An RHR blog reader, Micaela, wrote me an email asking for a healthy recipe that would cure her craving for candy corn. This was a tough one! As a former candy corn lover, I knew from firsthand how tasty and addicting those sweet little kernels can be.
And I also knew that the flavor I was trying to wholesomely reproduce was…corn syrup. Gulp!
I didn’t want to end up with a super sweet, high-calorie treat that simply replaced the refined sugar with a more wholesome sweetener. No, I saw a treat developing that had more to it nutritionally.
Enter the sweet potato.
With the addition of cooked sweet potato, this wholesome candy (and yes, make no mistake, it IS candy) provides usable, complex carbohydrates as well as the cure for your candy corn craving.
Make the candies into pinwheels, or channel your inner candy corn with little kernel shapes. It’s delish either way!
1½ cups cooked sweet potato (1 or 2 sweet potatoes)
2 cups arrowroot starch
1 cup coconut sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
¼ teaspoon almond extract
½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon coconut milk, full fat
¼ cup Almond Butter
2 tablespoons pure maple syrup
dash of sea salt
⅓ cup shredded coconut
To cook the sweet potato: Preheat the oven to 450 degrees F. Line a baking sheet with foil. Poke the sweet potato(es) all over with a fork. Place on the baking sheet and bake for 30 minutes. Flip over and bake for another 30 minutes. Remove from the oven and allow to cool before removing the skins and measuring out 1 ½ cups.
Combine the remaining candy ingredients in a medium sized mixing bowl. Knead the mixture until smooth.
Sprinkle a clean cutting board or counter with arrowroot starch. Use a rolling pin to flatten the sweet potato dough into a large rectangle.
In a small bowl combine the almond butter, maple syrup and salt. Spread the filling over the dough. Sprinkle with the coconut. Roll the dough up, like a jelly roll. Place in the fridge for an hour.
Slice the dough into pinwheels and serve.
Calories: 51
Fat: 1g
Carbohydrates: 10g
Sodium: 9mg
Fiber: 1g
Protein: 1g
Sugar: 1g