Happy New Year! I wanted to get the year off to a sweet start, so here’s the dessert I made for Christmas, which just happened to turn out to be one of my favorite desserts ever.

As soon as I saw this recipe, I knew I wanted to make it. I love things that are salty and sweet and pecans are never a bad thing either; add chocolate and you have to have a winning dessert.

I actually think it’s easier to make raw tortes and pies than cooked ones; you don’t have to worry about cutting cold butter into the crust or cooking them in a water bath. This recipe comes together extremely quickly and is full of flavor.

I used maple syrup because I had plenty on hand. To make this fully raw, use agave nectar or raw honey.

Raw Salted Caramel Chocolate Pecan Torte

Prep time: 15 minutes

Cook time: 0 minutes

Ingredients(Makes 1 torte):

For the crust:

• 6oz(about 1 1/2 cups) dates
• 6oz(1 1/2 cups) pecans

For the caramel:

• 2oz dates
• 6 Tablespoons maple syrup or other liquid sweetener
• 1/2 teaspoon coarse salt

For the filling:

• 1/2 cup cocoa powder
• 1/4 cup coconut oil, melted
• 1/2 cup maple syrup or other liquid sweetener
• Sea salt and pecans for garnish

Method:

1. To make the crust, pulse the dates and pecans in a food processor until it forms a dough ball. If after a while the dough hasn’t come together, add water by the tablespoon slowly until it does.
2. Grease a 9-inch pan lightly with coconut oil. Press the dough into the pan and spread it out evenly into a pie crust shape, raising it at the side. Make sure there are no holes in the bottom.
3. Make the caramel by blending together the maple syrup and dates in a food processor until smooth and golden in color. Once it’s blended into a sauce, add in the sea salt and mix gently.
4. Pour the caramel in a thin layer on top of the bottom of the crust, spreading it out evenly.
5. To make the filling, blend the melted coconut oil, cocoa powder, and maple syrup in a food processor until it’s uniformly mixed.
6. Carefully cover the caramel layer with the chocolate layer. For me it was easiest to add a little bit of topping all around the pie and lightly blending the top together with a soft spatula.
7. Garnish the top with pecans and sea salt if desired.
8. Refrigerate your torte until the filling sets. Remove it from the refrigerator about 10-15 minutes before cutting and serving. Personally I liked this when it was still slightly chilled but you can also eat it at room temperature.

I would have liked to have gotten better pictures of this but it was too good not to just dig into. It may not be one of the prettiest desserts, but it’s by far one of the tastiest I’ve made in a long time. I can’t wait to make this again.

Like I’ve said before, I’m not a big cookie fan. I’m a frosting person. I was the kid who would break apart an Oreo or maple leaf cookie, lick out the inside, and put the cookie halves back in the box. You can’t imagine how much that thrilled my parents.

I was going to fill these with a soft chocolate ganache, but since the cookies are rather unsweet on their own I thought a sweeter filling would contrast nicely and let all the flavors show. Because of that I went with my favorite kind of frosting: Buttercream. The filling is rich, sweet, and creamy adding a whole new level to the cookies.

I give a suggested recipe for the cookies to use but you can really do this with any cookie recipe. Again, this is really easy to make vegan by simply substituting a dairy-free margarine for the butter.

Peanut Butter Buttercream Sandwich Cookies

Prep time: 5 minutes

Cook time: 0 minutes

Ingredients(Makes 9 sandwich cookies):

• 1 batch peanut butter cookies
• 3 Tablespoons no-oil added peanut butter
• 3 Tablespoons butter, room temperature
• 3/4 cup powdered sugar
• 1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Method:

1. Cream together the peanut butter, butter, powdered sugar and vanilla extract until it makes a smooth and thick buttercream.
2. Scoop 1 tablespoon of buttercream onto the flat side of a cookie and sandwich together with an equally sized cookie. Repeat until all of the cookies and frosting are gone.

Well I made it 4 days into December before breaking down and making Christmas cookies. I couldn’t hold up to the pressure any longer.

The truth is I’m not the biggest cookie fan. I have my favorites(like peanut butter cookies) but on the whole would rather have something else. One cookie I love is the peanut butter cookie from Wildflour Bakery which is gluten-free and vegan. It’s so sweet and soft and falls apart in your mouth. I thought I might try to make a cookie like theirs; this isn’t nearly the same, but I like it in its own respect which is why I’m posting the recipe. It’s less sweet but much more peanut buttery; it almost tastes like eating a spoonful of peanut butter in cookie form.

This recipe can easily be made vegan by using a dairy-free butter substitute. I would not recommend subbing in coconut oil for the butter in a 1:1 ratio because they do not act the same in baking and I can’t say for how it would turn out.

Egg-Free Peanut Butter Cookies

Prep time: 30 minutes

Cook time: 16-18 minutes

Ingredients(Makes about 1 1/2 dozen cookies):

• 1 cup no-oil added peanut butter
• 1/4 cup butter
• 3/4 cup maple syrup
• 3/4 cup brown rice flour
• 1/4 cup tapioca starch(or corn starch)

Method:

1. Preheat your oven to 350 degrees and line a couple baking trays with parchment paper.
2. Beat together all of the ingredients. Put the batter in the refrigerator of freezer to harden until you can handle the dough and roll it into balls.
3. Once the dough has reached that stage, scoop the dough and roll it into balls. Place the balls about 2 inches apart on the baking trays.
4. Bake for 16-20 minutes until the outside is golden. The cookies will still be very soft to the touch when they’re done.
5. Remove the cookies from the oven and let them cool completely before handling. As they cool, the outside will harden up and make them less fragile.
6. Store sealed in an airtight container at room temperature when not eating.

You’re going to want to bookmark this one; trust me.

I never understood the appeal of mug cakes before recently. It seemed to me that if you wanted something chocolate and delicious you should put in the time and effort to bake some almond flour brownies and the extra hour would be well worth it. It also didn’t help that most mug cake recipes aren’t gluten-free, or—if they are—come out with a weird starchy taste to them.

But now I’ve seen the light and have come around to mug cakes, partly because the oven I use was 3 floors below where I lived at the time I made this and partly because the recipe is so damn good. When I was trying the recipe, I also wanted something that was sort of healthy. This is healthy enough even to be eaten for breakfast, which I’ve done on a few too many occasions.

The original recipe is only 4 ingredients, but you can add in things like chocolate chips, walnuts, candied ginger, vanilla extract, and anything else to shake things up.

Paleo Mug Cake

Prep time: 5 minutes

Cook time: 3 minutes

Ingredients(Makes 1 cake):

• 1 small ripe banana
• 1 1/2 Tablespoons almond butter(or any nut butter)
• 1 egg
• 2 heaping Tablespoons cocoa powder
• 2 teaspoons sweetener(optional)
• Chocolate chips, walnuts, dried fruit, or other mix-ins(optional)

Method:

1. With a fork, mash the banana into a smooth puree.
2. Mix the almond butter, egg, cocoa powder, and extra sweetener if using into the banana puree until it forms an even batter.
3. Fold in any mix-ins into the batter that you’d like. Otherwise, our the batter into a mug or other microwave safe container. Be sure to only fill the container up to 2/3rds the way because it will expand in the microwave.
4. Microwave on high for 2 and 1/2 minutes until the center is set. Carefully remove the mug from the microwave and enjoy hot, cold, or at room temperature.

I don’t add sweetener to mine and it still tastes delicious. I’ve only ever made it with almond butter but I’m sure peanut butter would be a nice alteration. The banana flavor is definitely prevalent, especially once it cools, but that only reminds me of a chocolate covered banana which I love. The best things about these cakes are that they don’t have any sort of flour flavor to them and are rich and fudgy like a brownie. The worst thing about this recipe is once you make it you’ll never stop.