Super Cacao Brownies

These fudgy brownies are so rich and dense that you only need a small piece, but feel free to have a big one. With ingredients like raw cacao, wheatgerm and ground flax seeds these brownies are packed with antioxidants, vitamins, healthy fats, omegas, fiber, protein and complex carbs. But don’t worry, there’s enough sugar and butter to make them taste amazing and nothing like a “health food”.

Cacao vs cocoa - Cacao is the raw form, cocoa is heated at high temperatures which reduces the nutritional value.

If you are wondering what happens to the nutritional value when you bake raw cacao into brownies, the answer is, I don’t know. Unfortunately there are no studies to that effect. So I’ve made the baking temperature quite low (only 300ºF) in order to try to help with that issue.

Makes: 12 servings

Preparation time: 20m
Cooking time: 20m
Total time: 1h5m

Ingredients:

  • 1 teaspoon virgin coconut oil
  • 4 large organic eggs
  • 1/2 cup sugar
  • 1/2 cup brown sugar
  • 1 cup unsweetened applesauce
  • 4 teaspoons vanilla extract
  • 4 ounces melted butter (about 1/2 cup)
  • 1 1/4 cups cacao powder
  • 1/4 cup ground flax seeds
  • 1/2 cup wheatgerm (omit this if making gluten-free)
  • 1/2 cup all purpose flour (or gluten-free all purpose flour)
  • 1/2 teaspoon coarse salt
  • 1 - 2 cups chopped walnuts
  • 1/2 cup unsweetened shredded coconut

Equipment: 8x8 baking dish, large bowl, medium bowl

Instructions:

  1. Preheat oven to 300ºF/150ºC.
  2. Grease a baking dish with coconut oil.
  3. In a large bowl mix together the eggs, sugars, applesauce, vanilla extract and butter. If you have just melted the butter then it is best to let it cool a bit before mixing in and drizzle it in slowly so that it doesn’t cook the eggs.
  4. In a separate bowl mix the dry ingredients: cocoa powder, ground flax, wheatgerm, flour and salt. Then dump the dry mixture on top of the wet mixture and stir until combined.
  5. Fold the walnuts into the batter.
  6. Use a spatula to spread the batter into the greased baking dish.
  7. Sprinkle the shredded coconut across the top.
  8. Bake at 300ºF/150ºC for 35-45 minutes until you can insert a toothpick and it comes out clean or with just dry crumbs. Let the brownies cool in the pan for 5-10 minutes before slicing.