Guilt-free homemade Twix bars for a delicious treat at home

Hi Bold Bakers! So I get many requests from you on a daily basis for healthy desserts. So I thought how about Bold Baking Guilt Free. You get the same big and bold results, but just lighter ingredients. So I invited Olivia Crouppen. Hi! Olivia is the master of healthy baking. Also you might recognize Olivia from Season 6 of MasterChef. And if you follow me on social media, Olivia is actually my very talented culinary assistant. I'm so excited to be here today, thank you guys so much for having me. So Olivia had a really good idea, why not take something that we already know and love which is a Twix, and just reinvent the recipe a little bit. This recipe is awesome, it's really really easy, it's all kinds of ingredients you probably already have at home that you might never use before. So a lot of you know that a Twix is my all time favorite candy bar. So I wouldn't say that I am dubious of this recipe, I would say that I am more curious of how this is going to turn out because I want it to taste like a Twix. I hear you, and that's part of why I chose this. This recipe is so easy, and I think it's honestly gonna blow you away. It starts with that awesome cookie base. You've got the caramel in the middle and then the chocolate on top. I mean, what more could you ask for? It's inspiration. The first thing that we're gonna do is make our cookie crust. In a large bowl, you're going to add almond flour, a little bit of coconut flour, next, some coconut oil, and then some maple syrup. And then you just stir it all up. That is looking great. Have you ever used almond flour or coconut flour before? I really like when it comes to baking the texture that they give like cakes and stuff like that. They just absorb liquid a little bit differently and make them like really moist. I love to use almond flour and coconut flour because they're grain free and they're great for people who are gluten free and like Jen said they add a lot of extra texture that you wouldn't get from normal flour. Yeah, exactly. Liv, how is this looking? That is perfect. So it comes together into like a sticky paste which is really great because it's gonna be easy to press into our tin. This is super easy. Usually when I make a crust you have to rub in butter, you gotta use your food processor, this is like way easier. This is super easy, it's all in one bowl, couldn't be simpler. Lovely. Into our tin? Yes. So we have an 8x8 baking tin here, it's lined with parchment paper, we're gonna go ahead and get our cookie base in there, we're gonna make sure it's really nice and smooth and even. We're gonna use our fingertips just to make sure it's in one even layer because when you think of a Twix you always think of that nice strip of cookie on the bottom. This is looking awesome. This is vegan, this is gluten-free, this is dairy-free, but most importantly, it's just really delicious. It's delicious. Okay Liv, what's the next step? So our next step is to get it into the oven. Lovely. Bake this off at 350 degrees Fahrenheit or 180 degrees Celsius for about 13 minutes. All right guys, so our cookie crust is done. We're going to set it aside to cool and now we're going to make our caramel layer. So in a medium bowl, I'm going to put my almond butter and a little bit of maple syrup. In our bowl, can you go ahead and add the coconut oil and then the flavorings, which are vanilla and salt. So Gem, will you go ahead and mix that all up for me? I will. I really, really love this as a caramel sauce. I know it's probably not like anything you've had before, but if you think about it, just like normal caramel, it has a lot of sweet, it has a lot of salt, it's really that nice balance of flavors. And usually caramel is really hard to make, this is literally foolproof. You know what, that's a really good point because caramel is tricky to make. It can be finicky, it can burn, people don't know when it's ready. You don't have to cook this, you just mix it all together. It's a mixable caramel. So now our caramel is all mixed up, it's really shiny and smooth, everything's evenly combined. Honestly it looks just like regular caramel. So the next thing that we're going to do is layer our caramel on top of our cookie crust just like you would in a normal Twix. So you're just looking for an even layer of the caramel, if you want you can take your spatula and run it across the top to make sure it's spread evenly. You know, actually, here's something that people might want to know at home. What is the craziest thing that we've done since you've been working with me? Really good question. I think all the microwave cakes are definitely crazy. I can't believe how good they are and that they actually can be made in the microwave. I know when we were testing the recipes, we were like, what is going to happen? But they turned out. How did they turn out? Seriously amazing. We're going to get this into the fridge for about 30 minutes and make our chocolate layer. So because I've done this a few times, I'm guessing we're starting out in a large bowl. You are correct. In a large bowl, we're going to add sifted cocoa powder, coconut oil, a little bit of maple syrup, and some salt. So now, just stir it together with a whisk. Now I just want to note from my personal experience, Liv, I'm guessing you only stir this until it's combined, until the cocoa powder has dissolved, because sometimes when you overmix cocoa powder, it can separate. So you might have guessed, the next thing we're going to do is put this on top of our caramel layer to complete our Twix bars. Lovely, let's do it. Alright guys, so our Twix is out of the fridge, the caramel layer is all set up and is looking great so we're going to go ahead and pour over the chocolate. So now I'm guessing I just spread this out with a spatula. You're absolutely right. You're going to go ahead and just spread it out across the top and make sure it's really nice and smooth. Our last step is to go ahead and get this into the fridge to set up one final time. You really want all the layers to kind of get to know each other and make sure that everything is all firm so that we can cut it into Twix bars. Ooh, sounds delicious. This is yum by the way. So good, right? So Olivia actually made her first cameo in my Best Ever Hot Chocolate video if you saw that. Olivia came in to style one of our pictures because we have to, once we make something, get the beautiful thumbnails and the lovely photography for the website, biggerbolderbaking.com by the way, that's where this recipe is. I absolutely love my job, food styling is something that I think a lot of people don't actually even know about. I'm so lucky to be a part of Bigger Bolder Baking, I actually used to be a wardrobe stylist and I worked in men's fashion and then after MasterChef, I knew I couldn't go back to fashion and I really wanted to just focus on food and I haven't really looked back. Dun-dun-dun-dun-dun-dun-dun-dun-dun-dun-dun-dun. Ah! They look lovely. Have you ever seen anything like that in your life? No, they look fantastic. They look so good. I'm so excited for each of them. Great job, Liv. So all that's left to do is get them out of the tin. I like to cut mine into 16 bars, But you can really cut them into any shape you like. Oh look at all those lovely layers Just like you promised me Liv. Okay Liv, here we go. Cheers. Cheers Mm-hmm. This caramel is legit. That is a serious yummy caramel. I see it. I see it in your face. She's loving it She doesn't lie. Do you know what I love about your baking? Olivia's very generous with the salt. Mm-hmm. Not overly generous, but the right amount of salt It just makes everything taste like yummy, yummy, yummy It has that really nice balance of like salt and sweetness from the caramel and then the chocolate is like rich and melty. It's a Twix Liv, it's a Twix. If you guys want to see more bold baking guilt free then let me know in the comments below. And then Olivia can come back and see us. Aw thank you so much for having me, so much fun. Really hope you enjoyed this episode and I'll see you back here really soon for more Bigger Bolder Baking. Got it.