Right up my alley - a chocolate treat that is easy and dare I say, good for you. I'm not the creator, I found the original on Pinterest, with credit to The Big Man's World, but made a few modifications, and absolutely loved them. Chocolate wins around here, so I had to share.

To be straight - these are not your typical brownie. But they are super decadent, fudgy & very rich - without any butter, oil, or wheat flour, but a sweet potato & cocoa base.  I have a serious sweet tooth, and thought 2"x 2" squares would be a good size, I ended up cutting them in half, into 1"x 2" rectangles because they are so rich. These are Paleo, gluten-free and can be made dairy-free & vegan very easily.

Gluten Free - No Bake - Protein Brownies

For the Brownies 

1/2 cup coconut flour
1/2 cup cocoa powder (these are made with dark/dutch process cocoa, but you can use any cocoa)
1 scoop chocolate protein powder (I chose Casein)
1/3 cup nut butter of choice (I used peanut butter)
1/2 cup raw honey (can sub maple syrup, agave or brown rice syrup)
1/2 cup mashed sweet potato (can sub for mashed pumpkin)*
1/4 cup milk of choice

*With everyone in love with Fall, I could not find canned pumpkin - I'm not a fan of canned sweet potato, and I was too impatient to bake a sweet potato - so I used baby food. For reals. I picked up a 4oz pouch of pureed sweet potatoes for these and it worked perfect! #momwin

For the Protein Frosting

2 scoops chocolate Casein protein powder (can sub dairy-free protein)
approx 1/3 cup milk of choice

Instructions:

1. Line a small, deep baking tray with parchment paper and set aside. I used a 4"x 8" loaf pan.

2. In a large mixing bowl, add your coconut flour, cocoa and protein powder and set aside.

3. In a microwave safe bowl, melt your nut butter with the honey, stir until combined. Add the wet mixture to the dry mixture and mix until fully incorporated. Stir through the mashed sweet potato until fully incorporated and batter is even.
 - If batter is too thick, add a tablespoon or more of milk of choice until a very thick batter is formed. If batter is too thin, add a dash more coconut flour.

4. Pour batter into the lined baking dish, pressing evenly with a spoon into the corners & sides. Refrigerate for at least 30 minutes to firm up. While no bake brownies are firming up, make your frosting.

5. For the Frosting simply combine the casein & milk in a bowl and mix until fully combined and thick, & spread on cooled brownies.

Pull out by the edges of the parchment paper and cut into squares. Keep these in the fridge in tupperware to keep the frosting in place.

These are fantastic sub for more calorie & sugar laden treats. Aria, our two year old, inhaled a whole square the other night and I didn't feel even a sliver of guilt. If you are working these into a diet, or are watching your macros, these are a great post workout. The macro breakdown is below.

I'd love to hear your feedback on these! Comment at the bottom, and be sure to share with your friends on Pinterest & Facebook!

Macro Breakdown (with my modifications): 

Hope you all had a wonderful Labor Day weekend! We enjoyed a rather relaxing one here. September 1st rolled around and boom, Fall was here. We caught up on yardwork, brought out just a little bit of Fall decor and found some new pieces (have you seen those faux-marble pumpkins?!) and ended with a fun evening in the backyard chasing Aria around.

Blogging has been slow lately, but I think that has to do with us hanging onto Summer as much as we can. We also have been tied up with a project that we have spent months and months... and months on, that is finally becoming very real and I can't wait to share it with you!

Emerson is 5 months old now, and I think she's growing at warp speed. And Aria is all about the word "no", topped with a little sass, but doles out all the kisses she can, and is becoming fairly snugly, which is the best, since she is generally all about her own personal space, haha! I will take all the snuggles I can get.

We did attempt to start potty training, but Aria's fear to the toilet the first day, turned into curiosity (since it celebrates if they go potty), then rejection of her new training pants and of the toilet all together - I even tried bribing with stickers. No success at this time :|, we'll try again soon.

We are in the midst of sleep-training Emerson, although her recent growth spurt set us back a few weeks, but I'm working on putting together all our sleep training tips & tricks, so keep an eye out for that later this week.





XO, McKenzie