I love my lemon brownies. I realize that some baked goods are not as good using whole wheat flour but it works with my one bowl lemon brownies recipe. In fact, I always make them this way now and I want to encourage everyone to try them this way. Any time you can avoid white flour, it’s a good thing. It needs to be whole wheat pastry flour and the result is a lovely, soft, delicious lemon bar.
I made them today in an 8 x 8-inch square pan but you can use a 9 x 9 for a more dense bar. I had some meyer lemons on my tree and if you have meyers, which have a milder lemon flavor, well I can tell you they make delicious lemon brownies. Oh, I forgot to mention this is the easiest recipe ever. Everything goes in one bowl, no mixer, no butter, no white flour, and if you make them… no brownies left! Click here for the recipe. – Jenny Jones
Guess what? I decided to try making my sugar cookies with whole wheat pastry flour and they turned out perfect! In fact, you will not be able to tell the difference. I wish I had tried this sooner but I only make these Christmas cookies once a year.
I used whole wheat pastry flour combined with all purpose flour and now these healthier sugar cookies, which already have half the butter and less sugar than most recipes, are even better. Since I give a lot of these as gifts, I prefer to use a cookie press – it’s so much faster and it makes smaller cookies so you can give more.
I’m not the best at adding sprinkles but I do recommend a very fine ground sugar if using a cookie press. A more coarse sugar will roll off the cookies but one that’s finely ground will stick. If you want to make my healthier Christmas sugar cookies even healthier, I hope you’ll try the whole wheat version. I even simplified the process so these homemadce sugar cookies are a breeze to make. Click here for the recipe. – Jenny Jones
My Christmas snowball cookies look fancy but they are so easy, even an amateur cook can make them. There’s no mixer required because this recipe is so simple. You just put all the ingredients into a bowl and combine with your hands. After a brief stint in the fridge, you just shape them into balls and bake. They are actually pecan balls so you must be sure to toast the pecans first. It really adds so much more flavor to these powdered sugar cookies.
They make a beautiful presentation so I often give them as a homemade Christmas gift. But they don’t just look good. These pecan balls simply melt in your mouth and every time I serve them or gift them, people ask for the recipe. And here’s some even better news. You can make them ahead and freeze! Gotta love that: Easy make-ahead Christmas cookies! Click here for the recipe. – Jenny Jones
Here’s a simple chocolate cake recipe that works equally well using whole wheat pastry flour or all purpose flour. In fact, it’s hard to tell the difference so I prefer making it whole wheat. It’s like a chocolate pound cake but healthier because it’s 100% whole grain but you can make it with all purpose flour if you like. And instead of butter I use extra light olive oil. What sends it over the moon is adding dark chocolate chips and toasted nuts.
The only cocoa I use for my baking is Dutch process because it’s never bitter and the result is a beautiful, dark chocolate cake. I can always find it (Droste brand) at World Market. Pound cakes tend to be heavy and dense but by beating the egg whites separately, it makes the cake lighter and taller. My loaf pan measures 8 1/2 x 4 1/2 inches.
If you’re a chocolate lover like I am, I hope you like this moist and delicious, easy chocolate loaf cake. Click here for the recipe. – Jenny Jones
I love this chocolate cake! Today I made baked ziti for dinner, along with a beautiful salad with two kinds of lettuce, orange pepper, cucumber, garbanzo beans, fresh peas, and red endive tossed with my Greek Salad Dressing. Before starting dinner, I had such a craving for chocolate cake and needed one I could make quickly because it was dessert for today’s dinner so I made my Easy One Bowl Chocolate Cake.
If you haven’t tried it yet, it is really fast and easy to make, uses no eggs, no mixer, and it’s super moist and delicious. You only need one bowl and it’s probably less work than using a mix. I promise you if you try this cake, you will never buy a mix again. I made it and it cooled down just in time to frost after dinner. Whenever I have a piece of this cake I never feel weighed down and always feel like I could have seconds but I don’t. It keeps really well so we will have dessert for days. At the end if there’s only one slice left, I always suggest that we arm wrestle for it!
If you want to make the best and easiest one bowl chocolate cake click here for the recipe. – Jenny Jones
This is a variation of my chocolate almond clusters and I love it. Instead of using whole almonds, I chopped them into pieces and added some chopped dried cherries and raisins. The result is a wonderfully chewy, dark chocolate, healthy sweet treat full of protein, heart-healthy fats, antioxidants and fiber. I used a dark chocolate bar (72% cacao) from World Market and followed the same process as my original recipe but instead of using tiny paper cups, I just dropped the clusters onto wax paper, let them cool, and then refrigerate.
The easiest way to refrigerate them is to slide a cutting board under the wax paper and place the whole thing in the fridge until the clusters are cold and set. Then you can put them all into a covered container but always keep them refrigerated; otherwise, the chocolate will melt in your hands. Next time you’re craving a chocolate bar or some m&m’s, try this healthier homemade fruit & nut dark chocolate cluster. Click here for the recipe. – Jenny Jones
These are not raisins – they’re melted chunks of dark chocolate. I wanted an easy dessert and he wanted chocolate. So I made my easy peanut butter cookie recipe with added dark chocolate… oh and some extra added peanuts too. This recipe is so flexible and they turned out fantastic. I chopped up about 1/3 of a 72% dark chocolate bar from World Market but you could use Ghirardelli dark chocolate chips, and then I chopped up some roasted peanuts. I stirred them all into the simple cookie dough and wow, they were good.
Even if you make the original peanut butter cookie recipe, you will love that they have no flour and there is no butter or oil. So they are gluten free, healthy, and super easy to make. Click here for the recipe. – Jenny Jones
I love this! It’s a healthy dessert full of fiber and dark chocolate. It’s made with no white flour, no butter, and it’s a super easy one-bowl recipe. And if you line your pan with foil, there’s almost no cleanup. You can use walnuts but I find that pecans, especially when they are toasted first, have so much more flavor so they are my nuts of choice for most baking. In fact, I toast one bag at a time and keep them refrigerated for all my baking.
Now about the chocolate: Using a 70% dark chocolate bar is the healthiest choice and I like to use the 72% bar from World Market but you do have to chop it up so chocolate chips are definitely easier. I recently discovered Ghirardelli 60% dark chocolate chips and they are great but bigger than most so I did not like the result when I added them whole. So I chopped them into smaller pieces and an added benefit was there was more chocolate in every bite.
These are the chocolate chips I used, but I chopped them up first:
And here is what the World Market bar looks like:
My favorite thing, besides the delicious, chewy taste of this healthy dessert bar, is how incredibly easy it is. One bowl, no mixer, just mix it all up and bake. These healthy oatmeal chocolate chip bars are not just dessert – I must confess I also have them with breakfast. For a healthy dessert or a chewy oatmeal breakfast bar, just click here for the recipe. – Jenny Jones
Easy desserts are my favorite thing and when they’re fast, it’s even better. My blondies, made from scratch, are ready in 30 minutes. Most other recipes use a stick of butter and sometimes two but I only use 3 tablespoons of butter and they are delicious. Of course, the darker the chocolate chips the better for your health so I buy the darkest I can find but I have also made these blondie bars with a 70% chocolate bar. I just chop some of it up into pieces and they become my chocolate chunks.
My favorite nuts for blondies is pecans but you really must toast them first. Of all the nuts used in baking, pecans are the most fragrant after they are toasted. You can see my video on how to toast nuts under the Videos section. I always try to make my desserts as healthy as possible and this one works well with half whole wheat pastry flour and half all purpose flour. I wasn’t sure what to call them. The long name would be “Quick & Easy One Bowl Chocolate Chunk Toasted Pecan Blondies.” Too much? Click here for the recipe. – Jenny Jones
Here’s a closeup of my Crispy Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies. They are big! These are the ones made with 100% whole grains and no butter. Before baking you press them flat with a fork and they spread even more when they bake and come out super thin and crispy. I made them last night and the recipe makes twelve. There are five left. Click here for the recipe. – Jenny Jones
I love my lemon brownies. I realize that some baked goods are not as good using whole wheat flour but it works with my one bowl lemon brownies recipe. In fact, I always make them this way now and I want to encourage everyone to try them this way. Any time you can avoid white flour, it’s a good thing. It needs to be whole wheat pastry flour and the result is a lovely, soft, delicious lemon bar.
