I Lost 10 lbs Eating Chocolate Molten Lava Cakes!

Sounds crazy, right? It’s true, but this article isn’t about how to lose weight. It’s about substitutions I made to my diet to make healthier choices. These substitutions enabled me to eat grain-free molten lava cakes for dessert every evening for 2 weeks and lose 10 pounds. I share some of these substitutions below. If you were thinking of taking steps to improve your eating habits, I hope they help you with some ideas. In this article, I’m going to share some of my favorite grain-free, processed sugar-free, conventional dairy-free recipes and substitutes that I’ve found in my journey to eating healthier.

I had always believed that anything in moderation was fine as long as I was eating a well rounded diet with lots of fruits and vegetables. Because of food allergies with a couple kids, we already had to make most foods ourselves because the store bought alternatives contained allergens. Over the last 6 months, I’ve radically changed my diet and feel much better.

Every body is different and processes foods differently, so I’m not saying that everyone should do what I did. It has been challenging, and I know there are some things that I could be doing better. I’m just going to share my journey and what I’ve found. You do you. Be sure to consult your healthcare practitioner before making any diet changes.

I Ended Up Eliminating Many Foods From My Diet

I was having some symptoms and was praying about what to do about them. This led me on an interesting journey. I was led to take a class from one of my favorite authors. This class listed some of the worst foods to be eating. As he listed these foods, I felt that I was supposed to cut quite a few of them out, as well. Here are the major offenders that I chose to eliminate from my diet.

• Refined sugar
  • I will eat naturally occurring sugars, but try to keep them limited to moderation.
• Conventional grains
  • My biggest challenges seem to be wheat and corn. I try to stay completely grain free, or eat sprouted grains. We are trying to switch our whole household to either Italian pasta or sprouted or ancient flours.
• Conventional dairy
  • I have switched to grass fed or imported butter and cage free organic eggs. Outside of that, I’ve mostly eliminated dairy.
• Hydrogenated conventional oils
  • I only use avocado oil, olive oil, and coconut oil in our house
• Legumes
  • Our house has to avoid legumes anyway due to a severe allergy, but legumes really aren’t the healthiest of items for me, either.
• I also tried to swap our meats for grass-fed beef and chicken for no antibiotic free range (where our budget would allow)

This was a really big change for me. I felt that we ate a mostly paleo diet before because one of my kids can’t have dairy or legumes. Once I started this, I realized how much we ate pasta and breads since he wasn’t allergic to them. Cutting them out was a hard adjustment for me.

People often heard my list of no’s and asked what I could eat. I could eat meats, fruits and veggies, nuts, and spices. This journey taught me a lot about almond, coconut, tapioca, and cassava flours. I learned about coconut sugar and using fruit as a sweetener, like dates.

Grain-Free Substitutes I Found

I started using arrowroot as a thickening agent instead of cornstarch. I like the Siete brand almond tortilla shells instead of flour or corn shells when we are having tacos. Siete also makes grain-free chips. I did not care for the lime ones, but I really like their Dip Chips.

I like to use a sweet potato as a base and add my Italian Beef meet or Sloppy Joe meat instead of a bun. Instead of pasta, I often use zucchini noodles or cauliflower pasta (read the ingredients because I’ve found a lot of cauliflower items that still have wheat as an ingredient. Unfortunately, that defeats the purpose of what I’m trying to do.) I also really like frozen cauliflower rice.

If I’m having trouble finding a lunch or a snack to eat that meets my criteria, I just make myself a protein shake. I’ve learned that if I add protein powder and collagen powder, it makes it pretty filling. My shakes are usually just some fruit, sometimes veggies, protein and collagen powder and either water, almond milk or coconut milk. They are pretty easy when I don’t want to have to cook something.

My Sweet-Tooth had the best of me; I needed to find Grain-Free Substitutes

One of the hardest things for me to break was my sweet habit. (That’s probably where my weight gain had come from.) I found that I didn’t need a lot of sweets, I just really liked a little something sweet after dinner. In doing this new diet, I did some research on some grain-free dessert substitutes that I could make that would fit this new plan.

I found a couple really awesome desserts out there and wanted to share. They are not 100% sugar free. I use the Enjoy Life Dark Chocolate chips, which are soy free and 69% cacao, so it’s better than many other options out there.

Molten Lava Cakes

The first dessert recipe I tried was gluten-free molten lava cakes. The first time I made them, I used blended cherries as my sugar substitute and made up my own recipe. They were amazing. Unfortunately, I haven’t been able to replicate them very well. If I get it down to a science, I’ll definitely share the recipe. I’ve got the berry syrup part figured out, but I’ll share it all together when I get the whole thing nailed.

In the meantime, I often use the molten lava cake recipe I found on draxe.com. It uses cassava flour and coconut sugar. It is pretty delicious. My guests didn’t realize they were gluten-free.

Brownies

The absolute best brownie recipe I found is on almondeater.com. I make them with grass-fed butter instead of the coconut oil. (Personally, I prefer the flavor and texture better.) 

I had been trying a number of recipes for myself. My kids had not been caring for the ones I made, so I usually made a batch for them with my original recipe and a batch that I was testing. One day, I only made a batch for me. My 4 year-old asked if they were my brownies or his brownies. I told him to try them and let me know. He said they were his. When I told him that they were actually mine, he replied, “No, mommy, these are all of our brownies!”

Over Time I Found My Old Favorites Were Too Sweet

After only eating these natural sugars substitutes, I found that the sweets I used to eat were too sweet for me. If I had a candy that I used to love, I found that my mouth would salivate for a few minutes afterwards and it was a really weird feeling. For my birthday, we went to Cheesecake Factory for dessert (yes, I intended on making an exception for the evening). I took 3 bites of my cake and had enough. It was far too sweet for me. My kids loved that they got to eat the rest of it the next day.

“Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your bodies.”

1 Cor 6:19-20

I am feeling much better with my new dietary changes. My symptoms are not completely gone, but are dramatically better. They definitely flare up when I eat foods that I’m trying to stay away from.

Summary of Favorite Grain-Free Dessert Recipes

• Molten Lava Cake
• Best Grain-Free Brownies (I use a 1-for-1 substitution of grass-fed butter instead of coconut oil)

How about you? Have you found some great healthy alternatives to traditional processed foods? I always love to hear new tips and tricks, especially since I’ve fallen into a bit of a food rut lately. Please share this if it helped you or might help someone you know.