Healthy Homemade Mint Meltaways – GAPS, Paleo, Dairy-Free, Sugar-Free
When we began the GAPS intro protocol to heal our allergies and autoimmune challenges, we needed a sweet treat that healed and soothed the gut. These healthy homemade mint meltaways were exactly what we needed! Creamy, sweet, and minty, they satisfy a sweet tooth craving with no crash after! We have since added this dessert into our regular rotation, keeping them in the freezer. I like them frozen even better!
This recipe is adapted from Becky Plotner’s book GAPS Recipes, Stage by Stage, With Recipes. If you do not have a copy, I highly recommend it.
Healthy Homemade Mint Meltaways May Resolve Sugar Cravings
Dr. Natasha recommends overcoming sugar cravings by mixing honey and butter (or a tolerated animal fat). Anytime you are feeling you need something sweet, have a spoonful of the honey/fat mixture. Overtime, sugar cravings will resolve. Dr. Natasha shares:
“Cravings for sweet things and chocolate are due to unstable blood sugar level. In order to remove your sugar cravings you need to keep your blood sugar at a steady level. Here is what we do: make a butter / honey mixture or a coconut oil / honey mixture, put it in a glass jar and carry that jar with you everywhere. Eat 2-3 tablespoons of this mixture every 15-25 minutes all day long. Do this for a month or longer depending on the severity of your sugar cravings; in the meantime focus on implementing the GAPS diet, which will normalise your blood sugar permanently. Once your blood sugar is normal, you cravings will be gone and at that stage you can stop carrying a jar of butter / honey mixture with you.” (source)
Often, our bodies actually just need more fat or protein when we crave something sweet! These mint meltaways are a great and yummy way to satisfy a sweet craving without spiking blood sugars.
Honey vs Sugar
A few interesting facts about honey vs. sugar:
- When we eat refined sugar, our bodies need to burn magnesium in order to process it. Honey contains trace minerals, such as magnesium.
- Honey has a lower glycemic index than sugar. This means honey does not spike blood sugars as readily as sugar.
- “Considerable evidence from experimental studies shows that the honey may provide benefits in the management of diabetes mellitus. The benefits could be a better control of the hyperglycemic state, limiting other metabolic disorders and diminishing the deleterious effects on different organs that may produce diabetic complications” (source).
Metabolic Syndrome: Effects of Honey vs. Sugar
Dr. Natasha explains:
Metabolic syndrome is caused by processed carbohydrates, which dominate our Western food consumption (breakfast cereals, sugar, everything made from flour including breads and pasta, etc). If you remove those and replace your sugar with natural honey you will be protected from metabolic syndrome. Listen to your taste buds and they will not allow you to overdose on honey or any other food. Please read more on this subject in my book ‘Put Your Heart In Your Mouth‘.
Sugar is a processed substance, it is extracted from natural plants which contain many nutrients necessary for your body to metabolize sugar safely. When sugar is extracted from cane or sugar beet all those other necessary nutrients are removed. So when this processed sugar comes into your body, your body has to come up with all the missing nutrients in order to make that sugar safe. Magnesium deficiency is a major result of sugar consumption, causing high blood pressure and neurological and behavioral problems (because to metabolize sugar the body needs large amounts of magnesium). But magnesium is just one nutrient necessary to make sugar safe, there are hundreds of others. Honey is a natural product full of magnesium and other nutrients necessary for the sugars in honey to be safe for the human body (source).
Health Benefits of Animal Fat
These healthy homemade mint meltaways, as well as all other recipes on this blog, can be made with a choice animal fat instead of coconut oil. We have been repeatedly misinformed that consuming animal fats can cause heart attacks, strokes, high cholesterol, weight gain, and more. The true culprit of ill health comes from too much insulin (which is caused from eating processed sugars and carbohydrates) and vegetable and seed oils.
Glucagon is a hormone produced by the liver in response to consumption of fat and animal protein. This hormone works in opposition to insulin. Insulin is the ‘master fat-storage’ hormone in the body, as long as you have too much insulin in your blood you will store everything you eat as fat. Insulin dominance in the body is the cause of obesity, diabetes, heart disease, cancer and many other modern maladies. Why do people have insulin dominance? Because of consuming processed carbohydrates: bread (including sandwiches), breakfast cereals, sugar, soft drinks, snacks and sweets, etc. These carbohydrates stimulate production of too much insulin. In Nature everything works as a union of opposites: to oppose insulin our bodies produce glucagon. Glucagon is a ‘master fat-burning’ hormone, it mobilizes your own body fat to be used for energy production. When your body starts producing glucagon you lose excess weight, your body assumes its natural healthy shape, and the risks of diabetes, heart disease and cancer are removed. To produce glucagon you need to eat plenty of animal fat and protein: meat, fish, eggs and good quality dairy products (source).
How to Make Healthy Homemade Mint Meltaways
Ingredients
- 1 cup coconut oil (or substitute neutral tasting plant or animal fat-no seed oils)
- Optional substitutions:
- Butter, Palm Oil, Ghee, Duck fat, Grass-fed lard
- 2 Tablespoons raw honey
- 1 teaspoon pure mint extract
Instructions
- Melt coconut oil (or fat)
- Stir in raw honey and mint extract
- Pour into flat glass pan, like Pyrex or into silicone molds for fun shapes
- Refrigerate or freeze until hardened.
- Cut into desired sizes/shapes or pop out of molds and serve
- Store in the freezer for longer term and to enjoy as a frozen treat
Shop This Post
- GAPS Stage by Stage, With Recipes
- Coconut Oil (or a neutral tasting plant or animal fat; no seed oils)
- Mint extract
- Raw honey
- Freezer safe Pyrex
- Silicone molds
I hope you enjoy these healthy homemade mint meltaways! Let me know in the comments how you enjoy them and any variations you enjoy.
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