Pear and Brazil Nut Chocolate Brownies

Food Recipes
1

Ingredients

60 g
pitted dates, finely chopped
60 g
coconut oil (or unsalted butter, softened), plus extra to grease
3
eggs
100 g
ground almonds (almond meal)
1
pear, quartered and cored, skin on
140 g
dark chocolate (70% cocoa solids)
25 g
Brazil nuts, chopped
pinch of salt

Cook’s notes

Oven temperatures are for conventional; if using fan-forced (convection), reduce the temperature by 20˚C. | We use Australian tablespoons and cups: 1 teaspoon equals 5 ml; 1 tablespoon equals 20 ml; 1 cup equals 250 ml. | All herbs are fresh (unless specified) and cups are lightly packed. | All vegetables are medium size and peeled, unless specified. | All eggs are 55-60 g, unless specified.
Instructions

Preheat the oven to 180°C and grease a 20 cm square cake tin.

Put the dates in a small saucepan with a splash of water. Cover and gently simmer for 3-5 minutes or until they soften. Allow them to cool, then blend them with the coconut oil in a food processor or with a hand blender. Transfer the mixture to a large bowl and add the eggs, then the ground almonds, and beat until everything is incorporated. Dice the pear into ½-cm squares and stir it into the mixture, too.

Melt the dark chocolate in a heatproof bowl set over, but not touching, a pan of steaming water (or microwave it on a medium heat for 1-2 minutes). Allow it to cool a bit before stirring it into the brownie mixture with the Brazil nuts and salt. Pour the mixture into the tin and bake it for 15-20 minutes, or until a knife comes out clean. Delicious with a dollop of crème fraîche, if you like.

Recipe and image from The 8-Week Blood Sugar Diet Recipe Book (Simon & Schuster Australia, $35, pbk). Photography by Joe Sarah.

2

This sounds great! For fun, I put it into MFP to compute the nutritional info (for 8 servings):

Pear_BN_Brownies.PNG1006×1554 87.9 KB

1 Like
3

They taste great, but are a bit fragile, cake tends to break easily.

4

This does look really good. And it is gluten-free to!

We do a lot of different things made with almond meal. Low-carb and gluten-free baked goods are usually very crumbly. We have found that, pretty consistently, these items work best after they are refrigerated overnight. I know, it takes way that fresh-baked brownie. But in many cases it actually improves both flavor and mouth feel. Most of the time we also add in some cream cheese. This makes a big difference in how things bind together as well.

1 Like
5

I always wondered if there were a use for Brazil Nuts. They always end up in the trash when included with mixed nuts. Yuck😀. But the brownies sound good.

6

Thanks for the hint to put the cake in the fridge to stop it being so crumbly. Never thought of doing that.
I think you could use any nut, doesn’t have to be brazil nuts, pistachio would be great I reckon.