• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

Travelling oven

food & travel

  • Home
  • About
  • travel
  • Recipes
  • Portfolio
  • Stock Images
  • Contact
    • Work with me
  • Workshops
  • Photography

Pumpkin and almond butter brownies

November 12, 2015 By travellingoven 8 Comments

For me brownies are just like muffins, a dessert that is not fancy but simple and delicious so it can be perfect with your afternoon tea or coffee or for breakfast with a glass of milk (almond for me but any will do!). But brownies can be also really, really sweet and full of butter and refined sugar so not really a healthy breakfast or a treat.

It’s interesting how when you stop eating refined sugar (or drastically reduce), your body doesn’t crave those intense sweetness in desserts any more. On the contrary, you can not stand when something is too sweet and if you take a bite of a dessert like that, it just makes your face grimace in a similar way like if you bite into a very sour lemon or something. Your body says “no, I don’t like that!”. And this coming from a person that just a bit more than a year ago was eating Turkish baklavas (and those are sweet!!) like there is no tomorrow! 🙂

Pumpkin and almond butter brownies

Pumpkin and almond butter brownies

Once you start replacing white refined sugar with natural sweeteners like maple or agave syrup or coconut sugar, you’ll notice how desserts made with them actually taste better, they are not overly sweet so sugar doesn’t mask the flavor of other ingredients.
Believe me, I still crave desserts and treats as that’s such an important part of life (I hope you agree!) but just not sickly sweet ones. I really enjoy trying to make desserts recipes healthier but still indulgent and delicious. That’s how I came up with this one, I wanted to make Chocolate Pumpkin brownies but with no refined sugar and butter and I tried few versions until I found the one I really liked!

I used my favorite almond butter but don’t worry if you are not used to using it, believe me, it’s so easy to make and much cheaper that when you buy it in the health food stores. That easy recipe is already on the blog so have a look here.
To be honest with you, first I tried to make these brownies with no eggs as I thought it would be cool if the recipe would be also for vegans and people with egg allergy but that didn’t really turned out as planned. I mean, they were still good but the texture was all wrong and they were way too crumbly. But feel free to experiment if you want and maybe replace eggs with flax seeds + water to make it egg-less and vegan.
There are no many ingredients and all is done in less than an hour. To make the brownies even more delicious, I topped them with candied walnuts so don’t miss those, they add an extra crunch and are so yummy!

Pumpkin and almond butter brownies

Recipe in English:

Pumpkin & almond butter brownies
 
Save Print
Prep time
20 mins
Cook time
25 mins
Total time
45 mins
 
Author: Lili Basic
Recipe type: Dessert
Serves: 9
Ingredients
  • ½ cup pumpkin puree (store-bough or just cook about 250 g of pumpkin chopped in cubes, when soft, remove the water and blend to get puree)
  • ½ cup almond butter (store-bough or see on the blog under "Vegan" how to make almond butter, for ½ cup butter you'll need 200 g almonds)
  • ½ cup maple syrup
  • 2 eggs
  • 1 tsp vanilla extract
  • 1-2 tbsp raw cacao
  • ⅓ cup spelt flour (or all purpose flour)
  • 1 tsp baking soda
  • pinch of cinnamon
  • pinch of salt
  • For topping:
  • 1 cup walnuts
  • 2 tbsp maple syrup
  • 1 tbsp coconut oil (or butter)
  • pinch of salt
  • Note: 1 cup = 250 ml
  • Instead of almond butter, you can use cashew butter, I tried it out and it works fine.
Preparation
  1. Preheat oven to 175 C (350 F). Prepare 20 x 20 cm / 8 x 8 inch baking dish and line it with parchment paper.
  2. In a large mixing bowl combine pumpkin puree, almond butter, eggs, maple syrup and vanilla. Stir with a whisk until combined.
  3. Stir in flour, cacao, baking soda, cinnamon and salt. Transfer into prepared baking dish.
  4. Bake for about 20-25 minutes (don't over-bake), remove from the oven and let it cool on room temperature.
  5. While the brownies are baking in the oven, prepare caramelised walnuts for the topping.
  6. In a pan combine whole pecans, maple syrup, coconut oil and salt and stir over medium heat for about 10 minutes until they start to lightly caramelize. Remove from the fire and let them cool.
  7. Once they are cooled down, cut the brownies using a long knife and top them with candied pecans. Enjoy!
3.5.3229

Recipe in Croatian / Recept na hrvatskom:
Brownie s bundevom i bademovim maslacem
 
Save Print
Prep time
20 mins
Cook time
25 mins
Total time
45 mins
 
Author: Lili Basic
Recipe type: Desert
Serves: 9 brownija
Ingredients
  • SASTOJCI
  • ½ salice pirea od bundeve (kupljenog ili skuhanog od oko 250 g bundeve)
  • ½ salice bademovog maslaca (kupljenog ili potrazite na blogun pod "Vegan" kako ga napraviti kod kuce, trebat ce vam 200 g badema)
  • ½ salice javorovog sirupa
  • 2 jaja
  • 1 zlicica vanilin ekstrakta
  • 1-2 zlice sirovog kakaa
  • ⅓ salice pirovog (ili drugog) brasna
  • 1 zlicica soda bikarbone
  • malo cimeta
  • malo soli
  • Za posipanje
  • 1 salica oraha
  • 2 zlice javorovog sirupa
  • 1 zlica kokosovog ulja (ili maslaca)
  • prstohvat soli
  • Napomena: 1 salice = 250 ml
  • Umjesto bademovog maslaca mozete koristiti maslac od indijskih oracica.
Preparation
  1. PRIPREMA
  2. Zagrijte pecnicu na 175 C. Oblozite 20 x 20 cm kalup papirom za pecenje.
  3. U vecoj posudi pomijesajte pire od bundeve, maslac od badema, jaja, javorov sirup i vaniliju dok se sve dobro ne sjedini.
  4. Umijesajte brasno, kakao, sodu bikarbonu, cimet i sol. Rasporedite smjesu u pripremljeni kalup.
  5. Pecite oko 20-25 min (nemojte prepeci!) i kad je peceno, ostavite da se ohladi.
  6. Dok se browniji peku, pripremite orascice za posipanje. U tavi pomijesajte pekane ili orahe, javorov sirup, kokosovo ulje i malo soli i przite na laganoj vatri 10-minuta dok se blago karameliziraju. Maknite s vatre i ostavite da se ohlade.
  7. Razrezite brownije na kocke i posipajte pripremljenim karameliziranim orasima. Dobar tek!
3.5.3229

Pumpkin and almond butter brownies

*Thank you so much for being here, that makes me so happy! You can also follow my Travelling oven on Facebook, Instagram and Pinterest, as well as subscribe to receive new blog posts via email.

SaveSave

SaveSave

Share this:

  • Facebook
  • Pinterest
  • Email

Filed Under: brownies & bars Tagged With: almond butter, brownie, brownies, chocolate, dessert, pecans, pumpkin, walnuts

Previous Post: « Beetroot, pear & feta cheese salad
Next Post: Roasted Brussels sprouts, sweet potatoes & cranberries »

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Natasa | My daily sourdough bread says

    November 12, 2015 at 2:29 pm

    Oh, Lili, you just woke up my taste buds and the memories of Greece where I ate brownies everyday, they were so good. I haven’t even tried making them since then. But your recipe!! I’ve never like brownie recipes with tons of sugar either, so your recipe is on my favorite recipes list 🙂

    Do you think I could use any gluten-free flour instead of spelt? Probably yes 🙂 I will try it and let you know 🙂

    Will the butternut pumpkin work?

    Wish you a nice day,
    Nataša

    Reply
    • travellingoven says

      November 12, 2015 at 4:20 pm

      Dear Natasa, thank you so much for your sweet comment! There is just a little quantity of flour that goes in these brownies (1/3 cup) so I’m sure you could use some other gluten-free flour instead of spelt. Butternut pumpkin should work great! 🙂

      Reply
  2. Brigita says

    August 4, 2017 at 10:32 am

    Hey dear Lili,

    I love your blog and you recipes. I always look first at your site when I want to make something new.
    i have one littLe question about this brownies: do you think it will work with raw avocado instead of pumpkin puree?
    Thank you!
    Keep up great work
    Greetings from slovenia
    Brigita

    Reply
    • travellingoven says

      August 4, 2017 at 11:15 am

      Hello dear Brigita, thank you very much for your kind words and for following my work! It means a lot to me! 🙂 Instead of avocado I would suggest to try replacing pumpkin puree with apple puree that you can easily make yourself by just cooking some apples until soft and than blending them to get a puree. That is much more similar in texture and also the taste would work well. Let me know if you give it a try! Have a great day, Lili <3

      Reply
      • Brigita says

        August 4, 2017 at 2:13 pm

        Thanks for your answer. I Ve been thinking about apple puree as well. I’ll let you know.
        GReat day to you too.
        <3 brigita

        Reply
        • travellingoven says

          August 4, 2017 at 5:39 pm

          Thank you Brigita! <3

          Reply

Trackbacks

  1. Autumn Recipes – Pumpkin Brownies Roundup says:
    August 18, 2017 at 2:02 pm

    […] Chocolate Pumpkin & Almond Butter Brownies by Travelling Oven […]

    Reply
  2. Zdravi deserti s bundevom - Natalie's Food & Health says:
    November 3, 2017 at 12:49 pm

    […] | Culinary postcards | Recept preuzmi OVDJE. Brownie s bundevom | Travelling oven | Recept preuzmi OVDJE. Mekani kolačići s bundevom | Foodoris | Recept preuzmi OVDJE. Mekani kolač od buče | Vanilla […]

    Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Primary Sidebar

Hi! I’m Lili and I’m so happy
to welcome you on my blog!

First things first. Why Travelling oven you’re wondering? Well, when this blog was created I had been living as an expat for about 8 years in beautiful countries like Scotland, Kazakhstan, Switzerland, Turkey...READ MORE...

lili.basic

lili.basic
I feel like this week lasted a month! 😳 So I’ I feel like this week lasted a month! 😳 So I’m really looking forward to the weekend, spending time with friends, long walks, good coffee and some sweet comfort food. I need it and deserve it! 😉 Hope you’ll do something good for yourself too…
…..
Image shot for client @ezza.dubrovnik
February means we can eat more sweet fried food, r February means we can eat more sweet fried food, right? 😉
Winter beauty 🤍 Winter beauty 🤍
Solitude…🤍 Couldn’t decide which one to pos Solitude…🤍 Couldn’t decide which one to post so here are three trees images from one magical snowy winter morning.
Stillness of winter. Lake Bled, Slovenia. Not my u Stillness of winter. Lake Bled, Slovenia. Not my usual edit but I felt like bw is better choice to show the silence of a moody snowy day, hope you like it! 🖤
One of many beautiful winter scenes I got to exper One of many beautiful winter scenes I got to experience last week in Slovenia..❄️ I’ve been waiting for this much snow and the opportunity to enjoy it for years and I feel like my dream came true. So very grateful! 🙏🤍
‘Home is the place where you don’t have to wor ‘Home is the place where you don’t have to work hard just to be loved…’ (Najwa Zebian)
Melancholy of a rainy day… 🌧️ ….. (Imag Melancholy of a rainy day… 🌧️
….. 

(Image shot for @villa_ariston )
I’m beyond grateful for all the opportunities an I’m beyond grateful for all the opportunities and wonderful people I had a pleasure to work with in 2022 so here are just few moments from different shoots.. In my private life I’m grateful for all the lessons this year gave me, even if the road was difficult and painful at times. But step by step I’m getting there or at least moving in the right direction. We can only do our best and keep trying, learning, being gentle to ourselves when it gets tough. I appreciate so much my people who are always there for me every step of the way! 🥰
I would like to wish you all a very happy new year! ✨🥂 May your dreams and wishes come true and hope that the new year will bring more love, kindness and peace to all of us! ❤️
Sending love to all of you who have been here with Sending love to all of you who have been here with me this year! And specially to those who feel lonely, hurt, sad or heartbroken during this time of the year.. ❤️ I know that holiday season can be extra hard if you’re going through something difficult. But believe that there are better days ahead, filled with more light, pleasure, wonderful new experiences and people who appreciate you and love you just the way you are.. You are enough, you are important, you are unique! ✨✨✨
Some winter magic…🤍 It seems we won’t have Some winter magic…🤍 It seems we won’t have white Christmas afterall, the forecast is not promising but maybe white January..?! ☺️❄️❄️❄️
Esplanade 1925 Lounge & Bar is definitely the most Esplanade 1925 Lounge & Bar is definitely the most elegant place in Zagreb to have a cocktail and what a pleasure it is to shoot there. Sharing some of my favourites from a cocktail shoot I did for @esplanadezagreb hotel… All cocktails prepared by @master_kishoni ✨✨✨
.
.
.
.
.

#foodphotography #cocktails #foodandwine #artofvisuals #cocktailsphotography #raw_cocktails 
#artofliving #foodfluffer #createtoinspire #drinkstagram #igcocktails #craftcocktail #justcocktails #zagreb #zivimhr #esplanade #croatia #croatiafulloflife #croatiafullofmagic #punkuferhr #zadovoljnahr #feminahr #canonhrvatska #travellingoven #lilibasic
Load More... Follow on Instagram

Subscribe to Blog via Email

Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Copyright © 2023 · The Travellling Oven · THEME BY SHAY BOCKS · DESIGNED BY TABITHA EMMA · Privacy Policy