Speaker 1: 0:00

Hey there, sunshine. Welcome to the Power On Plants podcast. We're your host, jared and Anita Roussell, and we're absolutely head over heels for whole plant foods and helping you navigate this incredible plant based journey. That's because our lives have been completely changed by plant based goodness. We used to struggle every day with excess pounds and low energy, vascular disease, joint pain and lack of sleep, just to name a few, and even though we're medical professionals, we still weren't getting practical answers that actually worked. So we dug into the research, we started living what we learned, and now we both have our lives back, and that's what we want for you, too. The truth is, you can do this, and it's not hard. You just need a way that will bring real and lasting change, and that path. It has to be simple and enjoyable, and it's got to be delicious too. So are you ready to live your life to the fullest? Then you're in the right place, because living without limits that's what Power On Plants is all about. So pull up your chair, grab a matcha latte and let's get started. Are you here because you love sweet treats? Well, you're in good company, because we love sweet treats, sweet treats, sweet treats too. This is going to be a good one, I can tell. So here is the thing. We got to have our sweet treats and we don't want to say to ourselves I can't have this, I can't have that. It's what Jared always says. You got to say how can I right? I've told this story before, but I've got to tell it again because it just never gets old. We have met so many people. I won't tell about a specific one. It just happens time and time again when and it's usually a woman telling us her husband's problem with his health is that he likes sweet things. If he'd just quit eating all the sweet stuff he'd be alright.

Speaker 2: 1:54

He'd be okay, because sweet's not bad.

Speaker 1: 1:56

Right, because a banana is making everybody in the world sick. It's the banana, no, but he's probably not eating bananas.

Speaker 2: 2:01

I'm sure that's not what she's complaining about.

Speaker 1: 2:04

He's probably got his box of little Debbie's over there, I don't know, honeybun or something.

Speaker 2: 2:08

There's Werther's butterscotch candies.

Speaker 1: 2:10

Maybe, maybe just chocolate cake and stuff. I want you to wrap your head around the fact that you can have sweet treats. You don't have to have sweet cravings anymore, because I'll tell you when you eat sweets in the way that we teach you, just lose that. The cravings lose their hold on you. If you don't know how to get rid of sweet cravings, you need to go back and start with episode 224 and listen to it as well as 225, because we have a two-part episode on getting rid of sweet cravings that you are going to love. Okay, but today I want to talk more practically about what do you use to replace the sweet Like if you just love something sweet to eat what are you going to eat?

Speaker 2: 2:51

Replace the sweeteners and some of those sweet treats.

Speaker 1: 2:53

Well, we're going to talk about that too, but I want to talk about what do you eat? That's sweet, because if she's sitting there, like we were before, she's thinking how do I do this, how do I make plant-based work for me in the way that is going to be sustainable? In order to be sustainable, you got to love what you're eating. Not only does it have to be healthy and make you feel good, but listen, we've eaten some nasty foods in the name of health. Do you know what I'm talking about? I'm so over that and we are anti that. That's what Power and Plants is all about.

Speaker 2: 3:24

We're anti-gross. Anti-gross tasting food no.

Speaker 1: 3:28

I can't, seriously. We've got to stop with saying recipes are five star when they're not five star, because I've been on websites just like you look in, made the recipes and ended up hangry because it weren't no brownie. You know what I'm saying. You can tell me it's a brownie, all day long.

Speaker 2: 3:46

You started off angry, then you became hungry, because now you were angry and still hungry and couldn't eat what you were wanting to eat.

Speaker 1: 3:54

Well, I wasn't angry when I found the recipe. I thought it'd be good.

Speaker 2: 3:57

Now, that was after all, that, yeah, after you spend all that time and you try and you thought this isn't good and you get angry and then you think I'm still hungry. Now. You're hungry.

Speaker 1: 4:06

And let's talk about how. Maybe it took an hour, an hour and a half. Why does it take that long to get a dessert on the table? I have it no idea. Okay, we don't do that around here. It's only special occasion desserts and treats that we take that long to make, because our regular Day-to-day does not allow for that. Does yours? No, it doesn't right.

Speaker 2: 4:26

Most likely not and when you find strategies that make the stuff you love and it doesn't have to take that long. Why would you want to anyway, if you can prepare something in 15 minutes. It's awesome. You love it. It's your go-to quick. Why would you want to take an hour and a half to do?

Speaker 1: 4:40

Yeah, oh yeah, hashtag go-to-quick, we got to have those right, I think you got to have that list. Go and make your list of favorites and find your new one. So if you love sweet sister, listen, you're going to find your new favorites. If you've tried one brownie, that did you wrong. Don't worry, there are other brownie recipes out there.

Speaker 2: 4:59

Look, just just break up with the first brownie recipe, find you a new one right, absolutely break up with it.

Speaker 1: 5:05

It's got to go. I had a meeting with someone on the phone the other day and she was saying to me look, anita, I'm just gonna be honest with you, my husband, he tried brownies. I made the bean brownies one time for him and he said what is this? These are not brownies, and I had some kind of cottage cheese swirl in there and it was really bad. I don't even know what that was. And he is a little more reluctant to try things now because he's been burned. Okay, when you get burned with a plant-based recipe, I mean seriously. There's even comedians. We were listening to this comedian the other day and he was talking about how he walked by this vegan bakery and he went in and he's trying the vegan.

Speaker 2: 5:46

Head cakes, but he didn't realize it was a vegan bakery. He didn't, and he saw the. I think it was a root beer donut or something.

Speaker 1: 5:53

I forgot exactly what it was. It looked fantastic.

Speaker 2: 5:56

And she said can I help you? Do you want one of those? And he said no, I want to Put one in the bag because the other one's not making it outside of here. And then when he tried it, it was like somebody just slam the brakes on in the car right in the middle.

Speaker 1: 6:10

He said he spat it out. He said, took a bite on it, spitting it out in the store. And she said, sir, did you not realize you're in a vegan bakery? Now, hold up, right there in my brain, I hear cars screeching, tires screeching. I don't get that. I don't get that. Why should it be that, just because it says vegan or plant-based, that it tastes nasty? Why do we even have the idea? Who gave us that idea, right, sister? Who Gave us the idea that healthy has to equal nasty? You know why? It is because we've had one too many run-in with the wrong recipe. So if you try the wrong recipe and it is really bad, try another one from someone different, okay, move along. Or Give that other person to try with one or two more, because there may be just be a few tweaks you need to make for your taste. But sometimes and I'll say many, many times, it's not just the one or two tweaks. Okay, find your new favorites, and this involves Sweet things. Okay, listen, a woman doesn't need to tell her husband he has to give up brownies or put something on a plate in front of him. That is just not good. So we have a brownie recipe we came out with, because we knew people love brownies. We put it into the membership where all our new recipes go, because our members need that. You guys need to know how to do these things. What do we eat now? I'm gonna have chair. Just I'm putting them on the spot again.

Speaker 2: 7:35

I'm gonna have him share with you. I'm starting to become used to the uncomfortable feeling. It's becoming the new normal.

Speaker 1: 7:44

You're too comfortable. I'm gonna get a bright spotlight and I'm gonna start just shun it it on you. Just turn it it on when I put you in the spotlight, alright and we'll put a sound effect for that too.

Speaker 2: 7:53

Are you ready? Yes go ahead.

Speaker 1: 8:00

You need to go, you need to tell us what you love, that are your favorite sweet treats go to, and then I want you to tell us how long it takes you to make them.

Speaker 2: 8:10

Well, that's kind of tricky because I don't make a lot of this stuff.

Speaker 1: 8:16

Good.

Speaker 2: 8:17

These are simple, and should I be here home alone, which never happens, or one of my children is not making a sweet treat, then I we've got the recipes. They're simple. I could do it.

Speaker 1: 8:29

Well, the kids do it, so obviously, yes, I just kind of piggyback on them.

Speaker 2: 8:33

I smell something. Oh hey, is somebody making some gingerbread? He's a taster he doesn't make him.

Speaker 1: 8:40

Okay, let's say you had a sweet craving at night time and you did. You didn't need a recipe or anything, you were just craving something sweet. Well, what would you reach for?

Speaker 2: 8:51

Oh, am I making a recipe?

Speaker 1: 8:55

It's not a recipe, just something you're gonna throw it together or something you're gonna grab an eight, probably something that's quick and simple.

Speaker 2: 9:00

That comes to mind. We'd be grabbing a date. Mm-hmm, pitting it. Take the pit out, please.

Speaker 1: 9:05

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 9:05

I'll make that mistake take the pit out and then maybe put just a little bit of a nut butter on it. I love that. That's such a great sweet one Maybe two and it just gives you that burst of flavor and it gives you that it's filling and it satisfies that sweet craving.

Speaker 1: 9:20

Absolutely okay. So this is something really simple. Right before he taped this recipe, I was hungry. So what's sitting right here next to me? I got two things and I mixed them together, and I didn't have any trail mix in the pantry. So what I do?

Speaker 2: 9:35

Right now I see in front of her some raisins organic raisins and some shelled sunflower seeds.

Speaker 1: 9:41

They're so good together, y'all, they're so good that. Or raisins and almonds Yum, just raw, I mean just raw. Just grab a handful and eat them. They're so good. Okay, they're not gonna hurt you. Nuts are not gonna pack on the pounds. Nuts are not the problem. Dr Greger has the whole video on nuts and how you can eat nuts and even women that ate more nuts. Over time, the majority of them even lost more weight, adding in tens of thousands of calories. Was it not tens of thousands?

Speaker 2: 10:09

It was over the course of months. So, he's saying a handful of nuts a day. He's not saying eat two jars of peanut butter. Obviously. Yeah but just adding some in a sensible amount, you don't have to be afraid of them, and that they actually do improve longevity. There are a lot of nutrients, a lot of minerals, phytonutrients, and they're, they're good, don't be afraid, right.

Speaker 1: 10:29

So even with the nut butter that you did, you could take two dates a spoonful of nut butter.

Speaker 2: 10:34

Well, even with that it's maybe delicious. A half teaspoon each.

Speaker 1: 10:38

It doesn't take much, no, not at all, just a touch. It's so good.

Speaker 2: 10:42

So the raisins feeling particularly lazy, I just forget the nut butter. I just grabbed the date needed.

Speaker 1: 10:47

They're really good. Frozen to, they taste like caramel. Yeah, they ever you remember doing that with apples we haven't done that in a while, but dates frozen with apple slices so good it's like it's kind of like a candy, or actually it's like a caramel apple. Yeah, it's really like a caramel or we've done it.

Speaker 2: 11:02

Haven't done this in a while, but have done it before. Where we take a pecan, put that inside the date and freeze it and that's like a little pie. And one, one or two bites, you get that that hit of that flavor, and it doesn't take much.

Speaker 1: 11:16

You know what? That one's almost so sweet for me. I always use a half date because we use medjool dates. They are the best.

Speaker 2: 11:22

They're so good candy I'm telling.

Speaker 1: 11:25

Okay. So if you haven't tried medjool dates, that's what you need to order. You take the pit out and then I take just half the date and wrap it around the pecan half. Okay, it's really, really good. Now, if you got a whole pecan, you can wrap the whole date around it. I feel like it's almost too sweet for me with the whole date and the pecan, but it depends on how much of a sweet tooth you are. One date is not gonna hurt you. Two dates are not gonna hurt you. Okay, enjoy your sweet treats. We eat brownies. We still eat cupcake. I have carrot cake gyms. I have a gluten-free version and a regular version. They're absolutely wonderful. We eat banana bread muffin just we do, and they are mixing and they are zero guilt Zero guilt, and they're delicious. Do we worry about it? Do we watch our calories? No, do we maintain our weight? Yes, we've lost over 70 pounds without even trying. Some people may get frustrated by that, but it's the truth and the good news is that it's good news. It should be something to celebrate, because if you're trying to lose some weight, it is the easiest way to lose weight. We're gonna talk about why that is on an upcoming episode, but we're gonna stick with sweets here. So we just wanted to give you some ideas of some different things you can make. If I want some of the sweet I just don't have a lot of time I might go to the pantry and get a little nut butter and stir a little Rock a cow powder into it. It's like cocoa powder, but less refined. Stir that in there with Maybe a little bit of date syrup. I really really love that. That's so good. So now we've talked about regular dates. Now with regular dates or dried fruit of any kind, you can use that to sweeten things. So think about how you might do that. If you wanted to touch the sweetness in your salad, you can add some dry fruit, things like that. There's all kinds of ways you can do that. If you want something sweet, you can easily make a berry cobbler without adding a lot of extra sugar, just with naturally sweet fruits like pineapples and mangoes, and throw those in with your cherries and blueberries. It really is almost limitless what you can make with just fruit, frozen and fresh. And then there is sweetening things with the dried fruit, like we talked about. You've got plums, you've got prunes, you've got raisins, dried mangoes, all of these different dried fruits, but I want you to remember, always check and make sure there's no added sugars, no added oil, because almost every dried fruit out there has added sugar and added oil. You will find your new favorites, though. I promise you they are there. So so far we've talked about eating sweet things, or sweetening things with dried fruit, with regular fruit. We mentioned date syrup. Date syrup is a little bit more refined than date paste. You can make date paste at home just by taking those pitted medjool dates, soaking them in some water and blending them up in your food processor. Then you store it in your fridge and it'll last for days. So that's a great way to sweeten things. You use that date paste because you have all that fiber from the dates in there and if you get date syrup that fiber's been removed. They just strain out the syrup from it and the fiber's been removed, but I would say some of it is probably still in there and not all of it. So date syrup and date paste are some of the better sweeteners that are out there, because you do get a lot of the nutrients.

Speaker 2: 14:42

You're keeping a lot of the phytonutrients in it because it's predominantly a whole food.

Speaker 1: 14:47

And now there's date sugar. Date sugar is a dry sweetener but it's very fibrous. It doesn't melt like regular sugar.

Speaker 2: 14:55

No, in my understanding is they just take the date, dry it and then powder it up.

Speaker 1: 15:00

So the date sugar is a great option if you're looking for something dry and baked goods. It tends to work pretty well because you've got the softness from the dates. It softens up. It doesn't melt, but it softens up, so it's almost like you don't even know it's in there and that can be a good option for a dry sugar tea.

Speaker 2: 15:16

For a recipe.

Speaker 1: 15:17

yes, Now if you were to try to stir it in tea, you'd have some stuff at the bottom. I'd choose something more liquid, like a date syrup for that. And then there's molasses. I'm going to let you tell us about molasses a little bit.

Speaker 2: 15:30

Yes, because molasses. A lot of people may misunderstand exactly what it was because I know I did in the beginning Because you see it's a syrup, but it is a great substitute because it still has a ton of minerals left in it. So I was doing a little research, learning about molasses, and it's predominantly from sugar cane, or you can also make it from sugar beet. It can also be made from sorghum. I've heard of that. I knew that. I think we may even have a jar in our pantry of it, but it can also be made from pomegranate.

Speaker 1: 16:00

It can also be made from dates.

Speaker 2: 16:01

I've never seen that before.

Speaker 1: 16:02

That would be very interesting to try. I'd love to try that.

Speaker 2: 16:06

But the thing with molasses is that they take the juice and they boil it down. You boil the water off of it. The sugar within it will crystallize. They take it off the top and then you're left with whatever's left. Okay, first time they do that, that's light molasses. They boil it again, repeat the process, take the sugar crystals off of it. That becomes dark molasses. They do it one more time and then you get black strap molasses, which I'm assuming is because it's so thick that as you pour it it creates a strap-like. Look to it as it's pouring off the lip of the jar Makes sense. I've only ever heard of black strap molasses. I didn't realize that it was boiled three times to get to that process, but that's where you get a concentration of the minerals, also a concentration of the flavor too. It's got a very defined flavor which, if you're not used to in the beginning, it may be a little different. I always thought of it, whenever I tried it, as tasting like gingerbread, because it's the predominant sweetener in gingerbread, but now I use it on my morning oats and I love it. I absolutely love it. The thing about molasses, though, is not a lower calorie sweetener. Tablespoon of molasses is about 58 calories. Tablespoon of sugar is roughly about 50 calories.

Speaker 1: 17:20

But are you saying they should count calories? No, I'm not saying you should count calories.

Speaker 2: 17:24

However, if you have diabetes and you're making that transition. This is something to be aware of. Right. But the benefit of using molasses as a sweetener is that it's not just sugar like a refined white sugar. With refined white sugar, it's just sugar. There's nothing else in it. Right, with this, you still get a lot of minerals in it, like one tablespoon will have 13% of manganese, 12% of magnesium, 5% iron, 3% calcium. Now you're not going to use this as your sole source of any of those minerals Right Absolutely. You're not going to go any 30 tablespoons of this to get 90% of your daily intake of calcium. However, if you're going to use a sweetener and we would say, don't go crazy on this, but if you've got a recipe where you need a tablespoon or two of a sweetener- this is a much better choice than just a refined white sugar, because you're getting these added benefits.

Speaker 1: 18:15

Or if you're making gingerbread and you just need that flavor, I have molasses. I have a great gingerbread recipe and I use a little bit in it. But I'll tell you, I look at recipes for sweets and I think how in the world does this have a cup and a half of the sweetener?

Speaker 2: 18:30

in it? Oh, I know Some of those. What in the world you?

Speaker 1: 18:34

have to be crazy. So I really tweak it down to where it's still really nice and sweet, but it's just not going to put you over the edge. And I use the better sweeteners because you've got to have the things that are not going to make you feel like you're going to crash and burn. We just don't want to live that way anymore.

Speaker 2: 18:51

Now, one more thing about molasses is that it does come as sulfured and unsulfored. With sulfured they'll put sulfur dioxide in there. That acts as a preservative. Now, one other thing with that is it does cut the sweetness of it some. So if you have a sulfur molasses it may not taste as sweet. I would recommend going unsulfored, absolutely Having as few preservatives as possible. Every time Every time, every time, molasses that comes from cane syrup. I don't know why the difference, but apparently it does not require to be sulfured to last longer in your pantry.

Speaker 1: 19:22

Okay, interesting.

Speaker 2: 19:24

So there you go.

Speaker 1: 19:25

There you go. So these are the sweeteners we recommend. These are the easiest ways. Are these the only sweeteners that you can use? Absolutely not. There are tons of ways to sweeten your food and make it plant-based. We do talk about some of those in episodes 224 and 225, where we talk about how to curb your sugar cravings. So if you haven't listened to those again, go back and listen, because there's so much good strategic information in there. But today I want you to walk away just feeling like, hey, I can have my sweets, and a smile on my face too, because we're all about that. Right, in order for plant-based to be sustainable, we've got to be able to have the foods we love and, girl, that includes sweets. You know it does. Some of us have bigger sweet tooth than others. I mean, if it was up to me, I'd go back for more of the main meal. It's always been that way. We have clients inside the membership who say I have a sweet tooth, I've got to have my sweet things, and they're perfectly satisfied with the desserts that we provide and they don't miss their old favorites. Why should we make ourselves miserable in the name of health? It has got to stop. It's got to stop, no more. From this point forward, you are not going to allow yourself to be sabotaged by the thought that you cannot have the foods you love, because it's just not true. Okay, you're going to find your new favorites, and that includes sweet treats. We hope you've gotten some fun, new, great ideas and we look forward to hanging out with you again next time on Power On Plants.