALLER from the sides, but not the top. So I added a cat stencil using cocoa powder. Next, I made my man orange jello (using NuNaturals gelatin) with mandarin oranges inside. I felt like those looked lonely with just whipped cream, so I added an orange slice. I stand by these decisions, and wish I had a bowl of this whipped cream right now.

I should add that this cheesecake recipe was made in a silicone mold I purchased for the oldest daughter of my decades-long friend Matt, aka The Domestic Specialist. She has been KILLIN IT with desserts and I thought it would be fun to see what she made with the same mold. She and her younger sister are both artists (I know this isn’t fair to the rest of the world, but her parents are amazing so it is not shocking). I asked her younger sister to decorate the box.

This was a test round…. but I have my idea for the mold ready to go. I’m ready to get completely destroyed by her amazingness.

For reference, look at a macaron side-by side:

Hers have the “feet,” which have been elusive to me. I have made two batches. While this one was miles better than my first, I still didn’t have feet. She did. She’s 11.

Remember when that little drummer prodigy girl kicked Dave Grohl’s butt in a drum-off? That’s what is going to happen here. I’m toast. 🙂

P/S- If you’d like to play along, I got the mold here. I do not get $ from Amazon or anything. I’m a baller on a budget and wanna share in case you’d like to make something, too.

XO,

Chia seeds, Collagen, and Gelatin- Oh My!

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I mentioned last week that I am trying out keto recipes. I am not a keto gal, but I like a challenge and NuNaturals products work well for Keto lifestyles. Last week I made a no-bake cheesecake. This week I decided I wanted to make a keto chia seed pudding with matcha powder. Look at this majesty:

Keto Trifle made with Chia Seed Pudding, Vanilla Collagen Pudding, and Berry Gelatin

  • 1 tsp matcha bloomed in hot water
  • 1/2 cup milk of choice
  • 2 tbsp chia seeds
  • 1/2 packet of NuNaturals Stevia

Once the matcha was mixed in with the hot water, I let it cool a bit then added almond milk and chia seeds. I poured this into two dessert cups. Then it chillaxed in the fridge while I made some pudding.

  • 1 packet of Vanilla Pudding (stevia sweetened- no sugar)
  • 2 tbsp NuNaturals Collagen
  • 1.5 cups milk of choice

I put these three ingredients in my kitchenaid mixer and “lett’r whirl” for 2 minutes. PUDDING! This was spooned on top of the chilled chia pudding (now solid because it was in the fridge).

Finally, I wanted to make some gelatin as a top layer. I forgot that it is super hot when you make it and I did not want to melt the other layers. So this was cooled in two separate dessert cups and added to the top at the end. The ingredients for this layer (more like a little hat):

  • 1 tbsp NuNaturals gelatin
  • 1 cup raspberries
  • 2 cups water
  • NuNauturals Vanilla Syrup (to taste)

I bloomed the gelatin in 1/4 cup of the water. The rest of the water, raspberries, and syrup were heated on the stovetop until it started to boil. I then removed it from the heat, added the bloomed gelatin, and whisked it until everything was incorporated. Finally, I strained the gelatin into a cup. Each little gelatin circle had a strawberry slice. So fancy, y’all.

Protein Pudding and Jell-O Coupe

I had extra pudding and gelatin, so I made a lightened up version of one of my favorite childhood desserts. We used to get dinner at this place called The Forge. They sold red jello with whipped cream as a dessert and, in spite of the fact that this seems like a hospital dessert, I wanted it every damn time. Don’t ask kids why when it comes to food cravings (or me in general, TBH). I made a lightened up version of this using the leftover ingredients.

First, I poured the leftover gelatin in two coupe glasses. Then I added diced strawberries. These sat out until they were at room temperature, then they were placed in the refrigerator (I also did this for the strawberry “hats” shown above).

I chilled these four bebes in the fridge. The littler ones are the “hats” on top of the chia pudding trifles. I put those back in the refrigerator to work on my homage to the Forge dessert. I spooned a mixture of the leftover pudding and cool whip on top of the gelatin layer. This was decorated with a little whipped cream cloud and 1/2 a strawberry.

Look at this elegant leftover feast:

I am going to attempt a baked keto espresso cheesecake for next round… stay tuned!

XO,

Keto No Bake Cheesecakes

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I wanted to dabble in the keto recipe game. I am not a keto person because bread is life, but at the same time I know some people have had success with this and they need desserts too, dang it!

The next few weeks I plan to share some keto recipes using NuNaturals sweeteners, MCT oil powder, Gelatin, and Collagen.

First up? An EASY dessert for two. This took longer to write up than it did to make. I wanted a no-bake option and decided cheesecake would be a delish treat for me to test out (for you, dear readers… I am selfless).

This recipe uses collagen and sweeteners. Here’s my IKEA directions (pictures only), followed by the recipe card.

I would like to add, for the record, that I used a tbsp of that little bowl of butter. Just in case you thought a full bowl of butter was used for these two baby cheesecakes… 🙂

Recipe Card

What’s next on the keto train? I am looking at a espresso cheesecake that is baked, as well as some chia puddings and maybe brownies? Time will tell…

XO,