Low-carb desserts are. not. easy. Sure, making them isn’t all that hard, but recipes to create things that bear more than a passing resemblance to their namesakes are not easily found. That hurdle is what kept the beau and I locked in the kitchen last weekend, baking, analyzing, and brainstorming. And after two days of experiments–many failed and a few successful–I exhaustedly present to you our take on the low-carb chocolate chip cookie.
Now this isn’t a catchall recipe, not that any chocolate chip recipe could be. Although I prefer chewy cookies, one day (maybe after low-carb shortbread, pecan sandies, grasshoppers, macaroons, and, dear God, cookie cakes) I’ll come back and find a good crunchy variation. Until then, these will be more than enough for me.
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As far as fast food goes, my favorite restaurant has to be La Madeleine. When I was growing up, we would walk to the one just off St. Charles Avenue in New Orleans, and being surrounded by French-Acadian culture with trollies whizzing by, it never occurred to me that it might be part of a chain. You can imagine my surprise (and delight, and then dismay) when I found one buried in a Baton Rouge suburb years later.
I still enjoy going, but the character of the our location just isn’t the same. Homegrown Texan girls trying to wrap their tongues around “Bonsoir, monsieur” change the atmosphere in a way that’s hard to ignore. The one thing that hasn’t changed, though, is the utter perfection of their tomato basil soup.
Knowing I didn’t want to go to a pastry-filled French bakery for one of their few low-carb dishes, last weekend we took a stab at making our own version. It may be winter here in Austin, but go into any grocery and you will find box after box of fresh tomatoes, still glowing from the Mexican sun. Armed with fresh produce and garlic flax bread, this recipe turned out better than either of us expected.
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When I tell people that I eat low carb, they usually say something along the lines of, “Oh, so you don’t eat bread?” Au contraire. Sure, it means no wheat, but the end of gluten is where things just start to get interesting.
This weekend we made tomato basil soup, a dish you really can’t have without something to dip. Never one to settle, I made a loaf of garlic flax flatbread that turned out to be just a little bit better than I had expected. Except that it was supposed to be crackers. It turns out that an eighth of an inch is a lot thinner than I had spent my life assuming, so I rolled the dough about three times too thick. And although you might think an absolutely unleavened bread would be tough, the baked-in parmesan left a springy, absorbent texture that lent itself to soup. I’m filing this accident under “keep.”
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I have never been a fan of chicken breasts–they’re usually too dry, they have a rope-like texture, and they were always a part of my parents’ “healthy” dinners (boiled chicken, steamed broccoli, and a large helping of white rice). Indeed, experimenting with this recipe was the first time I’d bought a package of breasts in well over a year. Despite my misgivings, this dish turned out great. The breading was crunchy, the chicken was moist, and the sauce was full of creamy flavor. Best of all, it was low carb and gluten free.
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Almond flour is an essential part of low-carb or gluten-free baking, but buying it pre-milled
can get unreasonably pricey. Grinding it at home is a fresher, less expensive alternative that has saved the LowCarbist a pretty penny this holiday season.
To mill, you’ll need a food processor (or a blender) and a bag of almonds. Blanched almonds yield the lightest, finest flour, but whole almonds provide a tiny bit more fiber. I always choose blanched, because they are slightly softer and easier to grind.
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This recipe combines every type of onion available at your average grocery, give or take an allium. The result is a creamy, sweet casserole with a tangy cheese crust. The interplay of the crunchy top and the sweet bottom isn’t unlike coffee cake, if that can be said about a dish with more than a pound of onions.
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Jalapeño poppers are the crown jewel of low carb entertaining. They’re tasty, Atkins induction friendly, and no one thinks of them as diet food. Not only that, but you can make a full oven of them for under $6. I made these long before I ever had a breaded, fried popper, and when I did finally try the high carb version, it wasn’t half as good.
Ingredients
- jalapeños
- cream cheese
- bacon
- toothpicks
Preheat the oven to 400°F. Cut the tops off the peppers and slice them down the middle. Then scoop out the interiors, making sure to get every last seed. The seeds are very spicy, and every one missed will be an unexpected burst of heat. Wash the peppers in a colander, then set them to dry.
Tip: Wash peppers in cold water, lest they form a potent pepper mist and blind you for the evening.
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