Healthy Twinkies?????
What comes to mind when you think of unhealthy foods?
Right away, I picture two things: Big Macs and Twinkies. While the latter is certainly not the most unhealthy food in existence (Hello double doughnut bacon cheeseburgers!), Twinkies have earned a bad rap thanks to their high sugar content, long list of artificial ingredients, and their creepy ability to stay fresh for 100 years.
(As it turns out, that last point is just an urban legend. Twinkies don’t really last 100 years.)
During the Great Twinkie Shortage of 2012 (It has a name… Who knew!), when Hostess declared bankruptcy and stopped producing Twinkies, I thought it might be fun to create a healthier recipe for homemade Twinkies. Paying homage to the original Twinkies—which were filled with banana cream until the US rationed bananas during WWII—I’ve opted for a banana-flavored filling in these homemade and healthy Twinkies.
You can easily make them banana-free if you prefer.
Homemade Healthy Twinkies
(makes 8)
- 1 cup spelt or all-purpose flour (130g)
- 1 1/2 tsp baking powder
- 1/3 cup xylitol or sugar of choice (60g)
- 1/16 tsp pure stevia, or 2 extra tbsp sugar of choice
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 3 tbsp vegetable or coconut oil (30g)
- 1 tsp pure vanilla extract
- 1 tsp white or apple cider vinegar
- 2/3 cup milk of choice (160g)
Homemade Healthy Twinkies Recipe: Preheat oven to 300 degrees F, and grease a canoe pan if you have one. (For Twinkies without a canoe pan: Shape tin foil, double folded for sturdiness, into 8 canoe-shaped wells. Lightly grease the insides of each well, and position on a baking tray.) In a large bowl, combine all dry ingredients and stir very well. Whisk all liquid ingredients in a separate bowl, then pour wet into dry and stir until just evenly mixed. Immediately portion into the molds. Bake 16 minutes, then take out of the oven and let sit 5 minutes before removing from the molds. Let cool completely before filling.
Filling: (Feel free to fill with something else, such as Suzanne’s Ricemellow Crème, if you can’t have nuts.)
- 1 cup raw cashews or macadamia nuts (120g)
- 1 banana (omit for a banana-free version)
- pinch salt
- 1/4 tsp pure vanilla extract
- pinch stevia extract, or 2 tbsp sweetener of choice (liquid or granulated both work here)
- milk of choice as needed, to achieve a pastry-cream texture
In a cereal bowl, cover the nuts with water and let sit at least 3 hours (no longer than 8). Drain completely, then combine all ingredients in a Vita-Mix or a good food processor (adding a little milk of choice until the correct consistency is reached – you’ll need more if omitting the banana and/or if using a dry sweetener). Blend until very smooth and creamy, occasionally scraping down the sides if using a food processor. To fill the homemade Twinkies, poke three holes in the bottom of each, using a chopstick or the non-pronged end of a fork, and move the instrument around inside the pastry to make room for the filling. Pipe filling into the healthy Twinkies with a pastry bag, or a plastic bag with a tiny portion of one of the edges cut off, or the filling injector that comes with a canoe pan.
View Healthy Twinkies Calories and Nutrition
Question of the Day:
What are some of the unhealthiest foods you can think of?
There are always Cheesecake Factory desserts… and the Wendy’s Triple Baconator (as scary as the name implies)… There’s also a casserole recipe making the rounds on Pinterest that consists of nothing more than tater tots, ground beef, bacon, cream of something soup, and three different types of cheese. Not a green vegetable in sight. You look at something like that and it’s no wonder modern society is plagued with so many health problems.
Link Of The Day:
Hopefully I’m not repeating a comment, but google “Norpro cream canoe pan” and you will find what Katie is referring to on sites like Amazon. I’ve also seem these pans at Sur la Table.
I am SO happy to live in America and have all the freedoms that we have, and the virtues that we were built on. But it’s at times like that, when I see casseroles made of grease, oil, butter, and bad fats, and cheese, and possessed meats that I feel embarrassed for us as a nation. . .Thanks for the recipe!!!! 😀 I was hoping to see this pop up!
Yummy! The filing is pure decadence!
OMG I think I love you! My sweet son just does not get many treats due to his food allergies and intolerances and this looks tweak able for him! Thank you for giving me a great treat to make for my son! Hugs!
Being Australian and having never been to America, I’ve never tried a Twinkie. I read that Woody Harrelson ate vegan Twinkies when filming “Zombieland” – his character was a Twinkie fiend, but Woody is vegan. Makes sense.
Wow, I hate real twinkies but this healthy twinkie looks and sounds delicious that I will try for sure. One of the unhealthiest foods is probably Nutella, yet it is so delicious. Sadly off-brands don’t taste the same. And while I LOVE your vegan Nutella recipe, love the recipe of others’, have my own ‘Nutella’ recipe, enjoy Justin’s and other spreads – sadly, NONE of them is like Nutella, amazing chocolate hazelnut butters, yes, healthier, yes, vegan, yes, but not like Nutella…this is probably saddest things in my life that Nutella is non-vegan and terribly unhealthy. Vent over. And yes, cheesecake factory…and all sodas
Why is Nutella unhealthy?
The first ingredient is sugar. The rest are: palm oil, hazelnut, cocoa, skim milk, whey, lecithin & emulsifier (soy), vanilin, artificial flavors…it is a sugary processed food, nothing healthy about it… It is also not vegan.
what disturbs me more is that advertisers make it seem like a healthy spread “with cocoa, hazelnuts, and just a touch of skim milk” and 5 teaspoons of sugar! Not a great way to start the day.
Right…but Nutella is certainly NOT the only one with false advertisement as such. :/
You’re right, I say a commercial for some popcorn, which claimed that it had “half the fat of potato chips” and “zero grams of trans fat per serving” it was the second statement that got me. If there is 0.5 grams of trans fat per serving, manufacturers can claim that the product has zero.
I looked up the nutrition for this snack, and it contained partially hydrogenated oil (trans fat) so, I guess it isn’t so healthy, besides, fat makes a snack filling and flavorful. Take away fat, and it’s easier to eat multiple portions (and blow your daily allowance for trans fat). The food also had a whole bunch of refined sugar.
Be trying these out this afternoon, well my girlfriend will. Cheers Katie
I would agree that some Wendy’s burgers are scarily unhealthy, I would know, I make burgers there! Worse than the triple baconator is the quadruple baconator though, I once made one of those and the person ordered 8 extra slices of cheese! I felt bad having to serve a ‘heart-attack’ burger…..also marshmallows…..pure sugar and I have a tendency to toast a whole bag’s worth and eat them singlehandedly, and then regretting it later. 😉
Yes sometimes when looking at Pinterest recipes I think people are just trying to out-do each other. Like adding ranch, bacon, salami, and cheese to something that ordinarily doesn’t have any of those on it… why?? I totally believe in treating yourself, but don’t kill yourself at the same time…
There’s always Outback Steakhouse’s Bloomin’ Onion. There’s a girl I work with that orders it for her meal. It’s deep fried (and since I’m one of the minority here that isn’t vegan, I’ve heard they use beef tallow for frying) and over 2000 calories. I like the sauce it comes with, but it’s not worth it.
Potatoes are the worst thing for health. What’s worse is that people think they’re actually healthy. They are pure starch, and have almost no other nutrients. You might as well eat pure sugar because they are so high on the glycemic index. No seriously, they turn to sugar as soon as they hit your mouth. And a study from Harvard shows that an extra serving of potatoes leads to weight gain over the years. Most people don’t eat the skin, which has the negligible amount of nutrients, and then they start loading on bacon, sour cream, butter, salt, and it pretty much becomes the worst thing ever. We’re all better off without potatoes, as they have absolutely no place in a healthy diet.
I think poor potatoes get a bad rep because of the low carb craze. They are a good source of potassium, fiber, vitamin c. I think it all depends on how you cook them.Yes, loading them up with stuff and not eating the skin would not be the most nutritious way to eat them, but if you leave the skin on and roast them with some olive oil, salt, and pepper they are tasty and nutritious. I don’t think many whole foods, such as a potato, are totally devoid of any benefit to your body.
My dietician who has a degree in Human Nutrition and Dietetics tells me that whole potatoes are very good for you.
Hahaha, I know. I’m just kidding, I was posing as one of the people who sheepishly bash potatoes, to show them how ridiculous they sound when really, there is no good argument for it. I believe that potatoes are good for you and a cheap source of nutrients.
They are pure starch: -No, they have a little bit of fiber, protein, water, and a plethora of several vitamins and nutrients, of which include potassium, iron, copper, vitamin C, vitamin B6 and others. Now, it may not have huge levels of these, except for K and Vitamin C, but you’re not going to get a vitamin deficiency, just because you had a baked potato at lunch instead of spinach. And even if they are starchy, our bodies like having carbohydrates to fuel our muscles. I wonder why people think “starch” is bad but “complex carbohydrates” are good. They’re synonyms.
They’re high GI-If you eat with fat, protein, or fiber, you will reduce the GI. You should only be concerned if you’re eating several, deskinned potatoes absolutely plain. Enjoy potatoes with some olive oil, some beans. Besides, most tropical fruits are GI, and I don’t hear people screaming to avoid them like the plague.
They turn to sugar as soon as they hit your mouth-our saliva has enzymes that start to break down starch (polysaccharides/complex carbohydrates), same thing happens to oats, quinoa, apples, carrots, I don’t see anyone bashing those.
Potatoes cause weight gain over the years: – get off your a$$ and exercise.
I never liked twinkies as a kid. The banana filling sounds good though. When I think of unhealthy food, I think of a hot dog and soda.
Brilliant. I see vegan twinkies in my near future. Thanks for posting this.
My partner made them yesterday and she did a great job as they were absolutely delicious.
Hi Katie!
When you revamped your blog, you had a ‘print’ option . Why did that go away?
Thanks 🙂
These twinkies are genius! They look so much better than the store bought which I cannot stand. They taste like plastic goo! I admit I do like a gooey casserole and I think that those types are meant to be eaten with the veggies on the side? That’s how I was raised at least. I add greek yogurt in place of sour cream or soups for those recipes and you wouldn’t know the difference! Unhealthy favorites…anything smothered in gravy lol