The 3 Best Natural Sweeteners and How to Use Them

Baking with natural sweeteners such as date paste, honey and maple syrup is easier than you might think. Just the same, some recipes present challenges to using something other than a granular sugar. That is why I choose from several different natural sugars depending on what I’m baking. In this article, I’m going to share with you how to know which natural sugar to use for various baked goods and treats.

Challenges to Using Natural Sweeteners

Deciding to use natural sweeteners in your baking is a great way to reduce processed sugar in your children’s diet (and your own). As you learn how to replace table sugar with dates, honey and maple syrup in your pantry, you will find these invaluable items becoming staples you can’t live without.

But using a healthier, unprocessed form of sugar can also present challenges to many recipes. Since these natural sugars all contain varying degrees of moisture, they are obviously not the perfect replacement for granular sugar. You will have to alter recipes to account for the extra moisture in your baked goods by adding more dry ingredients or reducing other liquids to find a balance.

Of course, the recipes on this blog are already balanced for you. But if you are branching out and trying to make traditional recipes you find online or in your cookbook by replacing white sugar with a healthier, natural sweetener, you might run into some trouble.

In addition to the fact that these moist sweeteners throw off the ratio of dry-to-wet ingredients in traditional recipes, some edibles might actually seem impossible to make with a moist sweetener.

For example, when I wanted to create a recipe for buckeyes, I had to figure out how to do it in a way that the peanut butter balls would firm up in the fridge and stay firm enough to dip in warm chocolate. If I used date paste, the peanut butter would never firm up because date paste remains a paste (not a solid) when it is cold. And maple syrup was a no since it is always in a liquid state.

So I turned to honey. But it could not be just any honey. Those honey bears you get from the grocery store are too runny and will not firm up enough in the fridge. It had to be cold-extracted (raw) and unfiltered honey. Raw honey crystalizes and can become very thick. When it does crystalize, I actually have to work to scoop the honey out of my jar and it comes out in chunks.

Plus, raw honey is healthier and better for you and your kids because it has not been heated to kill bacteria (which inevitably also kills some of the good guys).

So by making use of my fridge and freezer, I was able to make delectable buckeyes (that the kids love) using only raw honey as my sweetener, both in the peanut butter balls and the chocolate coating.

Replacing granular sugar with healthier, natural, moist sugar options can indeed be done. Here are some tips on when to use each type of natural sweetener.

How to Use Date Paste

Date paste is, overall, my favorite natural sweetener simply because it cannot get more natural than pureed fruit.

Date paste has a milder sweetening capacity compared to honey and maple syrup. It is also the least liquidy of my three preferred natural sweeteners. Despite the fact that date paste does not firm up in the fridge, it does have a nice texture for a variety of treats. It also bakes very well into several sweet foods.

And date paste is super easy to make with my simple date paste recipe. Alternatively, you can also buy date paste from Amazon or Middle Eastern grocery stores. The store-bought date paste does not contain as much liquid and may need hot water added to it to make it mixable.

My favorite way to use date paste is in cookies. It gives cookies good flavor and excellent texture without requiring me to significantly alter my dry-to-wet ratio and without being overly sweet in the final product. Date paste does not make cookies dense while keeping them moist.

Date paste is also great for making energy balls. As the least liquid natural sweetener of the three, it mixes into cream cheese or oat flour batters (like in my chocolate cheesecake energy balls and chocolate chip cookie dough energy balls) smoothly while allowing balls to keep their shape once rolled.

Another great use for date paste is as a base for frosting. And speaking of frosting, I also use date paste in cake and cupcake recipes sometimes. More often, though, I use it in muffin recipes since cakes and cupcakes generally require a sweeter result.

For reference, here are things you can make with date paste:

• Cookies
• Cakes & Cupcakes
• Muffins
• Energy Balls
• Frosting

How to Use Honey

Raw honey is my second favorite natural sweetener because of its health benefits. I’m actually not a fan of the taste of honey by itself – although raw honey does have a much more pleasant flavor than processed honey that is mostly just over-the-top sweetness.

However, since I’m not big on the taste of honey, I don’t like to use it in everything. A lot of baked goods end up with an overpowering honey flavor when they are wholly sweetened with honey. Consequently, I often prefer to use honey in smaller amounts or combined with other sweeteners to achieve sweetness without the honey taking over the flavor of the treat.

But for treats that do not need to be baked, I have fallen in love with raw honey for the reasons I mentioned earlier with my buckeye recipe: It solidifies and helps firm up cold treats.

Raw honey is wonderful for making your own chocolate because it will thicken with the other ingredients in the fridge or freezer.

And here’s something else exciting you can use raw honey for: Making whipped cream! Yes, you can achieve a stable fluff in whipped cream without granular or powdered sugar. As long as you use raw honey and not processed, it will set up just find when you whip that cream into shape.

Honey also pairs really well with oats. This is one area where I don’t mind baking with honey. I sweeten granola with honey and I also sweeten oat flour muffins with honey because oats and honey make such a great couple.

Also, you can make lollipops out of honey. This will, however, kill the beneficial bacteria since you have to heat the honey to a high temperature to turn make lollipops or other hard candies.

So to summarize, here are some great recipes to make with honey:

• Hard Chocolate (chocolate chunks, candies, coatings, etc.)
• Whipped Cream
• Oat Recipes (granola, oat flour muffins, etc.)
• Lollipops & Hard Candies

How to Use Maple Syrup

Maple syrup is the sweetest of my three preferred natural sweeteners. It is also the most liquid which can sometimes present challenges. However, maple syrup has many uses in naturally sweetening your children’s breakfasts, snacks and desserts.

My favorite way to use maple syrup is definitely in cake and cupcake recipes. The reason is because of its intense sweetness that is perfect for the ultra-sweet nature of these celebratory treats.

Maple syrup is absolutely wonderful for creating a light, sweet cake texture and flavor. It does not weigh the cake down and kids don’t even know the source of sweetness is anything besides white sugar. But maple syrup won’t spike blood sugar as much as white sugar. So no worries over the sugar-rush effect when you bake your child’s birthday party cupcakes with maple syrup.

I use maple syrup in my chocolate cake recipe, my vanilla cupcake recipe and my strawberry cupcake recipe. And they have been highly successful with not only my own kids, but their friends as well.

I also like to use maple syrup for muffins, partly because muffins are also usually meant to be pretty sweet. But also because using maple syrup is quick and easy (it’s literally as easy as using white sugar scooped out of a bag). When I’m making muffins, it’s often for breakfast and I just want to get them made quick to fill my kids’ bellies.

And speaking of breakfast, I also use maple syrup for the sweetener in my pancakes and waffles. You don’t need much and, once again, it’s quick and easy to mix in.

Maple syrup can also be used for making hard candies and lollipops.

So here are some of the best ways to use maple syrup:

• Cakes and Cupcakes
• Muffins
• Pancakes & Waffles
• Lollipops & Hard Candies

My Naturally Sweet Challenge for You

So now you know a little bit more about how and when to use my top three natural sweeteners. If there is a natural sugar you have not tried using before, I challenge you to pick a recipe on this blog that uses that sweetener and try making that recipe. And then, tag @NaturallySweetenedKids on social media to let me know how it went 🙂

You might be surprised by how much your kids like the result and by how easy it can be to use natural sweeteners instead of processed sugar. Even kids who don’t like dates, honey or maple syrup enjoy treats made with them. My very picky daughter is proof of that!

Okay, I’ve got to get back to the kitchen now. There are naturally sweetened recipes to be created and tested on hangry children 😀

I’ll meet you back here when I have another new kid-approved recipe to share. Make sure you are subscribed to the NSK email newsletter (subscribe in the form below) so you don’t miss my weekly new recipes.

Happy treat-making!