Chocolate Chip Bacon Pancakes ~ no gluten, nuts, dairy, soy or refined sugars!

I've been feeling rather uninspired for dinners lately until tonight when I remembered that I had a package of bacon in the fridge. Woo hoo!! Pancakes and bacon sounded good and then it hit me: chocolate chip bacon pancakes!

They turned out amazing!! I love them!  They are not very sweet, I am not a fan of super sweet things. Part of the not sweetness of them is due to the unsweetened chocolate that I use in the batter, if you use sweetened chocolate chips (like Enjoy Life brand) then they will be very sweet.

Hope you enjoy them as much as we did!

Ingredients:
1 organic egg
1 cup Organic Coconut Milk Beverage Unsweetened
2 Tablespoons olive oil
1 tablespoon Organic Coconut Sugar
1/4 teaspoon sea salt
3/4 cup Bob's Red Mill Gluten-Free All-Purpose Flour
1/4 cup Organic Coconut Flour
1/2 ounce Baker's Unsweetened Chocolate
4 ounces of bacon (I use Hemplers that is cured with organic honey instead of sugar)

Chop up the bacon into small cubes and fry in a frying pan. Drain bacon from oil and let set on a plate covered in a paper towel. Chop the chocolate cubes into tiny chunks.

Using a fork, whip the egg in a medium mixing bowl for about 30 seconds. Stir in the remaining ingredients and stir just until mixed and not lumpy. Do not over mix. Gently fold in the bacon and chocolate chunks.

Pour 1/4 cup of batter at a time onto a griddle heated to 375F. Grill pancakes for a minute or two on each side until they are a beautiful golden brown.

Yields 10 pancakes

 We enjoyed these with our organic Earth Balance spread and a little maple syrup drizzled over the top.

For more amazing recipes, be sure and check out Allergy Free Alaska and their Gluten Free and DIY Tuesdays page! Talk about some amazing recipes!!

Primo Paleo Chcolate Chip Cookies

Since finding out I had a cane sugar allergy several months ago, I have missed chocolate chip cookies. And well, chocolate in general. But especially my fav cookies, Gluten and Dairy-free Chocolate Chip Cookies.  I spent hours online looking for a chocolate chip recipe that fit all my allergy requirements and finally decided just to "wing it" and make my own.

Ingredients:
2 organic eggs
1 Tablespoon unsulphured blackstrap molasses
1/2 cup organic coconut oil
1 Tablespoon almond (or coconut) milk
2 Tablespoons organic maple syrup
1/2 cup organic coconut palm sugar
1/2 cup coconut flour
1/3 cup tapioca starch
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 and 3/4 cup almond flour
2 oz of unsweetened bakers chocolate squares

Use a hand mixer and cream together the first 6 ingredients. Add remaining dry ingredients, excluding the chocolate, and blend until you have a firm dough. Chop up the chocolate squares to the size that you would like them. Stir them in.

Pick up a small amount of dough and roll it into a 1 inch sized ball using your hands. Flatten ball with your hands so that you have a nice, round, circle and place it onto a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. Cookies will not expand in diameter while baking so they can be placed fairly close to each other but not touching.

Bake for 10-12 minutes at 375F or until they are a light golden brown on top. Remove from baking sheet and allow to cool on a wire rack. Enjoy!

Yields 2 dozen cookies

Paleo Brownies

I was craving brownies something terrible the other day. I was looking around online for a recipe that fit my dietary restrictions and matched up with things I had in the house. I am NOT a fan of running to the store for one expensive ingredient!

I found one that I had most of the ingredients for and then modified it to make it fit. Hope that you enjoy them!!

Ingredients
1 cup Almond Flour
1/4 teaspoon sea salt
1/4 teaspoon baking soda (if you are going strict paleo then use a substitute here)
1/2 cup Raw Cacao Powder (cocoa powder works just fine too)
9 pitted dates
3 organic eggs
1/2 cup Organic Coconut Oil
1 teaspoon stevia extract (I make my own, get the directions here)

Put everything into your Food Processor and blend until smooth. It will be a very thick and pasty consistency.

Line a 9x9 inch baking pan with Parchment Paper . Using a spatula, spoon the batter into the pan and smooth down as best as possible.

Bake at 350F for 18-20 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.

Remove from the oven and let the brownies cool in the pan on a cooling rack for at least 1 hour before cutting.

They taste amazing!! I loved the texture! As a (mostly) grain-free baker, texture is HUGE for me. These actually had the taste and texture of real brownies!!

We ate quite a bit the night they were baked and then stored the remainder in an airtight container in the refrigerator.

Healthy Chocolate?

I am pretty sure that I will never buy pre-made chocolate at the store again!!

I found an awesome post on Pinterest (here) and Gabriella and I decided to try making it last night.

We gathered our ingredients:

Coconut Oil, raw honey, unsweetened cocoa powder, pure vanilla and sunflower seed butter. 

We melted 1/2 cup of coconut oil and poured it into our blender. Next we added 1/2 cup of cocoa powder and 1/2 cup of sunflower seed butter. 1/4 cup of raw honey (thanks Uncle Steve!) and 1/2 teaspoon of vanilla then we were done. So easy!

We blended up everything for about 30 seconds (just until it was all smooth). Then we poured the mixture into cupcake liners in a cupcake tin. 

10 minutes in the freezer (or about 30 minutes in the refrigerator) and they were set up!

They were AMAZING!!! So rich and creamy and delicious! 

The kids shared one, I had one and Matt had two. The rest we are storing in the refrigerator in a sealed container. 

I love how simple these were to make and how pure of ingredients they are! No chemicals that are impossible to pronounce, no concerns for GMOs or cross contamination with any allergens. 

There is an almost unending list of benefits of coconut oil!

(check out this website for more info)