Shirtless Chef – Brownies that are so Giada

Local fitness enthusiast Jason Murphy remakes favorite meals of his youth into healthy dishes. See the full list of his recipes at www.mysaline.com/shirtless.

A warm brownie is the ultimate comfort dessert. It’s a dense little chocolate cake you can hold in your hand, what’s not to love about that? Back in my previous life, I was known to nuke one of those Little Debbie cosmic brownies in the microwave for 10 seconds, dump a giant scoop of vanilla ice cream on it, and then maybe do it again once that bowl was demolished. Looking at the nutrition label, one of those brownies has 42 grams of simple carbs, and 11 grams of fat, with 5 of of those being saturated fat. The ingredient list reads like a chemical truck spill on the highway:

Ingredients

Enriched Bleached Flour (Wheat Flour, Niacin, Reduced Iron, Thiamin Mononitrate [Vitamin B1], Riboflavin [Vitamin B2], Folic Acid), Corn Syrup, Palm and Soybean Oils with TBHQ and Citric Acid to protect flavor, Sugar, Dextrose, Water, Cocoa. Contains 2% or less of each of the following: Soy Flour, Cosmic Candy Pieces (Semi-Sweet Chocolate Chips [Sugar, Chocolate, Cocoa Butter, Soy Lecithin, Vanilla], Sugar, Corn Starch, Titanium Dioxide, Gum Arabic, Confectioner?s Glaze, Carnauba Wax, Yellow 5 Lake, Yellow 6 Lake, Blue 1 Lake, Red 3, Milk), High Fructose Corn Syrup, Whey, Eggs, Soy Lecithin, Corn Starch, Salt, Leavening (Sodium Aluminum Phosphate, Baking Soda), Caramel Color, Soybean Oil, Natural and Artificial Flavors, Red 40, Palm and Palm Kernel Oil, Titanium Dioxide, Yellow 5 Lake, Yellow 6 Lake, Blue 1 Lake, Red 3, Blue 2 Lake, Egg Whites, Modified Corn Starch, Polysorbate 60, Citric Acid, Mono- and Diglycerides, Sorbic Acid (to preserve freshness).

I know that if I bit into one of these disaster cakes now, the sweetness would be overwhelming and I would be sick. It’s amazing what a person can get conditioned to as normal. We can do much, much better. Brownies can be a great treat on the Shirtless Chef lifestyle. We just have to take matters into our own hands and use the proper ingredients and techniques, and we will have a dessert that is both delicious and is good for you. I make an Avocado brownie that is fantastic, but as pricey as avocados are, it might be hard to use them in desserts right now. We also can keep the calorie count down by not using avocados, as they are a calorie dense food. This recipe is actually inspired by the tv chef Giada De Laurentiis. Her recipes are heavily influenced by her Italian heritage, and Italy uses much more healthy and natural ingredients than the heavily processed and preservative laden choices we make here. I have altered a few items to drop the simple carb count, which in turn changes the techniques a bit. She uses coconut sugar, which is better than refined white sugar, but to the body, it’s just simple carbs in the end. I replace that with Stevia in the raw, so the creaming method will have to be employed with room temperature eggs to ensure smoothness. She also uses a non-stick pan in the oven, but I stick (see what I did there?) with cast iron anytime I’m using pans in the oven. I just don’t trust non-stick pans taking that kind of heat and not transferring whatever chemicals they use to be non-stick into the food. Fool me once, DuPont…

Use pasture raised eggs, grass fed butter, dark chocolate chips, and natural raw cocoa, and these brownies will be ones you can feel good about having as a treat every now and again. If you have an ice cream maker at home, whip up a batch of low carb vanilla or some homemade whipped cream as a topping. The mega-marts have a few low sugar options for ice cream now as well, Rebel brand Ice cream has the best taste and ingredients that I have found.

Almost Giada Brownies:

Ingredients:

2/3 cup coconut oil, melted and cooled

1 cup Stevia in the Raw sweetener

1/4 tsp sea salt

2 tsp vanilla extract

2 eggs at room temp

1 egg yolk at room temp

2/3 cup almond flour

1/4 tsp baking powder

2/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder

1 cup 70% dark chocolate chips

Butter to lube cast iron pan

Instructions:

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees. Mix the almond flour, salt, baking powder, and cocoa in a bowl. You can sift those ingredients to create a lighter texture, or mix well with a whisk.

Place the Stevia in the raw in a large mixing bowl and work in one egg at a time, whisking until the mixture is smooth. Work in the yolk as well after both eggs are mixed, then add the vanilla extract and cooled coconut oil, mixing again: