Caramel slice is a treat I used to love getting from the bakery or a cafe, however, they generally are loaded with sugar as well as butter and who knows what other animal products! Fortunately I’ve come up with a recipe which is vegan and refined sugar-free as well as gluten-free so you (and I) can get your caramel slice fix!

I should say though that even though these are REFINED sugar-free they do still include some natural sugar from dates. And with oats making up a good chunk of the base, along with more dates this actually isn’t low in carbs at all. But the carbs which are present are good carbs at least. And using natural sugars rather than refined will mean you’re less likely to get those blood sugar spikes. I know it’ll be difficult, but basically just try not to binge too hard on these. 

The base is gluten-free as long as you use gluten-free oats. It’s made using almonds and oats which are ground to a flour-like consistency. You can also use pre-ground almonds or oats (or almond flour and oat flour) but my recipe starts with them whole. Coconut oil helps to bind the flours together, and the dates also help with that while adding a bit of sweetness. I actually used date paste rather than whole dates but you can do either. I’m a big fan of date paste as it means I don’t have to soak and blend up the dates, the hard part is already done. The base mixture then gets pressed into an oven dish or baking tin about 20x20cm in size. If you use a different size it’ll either mean your layers are really thick and you have fewer pieces, or the opposite. So I recommend using the correct size if you can. I actually don’t own a 20x20cm baking tin. However, once I’d made up the base I looked at it and thought hmm if I use my big baking dish (I only have bigger ones) that’ll be too thin. So I sort of used some tin foil to make a wall within my baking dish to make it closer to 20x20cm, so that’s an option for you if you’re like me and ill-equipped in the baking tin compartment.  

For the filling the main ingredient is cashews. Cashews are great as they’re fatty and creamy thus making a creamy filling. They’re also a nice caramel-like colour. Use unsalted. Those are blended up with more dates (or date paste), vanilla, a bit of sweetener and some coconut oil and coconut cream. The reason I used both coconut cream and coconut oil is because the cream, as the name suggests adds a nice creaminess and sort of bulks the filling up a bit, milk or cream is often used in traditional non-vegan caramel so I wanted to emulate that. However, if I just used more coconut cream and no coconut oil it would be a lot runnier. When refrigerated coconut oil hardens and sets which is why I chose to add it to the filling. 

I also needed both dates and sweetener because the more dates you add the runnier the mixture and also the more sugars (albeit natural). So I used a bit less dates and topped up the sweetness with sweetener. I also couldn’t use only sweetener as the consistency would just be super dry and thick and just completely wrong, plus dates help to give the filling a nice colour.  

Moving on the chocolate topping. Well, it’s chocolate. And that’s all. Try and find a vegan and sugar-free chocolate. It may take a little bit of searching, I used Healtheries 99% sugar-free baking bits They’re my go-to. It can be a little pricey but is also often on special.

Once the chocolate topping goes on it then needs to set in the fridge for around 2 hours before cutting into squares. 

This caramel slice is perfect for a cheeky afternoon treat and goes down well with a coffee!

Store in the fridge and eat within about 5 days.

If you are after more refined sugar-free or even just sugar-free desserts and treats, check out my sweet treats

Kitchen tools I recommend for this recipe:

A Food processor or blender, I used my trusty Nutribullet

A 20cm x 20cm baking dish such as this Sweese Porcelain Baking Dish

Double boiler just like this one 

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