Designing Healthy Desserts

This was a very fun class! Just by the name of it, you can tell I thoroughly enjoyed it! There was a lot of thought and learning that had to take place. It was a very creative class, where we got to use our imaginations. The only problem was staying within the strict guidelines of specific health problems and illnesses. For example, a cardiac patient could only have 30% of fat in the dessert, with 8% of saturated fat or less. A diabetic patient can only have 40-60% of the dessert as carbohydrates with 12-20% of protein and 30-35% fat. A vegan cannot have any animal products. A celiac patient  cannot have gluten which means we have to use a different combination of flours for certain baked goods. In general, we also had to have under 300 calories, less than 140 mg of sodium, less than 60 mg of cholesterol, and less than 1/3 of the calories from fat. Included in all of our desserts had to be a main component, sauce, garnish, and crunch factor. We were all assigned a specific disease and dessert category on a specific day. Some of them were challenging, but we were able to use our creative side for this class.

The first day was the only day we did a whole class experiment. We all made brownies, but everyone substituted half of the fat (butter) with a fat substitute or replacement. My group made fig paste, while others used applesauce, bananas, yogurt, tofu, pumpkin and black beans. They all tasted really good, and possibly even better than the control brownie, which was full butter. I really enjoyed the texture of the black bean brownie and fig brownie. Also, the added cocoa powder to all the brownies gave that rich chocolate taste without too much fat and calories from more chocolate.

There were a lot of different restrictions and dessert combinations, but I just wanted to show you my partner and my creations, and if you want the recipes or tips/tricks/ideas, feel free to get a hold of me through here, facebook (facebok.com/nikkizintak) or email (nzintak@gmail.com).

Crepe Day:Diabetic: Peanut butter and Banana Crepe

Frozen Desserts : Cardiac :  Blackberry Spoom with Meringue

Meringue with Fruit : Vegan : Flaxseed Meringue with Berry Compote, Flaxseed Tuile, and Angel Food Cake

Pie : Gluten Free : Pumpkin Pie with Oeufs a la Neige and Bacon Caramel Popcorn

Cheesecake : GERD patient : Banana tofu/mascarpone cheesecake with  mango mint sauce, coconut whipped cream, and granola.

This was my final. We had to come up with 3 desserts from different categories with 3 different dietary restrictions. Everyone worked individually and we had over the course of 2 days to do everything.

 The first is a vegan chocolate avocado mousse with an orange sauce, dehydrated orange peel, and chocolate dipped clementine

The second dessert is for the cardiac patient: A heart healthy peach frozen yogurt with a blueberry grand marnier sauce, an almond tuile crunch factor and sugared blueberries.

   

Finally, I made a gluten free carrot cake. This was made with a combination of different (non-wheat) flours. The sauce was a yogurt icing, with a pistachio golden raisin granola and carrot flower chips.

As previously mentioned, there was a lot of work and information given to us, so if you are interested and would like some more details, let me know!