These Healthy Peanut Butter Blondies are gluten-free, dairy-free, refined-sugar free and vegan friendly! Made with chickpeas but you’d never know it! It’s the perfect healthy dessert recipe that you can feel great about indulging in!
This recipe was originally posted on March 31st, 2016. The photos have been updated and a video has been added to give an old favorite a little facelift!
Today I’m sharing a recipe with you that has been 2 years in the making. These Healthy Peanut Butter Blondies are a dessert you can feel great about eating! As you know by now…I always have some sort of healthy dessert on hand or just coming out of the oven in my house.
I have this habit that I can’t don’t want to kick, of sitting down and having a legit dessert every night after dinner. However, I would like to live past 45, so I love making treats that taste indulgent but are actually good for you, like these chickpea blondies! One of my favorite ways to achieve this goal is by using beans in place of flour in baked goods!
Chickpea Blondies?!
These healthy peanut butter blondies use chickpeas instead of flour and peanut butter in place of butter or oil. I know what you’re thinking, there are so many chickpea peanut butter recipes out there, what makes this one different?
I’ve tried (and liked) many of those recipes, but there’s something about this one that just did it for me. I really love the combination of honey and coconut sugar as the sweetener, and the addition of 1 TBS of almond milk really made the texture perfect! This recipe ended my search for a delicious, healthy, peanut butter cookie that’s high in protein and fiber!
These healthy peanut butter blondies are also vegan-friendly (no eggs)! So you can {and will want to!} lick the Vitamix clean without a care in the world! Yay! I love adding a touch of sea salt to the top of these before baking them….you can’t go wrong with sweet and salty!
How to Make Healthy Peanut Butter Blondies
This vegan blondies recipe is SO easy! Simply toss everything (except the chocolate chips) into the container of your Vitamix (or other high-powered blender or food processor) and blend away! It takes 5 minutes to put together and 30 minutes to bake. Which means that you can have a delicious dessert ready to go in no time!
- Room temperature. One thing to note is that these blondies blend the easiest when all the ingredients are at room temperature. If you’re using a solid peanut butter, I recommend melting it a touch before putting it in your blender. Rinse the chickpeas with warm water, and let the almond milk warm up a bit at room temperature too!
Healthy Peanut Butter Blondies: Substitutions
Like I said earlier, I tweaked and tested this recipe many, many times before deciding to share it with the world. So I recommend making it exactly as written. However, if you must, here are a few possible substitutions! 🙂
- Chickpeas. Great Northern Beans {aka: white beans, aka: Cannellini beans} also work well in this recipe! However, chickpeas (aka: garbanzo beans} are my favorites!
- Peanut butter. I honestly have never tried this recipe with any other nut or seed butter, but I am guessing that any all-natural variety would work very well!
- Honey. Use pure maple syrup for a vegan variety!
- Coconut sugar. Any granulated sugar works well in this recipe. I prefer coconut sugar because it is unrefined and tastes amazing!
- Almond milk. Any non-dairy or regular dairy-full milk works excellently in this recipe! I have also used non-dairy creamer with yummy results too!
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Healthy Peanut Butter Blondies
Ingredients
- 1 15 oz can chickpeas (garbanzo beans), rinsed and drained
- ½ cup peanut butter
- ¼ cup honey can substitute maple syrup for a vegan option
- ¼ cup coconut sugar
- 1 TBS almond milk
- 2 tsp vanilla
- ½ tsp sea salt
- ½ tsp baking powder
- ¼ tsp baking soda
- ½ cup chocolate chips
- extra sea salt & chocolate chips for the top
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Grease an 8" or 9" glass baking pan and set aside.
- Put all ingredients except for chocolate chips into your blender (Vitamix) or food processor. I highly recommend a great blender like the Vitamix so you get a perfectly smooth consistency.
- Blend until creamy and smooth.
- Once smooth, add chocolate chips and mix by hand.
- Pour mixture into your prepared pan and spread out evenly.
- Sprinkle a few more chocolate chips and sea salt on top.
- Bake in your preheated oven for 20-30 mintues until the edges just pull away from the pan, the top is set and slightly golden brown.
- Let cool for at least 15 minutes, then enjoy!
- Store in an airtight container in the refrigerator. You can eat them cold or warm in the microwave for 15 seconds to regain the fresh-from-the-oven deliciousness!
Video
Nutrition
Question: have you tried baking with beans?! If so, how did you like it?
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Martha Johnson
These look great! I’m wondering if you’ve tried using PBFit or PB2 (Peanut butter powder) instead of peanut butter. The powder is so much lower in fat, that definitely would make it even healthier. Wanting to figure this one out!
Laura
Hey Martha! I haven’t tried using powdered peanut butter in this recipe! But if you do let me know how it goes!
Shelly.
I made these this morning ..They came out delicious.. I made them in a round 8 inch pan and cut them like pie !!! Got 8 yummy servings. I will make many more times!!!
Kay
I’ve made these for countless events and they’re always a hit! One of my go-to desserts.
Christin
My daughters made these tonight and they were amazing! We used natural pb and a mix of dark and mini chocolate chips. We love chickpeas and this is just another wonderful way to eat them! Thanks for an amazing recipe!
Misty Blahuta
Wow! When this recipe popped up on my Pinterest feed I jumped up and made them right away. I didn’t tell my daughter they were made with chickpeas until she’d taken a bite and she couldn’t tell. I used almond butter because it’s what I had on hand, otherwise no changes. The texture is amazing. These blondies are comforting and satisfied my super-sweet tooth and my daughters not-so-sweet tooth. We both thought they were perfection.
Laura
YES! I love surprising my family with healthy treats! I’m so glad you and your daughter love them!
Ari
Can I add protein powder to it?
Laura
You could! It will change the flavor of the recipe though!
Shayley Timm
These are so good, I made them with maple syrup for a vegan version. I need to have a nightly sweet treat after dinner too!
Also, I’m a big fan of your blog and have recently started my own!
Loni
Should I use fine or coarse sea salt? I can’t wait to try these!
Tiffany Comer
Love this recipe! I used sugar free maple syrup in place of the honey, Stevia in place of the coconut sugar, and cashew milk instead of almond milk (it was what I had). I also added an egg but I’m sure it would be fine without it.
I took a potato masher to the chickpeas before I added any other ingredients which made the skin come off easily, then I blended everything together with a hand mixer.
They came out delicious and my family loved them! Will definitely make again.
Laura
So glad you loved them Tiffany! <3
HEATHER
YUM! i made these and used walnuts because I was out of choc chips and also added:
1 heaping Tbsp cinnamon
1 tsp powdered ginger
3 tsp homemade chai mix
THIS RECIPE IS A KEEPER. I wrapped them in individual servings in wax paper and stored in a ziploc bag in the freezer. I think they taste best chilled.
Anita
I made these yesterday! Amazing! I added one egg( for a little extra protein) and doubled the recipe for a 9×11 pan! Super yummy and my one kid who likes chocolate loved them!
Kelly
Wow. These are delicious & you can’t taste the chickpeas at all. I didn’t tell my boyfriend that there were chickpeas in the recipe (because he’d freak out), and he had no clue. Thank you!
Laura
So glad you loved them Kelly! I totally relate to not telling my family what’s really in something before they try it and proclaim that they like it! 😉
Lisa
Mine turned out wobbly in the middle and simply wouldn’t cook through :/ Is there something wrong with how I mixed the batter?
Katherine Degelmann
Me too!!! Can anyone advise how to get them to cook through?
Laura
Hello! I’d recommend just baking them until they are cooked through! I have never had this issue before so I’m unsure what is happening. Did you make any substitutions or alter the method of the recipe at all?
Cheryle
I doubled the recipe, all ingredients were at room temp, and my Vitamix bogged down. Finally I added 2 aquafaba eggs, and they are baking now. The batter was delicious. The Blondies turned out to be delicious. I ended up baking them about 45 minutes. Took them to a class to share, and people really enjoyed them.
Any thoughts on the bogging down of the Vitamix? Thanks.