Dessert Plate

Yes, I really did eat all of this.  No, I'm not fat ;)

So, I suppose you want to know what was on my plate of decadence!  (BTW: I work out for 2 hours every Saturday, so I eat dessert.  It all comes out a wash, you know?)

Going from left to right, top to bottom:

1) A PB pretzel bar

2) Single serving pb cookies from Foodie Fiasco (using PB2, and baking - I think microwaved things taste funny)

3) Home made candied almonds.  A work in progress, definately, but here's what I did (adapted from VegWeb).  In a small pot over medium heat, combine 2/3 cup water, 3/4 cup stevia, 1/2 tsp vanilla extract, 1/2 tsp cinnamon, and 1 tsp guar gum.  Bring to a boil-ish and add ~1/2 cup almonds.  Keep stirring, and the mixture will caramelize/reduce, and become more of a coating for the almonds.  At this point I stopped, dumped the almonds onto wax paper coated with nonstick spray, and cooled them.  Next time I will try baking them and see if the coating hardens up.

4) (next row) Lemon pistachio rice crispie bar from Chocolawty!  Woooooooowwwwwwwwwwwww!  These babies are amazing!  The lemon and pistachio is such a genious combination.  Changes: halved the recipe, used lemon zest in place of lemon extract, used sugar free maple syrup in place of rice syrup, pulverized pistachios in my Vitamix for the pistachio butter, used powdered stevia in place of stevia extract, skipped the protein powder (I might have used another flour in it's place, but I can't remember), subbed stevia + soy milk for the honey, used shredded coconut in place of the coconut oil, and skipped the jam (forgot it, actually).

Wow, that was a LOT! ;)

5) Cookie dough from Chocolawty!  This stuff is made with chickpeas.  I FINALLY got up my courage to make a dessert with chickpeas... and I won't lie, you can kind of tell it's not your normal flour and butter.  But that does NOT mean it tastes bad - it's just different.  I will totally be having more chickpea desserts in the future - they're good, in their own right.  Surprisingly good, really.  Changes: halved recipe, stevia + molasses for the brown sugar, used straight up almonds in place of almond butter, and used more stevia in place of the stevia extract.

6) PB pretzel nuggets, store bought goodness.  I REALLY can't get enough of these things.

7) Home made chocolate covered almonds.  You melt chocolate chips in the microwave and dip your almonds in there.  Hm... sounds hard! ;)  Hey, it just struck me, I should do double dipped almonds next time... they WERE a bit skimpy on the chocolate!

AAAAAAAANNNNNND...

8) Whew!  Ok, so I have redesigned these Chocolate PB Pretzel Sandwiches.  You mix PB2, stevia, and soy milk to form a paste, sandwich that between pretzels, and smother it in melted chocolate.  MUCH healthier, and I can now make just the right amount for me!