Here's a delicious flourless dairy free brownie recipe you'll love if you can't hack gluten or don't need eggs, butter or milk. It's been a while since I've written here.

Since I last wrote, my oldest daughter was diagnosed with numerous food sensitivities. I brought her in for a blood test just before Christmas because she had been dealing with an ongoing skin condition that had become painful. Before testing her for food sensitivities, her demonologist prescribed some pretty potent steroids. They worked on the affected areas very well but no sooner were the steroids applied that she developed a strange rash all over her face…the result of the steroids themselves. At the time she was six, so we halted that form of treatment.

Of course, we continued to eat completely clean, hoping that her skin condition would resolve itself. It did not. Ultimately, the blood tests showed my daughter was very sensitive to the following foods:

• All dairy
• Eggs (from duck and chicken)
• Beans
• Gluten
• Cane sugar
• Cranberries
• Coffee beans
• Mushrooms

Off all the foods to cut out, eggs and cane sugar are a real pain the butt. Eggs, mostly because they're so easy to make and my daughter loves them. Cane sugar, not because we eat much…in fact, I can't remember the last time I had cane sugar in my house, but because it's in everything, even in modest amounts.

I immediately started to modify some of the foods that she regularly ate. Dairy-free options are easy to find, but many of those foods have loads of cane sugar in them. Gluten-free options are more than abundant, but they often have eggs and cane sugar in them. Finally, egg-free foods are easy to find, but they almost always have lots of cane sugar in them.

Fortunately, I like to play around with recipes, putting modifications on different entrees or desserts that I find…usually just to make them healthier, but now to include all of these eliminations. That challenge is on!

Last week I came across a recipe for Flourless Fudgy Brownies from the website Living Healthy with Chocolate. I was able to tweak this already-good recipe enough to accommodate my daughter…as well as the rest of my family's taste buds. Here's the result.

 

Flourless Dairy Free Brownies

yields 8

1/2 c. cacao powder
1/2 c. unsweetened cocoa powder
1 c. flax meal + 2 tbsp flax meal
2 tsp. baking soda
3/4 tsp. salt
1 c. coconut milk (full fat)
2 tsp. vanilla
1/2 c. honey or maple syrup
4 tbsp. almond butter (if you're nut-free, you can substitute sunflower seed butter)
1/2 c. chocolate chips*
6 tbsp. water

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

In a small bowl, mix together 2 tbsp flax and 6 tbsp water. Set aside. This is your egg substitute.

In a large bowl, mix together the cacao powder, cocoa powder flax meal, baking soda, and salt. Note: if you don't have cacao powder, you can make the entire recipe with cocoa powder. That said, cacao really does add a nice, dense chocolatey flavor.

In a medium-size bowl, mix together the coconut milk, egg substitute, vanilla, honey (or maple syrup), and almond butter.

Combine all ingredients together in the large bowl. Pour into a 9 x 9 baking pan, greased or lined with parchment paper. Finally, sprinkle the top of the brownies with the chocolate chips. If you're looking for a cane sugar-free chocolate chip, you can do without. If not, use your favorite dark chocolate chips. (see notes on the chocolate chips I used below)

Bake for 20 to 25 minutes. The brownies are fully baked when they pass the toothpick test.

I hope you enjoy these. If you would like to see any other recipe modified for special dietary considerations, let me know. I'll be spending quite a bit more time in the kitchen moving forward!