Heavenly Homemakers

Encouraging women in homemaking, healthy eating and parenting

Easy Low Sugar Peanut Butter Brownies

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My first attempt at creating Low Sugar Peanut Butter Brownies actually turned out too sweet! This was shocking seeing as I had cut the sugar down tremendously from the original recipe I had found to give me the inspiration. I cut it down even more and voila. Peanut Butter Brownie perfection!

I love that cutting down sugar in recipes still turns out awesome treats. These are as simple as can be, perfectly moist (as long as you don’t overbake them), and made even more fabulous because of the peanut butter whipped frosting we spread over the top.

Make yourself a batch, pour yourself a glass of milk, sit back, and enjoy!

Easy Low Sugar Peanut Butter Brownies

Easy Low Sugar Peanut Butter Brownies
 
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Serves: 12-15
Ingredients
  • ½ cup butter
  • 1 cup natural peanut butter*
  • ⅓ cup brown sugar or sucanat
  • ¼ teaspoon sea salt (leave this out if your peanut butter is already salted)
  • 2 eggs
  • 1 cup whole grain flour (I use freshly ground soft white wheat)
  • Frosting:
  • ¾ cup natural peanut butter
  • 1 cup heavy whipping cream
  • 10 drops liquid stevia
  • 2 teaspoons sugar or maple syrup
  • ½ teaspoon vanilla extract
Instructions
  1. In a small saucepan, heat butter and peanut butter until melted.
  2. Stir together melted butters and sugar in a mixing bowl.
  3. Add salt and eggs, mixing well.
  4. Fold in flour and stir until well combined.
  5. Spread batter into a 9x9 or 8x8 inch baking dish.
  6. Bake in a 350 degree oven for 20-25 minutes or until brownies are lightly browned.
  7. Allow brownies to cool completely before frosting.
  8. FROSTING:
  9. In a high power blender, or in a bowl with a hand mixer, whip frosting ingredients together until thick and smooth.
  10. Spread over Peanut Butter Brownies.
  11. Store in the refrigerator.

*I use homemade peanut butter from one of the following recipes:

Here are many more Low Sugar Treats for you to enjoy!

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Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars (Low Sugar, Whole Grain)

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Who needs sugar when you can eat butter? What I mean to say is, these Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars taste lightly sweet and deliciously buttery. What else can we possibly need? (Chocolate chips.) Ah yes. Chocolate chips. Well, I guess we’ve thought of everything.

As many of you know, I’m not much into sugar anymore. But I do like a barely sweet treat to enjoy with my coffee. I’m not terribly picky. I think something is plenty sweet when it is only barely sweet. Much more sweetness than that seems like much too much these days.

My kids think I’m weird about this (and at least a couple of other things) and have become a bit leery of my homemade “super low sugar treats.” If Mom is eating it, it must be one of those weirdo stevia sweetened things and it probably won’t taste as good as a candy bar. I beg to differ, but I also remember being a teen and liking my Twix and Pepsi.

Now then, I guess it’s my job to confess that because of the aforementioned, I have learned to wait to eat my low sugar treats until AFTER I have served some to my sons. The two sons still living at home are the pickiest of our four. (And now we have an almost-adopted son, so I’ll be learning to say five sons instead of four, oh my goodness!)

My picky kids aren’t always willing to try new foods, so I must be wise in how I present them. I am MOM, therefore I know more than they do (about everything except Fortnite). I know very well that they will like the treat if only they try it with an open mind. After all, did I mention the butter? And the chocolate chips? And there’s actual sugar in it, not stevia. It’s just that I cut the sugar from 1 1/2 cups all the way down to just a 1/2 cup.

Just eat the cookie bars, kids.

So they did. And they like them. Shocker.

I snuck one later with my coffee, which made them second guess for a moment if they still liked them. Silly boys.

Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars

4.0 from 1 reviews
Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars (Low Sugar, Whole Grain)
 
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Serves: 9
Ingredients
  • 1 cup melted butter (2 sticks)
  • ½ cup brown sugar or sucanat
  • 2 eggs
  • ¼ teaspoon baking soda
  • ¼ teaspoon sea salt
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • 1 cup whole grain flour (I use freshly ground soft white wheat)
  • ¼ cup mini chocolate chips
Instructions
  1. Stir together melted butter and brown sugar.
  2. Add eggs, baking soda, salt, and vanilla, stirring well.
  3. Stir in flour until well combined.
  4. Fold in chocolate chips.
  5. Spread dough into an 8x8 inch baking dish.
  6. Bake in a 350 degree oven for 20-25 minutes or until golden brown.
  7. Allow bars to cool for 10 minutes before cutting and serving.

Are your kids leery to try any of your “healthier foods” for fear you might be serving them something weird? Silly kids.

Here are many more Low Sugar Treats that I promise my kids like, so yours will too!

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Easy Peanut Butter Pudding

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This one was Justus’ idea. He’s my 17-year old, my senior in high school. These are my last few months with him at home so when he said, “Mom, do you think you could figure out how to make Peanut Butter Pudding?” of course I immediately dropped whatever I was doing to work on his request.

peanut butter pudding2

I kid. I mean, I would never drop whatever I’m doing to go with a whim of one of my children. Never would I attempt to spoil any of my kids. Especially when it comes to food. They must be taught patience, that the world doesn’t revolve around them, even if it is their senior year and the mother can’t breathe at the thought of missing out on the delightful morning conversations she enjoys with her second born every morning before the others wake up. Even if.

Okay fine. I dropped what I was doing and I made the kid some Peanut Butter Pudding. It sounded like an amazing treat, and I agreed with Justus that the protein mixed in with the sweetness would be a fabulous combination.

Justus Senior4600

As an aside, it is worth a mention that I learned with our first born that the world doesn’t end when you graduate a child and send him from home. Life with your adult child does, indeed, grow in richness (this is ironic because of the college bills). But this doesn’t stop me from feeling all of the many feelings associated with launching another child from our nest. I will enjoy this time with him to the full. I will cry tears of joy and pride frequently. And I will make him pudding with peanut butter in it, just because he mentions that it sounds good.

The recipe is simple (you would expect nothing less, right?). It is creamy and rich and delightful. It tastes even better served with Chocolate Pudding.

Easy Peanut Butter Pudding

5.0 from 1 reviews
Easy Peanut Butter Pudding
 
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Serves: 6-8
Ingredients
  • 2½ cups milk
  • 3 egg yolks
  • ½ cup natural creamy peanut butter
  • ½ cup real maple syrup, honey, sucanat, or brown sugar
  • 4 Tablespoons corn starch
  • ¼ teaspoon sea salt
  • 1 Tablespoon butter
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla
Instructions
  1. In a medium saucepan, whisk together all ingredients except butter and vanilla.
  2. Cook over medium heat, stirring constantly until pudding begins to thicken.
  3. Stir over the heat for about 15 more seconds or until pudding has reached desired thickness. Remove immediately from the heat, and continue to stir until pudding is creamy.
  4. (I use my whisk the whole time for stirring and find this works great!)
  5. Add butter and vanilla and continue to stir until mixed.
  6. Pour into serving dishes and serve warm, or chill for two hours and serve cold.

Easy Peanut Butter Pudding

It’s possible you can look forward to me sharing other great food ideas Justus has this year. Not that I’ll drop everything and make them on a whim. We would never, ever want to spoil our children. Especially with food. Even if it’s their senior year.

Justus Senior2600

“Hey Mom. Think you could make my favorite Italian Cream Cheese Chicken soon?” Absolutely, Justus. Absolutely.

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Low Sugar Flourless Peanut Butter Cookie Recipe

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Low Sugar Flourless Peanut Butter Cookies and my Mother’s Day flowers!

Low Sugar Peanut Butter Cookies

About the time I think I’ve cut the sugar in every recipe that would possibly work, I find another that works just as well.

Do you remember my Flourless Peanut Butter Cookies? One cup peanut butter, one cup sugar, one egg. They’re delicious. They’re naturally gluten free so I can make them for my GF friends. They’re incredibly easy. And they have a very high sugar content.

I thought surely cutting the sugar in that recipe would mess up the consistency and turn out weird cookies – if they even turned out cookies at all. I am so happy to say, “I was wrong.”

The only thing that didn’t work when I cut the sugar in this recipe is that the dough didn’t allow me to do the cute little criss-cross fork squish thing. The dough was too sticky. Thankfully, life goes on and we’re all grown up enough to eat our peanut butter cookies without fork-squishing them, right? Thank goodness.

Low Sugar Flourless Peanut Butter CookiesYum

Low Sugar Flourless Peanut Butter Cookie Recipe
 
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Serves: 20ish
Ingredients
  • 2 cups natural peanut butter
  • ⅓ cup sucanat or brown sugar
  • 1 egg
Instructions
  1. Mix the ingredients together until smooth.
  2. Use a small or medium scoop to place dough balls on a cookie sheet, about two inches apart.
  3. Bake in a 350° oven for 10-12 minutes or until cookies are lightly browned.
  4. Allow them to sit on the cookie sheet for a few minutes before removing them to cool on a rack.

Get my Homemade Natural Peanut Butter Recipe here.

Low Sugar Peanut Butter Cookie Recipe

Matt and I are totally good with barely sweet treats. But the boys? Well, they’re a little more particular. Therefore, my kids are always the true testers for whether or not one of my Low Sugar Treats actually tastes good to other people.

I always hesitate to say these are low sugar, come try them because sometimes that makes the boys unsure from the get-go. But there I was, standing in the kitchen eating a peanut butter cookie. This made the boys suspicious. If Mom is eating it, it must be low sugar.

All that to say: These cookies smelled really good, which made my boys want some. Then they saw me eating them, which made them not so sure. I insisted they try a bite because I thought they were so good I could hardly stand it, and I knew they would like them once they tried.

What did they think?

Well, let’s just say that I had to stop them from finishing the entire batch in one sitting, and we all started shaking our heads once again at Betty Crocker for making us all think we needed eighty cups of sugar in cookie recipes just to make them taste good. C’mon, Betty.

You’ll want to look through all of our tried and true Low Sugar Recipes here. It is amazing how much sugar you can cut out of treats and still make them taste delicious! These Peanut Butter Cookies went from 2 cups down to 1/3 cup of sugar – and they are amazing.

Need more Low Sugar Cookie Recipes?

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Low Sugar Butterscotch Bars

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It’s a happy day. Gather ’round, my friends. I’ll share the secret of how we can remake a Heavenly Homemaker’s classic recipe, Butterscotch Bars, into Low Sugar Butterscotch Bars.

butterscotch bars 1

We have Colleen to thank for this. She’s the one who emailed me after I shared my Low Sugar Chocolate Fudge Cookie recipe, asking how I thought my Butterscotch Bars would turn out if we cut the sugar.

I wasn’t confident. While I’ve found that many recipes work amazingly well when we cut the sugar, the two I felt might have to stay sugar-full were the Butterscotch Bars and Chocolate Fudge Brownies.

But you never know until you try, right? Last week I shared that indeed, we can make Low Sugar Chocolate Brownies – proving myself wrong that it just wasn’t possible. Today I’m sharing that sugar in the Butterscotch Bars can be cut too! Boom!

Low Sugar Butterscotch BarsYum

Low Sugar Butterscotch Bars
 
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Serves: 15 bars
Ingredients
  • 1 cup melted butter
  • ½ cup sucanat or brown sugar
  • 2 eggs
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • 1¼ cups whole wheat pastry flour (regular white whole wheat flour works too)
Instructions
  1. Cream melted butter and sucanat together.
  2. Add eggs and vanilla.
  3. Stir in flour and mix well.
  4. Spread mixture into a 9x13 inch baking dish.
  5. Bake in a 350° oven for 20 minutes.

Low Sugar Butterscotch BarsConfession: I love these low sugar bars. I actually find that they are still almost too sweet for me so I can only have a tiny sliver. My family thinks they’re good. But when I made a pan of Butterscotch Bars for a houseful of college kids last week, I made the full sugar version.

If you’re going for a treat that’s rich and gooey – you’ll want to make the regular 2-cups of sugar (gag me) Butterscotch Bars. But if you want a treat that is lightly sweetened and deliciously tasty (just not ooey gooey super sweet) – this Low Sugar Butterscotch Bar recipe is what you want!

Find more Low Sugar Treats here. You guys – the list is getting long!! I’m loving this!

Heavenly Homemaker's Club Members: Access your homepage and all your fantastic resources here! Not a member yet? Please join us!

Whole Wheat Pumpkin Donuts

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After months of trial, illness, starvation, exhaustion, and many other forms of misery (encouraging post so far, Laura) – the Pilgrims and the Wampanoags came together for a great feast on what is now known as The First Thanksgiving. These incredible people had much to celebrate, no doubt.

On their table there was an abundance of lobster, rabbit, chicken, squash, chestnuts, hickory nuts, onions, leeks, dried fruits, radishes, and cabbage – all of the traditional foods you and I always serve to our families on Thanksgiving, right? (I always tear up a little during the carving of our traditional Thanksgiving Lobster.)

Quick question: How did the above First Thanksgiving menu give way to boxed stuffing and canned cranberry sauce that plops out onto a plate? Don’t answer that. But what I do what to know is this:  Where have these Whole Wheat Pumpkin Donuts been all my life? These need to be added to everyone’s Thanksgiving menu: turkey, green bean casserole, sweet potatoes, relish tray, mashed potatoes and gravy, homemade rolls with butter, and a big, huge platter of Pumpkin Donuts. Oh, and don’t forget the Lobster.

Whole Wheat Pumpkin Donuts with Glaze

These Pumpkin Donuts scream, “Fall is here! Be thankful! Inhale deeply the scent of cinnamon spice! Eat me already!” This is a fall treat that ranks right up there with all things amazing. This donut recipe stirs up quickly, rolls out easily, and fries up into fantastic goodies that might make you pass out. They are great with a cup of coffee or apple cider.

Whole Wheat Pumpkin Donuts (adapted from this recipe)Yum

5.0 from 1 reviews
Whole Wheat Pumpkin Donuts
 
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Serves: 15-20
Ingredients
  • 3½ cups whole wheat flour (I use freshly ground hard white wheat)
  • 4 teaspoons baking powder
  • 1 teaspoon sea salt
  • 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
  • ½ teaspoon nutmeg
  • ½ cup sucanat (or brown sugar)
  • 2 Tablespoons melted butter
  • 2 eggs
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • ½ cup buttermilk
  • 1 cup pumpkin puree
  • Oil for frying (I recommend coconut oil or palm shortening for healthy frying)
  • GLAZE:
  • 2 cups powdered sugar (I use unbleached powdered sugar)
  • ⅓ cup buttermilk
  • ½ teaspoon vanilla extract
Instructions
  1. Stir together whole wheat flour, baking powder, sea salt, ground cinnamon, nutmeg, and sucanat. Add melted butter, eggs, vanilla, buttermilk, and pumpkin puree - mixing until all ingredients are well combined.
  2. Roll dough on a well-floured surface.
  3. Cut out donuts and donut holes (makes about 15-20 of each).
  4. Fry dough in hot oil for about 3 minutes or until donuts are golden brown.
  5. Whisk glaze ingredients together and drizzle over warm donuts before serving.

Whole Wheat Pumpkin DonutsWhat are your family’s traditional Thanksgiving foods that are a little different from the norm?  I have to admit, not only have I never had a Thanksgiving Lobster on my table, I’m not sure I’ve ever actually eaten lobster, period. I’m a Kansas girl turned Nebraska girl. What can I say?

Heavenly Homemaker's Club Members: Access your homepage and all your fantastic resources here! Not a member yet? Please join us!