Healthy Baking Swaps for People With IBD
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Everyone loves a sweet treat from time to time, but unfortunately for those with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), baked goods laden with refined sugars, butter, and heavy cream can lead to gastrointestinal (GI) upset. Not to mention, while delicious, regularly indulging in sweets isn’t ideal for overall health. That said, making your own baked goods allows you to control the ingredients, so you can make adjustments to suit your dietary needs and health goals. Making certain gut-friendly ingredient swaps when baking your favorite recipes minimizes digestive distress and helps you feel your best, without negatively impacting flavor or texture. Whether you’re baking for a special occasion, or simply craving a sweet snack, here are five IBD-friendly baking swaps to try today.
1. Swap Out Refined Sugar for Mashed Banana
Bananas can be used for more than just banana bread. They contain naturally occurring fruit sugar, so mashed banana can replace the sweetness of refined granulated sugar in many recipes, while reducing total grams (g) of added sugars. Per the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), 1 cup of granulated sugar contains a whopping 188 g of sugar, while mashed banana only contains about 28 g of natural sugars. According to research published in the journal Frontiers in Nutrition, high sugar intake is associated with increased risk for IBD. Further, eating sugar in excess draws water into the gut, worsening diarrhea per the Crohn’s and Colitis Foundation.
When swapping out sugar for mashed banana, use half the amount of mashed banana as the amount of sugar called for in a recipe. Bananas provide a good amount of moisture along with their natural sweetness, so adding too much may alter the texture of your recipe.
Not only will mashed banana make your baked goods moist, it also provides a boost of potassium and soluble fiber. According to the Crohn’s and Colitis Foundation, eating bananas frequently may even help to decrease inflammation levels over time, too.
Recipes that best lend themselves to this healthier-for-you swap include sweets like brownies, cookies, muffins, and quick breads. Keep in mind that banana imparts some flavor to whatever it’s added to, and is better paired with certain flavor profiles over others, such as those involving fruit, chocolate, cinnamon, or peanut butter.
Try an oatmeal cookie recipe using mashed banana in place of sugar, courtesy of Healthy Fitness Meals.
2. Swap Out Butter for Avocado Puree
If you have ripe avocados about to go bad, put them to good use by incorporating them into baked goods. Avocados have a rich, buttery texture, making them a good butter substitute. While butter is composed mostly of saturated fat, per the USDA, avocados contain primarily monounsaturated fats, which are associated with decreased intestinal inflammation according to research published in the journal Mediators of Inflammation. Additionally, avocados are surprisingly rich in fiber, providing over 13 g per avocado. As outlined in research published in the journal Clinical Gastroenterology and Hepatology in February 2020, high fiber intakes are linked with a nearly 50 percent reduction in Crohn’s disease flare risk over a six month period.
Unlike bulky insoluble fibers found in the skins of fruits and vegetables, the soluble fiber in avocado flesh is soft in texture and much gentler on the GI tract, so incorporating them into your diet is a helpful way to boost fiber intake without triggering GI symptoms. An avocado-butter swap lends itself best to recipes involving cocoa powder, like brownies and chocolate cakes or muffins, as the cocoa will mask avocado’s green hue.
Try a brownie recipe using avocado puree in place of butter, courtesy of Detoxinista.
3. Swap Out White Flour for Chickpeas
While white flour–based foods can certainly fit into a healthy and balanced diet in moderation, and tend to be easier to digest for people with IBD, they don’t have as good a nutritional profile as other flour options.
In their whole form, legumes like chickpeas may be hard to digest if you have active IBD, but when broken down into a puree, they’re much easier on the gut. According to Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, chickpeas are rich in resistant starch, a type of prebiotic fiber that feeds healthy gut microbes. Surprisingly, chickpea puree can serve as a nutrient-dense swap for white flour in a variety of recipes, providing nearly 18 grams of protein per can, per the USDA. It works particularly well in recipes for baked goods with a dense texture, like brownies from Rachel Dykman Nutrition and cookies from The Roasted Root. Swapping out white flour for chickpea puree at a one-to-one ratio will make your brownies extra fudgy and give cookies a soft, gooey center. That said, chickpea puree may weigh down desserts with a light and airy texture, such as cakes, so keep that in mind before making the swap.
Don’t worry about your baked goods tasting like hummus — when combined with flavorful ingredients, you won’t even know the chickpeas are there.
Try a blondie recipe using chickpeas in place of flour, courtesy of Ambitious Kitchen.
4. Swap Out Heavy Cream for Pureed Silken Tofu
Most people are familiar with silken tofu (detailed by the USDA) served in miso soup at Japanese restaurants, but did you know you can also use it as a heavy cream replacement when baking? It’s higher in protein, significantly lower in saturated fat for easy digestibility, and since it’s dairy-free, it’s suitable for those with lactose intolerance.
Soy products like silken tofu are rich in compounds called isoflavones, which may help to lower intestinal inflammation and positively impact the gut microbiome, according to research published in the World Journal of Clinical Cases.
When pureed, silken tofu has a creamy, silky texture just like heavy cream, making it an effective one-to-one replacement. Whether you’re making a dairy-free cheesecake or a lightened up pumpkin pie, you won’t miss the heavy cream one bit.
Try a chocolate silk pie recipe using pureed silken tofu in place of heavy cream, courtesy of Minimalist Baker.
5. Swap Out Oil for Applesauce
One cup of plain unsweetened applesauce can replace 1 cup of oil in baking recipes, and since it’s naturally sweet, you might even consider slightly reducing the amount of sugar your recipe calls for. Replacing refined oils like vegetable or canola oil with applesauce (detailed by the USDA) not only lowers the fat content of baked goods, it also adds extra fiber in an easy-to-digest manner, providing around three grams per cup.
According to research published in the journal Nutrients, apples are rich in phenolic acids, a type of antioxidant with anti-inflammatory properties. This makes them especially beneficial for those with chronic inflammatory conditions like IBD. In fact, apples are a key component of many therapeutic diets used to help manage IBD. The Crohn’s Disease Exclusion Diet (CDED), for example, classifies apples as a mandatory food to be eaten daily, as outlined in the Nutrients research.
Applesauce is high in water content, making the finished product extra fluffy and delicious. Note that this swap may lend a subtle sweet apple flavor to your recipes, so it’s best reserved for sweet foods like muffins, cakes, cookies, and brownies, rather than savory ones.
Try a muffin recipe using applesauce in place of oil, courtesy of Chocolate Covered Katie.
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