Are you still powering through on your health kick from the New Year?

You might be one of very few (we lasted approximately one week, oops!) but you can satisfy your sweet tooth with Jasmine and Melissa Hemsley’s healthy treat recipes.

Who knew sticky toffee cake could be so guilt-free?

Recipe title: Sticky Toffee Tray Bake

Serves: 10

Ingredients

For the bake

  • 100g butter (at room temperature/soft), plus extra for greasing
  • 250g dates, pitted and roughly chopped
  • 200ml boiling water
  • 200g ground almonds
  • 3 medium eggs
  • sea salt
  • 20g chestnut or coconut flour
  • 1¼ teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
  • Optional: pinch of ground clove
  • Crème Fraiche to serve

For the sauce (optional)

  • 100g dates
  • 50g butter
  • 300-400ml boiling water

Method

  1. Preheat the oven to fan 170c/gas mark 5/375F. Grease a ceramic, glass or enamel baking dish with butter or line with baking parchment.

  2. To make the cake: Soak the dates in 200ml boiling water for 10 minutes. Drain the dates and put their liquid into a food processor along with the butter and the ground almonds and process until smooth.

  3. Add the eggs, a tiny pinch of salt and ground cloves, if using. Sift in the chestnut or coconut flour and bicarbonate of soda and process again until creamy.

  4. Chop the soaked dates and stir through the cake mixture until they are evenly distributed.

  5. Pour the mixture into the prepared dish and bake for 45 minutes at 170C or until cooked through. You might need to cover the top with parchment paper if it starts to look too brown after 35 minutes. The pudding will slump slightly when it comes out of the oven. Allow to cool and cut into squares and serve.

Tips:

  • If you want to have this as a dessert make a sauce to go with it. Again, soak 100g dates in the boiling water before blending with the butter. Process just the dates and butter and then slowly add the soaking water until your sauce is as smooth as possible. You can thin it with a touch more water and leave it warm or heat in a saucepan

  • You can also make this cake by hand. Blend the wet ingredients into the dry. Chop the dates as best you can for a lovely chunky texture to the pudding. For the sauce use a good quality maple syrup like Vertmont instead of the dates.

Recipe title: Chocolate and Clementine Bars

Serves: 6

Ingredients

  • 1 organic clementine
  • 100g coconut oil
  • 50g cocoa powder
  • 3 tablespoons maple syrup
  • 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
  • ¼ teaspoon orange extract (not essence)
  • a tiny pinch of sea salt

Method

  1. Line a small baking tin – about 11cm x 17cm – or similar – sized container with baking parchment.

  2. Zest the clementine with a grater or a zester and place the zester to one side. Peel the clementine, break into segments and arrange in the bottom of the prepared tin.

  3. Gently melt the coconut oil in a saucepan over a low heat. Remove from the heat and whisk in the cocoa powder until smooth, then stir in the remaining ingredients until well combined.

  4. Pour the fudge mixture over the clementine segments in the tin, then sprinkle over the clementine zest, pressing it gently onto the surface of the chocolate mixture.

  5. Chill in the fridge for 1 hour, or until set. Slice with a sharp knife and serve immediately as the chocolate becomes very soft at room temperature, or store in the fridge and eat within a day or two.

Taken from The Art of Eating Well by Jasmine and Melissa Hemsley