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Raw caramel-nut-bars with chocolate and fresh fruits

My first intention was to do raw food blueberry muffins. I saw the recipe and it sounded great. Unfortunately the dough became sticky and it was impossible to form little muffins out of it. So I decided to add more nuts and raisins, some honey as well as one caramel and chocolate layer. For the freshness and some more vitamines I added fresh fruits. The result: Some delicous caramel nut bars with chocolate and fresh fruits!

 

The recipe:

 

First you need all nuts you like (I took one cup of each walnuts, cashews, and peanuts)

 

You put the half of it in a blender and mix it until it becomes a sticky mixture. Then you add the other half with a spoon and mix it (manually) so that the sticky dough becomes a great nut dough.

 

Now you can add dried fruits which you have to chop up first. I took dates and raisins. Then you add a little pinch of himalayan salt, some honey and cinnamon (as you like). Before eating everything you should quickly press the crust into a plate and put it in the refridgerator.

 

For the Caramel I took some salted butter, which I melt together with sugar in a little pot. When the sugar gets the typical caramel color and there are no pieces left you can take the pot from the stove and put it over one side of the nuts mixture. Put it again in the fridge.

 

Last and very important thing: the chocolate. You can melt it eather in a bain-marie (you need some patience) or just for a minute into the microwave to melten it.

 

When the caramel-nut bars dried, you can turn them onto the caramel side, so that you can put the chocolate on the other side. If you like to add fruits too, you should slice them before putting the chocolate on it. When the chocolate is still liquid, you can put the fruits on. Now you just have to put it in the fridge and wait for the chocolate to cool and voilà! Easy recipe for delicious, healthy home-made nutbars!

 

 

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Caramelitas

Maika send me the recipe to try those delicious Caramel-Chocolate Oatmeal Bars and I couldn't wait to try them! The recipe comes from Our Best Bites and even if I do not used the all-ready-caramel and I mixed the dough with my own hands (unfortunately I do not have a hand mixer..) it was quite delicious. For the next time I think I would try to make the bars with less sugar, as it was probably a little bit too sweet (if this is even possible).

Ingeredients:

1 cup butter, softened
2 cups packed brown sugar (I actually used cane sugar, that's probably what made it too sweet)
2 eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 1/2 cups all purpose flour
3 cups quick-cooking rolled oats
1 cup mini semisweet chocolate chips (I took a bar of chocolate and chopped them)
1/2 cup chopped walnuts or pecans (I took walnuts and peanuts and toasted them first)
30 caramels (9 ounces), unwrapped (..or just do it on your own;)
3 tablespoons milk

Recipe:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Line a 15×10 inch baking pan with foil, leaving about 1 inch extending over the edges of the pan.  Set aside.

In a large mixing bowl beat butter with an electric mixer on medium to high speed for 30 seconds.  Add brown sugar.  Beat until combined, scraping sides of bowl occasionally.  Add eggs, vanilla, baking soda and salt; beat until combined.  Add flour slowly and mix until combined.  Stir in the oats.  Press 2/3 of the dough (about 3 1/3 cups) evenly into the bottom of the prepared pan.  Sprinkle with chocolate pieces and nuts.

In a medium sauce panheat and stir the caramels and milk over low heat until melted and smooth.  Drizzle caramel mixture over chocolate and nuts.  Take remaining dough and flatten small pieces with fingers and place evenly on top of the caramel layer.  Bake for 22-25 minutes or until top is just barely light brown, don’t overbake!.  Cool in pan on a wire rack until room temperature.  Use foil to lift uncut bars out of pan.  Place on cutting board; cut into bars.

 

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Can Eating Chocolate help you to lose Weight?

Can Eating Chocolate Help You Lose Weight?

Eating chocolate before and after your meals is the newest weight-loss tactic. But is it too good to be true?

chocolate-kocoon

Eat Chocolate, Lose Weight. If the title of the new weight-loss book from neuroscientist Will Clower, Ph.D., isn't enough to grab your attention, its promise might: Eat chocolate 20 minutes before and five minutes after lunch and dinner to cut your appetite by up to 50 percent.

Um, what? This set off our "this has got to be too good to be true" alarm, so we did some digging to find out if the chocolate diet really holds any weight.

MORE: How Chocolate Can Help you Lose Weight

It turns out, the sweet stuff can fight sugar spikes. In one study from the University of L'Aquila in Italy, people who ate a candy bar's worth of dark chocolate once a day for 15 days in a row decreased their potential for insulin resistance by almost 50 percent.

While researchers credit flavonoids for reducing insulin resistance, weight-loss specialist and board-certified internist Sue Decotiis, M.D., notes that dark chocolate also contains healthy fats, which slow the absorption of sugar into the blood stream. That helps prevent the dreaded insulin spike, which is famed for shuttling sugar straight into your fat cells. "Insulin spikes turn off your body's fat-burning mechanisms and make you hungry again several hours later," she says. Over time, they can also lead to insulin resistance and diabetes.

MORE: Health Benefits of Chocolate

Meanwhile, Swiss scientists have found that dark chocolate reduces the metabolic effects of stress, and University of Copenhagen researchers have shown that dark chocolate curbs cravings for sweet, salty, and fatty foods alike.

And that brings us to the fine print: This only works if you reach for dark chocolate (i.e., types that are made up of at least 70 percent cacao). "White and milk chocolate has a lot of added sugar and contains milk (also a type of sugar), while dark chocolate has less added sugar, contains monounsaturated fatty acids, and has a bittersweet taste that reduces the amount you eat," says Decotiis.

Plus, while it's hard not to take chocolate's weight-loss benefits as an excuse to pound chocolate bars like they're going out of style, Clower says each helping should be no bigger than the end of your thumb. Eat more than that, and not only could you overload on sugar and fat, but you could also ruin your dinner, says Decotiis.

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