Creamy low carb cheesecake bars with the delicious flavours of salted caramel sauce and toasted pecans. So heavenly, you’d never know it’s healthy!
Oh these divine keto salted caramel cheesecake bars! They were so pretty, I couldn’t stop taking pictures of them!
I take a lot of photos of food. I mean, a LOT of photos of food. It comes with the job, of course, but really, it’s a disproportionate amount of food and not so much of the rest of my life. My kids, my husband, my family and friends.
If a volcano were to erupt and Portland was buried Pompeii-style, archaeologists a few hundred years from now would get the wrong impression from my computer. They’d think that all I really cared about was food and that my kids were really just tangential to my life. They also might get the idea that all I ever ate was dessert, but that’s a whole other matter.
The reality is that I do actually like to photograph my kids. But kids move too much, whereas food stays still and does what I tell it to do. So food tends to get a little more time in front of the camera.
Nevertheless, if I were to lose a whole lot of my photography in one go, I’d much prefer it to be the food and not the kids. I know this for a fact, because I have now twice had to recover a whole lot of photos that seemingly disappeared out of my cloud storage. And twice now, I’ve been nearly heartsick when I can’t find the family pics where I know I last saved them. Thankfully, I back my computer up every few days so it’s mostly a matter of going into Time Machine and finding the right date and time when I know I last had them. I’ve been able to restore the files quickly and easily, but it still gives me a mini heart attack every time. Because those family photos are far more precious to me than the food. You have no idea how precious. Now I save them to both cloud storage AND on an external hard-drive. Fingers crossed that one of those is always working properly at any given moment!
Digital photography is supposed to make things easier and less stressful, isn’t it? Back in our parents’ day, photographs were stored in albums and boxes, taking up physical space and at the mercy of the elements. Remember all those stacks of film and prints in your basement or your attic, curling and fading with the passage of time? If you’re old like me, chances are you still have some of those boxes of childhood photos tucked away somewhere, waiting for you to go through them again. You don’t look at them very often anymore but it’s just comforting to know that they’re there, waiting for you like an old friend. But if there were a fire or a flood, they could be lost to you. I am not so sure digital photos are all that much different, really. I don’t go back through my digital files that often but I want them to be there when I feel the urge to call them up and reminisce. As long as the digital elements don’t send them up in smoke.
So yes, if the gods of the digital world want to make any of my photography disappear permanently, I beg them to take the food photos. Leave me the photos of my little girls in at their dance recital or my son learning to ride his bike. Leave me the photos of our camping trips and our silly impromptu dance parties. Oh please, please leave me the teeny tiny newborns, so impossibly small and squinchy-eyed in my arms. They may not be as clear or as perfectly styled as the food shots, they may be a bit out of focus or have a moving child only half in the frame. But they are worlds more precious to me.
Plus if the food pics disappear, I can always make the recipe again. Yes, I could happily make these low carb salted caramel cheesecake bars again. You know, just because the photos disappeared…
- 1 1/2 cups almond flour
- 1/4 cup finely chopped pecans
- 1/4 cup powdered Swerve Sweetener
- 1/4 cup butter melted
- 12 ounces cream cheese softened
- 1/2 cup Sugar-Free Caramel Sauce room temperature (don't add it in hot or it will curdle the cream cheese!)
- 1/4 cup Swerve Sweetener
- 1 large egg
- 1/2 tsp vanilla or caramel extract
- 3 tbsp heavy cream room temperature
- 1/4 cup Sugar-Free Caramel Sauce
- 16 toasted pecan halves optional
- Pinch sea salt
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Preheat oven to 325F.
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In the bottom of a 9x9 inch baking pan, combine almond flour, chopped pecans, sweetener and butter, tossing to combine well. Press firmly and evenly into bottom of pan.
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Bake 10 minutes and then remove and let cool while preparing the filling. Lower oven temperature to 275F.
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In a large bowl, beat cream cheese until smooth. Beat in caramel sauce and sweetener until well combined.
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Beat in egg, vanilla or caramel extract, and heavy cream until mixture is smooth. Pour over crust. Bake 25 to 35 minutes, or until cheesecake is set but just jiggles slightly in the center. Remove and let cool completely, then refrigerate until firm, about 2 hours.
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Cut into 16 bars and drizzle with more caramel sauce. Top each with a pecan half, if desired. Sprinkle with salt.
Serves 16. Each serving has 4.97 g of carbs and 1.45 g of fiber. Total NET CARBS = 3.52 g.
Food energy: 237kcal
Total fat: 21.47g
Calories from fat: 193
Cholesterol: 48mg
Carbohydrate: 4.97g
Total dietary fiber: 1.45g
Protein: 4.27g
