Keep Your New Year’s Resolution Delicious: Edibles and Baking With Stevia

Keep your New Year resolutions delicious by swapping refined sugar with a hemp-based sweetener. Baking with stevia (and other sweetener alternatives) never tasted so good.

It’s that time of year again! Time for new beginnings and starting over, time to reassess our unhealthy habits and make plans for needed changes. While there’s already Dry January and Veganuary, why not level up the challenge by cutting out refined sugar for the next 30 days? Fortunately, baking with stevia and other sugar alternatives will help break that sugar addiction. Your body will thank you. 

Cutting down sugar is by no means a simple feat, but by baking with Hemp You Can Feel™ stevia and other alternatives, it’s deliciously doable. Not only will you benefit from sweetener alternatives, but from a dose of healthy hemp as well.

The Health Benefits of Reducing Dietary Sugars 

At this point, the research is clear. All the refined sugar in our diet is directly linked to a host of chronic metabolic diseases currently widespread in our society. Certainly, robust randomized controlled trials and systematic reviews detail just how our highly processed, sugar-laden diet is to blame for rising instances of chronic disease. 

In a 2016 review published in Nutrients, authors James M. Rippe and Theodore J. Angelopoulos lay it out in no uncertain terms. As they state, sugars are the, “unique culprits for metabolically based diseases such as obesity, diabetes and cardiovascular disease appears inconsistent with modern, high quality evidence and is very unlikely to yield health benefits.” ^[1]Rippe, J. M., & Angelopoulos, T. J. (2016). Relationship between Added Sugars Consumption and Chronic Disease Risk Factors: Current Understanding. Nutrients, 8(11), 697. … Continue reading

With so much refined sugar permeating our diets, anything we can do to reduce the impact is a valuable step towards the risk of reducing chronic disease. At least, baking with stevia, saccharin, and other sugar alternatives is a simple and painless step towards a healthier diet. 

Healthier Still: Hemp You Can Feel™ Sweeteners

With the recent launch of Hemp You Can Feel™ line of sweeteners, there are now even more reasons to switch from baking with refined sugar to baking with stevia. Hemp You Can Feel™ has revolutionized cannabinoid extraction with the help of the honey bee. 

Hemp You Can Feel™ incorporates Bee-Fuse™ Technology from Phyto-Pharma International into all its healthy products, from coffee to gummies and beyond. Bee-Fuse™ is the first, genuinely all-natural, and bioavailable hemp extraction process.

The full line of cannabinoid-infused sweeteners from Hemp You Can Feel™ contains water-soluble, full-spectrum hemp extracts, thanks to the power of ethically cultivated honey. Bees love hemp, and Bee-Fuse™ allows them to express the hemp-sourced cannabinoids into their honey naturally. When incorporated into stevia, or other sweeteners, this technology imparts all the benefits of the hemp into a 100 percent water-soluble format.

Baking with stevia or any other Hemp You Can Feel™ sweetener means baking without refined white sugar, all the while still reaping the benefits of full-spectrum hemp extracts. For anyone striving for a healthier diet to kick start the new year, this is the first — and the second — step towards that goal.

Baking With Hemp You Can Feel™ Organic Stevia Blend

Hemp You Can Feel™ Organic Stevia Blend works well as a substitute for any recipe using stevia or other alternatives. Unlike straight stevia liquid or other sugar-swaps, this organic stevia blend is a simple 1:1 replacement. Many low-glycemic alternatives are super-sweetened, with only a few drops suitable for an entire dish. 

In baking, every ingredient is a calculation, based on a precise chemical reaction. Adjusting recipes to reduce the refined sugar in your diet can be tricky. There is a big difference between granulated white sugar and a few drops of stevia liquid in terms of chemistry of cooking, and the switch doesn’t always lead to successful results. This is why trading granulated sweeteners, like the Organic Stevia Blend, delivers better results.

Breakfast Nut and Fruit Cookies

Ingredients:

• 2 cups bran flakes
• two cups rolled oats
• 2 tbsp ground flaxseed
• 1 tbsp ground cinnamon
• 25 packets Hemp You Can Feel™ Organic Stevia Blend 
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp baking soda
• one  cup unsweetened applesauce
• 1/2 cup unsweetened plain yogurt
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 large egg
• 3/4 cup dried fruit (cranberries, apricots, apples)
• Zest of one orange
• ¾ cup mix nuts and seeds (walnut pieces, pumpkin seeds, sunflower seeds, hemp hearts)

Directions:

1. Preheat the oven to 350˚F (180˚C) and line two cookie sheets with parchment paper.
2. Whisk together dry ingredients, bran, rolled oats, flaxseed, cinnamon, Hemp You Can Feel™  Stevia Blend, baking soda, and baking powder in a large bowl. Set aside.
3. Combine apple sauce, yogurt, vanilla, and egg in a medium bowl. 
4. Gradually add the wet mixture to dry ingredients. Mix until just combined, scraping down the sides.
5. Add in orange zest, dried fruit, and nuts. Use a large spoon to combine.
6. Use a small ice cream scoop to place dough on a baking sheet 3 inches apart. If you don’t have an ice cream scoop, cookies should be roughly 3 tablespoons in size.
7. Bake for 15 minutes, or until golden brown. Cooking times may vary depending on your stove. 
8. Allow to cool on the baking sheet for 5 minutes to firm up before placing on a cooling rack.
9. Store for up to a week in an airtight container lined with parchment paper.

You can add a cannabis tincture to this recipe to turn it into an edible. There is no call for butter or oil in this recipe.

Keto-Friendly Fudgy Brownies

What’s the relationship between keto and low-sugar diets? Keto is a diet (and some would argue a lifestyle) that requires low carbohydrate and high fats. It’s all about shifting our bodies over from fast-burning carbohydrates (like sugars) to slow-burning fats. 

The benefits of keto are scientifically proven to be far beyond better weight management. Keto-diets reduce cholesterol, lower blood pressure, and positively impact blood glucose levels. Interestingly, cannabinoids may also help to manage glucose levels. Several studies over the last two decades have discovered  a fascinating relationship between cannabinoids and lower insulin levels. ^[2]Dashti, H. M., Mathew, T. C., Hussein, T., Asfar, S. K., Behbahani, A., Khoursheed, M. A., Al-Sayer, H. M., Bo-Abbas, Y. Y., & Al-Zaid, N. S. (2004). Long-term effects of a ketogenic diet in … Continue reading

In 2013, for example, a team of American researchers reported 16% lower fasting insulin levels among cannabis consumers, than non-consumers. Hemp You Can Feel low-glycemic sweeteners, are the ideal combination for anyone concerned with blood sugar management. ^[3]Penner, E. A., Buettner, H., & Mittleman, M. A. (2013). The impact of marijuana use on glucose, insulin, and insulin resistance among US adults. The American journal of medicine, 126(7), … Continue reading

Recipe

Ingredients:

• 5 oz cannabis infused butter, cubed
• 2 oz dark chocolate, broken into pieces
• 3 large eggs
• 25 packets Hemp You Can Feel™ Organic Stevia Blend
• 1/2 cup ground almond flour
• 1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
• ¼ tsp kosher salt 
• 1/2 tsp baking powder

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 325˚F (180˚C), and spray an 8″ x8″ glass baking dish with non-stick cooking oil.
2. Combine butter and dark chocolate into a microwave-safe bowl. Microwave mixture in 30-second increments, stirring in between until melted. Set aside to cool for ten minutes.
3. Whisk eggs until frothy, adding in Stevia Blend.
4. Combine egg mixture with chocolate, stirring to combine.
5. In a large bowl, whisk dry ingredients together: almond flour, cocoa powder, salt, and baking powder.
6. Slowly add wet ingredients to dry ingredients, stirring and scraping down the sides until smooth.
7. Pour mixture into the prepared baking dish, shaking gently to even out and get into the corners.
8. Bake for 15 to 20 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out with moist crumbs, but not with wet dough.
9. Allow to cool in the pan before transferring to a cutting board to cut into small squares.

Start The New Year Baking With Sweet Alternatives

Healthy New Year’s resolutions are always challenging, thanks to weeks of holiday treat setting a bad precedent. But cutting out sugar doesn’t have to feel like an uphill battle. Make the switch to healthier sweeteners easier this year by baking with stevia and other hemp-fueled sweet alternatives from Hemp You Can Feel™.