I have to admit I have a major sweet tooth. It seems like most of my posts are for sweets of some kind or another, but danishes have always been one of my favorites. These Sugar Free Mini Danishes are great with my afternoon tea or coffee. They would make a great breakfast treat as well.
These mini danishes are extremely versatile… especially following the Trim Healthy Mama lifestyle. They give me a sweet S treat and are made with the new THM Baking Blend (this is an Affiliate link). If you don’t have the new baking blend I’ll be sure to add some tweaks so that you can make these without it.
I would only eat 1 or 2 of these at a time, they are a little calorie dense with the cream cheese. They go great with a trimaccino rich or with a hot cup of tea.
You can use my rolled sugar cookie recipe to make the crusts of these if you don’t have the baking blend yet. Instead of rolling that dough you can just make a little ball from it and a depression with the back of the spoon for your filling.
The filling in these Sugar Free Mini Danishes is cream cheese with a 1/4 tsp of Polaner’s all fruit jelly that I needed to use up. You can also use slim belly jelly from the Trim Healthy Mama Book or my sugar free Black Berry Jelly recipe.
I’m finding that I really enjoy my afternoon cup… be it tea or coffee …it just really hits the spot and doesn’t keep me up half the night since it is in mid afternoon.
Here’s the recipe for the sugar free mini danishes:
- Serves: 18
- Serving size: 9
- Calories: 124
- Fat: 8g
- Saturated fat: 4g
- Unsaturated fat: 3g
- Carbohydrates: 11g
- Sugar: 9g
- Sodium: 84mg
- Protein: 2g
- Cholesterol: 62mg
- 2 oz. softened cream cheese
- 2 T salted grass fed butter, cut into small cubes
- 1 T palm shortening ( I use Spectrum brand)
- 1 egg
- 1¼ cup THM Baking Blend
- ¾ tsp. baking powder
- ½ tsp. vanilla extract
- ¼ C sweetener (I used Pyure Organic Stevia, All Purpose Sweetener, use 2 T THM Sweet Blend)
- 2 oz cream cheese, softened
- 1 egg yolk
- 1 tsp. vanilla extract
- pinch of high mineral salt (less than ⅛ tsp.)
- ¼ C sweetener (or 2 T THM Sweet blend)
- 1-2 T sugar-free fruit preserves or slim belly jelly (optional)
- 1 oz. softened (almost melted) cream cheese
- 2 T sweetener, powdered (or 1T powdered THM Sweet Blend)
- ¼ tsp. vanilla extract
- 1 T organic heavy cream
- Preheat oven to 325 and line a large baking sheet with parchment paper.
- In a large bowl, prepare dough ingredients. Combine THM Baking blend, cream cheese, butter, shortening, baking powder and salt. Use a fork or pastry blender to cut the cold butter, cream cheese and shortening into the flours to create a thick dough.
- Add in vanilla, sweetener and egg and mix with a large spoon until a light dough forms.
- Use a cookie scoop or two teaspoons to make golf ball sized balls of dough 2 inches apart on lined baking sheet.
- Flatten each pastry with the back of a spoon. Using your fingers, gently create shallow wells in each pastry, bringing up a small lip along the outside of each pastry. (Each pastry should be about 2½ inches in diameter)This dough is very tender, so you have to use a light touch to do this or it will crack and break.
- Place pastries, unfilled, in the oven on the middle rack and pre-bake approximately 3-5 minutes.
- Place softened cream cheese, egg yolk, vanilla, salt, and sweetener into a small bowl and beat either until smooth. The mixture will be thin.
- Remove pastries from oven. Allow to cool for a few moments and use your finger once again to very lightly press the wells down a bit if they've risen. You want to make sure you have well defined wells for the filling.
- Fill each pastry with about one teaspoon of cheese filling. It should be full, but not overflowing. If desired, place a dollop of sugar free fruit preserves (I used Polaner's Cherry) in the middle of the filling.
- Bake at 325 for about 20 minutes or until the centers are firm but not cracked and the crust is golden brown.
- In a small bowl, combine the cream cheese, sweetener, vanilla and heavy cream and mix until smooth.
- Pour the glaze into a baggie and cut a small hole in the tip, drizzle glaze over each pastry.
I would encourage you to purchase the Trim Healthy Mama products as the quality is some of the best on the market. I also appreciate any purchases through my affiliate link. Your price doesn’t change however I do receive a small commission that allows me to continue my blogging activities.
Cindi says
Made these today during our THM weekly meeting….well a few of us meet every week to try to support each other and try new techniques. These are delicious, made with strawberry slim belly jelly
judy says
I’m so glad you enjoyed them 🙂 Thanks for letting me know.
Hope N. Griffin says
These look delicious. I have some friends coming over for coffee next week. I will have to try these out on them. Thanks for linking up with #JoyHopeLive hope to see you back tomorrow!
Krystal says
I am not a very experienced baker but I made them! They are SO great! I posted a picture of them in the THM fb group with a link to this page for the recipe!
I didn’t have shortening so I subbed coconut oil.
Also, in your directions for the dough you say to add the ingredients and list salt. I may have missed it but I didn’t see a measurement for salt in your listed ingredients for the dough…? So I just guesstimated 1/4 tsp fine pink Himalayan salt. Turned out great!
Thanks so much for the recipe! Loving that THM Baking Blend!
judy says
I’m so happy that you enjoyed making these … The 1/4 tsp of salt is correct. And thank you So very much for linking back to the recipe.
Joy Nissen says
I pinned this and the link that it posted on my FB was Matcha Fried Ice Cream! But when I click on it it brings me to the Danish!! Just thought you might like to know that! Thanks!
Judy says
oh my gosh that’s so crazy… I’m not sure why it would do that :/