These Sugar-Free Brownies are incredibly fudgey and easily made gluten free!
This recipe was originally published on January 11, 2012 and it sure is a very popular recipe to date, but since then I discovered my allergies to wheat, so I wanted these to easily be adapted for a gluten free life style. Now you can make these whole wheat or gluten free and of course without any sugar added!!
My more popular brownie recipe on my blog is the flourless brownie recipe, but sometimes I run out of that secret ingredient. When I made this recently for the kids, they fell in love with them all over again and dare I say think they are better than my flourless recipe?!! Either way this recipe is a winner! You can make both then decide!
Of course my other motivation for making these wasn't just to make my kids happy, I wanted to get rid of the horrid pics I took back then!! But I did leave one below for you to laugh at. 🙂
If you can't find sugar -free chocolate chips you can use the highest grade of cocoa you can find in chocolate chips or even a candy bar and break it into pieces. I use Lily's sugar free chocolate chips because they are sweetened with stevia.
SO now after you wipe the drool off your chin you can laugh below at the horrid and sad pictures I left just to amuse you today!
(OLD SAD PIC)
(OLD SAD PIC)
I have tried making a bunch of sugar free brownie recipes and really love how these came out. I had guests and never shared they were sugar free, in fact one guest actually ate 3!!!
See its not that because I choose a sugar free life style that I have to give up chocolate! No its just that I need to make it more pure and more wholesome than boxed brownies without refined sugar that causes ....well.... you know the after effects of sugar highs don't you? If you haven't read my post about the sugar-free sweeteners I choose to use you may want to read, Top 3 Refined Sugar Free Sweeteners to get more info.
Embrace the chocolate I say!
Its not your enemy.
Now refined sugar THAT is not my friend! It causes me too much grief to allow it back in my life. You can read about my sugar free journey here.
You won't feel awful or get a spike in blood sugar after eating one of these scrumptious brownies, but I guarantee you may not be able to eat just one! A nice addition to these brownies would be to add some chopped walnuts. Unfortunately my boys are allergic but I can only bet they would be even more yummier!
Brenda's Notes: (Updated April 16, 2014)
- I adapted the temperature in the original recipe reducing the time to bake these.
- I added an egg as one was not in the original, but if you have an egg allergy you can sub a flax egg or leave it out entirely.
- I also subbed butter for the coconut oil in the gluten free version, but either will work.
- To make this gluten free: Remove the whole wheat pastry flour and substitute it with your favorite gluten free four blend. I used Bob's Red Mill. Add ½ teaspoon xanthan gum.
- Use 2-4 packets Sweetleaf Stevia (4 makes them super sweet) or 4 -6 tsp. of this powdered stevia by Sweetleaf.
- Pure stevia extract is used within the recipe so I could compare and because it is the extract it is much sweeter and you do not need as much.
- Nutrition info has been updated to include sugar free chocolate chips where the original was optional.
- P.S. I realize that the title of these is Sugar-Free brownies and applesauce is included in this recipe, But because it is only a small amount the natural sugar is still only 1 gram.
Sugar Free Chocolate Brownies Recipe
Ingredients
- 4 tablespoons coconut oil melted
- 4 tablespoons milk 1%
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- ⅔ cup unsweetened applesauce
- 1 egg
- ½ cup unsweetened cocoa powder
- 1 cup whole wheat pastry flour or see notes
- ½ teaspoons baking powder
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 1 ½ teaspoons pure stevia extract or 2 teaspoon Chocolate Liquid Stevia
- ½ cup sugar free chocolate chips
- Optional: ½ c. chopped nuts
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
- Whisk together oil, milk, vanilla, applesauce and egg.
- Add cocoa, flour, baking powder, salt and stevia (xanthan gum for gluten free) and mix well.
- Stir in chocolate chips.
- Add optional nuts if desired.
- Line an 8 by 8 baking dish with parchment paper.
- Pour batter into pan and top with a few more chocolate chips if desired.
- Bake for 20 minutes.
- Allow to cool for about 10 minutes before slicing.
Notes
Nutrition
About Brenda
Brenda Bennett is a certified Nutritional Therapy Practitioner, certified Sugar Detox Coach, certified Keto Coach and certified Life Coach. She has been Sugar Free & Refined carb free for 17 years and has written 2 cookbooks, Sugar-Free Mom, and Naturally Keto and her 3rd book The 30-Day Sugar Elimination Diet, is a four part program to help you detox from sugar, eliminate cravings, balance blood sugar and lose weight all while eating a delicious, nutrient dense whole foods. Meal plan offers two tracks to follow, low carb or keto. She is the founder of the Sugar Free Fresh Start course and Sugar Free Tribe weight loss membership. Learn more.
Marty
Hallo!
I've tried your recipe and I liked it very much! I just want to know if I could substitute Stevia for Honey, if yes, how much?
Jennifer Conger
I made these & they are so delicious! I refrigerated them and when I get a sweet tooth! I put them in the microwave and they are just as good as they were when I made them! After 2 weeks they are still delicious!
ETHER
Beautiful ideas I can’t wait to try this recipe, Thank you for share! i like this
terri
Hi, if I want to substitute the applesauce for butter, how much do I use in this recipe?
Rainy Lee
Hi.. your blog said it's gluten free but you used whole wheat flour for this recipe? This can't be right (?). Thanks
Brenda
I explained it under my notes.
Lisa
Is it possible to substitute Buckwheat flour for a Gluten Free option? Thanks!
Brenda
It might make them quite dense, I wouldn't use as much buckwheat as I did.
Robin
What is the purpose of the applesauce in this recipe?
Brenda
I wrote this recipe quite a few years ago and was trying to reduce the fat in my brownie by using the applesauce. I am low carb now and not low fat so if I were to make these again I'd skip the applesauce and increase the butter.
Robin
Thank you so much. I have tried applesauce before and could taste it too much. I will def try this one now!
Lisa
Hi Brenda, thank you for this recipe, it sounds great! I was wondering if you'd ever doubled or tripled the recipe and if you have any comments or suggestions for doing so? I need to make a large batch. Thanks so much!
Jan Noga
Read the blog and the recipe, then scrolled down through the comments and wanted to add a couple comments of my own.
The recipe looks interesting but I'm looking for recipes that don't use refined sugar or substitute sweeteners (natural or not). No matter how much stevia I might use, I can only taste bitter (I should note that I'm one of those people for whom cilantro tastes like dish soap - it's an enzyme thing). I also get GI issues from the other sweeteners so was looking for something that relied primarily on applesauce to provide sweetness. Any suggestions?
I make my own applesauce from nothing but apples. No added sugar or butter, just a splash of water to help with the steaming process. If you use a good blend of apples (I use equal numbers of Gala, Fuji, and Braeburn), you get a nice sweet applesauce that needs nothing else added and the sweetness is all from fructose rather than glucose or sucrose - processed differently by the body. Also, applesauce can be frozen, so, if you do use a jar and have leftover, freeze if in recipe amounts (I use 1 cup) in small bowls, then plop them in Ziplocs when frozen. That way you just pull out the number of 1-cup plops you need and thaw them next time you need applesauce for a recipe.
Since I don't use modern wheat any more, I've been experimenting with spelt and einkorn flours lately. I think einkorn might be too heavy for this but I'm going to try spelt. It's a 1 for 1 substitution but the liquid:dry ratio has to be tweaked. It will be interesting to see how this turns out. Thanks for a good base to start from.
I did want to weigh in on the milk. I know it's a small amount, but healthy diets absolutely should NOT include 1% or 2% milk unless you buy it from an organic dairy and really not even then. Full fat milk is actually not the culprit in cholesterol - moderation being the key. If you are borderline lactose intolerant as I am, it is essential that you eat full fat dairy in order to balance out the lactose - fat molecules consume lactose. But, the biggest concern about low-fat and skim milks is what is added but not included on the label because it isn't required - titanium dioxide. Take out the fat and you take out the color leaving a bluish liquid behind. To make low-fat and non-fat milk look like we all expect mild to look (white), milk producers add titanium dioxide to up the whiteness factor in the liquid. This can an allergen for some folks (mostly GI effects) but there are no regulations requiring producers to include this in the ingredients list. So, not a healthy substitute - just go ahead and use the whole milk. If you get issues drinking low or nonfat milk, it could be the titanium dioxide or it could be that you need the fat to process the lactose.