[Culprit]

My wife is a type two diabetic. This year I developed a biscotti recipe (an adaptation from several biscotti recipes I've read) so she could enjoy some holiday treats along with the rest of us. I don't know if this recipe is suitable for other diabetics (she's a type two under excellent control) but I thought I'd share it just in case anyone else is interested is giving it a try.

Ingredients:

1 3/4 cups all purpose flour
sifted together with:
3/4 tsp baking powder and 1/2 tsp kosher salt
1/2 stick unsalted butter
1/8 cup Sugar Twin "spoonable" brown sugar replacement
1/3 cup Splenda (or Altern from Walmart)
3 large fresh eggs
3 Tbsp anise seed
1/2 cup whole almonds

Creme the butter (at room temp.) brown sugar and sugar substitute in the bowl of a free standing mixer with paddle attachment on low speed to a fluffy consistency. Add the anise seed, flour/salt/baking powder mixture and the eggs and beat until all ingredients come together. Be careful not to overwork the dough. The dough may be a bit too "sticky" at this point (depending on the size of your eggs) and the flour may need to be increased by a very small amount.
Add the almonds to the dough and continue mixing to thoroughly distribute the nuts throughout the dough.
Remove the dough to a floured board and shape into a ball, then flatten the ball to about 3/4 inch thick. Put the dough in the refrigerator for about two or three hours.
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.
(At this point it might be a good idea to put on some laytex gloves)
Roll the dough into a cylindrical shape about 3 inches in diameter and place the roll onto parchment paper on a cookie sheet.
Press down on the dough to flatten it (to about 1/2 - 3/4 inch thickness) and bake this in the 350 degree oven for about 50 - 60 minutes or until an instant read thermometer placed into the center at one end of the loaf reads 204 degrees.
Remove the loaf from the oven and cool completely.
Preheat oven to 300 degrees
Using an electric knife or serrated edge bread knife, cut (saw) the loaf into thick slices (about 1/2 inch seems to work well) and place the slices on a parchment lined baking sheet. Put these into the 300 degree oven and toast about thirty minutes on each side or until golden brown.
Just be sure to turn them at least once during this toasting period.
Remove from oven and cool before placing into a cookie jar.
Makes about one dozen pieces of biscotti.

[Austin_]

I feel sorry for your wife. I can't eat many products as well- but no sugar? Isn't type two diabetic where you can't eat glucose-based products? (We learned about it in science). I think type one diabetic is where you can't eat cow's milk based products, so maybe the butter may be a problem for other diabetics? You can research it on wikipedia- I'm a little confused about the whole situation as well. By the way- that recipe looks excellent! I've gotta give it a try. Good luck!

[m brown]

thanks for the formula, it will help a bunch of people!

[panini]

Culprit
What a good feeling I got from reading your post. It's what this forum is all about. I'm feeling great about your wife! She's fortunate to have a great caregiver. And doing this so she may be included in the Holidays, well, enough said. You have it all figured out, my friend.
pan

[Mezzaluna]

Austin asked,

Isn't type two diabetic where you can't eat glucose-based products?

You may be confusing that fact that diabetics (and pre-diabetics like me) test their blood glucose level periodically. That doesn't mean we can't eat glucose; it's not exactly the same substance. (By the way, eating sugar doesn't make you become diabetic!)

The American Diabetes Association http://www.diabetes.org/nutrition-an...sweeteners.jsp says you can eat some of any type of sugar (ends with "--ose")- but you must balanace the carbs so you don't overshoot your limit. Mine is 45 carbs per day. When you figure a bowl of many unsugared cereals can exceed that amount, you can see why we need to limit the carbs and rearrange how we eat them through the day.

[Culprit]

Originally Posted by Austin_

I feel sorry for your wife. I can't eat many products as well- but no sugar? Isn't type two diabetic where you can't eat glucose-based products? (We learned about it in science). I think type one diabetic is where you can't eat cow's milk based products, so maybe the butter may be a problem for other diabetics? You can research it on wikipedia- I'm a little confused about the whole situation as well. By the way- that recipe looks excellent! I've gotta give it a try. Good luck!

Thanks Austin (and the others who commented) I appreciate your interest in learning about cooking for special needs people. I also cook, from time to time, for a friend who suffers from Celiac disease (gluten intolerance) and I can tell you that cooking for the diabetic is much easier than preparing meals for the Celiac sufferer. If you're interested in the challenges associated with that problem just Google "Celiac" disease and you'll find lots of interesting information on the Web.

[Austin_]

Your welcome. That is sad! Escpecially nowadays when wheat and flour based products are unbelievably common (baked goods, cereal, pasta)- and many savory things too! Like beef stew and chowder- you need flour to thicken that! I am incredibly sorry for your friend- and wife! And thanks for the information mezzaluma. Ya, I get confused often. xD

[Kayakado]

Removing sugar helps but it would be more diabetic friendly if you could substitute nut flours and wheat gluten flour for some if not all the wheat flour. Her threshold for carbohydrates is probably between 65 and 100 a day depending on her weight and physical activity levels. I cook for a type-2 diabetic who was able to stop injecting insulin by counting carbohydrates and focusing on eating low carb foods. Rice, corn, wheat, and milk are all off our list of common everyday foods. We replaced them with soy, nut flours, cream, butter, wheat gluten, cheese, etc.

[Kayakado]

Maybe she'd enjoy my brownie bites recipe

Melt 4 ozs of unsweetened chocolate with 1 stick of butter, add 1 cup of splenda and 1/4 c heavy cream and set aside.

Beat together 5 eggs and 3/4 c splenda and 6 sweet & low packets or similar. Splenda can be used for the whole 1 cup measure but it makes chocolate bitter, then stir in 1 Tbsp sugar-free vanilla

Whisk together 1 c of wheat glutin flour, 2 tsp of baking powder, and 1 Tbsp each of Almond meal, Pecan Meal, Soy Powder (roasted soy bean flour--raw tastes really awful), and Ground Flax Seed.

Add the dry to the wet and mix until evenly moist and then add 1 cup of chopped nuts (walnuts pecans or macadamias) and optional: 1/2 c of chopped sugar-free semi sweet chocolates pieces or chips.

Drop into lined muffin tins ( I use those aluminum liners) and bake for about 15 minutes or until just done. Bake too long and they will be too dry.