PICTURE Low Carb Instant Pot Shrimp, Crawfish, and Sausage Étouffée This easy low carb kept friendly Instant Pot étouffée will be a new favorite in your house. With a few simple swaps using cauliflower rice, this dish is excellent for low carb dieters. PICTURE Before scrolling down to the recipe, be sure to read my easy tips for making your recipes low carb, keto friendly and delicious. NOTE: We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites. PICTURE Question time! What is your favorite cold weather dish? I posed the above question on the Skinny Louisiana Facebook page and received the same style answers: gumbo, stews, soups, and étouffées! Growing up in Houma, LA I knew exactly when each cold front arrived from the amazing of the trinity, onion, pepper, and celery sautéing for a roux for our gumbo, stews, and étouffée. From various seafoods to wild game, gumbo, stews, and étouffées was our cold weather served over a big serving of rice. Delicious! When discussing favorite cold weather dishes with my Yankee (so, he is from the midwest, but anything north of I10 is the north) husband, he had the same glimmer in his eyes and stated his cold weather comfort foods are meat and potatoes. Wha…. Not criticizing, but where is my flavor! Today, we are tackling étouffée. And better yet, make sure to tackle my popular Low Carb King Cake Cheesecake Bars http://www.skinnylouisiana.com/low-carb-king-cake-cheesecake-bars/! Étouffée discussion: Roux or No Roux? Tomatoes or No Tomatoes? A ‘roux’ is the basis of many of our gumbo, stews, and étouffées. A roux is combination of flour and butter (or other fat) used to add thickness to a dish. Growing up, the shock of not using a roux would have had you disowned by many family members, but in today’s health standards, the concern with a roux is the carb content. Similarly striking a nerve, the used of tomatoes in an étouffée can start a family feud. Some use tomatoes, some do not. I am not up for debating the subject since I cook based on taste. Food history states Cajun étouffée (which I am 100% Cajun) does not use tomatoes, and Creole étouffée uses tomatoes. My philosophy - you do you. You like tomatoes, use them. You don’t, leave them out. No one has that time for negativity. Restaurants love to serve up étouffée including Pappadeaux shrimp étouffée, Paul Prudhomme shrimp étouffée, and Emeril’s shrimp étouffée. When chatting with folks, I learned the love the crawfish étouffée, but many folks are ready to take this dish to a low carb keto étouffée recipe. And with that, it was time to go to my drawing board and bring out the ‘new’ trusty Instant Pot. The result is an amazing low carb keto friendly étouffée the entire family will love. I hope you and your family will enjoy it as much as mine does! Where to Shop for Low Carb Ingredients Before I go over ingredients, know the items used in this recipe can be found at many of your local supermarkets and Drug Emporium. Many of you know my love of Drug Emporium stores. Not only does Drug Emporium have amazing prices (often the cheapest in town), I work with this amazing company in putting on Low Carb Food Demonstrations and product selection for shelves. All my items in the recipes are from Drug Emporium. For a full list of Drug Emporium store locations, click here. http://drugemporiuminc.com/ No Drug Emporium in your town? No worries, I have the links for where to purchase online! Where to Shop for Seafood While supermarkets do have a selection of seafood, make sure you are purchasing gulf coast and/or Louisiana gulf coast seafood. Do not purchase seafood from China. If you do not have access to crawfish (my son’s favorite seafood - one of his favorite recipes, Christian’s Crawfish Casserole, is in my first book, Skinny Louisiana…in the Kitchen) http://www.skinnylouisiana.com/order-cookbook/ , you can easily double the shrimp. Ingredients Low Carb Instant Pot Shrimp, Crawfish, and Sausage Étouffée Olive oil Onion Green Pepper Celery Garlic Applegate Andouille Sausage Tony Chachere’s Lite https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00ECJD4CG/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=B00ECJD4CG&linkCode=as2&tag=skinnylouisia-20&linkId=71889821300d28dec414a9c9c6a70b55 Tabasco OR any other Cajun seasoning Diced Tomatoes Diced Tomatoes with Green Chilies 1/2 cup bone broth or broth Frozen Cauliflower Rice Parsley Crawfish Shrimp Xanthum Gum Low Carb Ingredients in our Low Carb Instant Pot Shrimp, Crawfish, and Sausage Étouffée Extra Virgin Olive Oil Yes, you can sub your favorite kept friendly oil and/or ghee in this recipe. Sausage While sausage in general is a low carb food, I am specific when choosing my meats. I used Applegate Andouille Sausage https://applegate.com/ since it is a nitrate-free, no antibiotic meat. Not the mention, the flavor is amazing. You are welcome to use your favorite sausage, just check the carb count and ingredients list to make sure you don’t purchase a sausage with added sugar. Seasoning While not technically a low carb food, I do watch out for sodium in our food. We used Tony Chachere’s lite in this dish. Diced Tomatoes This ingredients is based on personal preferences. Tomatoes are an amazing source of lycopene, but for some on the keto diet, you would need to fit this in your macros if you do not eliminate the tomatoes. I love tomatoes in my étouffée, but you can leave out. My philosophy - you do you. You like tomatoes, use them. You don’t, leave them out. No one has that time for negativity. Rice With any gumbo, stew, or étouffée, rice is a must but in the low carb world, rice makes us run away, very fast. 1/2 cup of cooked white rice yields 21 grams of carbs AND NOTE wheat rice doesn’t fair much better. In fact, many of us do not realize the wheat rice has the SAME amount of carbs as our white rice. Enter our amazing vegetable, the cauliflower. From pizza to bread, cauliflower is an amazing substitute for rice in many of our recipes. Riced cauliflower is available frozen or in the produce section of the stores. Flour With any roux, flour is the basic ingredient. Flour serves as a thickening agent in our savory dishes. Flour in the low carb and low net carb world makes us cringe since whole wheat flour has 21 grams of carbs and 3 grams of fiber per 1/4 cup serving. Typically, we would make a roux first, but in the Instant Pot, we use Xanthum Gum. Xanthum gum is very popular in gluten free cooking because of its ability to thicken dishes and mimic the gluten. It is formed with the fermentation of glucose and a bacteria found in cabbage. Traditionally added to various desserts using almond and coconut flour to prevent the product from falling apart, xanthum gum is added at the end of the cooking process to thicken our étouffée in place of our roux. Xanthum gum has a high fiber count, leading to a ZERO net carb product! How to Make Low Carb Instant Pot Shrimp, Crawfish, and Sausage Étouffée Defrost your Sausage, Crawfish, and Shrimp. Grab the Cutting Board. Using a sharp knife, chop onions, peppers, celery, and garlic (mince). Place aside. With a new cutting board, slice your sausage. Place aside. Plug in the Instant Pot. Press the SAUTE button FIRST, then add your olive oil. Add onions, pepper, celery and sauté for 5-7 minutes. Add garlic. Continue to sauté for 1 minute. Add sausage. Cook for 5 minutes. Add seasoning, tomatoes (again, you can omit this), bone broth, and cauliflower rice. Combine. Press CANCEL. Lock lid. Make sure vent is SEALED. Press MANUAL. Cook on high pressure for 7 minutes. When Instant Pot Beeps, do a QUICK release. When valve drops, unlock and remove lid. Stir in parsley and shrimp. Press SAUTE button. Sauté for 5 minutes or until shrimp are pink. Stir in crawfish. Sauté 1 minute. Press KEEP WARM button. Xanthum Gum. Adding Xanthum gum is easy, but NEVER overdo it. Using a 1/2 teaspoon (yes that small), sprinkle Xanthum gum over mixture and quickly stir using a wooden spoon until Xanthum Gum is dissolved. I used 2 teaspoons of Xanthum gum, so this means I added Xanthum gum and stirred the mixture 4 times. Let sit for 3-5 minutes stirring occasionally. Serve. How to Make Low Carb Instant Pot Shrimp, Crawfish, and Sausage Étouffée Ingredients: 1 tbsp olive oil 1 onion, chopped 1 green pepper, chopped 3 stalks of celery, chopped 1 tbsp. garlic (or 3 garlic cloves, minced) 1 pkg. Applegate Andouille Chicken Sausage (or your favorite sausage) 1/2 tsp. Tony Chachere’s lite (or other light Cajun Seasonning) 1 tsp. Tabasco 1 14.5 oz can low-sodium or no salt diced tomatoes (keto can omit OR fit with macros) 1 10 oz can diced tomatoes with green chiles (keto can omit OR fit with macros) 1 pkg. frozen cauliflower rice 1/2 cup low sodium bone broth OR low sodium broth 1/2 cup parsley, chopped 1 lb. shrimp, peeled and deveined 1 lb. cooked crawfish, peeled and deveined 2 tsp. Xanthum gum Directions: Press SAUTE button on Instant Pot. Add oil. Add onion, green pepper, and celery. Sauté for 5-7 minutes. Add garlic. Sauté 1 minute. Add sausage. Sauté 5-7 minutes. Turn off Instant Pot by pressing KEEP WARM/CANCEL button. Stir in Tony’s Chacheres, Tabasco, diced tomatoes, diced tomatoes with green chiles, cauliflower rice, and bone broth. **REMEMBER - You CAN omit the tomatoes if you are strict keto or do not like etouffe with tomatoes. Secure lid. Make sure venting valve is sealed (closed). Press MANUAL function. Cook on high pressure for 7 minutes. When timer beeps, use quick-release method. Make sure valve drops. Unlock and remove lid. Press SAUTE button. Stir in parsley and shrimp. Cook 5 minutes. Stir in crawfish. Cook 1-2 minutes or until crawfish is warm. Press KEEP WARM/CANCEL button. Using a 1/2 teaspoon, sprinkle Xanthum gum over mixture. Stir until Xanthum gum is dissolved. Repeat 3 more times. Serve. Yield 10. 3/4 cup servings. Nutrition facts WITH tomatoes: NET CARBS: 6g. Calories: 190. Total fat: 6g. Cholesterol: 150mg. Sodium: 720mg. Total carbs: 9g. Fiber: 3g. Sugar: 4g. Protein: 24g. Nutrition facts WITHOUT tomatoes: NET CARBS: 4g. Calories: 180. Total fat: 6g. Cholesterol: 150mg. Sodium: 600mg. Total carbs: 6g. Fiber: 2g. Sugar: 2g. Protein: 24g. Carb count exclude sugar alcohols. New carb count is determined with the equation total carbohydrate – total fiber – sugar alcohol. This recipe was developed and copyright by culinary dietitian Shelly Marie Redmond. She is the author of Skinny Louisiana…in the Kitchen and upcoming Skinny Louisiana…in the Slow Cooker. She practices out of Eberhart Physical Therapy which she co-owns with her husband Greg. In her spare time, she watches Snapped and Investigation Discovery (let’s be honest!) You can purchase her book at the following link. http://www.skinnylouisiana.com/order-cookbook/ Want more Skinny Louisiana? Follow us on: Facebook – join our interactive community sharing recipes and video tips. Pinterest – let’s exchange recipes. You Tube – watch my fun, educational recipe tutorials and kitchen hacks. Email – ask Shelly questions at shelly@skinnylouisiana.com
Low Carb Instant Pot Shrimp, Crawfish, and Sausage Étouffée
January 25, 2019
Low Carb Air Fryer Beignets
February 2, 2019
4

Low Carb Peanut Butter King Cake Cheesecake Bars

A low carb, gluten free peanut butter king cake cheesecake bar recipe with simple ingredients the entire family is sure to love.

Low Carb Peanut Butter Cheesecake Bars

Before scrolling down to the recipe, be sure to read my easy tips for making your recipes low carb, keto friendly and delicious.

NOTE: We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites.

Low Carb Peanut Butter Cheesecake Bars

It’s about that time to start planning when and where we are going to park our cars for the parades! Get those purple, green, and gold shirts on as we are ready to pile on those long beads.

Question time:

What was the first Mardi Gras parade you ever attended?

Growing up in Houma, LA, I can’t tell you the first parade I went to because more than likely I was in diapers. I can tell you the first parade of each season I would attend was the Krewe of Hercules. I distinctly remember the parade was on a Friday night, and some years, I was wearing shorts, and other years, I was bundled from head to toe.

Arriving home, I was ready to have my slice of King Cake (my favorite was always Cannata’s King Cake ,and I wonder if that will ever change. Even though my fabulous friends at Randazzo do ship their amazing king cakes, I always long for my favorite from Cannata’s.

While I grew up going to parades, this experience was very new for my Yankee husband (ok, he is from the Midwest), Greg. His first parade took him to the Krewe of Highland in Shreveport.

15 years and 2 kids later we are ready to attend some family friendly parades, and just as we have various parades to attend we have ton of different king cake flavors we can purchase.

A few weeks ago I went to the drawing board to develop various king cakes and started with my Low Net Carb King Cake Bread Pudding, continuing to my Low Carb King Cake Cheesecake Bars. The Krewe of Skinny Louisiana continuing this trend with our Low Carb Peanut Butter King Cake Cheese Cake Bars.

I love King Cake. I love peanut butter. Let’s combine the 2 flavors!

Peanut butter in it self is incredibly popular, from our love of a spoonful from the jar, or in peanut butter fudge, so it naturally sounds like it would be perfect in our Low Carb Peanut Butter King Cake Cheesecake Bars.

Low Carb Peanut Butter King Cake Cheesecake Bars Ingredients

  • Sour cream
  • Eggs
  • 2 % Fairlife milk
  • Butter
  • Light cream cheese
  • 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
  • Almond flour
  • Swerve granular sugar
  • Swerve confectioners sugar
  • Swerve brown sugar
  • Baking powder
  • Salt
  • Peanut butter

Where to Shop for Low Carb Ingredients

Many of you know my love of Drug Emporium stores. Not only does Drug Emporium have amazing prices (often the cheapest in town), I work with this amazing company in putting on Low Carb Food Demonstrations and product selection for shelves. All my items in the recipes are from Drug Emporium. No Drug Emporium in your town? No worries, I have the links for where to purchase online!

Low Carb Ingredient Substitutions in our Low Carb Peanut Butter King Cake Cheesecake

Flour

With any dessert, flour is the basic ingredient. It serves several purposes, mainly as a thickening agent and to hold the wet ingredients together.  Flour in the low carb and low net carb world makes us cringe since whole wheat flour has 21 grams of carbs and 3 grams of fiber per 1/4 cup serving. Enter almond flour! Almond flour is made of almonds that have been ground to a fine texture. It is a gluten-free, keto-friendly, grain-free food and contains approximately 5-6 grams of carbs per 1/4 cup. Don’t panic over the carbs, almond flour has approximately 3 grams of fiber giving this flour a net carb of 3 per serving. And please don’t panic over the fat. Remember nuts are the fats we want to include in our diet. I do enjoy cooking with almond flour, but I personally feel due to it’s heavier texture, almond flour works best in bars, brownies, and muffins as well as in my batters for my vegetables and meats in the air-fryer. The type of almond flour does matter. Make sure to use super-fine almond flour from balanced almonds. We used Bob’s Mill Almond Flour in this recipe. You can purchase online here! 

Sugar

Sugar is used to add sweetness to our dessert recipes. While a spoonful of sugar may help the medicine go down, at 4 grams of carbs per teaspoon, a low carb sugar alternative is needed. One of my favorite sugar replacer is Swerve. Swerve is a keto friendly sugar replacer and taste amazing. Kick those old blue and pink packets good-bye and pick up this New Orleans product. In this recipe we used 3 types of Swerve, granular, brown, and confectioners.

Swerve granular is an amazing keto sugar replacer in baked goods, while our Swerve confectioners sugar replaces powdered sugar in items such as dips and frostings. Swerve brown sugar replacer is used in our filling.

Can’t find Swerve at your store? It’s always available online!

Cream Cheese

While my fabulous keto friends will keep the full-fat versions of cream cheese (please do if you are following keto), I used a light cream cheese to keep the calories down in this dish (yes, I look at calories). No fear, light cream cheese does not have any added sugar. Light cream cheese is a healthy alternative to cream cheese with 35 calories tablespoon compared to 51 calories in 1 tablespoon of cream cheese.

Peanut Butter

No all peanut butters are equal! While many of us love peanut butter as a snack, we have to be very careful in the type we select. Many of our peanut butters have added sugars. Look for a peanut butter with no added sugar. For a keto friendly dish, use almond butter.

Eggs

We love eggs in the Skinny Louisiana kitchen. Eggs offer us an amazing source of protein. No replacement needed in our eggs.

Butter

Yes, the recipe does call for butter. Under any circumstances, we do not use margarine in the Skinny Louisiana kitchen. We are quite mindful of the amount of butter we use, never using more than we need.

Milk

A low carb milk alternative is Fairlife milk. Fairlife milk not only taste amazing, but is ultra-filtrated thus taking the carb count from twelve to six and is lactose free. The ultra filtration process increase the protein in the product. Taste? Amazing! Fairlife milk is a staple in the Skinny Louisiana house and works amazing in all our low carb recipes. You can find Fairlife milk in the milk section of most supermarkets.

How to Make Low Carb Peanut Butter King Cake Cheesecake Bars

Start with a Hand Mixer

While I used my Kitchen Aid Mixer, you can easily use a hand mixer.

Steps for Dough Layers.

In a large bowl (or in mixer bowl), combine water, butter, sour cream, vanilla, egg, egg yolk, and butter. Beat with mixer on low for 2 minutes. Turn mixer on low and slowly add almond flour, Swerve, salt, and baking powder. Beat on low until combined, about 2 minutes. Place aside.

Steps of Peanut Butter Cheesecake Layers.

In a small bowl combine cream cheese, peanut butter, and Swerve. Beat with a hand mixer for 1-2 minutes. Place aside.

Steps for Baking.

Preheat oven to 325. Line 8 x 8 pan with non-stick aluminum foil. Spray with non-stick cooking spray. Using a spatula, scoop 1/2 flour mixture and spread in pan. Layer with peanut butter cream cheese mixture. Layer with remaining almond flour mixture. Bake in oven for 35-45 minutes or until set. Remove from oven and cool.

Glaze

Once our dish has cooled, we can make our simple glaze frosting with Swerve confectioners sugar and Fairlife milk. For fun we made purple, green, and gold colored Swerve sugars and sprinkled on top. To make this, place a tablespoon of Swerve granular sugar in a ziploc bag. Add 1-2 drops of food coloring. Mix.

Low Carb Peanut Butter King Cake Cheesecake Bars

Ingredients:

1/2 cup sour cream

1/3 cup water

1 tablespoon vanilla extract

2 eggs

1 egg yolk

3 tbsp. butter

3 1/4 cups almond flour

1/3 cup Swerve granular sugar

1 tsp. baking powder

1/4 tsp. salt

1 pkg. light cream cheese

2/3 cup Swerve brown sugar

2/3 cup peanut butter (can use almond butter)

1/3 cup 2% Fairlife milk

3/4 cup Swerve confectioners sugar

Green, gold, and purple Swerve colored granular sugar

Directions:

  1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees.
  2. Line an 8 x 8 pan with non-stick aluminum foil.
  3. In a large mixing bowl, combine sour cream, water, vanilla extract, eggs, egg yolk, and butter. Beat with hand mixer on low for 2 minutes.
  4. Turn off mixer and slowly add dry ingredients – almond flour, Swerve granular sugar, baking powder and salt. Combine with spatula. Beat for 2 minutes on low or until all ingredients are combined. Place aside.
  5. In a small bowl, combine light cream cheese, peanut butter, and Swerve brown sugar. Beat for 1-2 minutes. Place to the side.
  6. Layer 1/2 flour mixture, peanut butter cream cheese mixture, and 1/2 flour mixture in pan.
  7. Place in oven and bake for 45-55 minutes OR until set.
  8. While cooling, mix Fairlife milk and Swerve confectioners sugar. Pour glaze on cheesecake.
  9. Sprinkle with colored sugars.
  10. Serve!

YIELD: 24 bars

Nutrition Facts per Serving:

Calories: 220. Fat: 19g. Saturated fat: 4.5g. Cholesterol: 35mg. Sodium: 30mg. Carbohydrate: 6g. Fiber: 3 g. Sugar: 2g. Protein: 8g.

NET CARBS: 3g.

Carb count exclude sugar alcohols. New carb count is determined with the equation total carbohydrate – total fiber – sugar alcohol.

This recipe was developed and copyright by culinary dietitian Shelly Marie Redmond. She is the author of Skinny Louisiana…in the Kitchen and upcoming Skinny Louisiana…in the Slow Cooker. She practices out of Eberhart Physical Therapy which she co-owns with her husband Greg. In her spare time, she watches Snapped and Investigation Discovery (let’s be honest!)

You can purchase her book at the following link.

Email – ask Shelly questions at shelly@skinnylouisiana.com