Stevia is a relatively new product. Many people therefore do not yet know exactly how to process Stevia and what they can do with Stevia. We have collected a few tips and delicious recipes with Stevia that you can get started with right away.
Cooking with Stevia, tips
Fresh or dried stevia leaves
If you want to cook with Stevia but prefer not to use Stevia sweetener, you can just as easily work with fresh or dried Stevia. Don’t want green leaves in your dish? Then you can easily make a natural extract of Stevia yourself. Grab a small handful of Stevia leaves and pour one or two cups of boiling water on top. Let it steep for 15 minutes. Sieve the whole and you will have an extract that you can easily process further. You can also reduce the Stevia extract so that you get a concentrated, and therefore sweeter, Stevia extract.
Replace sugar in recipe
Do you want to replace sugar with Stevia in a recipe? Then keep in mind that the sweetening power of Stevia is much greater than that of sugar. The amount in grams you need of it is therefore much smaller. This is especially important with cookie or pastry recipes. Find a recipe that already takes into account the use of stevia or sweeteners or adjust the recipe with sugar. Substitute your sugar for Stevia, will you have slightly more dry ingredients? need to get a similar result. Usually this is just flour.
Recipes with Stevia
- Homemade Stevia tea and Stevia iced tea
- Apple cupcakes with Stevia
- Pancakes with Stevia
Homemade Stevia tea and Stevia iced tea
Stevia tea is very popular in China. It is drunk there as a treat and as a slimming aid. You can easily make stevia tea yourself with fresh or dried stevia leaves. The following recipe makes one and a half liters of Stevia tea or Stevia iced tea.
Necessities:
- A small handful of fresh or dried Stevia leaves.
- A liter of water
- Possibly herbs, herbal tea, lemon juice or honey
Method
Boil the water and just make tea from the Stevia as you are used to. Stevia has a nice, light taste in itself and you don’t have to add anything to the tea. However, you can adjust the tea completely to your own taste by mixing it with (herbal) tea or other ingredients. Tasty combinations with Stevia tea are: liquorice, honey, fennel tea, apple tea and lemon juice. You can let the stevia cool down to make stevia iced tea. Then keep in mind that you have to make a stronger and sweeter tea because a cold tea always needs some extra flavor.
Apple cupcakes with Stevia
Cupcakes are tasty, popular, fun to make and if you prepare them with Stevia, they are also healthy! This is an easy recipe for healthy cupcakes with Stevia, which you can eat right away or decorate to your heart’s content.
Necessities:
- One cup of (whole grain) wheat flour
- One cup of oatmeal
- One sachet of baking powder or dried yeast
- Two proteins
- One cup of low-fat milk
- One small apple in small dice
- Half cup of raisins
- One tablespoon of olive oil
- Two teaspoons of cinnamon
- One and a half teaspoons of Stevia powder (95 percent stevioside) or a handful of Stevia leaves
- Pinch of salt
Method
Heat the oven to 175 degrees. If you are working with Stevia leaves, grind them finely and then heat them, while stirring, together with the milk and the oil over a low heat until it boils. Remove the pan from the heat and let it steep. If you work with Stevia powder, you can go straight to the next step. In the meantime, mix the flour, oatmeal, cinnamon, salt and possibly the Stevia powder together and add the egg whites, the (cooled) milk and oil. Use a food processor or immersion blender to avoid coarse oatmeal flakes in your cupcakes. When you have a nice, smooth dough, you can stir in the apple pieces, raisins and yeast. Leave it all covered in a warm place for about 15 minutes so that the yeast can run its course. Divide the batter between the molds and bake the cupcakes for 15-20 minutes.
Pancakes with Stevia
Pancakes are a favorite with children and adults. This recipe for pancakes with Stevia is slightly different so that you can serve a tasty, responsible treat without sugar and with healthy fats.
Necessities:
- One cup of (whole grain) wheat flour
- One cup of chickpea or soy flour (If you’re using chickpea flour, add one more tablespoon of olive oil.)
- Six proteins
- Two cups of low-fat milk
- Two teaspoons of Stevia powder (95 percent stevioside) or a handful of Stevia leaves
- A pinch of salt
- Optional: a teaspoon of cinnamon and apple wedges
Method:
If you are working with Stevia leaves, first heat the leaves together with the milk and possibly the oil (follow the steps as in the recipe for cupcakes.). Then combine all ingredients and mix well using a food processor or hand blender. The proteins congeal during baking and the batter should be slightly thinner than with a standard pancake recipe. Fry the pancakes as usual, preferably in (olive) oil. If you want to make apple pancakes, put batter in the pan first. Place the apple wedges in the still moist batter and sprinkle with cinnamon if necessary. Then you can simply turn the pancake and bake it.