Candida-friendly COOKIE recipes - seriously!

[Guest guest]

Ahh, Easter. Church, egg hunts, bunnies, candy and potlucks. I'd had

the foresight to eat at home first before heading out to today's

potluck. Even though it was a gathering of Naturopathic medical

students, I KNEW I wouldn't be able to eat anthing there. I did bring

a Candida friendly dish (a Thai curry) so there would be at least one

thing I could eat.

I'd prepared myself mentally to resist all of today's Easter candy -

but I wasn't prepared for all the other tasty treats, and almost broke

down. It was time to figure out how to bake something sweet that I

could eat. So tonight I made 2 batches of cookies, improvising from a

couple of cookbook recipes and swapping out ingredients for " safe "

ones. Fortunately it turns out that almond flour (almond meal) can

work miracles.

I made 2 types of cookies: carob-almond (makes a nice rich, nutty,

almost-chocolatey cookie) and lemon-rhubarb (very moist and lemony).

Both turned out to be EXTREMELY tasty, as confirmed by my wife who is

definitely not on this diet.

1. First, mix up the following dry ingredients:

- 2 cups almond meal/flour. Very affordable at Trader Joe's, and

Bob's Red Mill brand is also widely available at natural food stores.

- 1/2 cup soy flour. Don't worry if it makes the batter taste

unpleasantly " beany " , because the soy flavor will bake out in the oven.

- 1/2 teaspoon salt.

- 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder.

- 2 tablespoons Stevia powder (different Stevia formulations may vary,

so just remember to use the sweetness equivalent of 1 cup of sugar).

- (almond-carob only): 4 tablespoons carob powder.

- (almond-carob only): 1/4 cup chopped almonds.

- (lemon-rhubarb only): 1/4 cup UNSWEETENED coconut shreds.

2. In a separate bowl mix up the following wet ingredients:

- 1/2 cup cooking oil (I use safflower, but you could use butter if

dairy is OK for you).

- 2 eggs.

- 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract.

- 1/4 cup soy milk.

- (almond-carob only): 1/2 teaspoon almond extract.

- (lemon-rhubarb only): 1/8 teaspoon almond extract.

- (lemon-rhubarb only): 3/4 teaspoon lemon extract.

- (lemon-rhubarb only): 1/2 cup cooked, stevia-sweetened rhubarb (see

below).

3. Mix the wet and dry ingredients thoroughly.

4. Drop cookies on a baking sheet exactly as you would any ordinary

drop cookies, and bake for 8-15 minutes at 350 degrees. This recipe

makes 10-15 cookies. You may have to experiment with the baking time

- fortunately you have to overbake these a LONG time to burn them.

5. Enjoy! See if you can do better than me and not eat most of them

in one sitting!

OK, here's the deal on the cooked rhubarb: I didn't keep track of the

exact proportions while I was preparing this ingredient, but here's

basically what I did: dice up the rhubarb in 1/4 to 1/2 inch cubes, as

you would to bake in a pie for example. Put in a saucepan with enough

water and cooking oil to keep the bottom from getting dry, and add (I

think) about 1 teaspoon stevia powder. I also added 1/2 teaspoon

(artificial) strawberry extract - yes, fake food I know, but I

couldn't resist and this ingredient would be optional.) Cook on

low-medium heat until softened. I highly recommend including this in

the lemon cookies because it makes them much more moist.

- Dan