Cranberry Christmas Tarts

I've been working on building up my recipe collection of healthy dessert recipes and this recipe is my latest favorite.  These creamy, delicious tarts are a wonderful, "guilt-free" treat, perfect for the holidays. They are a  lightly sweet, nutty, rich, orangey, ice creamy, cookie doughy, loaded with nuts and fruit, wheat free, gluten free, dairy free, free serving of deliciousness. You can garnish them with any fruit, but Kiwi looks especially pretty with the Cranberry during Christmas time, which is why I used them. 

  Cranberry Christmas Tarts

Place cashews, dates and flaxseed into a food processor or blender (if you are using a blender do this in smaller batches a little at a time).

Grind ingredients together, and pour into a bowl; the ingredients will cling together and form a sticky dough.

Pinch a small amount of dough and press into the bottom of each tart pan to form a crust.

In a clean food processor or blender, put all the  "Creamy layer" ingredients and blend the ingredients together until smooth and creamy. Spoon the blended ingredients onto the crust in the tart pans.

Cashews and Green Bananas  create the creamy base in this recipe and provide a low glycemic, dessert with a boost of fiber, resistant starch and protein. The green bananas have very little flavor, but complement the flavors added, and are a wonderful form of fiber, and resistant starch that will stifle the sugar cravings. So your eyes didn't deceive you when you skimmed the ingredient list, and saw "green" bananas; they are what you want for this recipe.

 Cranberry Christmas Tarts

Ingredients:

Crust
2 cups organic nuts of choice, such as walnuts, pecans, almonds or hazelnuts (Presoaked if desired), (You can also lightly roast them if you desire... which I did)
2 cups whole pitted dates
1/4 cup flax meal

For Creamy Layer
3 green bananas
2 1/2 cups cashews (presoaked)
2 teaspoons vanilla
6-8 drops orange essential oils
Juice from 1 medium orange
1/3 - 1/2 cup maple syrup, coconut syrup or honey (adjust to taste)
Orange zest from one orange (reserve 1 teaspoon for the Cranberry Topping)

For Cranberry Topping
1 bag fresh organic cranberries (reserve a small handful for garnish)
1/4 cup water or orange juice
1/2 cup maple syrup
6-8  drops orange essential oil
1 teaspoon orange zest

Optional Garnish

Sugared cranberries, (these can be removed before eating... they are for pretty value only).

Sliced Kiwis 

Mandarin orange segments
Sliced fruit of choice

Instructions:

1. Prepare tart pans (muffin tins make wonderful mini tarts) by spraying with cooking spray.  
2. Place cashews, dates and flaxseed into a food processor or blender (if you are using a blender do this in smaller batches a little at a time). Grind ingredients together, and pour into a bowl; the ingredients will cling together and form a sticky dough.
3. Pinch a small amount of dough and press into the bottom of each tart pan to form a crust.
4. In a clean food processor or blender, put all the "Creamy layer"ingredients and blend the ingredients together until smooth and creamy.
5. Spoon the blended ingredients for the creamy layer onto the crust in the tart pans.
6. Place Tart pans into the freezer.
7. Make a Cranberry Sauce topping as follows: Combine topping ingredients into a sauce pan.Turn to medium heat and and bring to a light boil. Stir and simmer until the mixture begins to thicken.
8. Allow the topping mixture to completely cool.
9. Once cool, spoon the mixture evenly over each tart.
10. Return tarts to the freezer.

To Serve:

Remove tarts from the freezer and allow to sit at room temperature 30-60 minutes.  Garnish with fruit and serve.

Enjoy!!!