Question on baking without sugar

[Katee]

I'm trying more and more to follow Dr. Davis' (http://www.trackyourplaque.com/blog/) views on eating. He advocates a no wheat/low starch/no sugar diet. (I don't agree with him 100% but most of what he says makes a lot of sense.) I have found it much easier to transform my diet to non-grain eating since i have been losing weight with the hCG.

But i still like baked goods!

Not long ago i made Duane a pumpkin pie, and i made a pumpkin custard for myself (basically the same, but no crust and i made mine without sugar). My custard had some stevia in it for sweetening. I don't remember if i used 1/4 or 1/2 tsp, but it was not much. I made Duane taste mine to see if he could tolerate it, and he thought it was fine. The custard cooked just fine without sugar. I consider this to be very healthy as its ingredients were pumpkin, eggs, heavy cream, spices and stevia.

But i'm wondering what i can use in other things that will bake similarly to goods baked with sugar. Sugar has a caramelizing effect on many baked things.

One of our favorite cookies has been the flourless peanut butter cookies.

The original recipe was:

1 C peanut butter
1 C sugar
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla

I have changed this by reducing the sugar to between 1/2 and 3/4 C, and added about 1 TB of applesauce.

But i would like to get rid of the sugar and don't know quite how to do it as the sugar is much of what holds this together.

I'm going to make another pumpkin pie for Duane today, and i'll have some pumpkin left over. I thought i might make peanut butter/pumpkin cookies, but do you think i can do without the sugar all together and hope that the pumpkin will hold it together? Or maybe i should use a small amount of GF flour?

Any suggestions are welcome! Thanks.

[Islander]

Sorry, Katee, I'm no help because I'm totally sugar-free. I don't bake. I weaned myself off most of that when I was diagnosed with diabetes. The closest I come is buckwheat pancakes every now and then. But why I'm replying: recipe for the sugar-free custard, please? That sounds like it might be a good dessert for my Thanksgiving guests!

[Katee]

recipe for the sugar-free custard, please?

You will have to wait a little while, but i'll be able to post it before Thanksgiving. Because i don't remember the exact amount of stevia i used (and if i get the amount wrong it won't taste good). So, sometime before Thanksgiving i will make it again, and then post the recipe.

[mellowsong]

Katee, maybe (and I'm just guessing here) more eggs might hold it together? You might look into coconut flour if that is something you can tolerate. I've made some coconut flour items with both stevia and honey but I honestly can't begin to guess the amount of stevia I used.