Deliciously Guilt Free – A low carb and keto bakery you need to know about

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I am a real fan of supporting small, family-run businesses. Especially when their product offers a solution for dietary requirements (i.e. low carb and keto) that aren’t well supported in the mainstream industry. How many of you long to easily have access to a treat that won’t impact you blood sugars? I for one don’t always have time to bake in the kitchen but still yearn for a treat. Luckily, wonderful businesses such as Deliciously Guilt Free are around to offer just that, delicious low carb baked goodies!

I came across Deliciously Guilt Free last year at the 2018 Allergy & Free From event in London. After purchasing, and devouring, several of their brownies I was hooked. This year I saw them again at the Allergy & Free From event and it was wonderful to see how well they are doing and how much the need for low carb products have grown! I got a chance to interview Basma from Deliciously Guilt Free, I was eager to find out more about them, about their products, and why they chose to sell low carb baked goods.

Basma & Dan, the wonderful husband and wife behind Deliciously Guilt free

1) Can you tell us a bit about Deliciously Guilt Free and the products you offer?

Deliciously Guilt Free is a Low Carb and Keto Bakery. We passionately believe in low sugar, low carb diets, and we are equally passionate that snacks and treats compatible with keto and low carb should be available to the UK keto community! We are a husband and wife team (Basma and Dan), based in Cambridge, and delivering our sweet treats UK-wide via our online shop.

2) What made you want to start Deliciously Guilt Free?

Well, totally out of the blue in my mid-30’s I was diagnosed with pregnancy diabetes (gestational diabetes) while pregnant with my first child. It was a wake up call that the standard western diet wasn’t working for me! In fact, looking back, it had never done me any good. I had all the hallmarks of insulin resistance! PCOS since my teens, I carried weight around my middle, and a hugely strong family history of diabetes. I’m a doctor, but I don’t specialise in diabetes or nutrition- we get taught very little about that in medical school. I did some research and came across a Sarah Hallberg TED talk video that totally changed my perspective. She is a US physician who uses low carb to treat her patients with diabetes, who managed to come off massive doses of medication. I quit carbs but I was frustrated to find very little available in the UK as a low carb snack. I worked full time and had a kid, and didn’t have time to bake my own bread, make pancakes from scratch, biscuits, cakes, sauces! It was a bit overwhelming having to plan ahead all the time to be able to eat low carb. So we decided if it didn’t exist, we could just make something ourselves- and that’s how it all started for us!

Dan & Basma, the husband and wife team behind Deliciously Guilt Free

3) What dietary restrictions do you cater for?

Our products are keto and low carb friendly. We also have vegan, dairy free, and egg free options.

4) What type of ingredients do you use to make your brownies low carb? I was very happy to discover that your brownies had little to no effect on my blood glucose levels.

Our brownies are made from almond flour and we use sweeteners that are plant derived and especially chosen to minimise impact on blood sugar. Specifically none of our products include maltitol, which I have personal experience of blood sugar spikes with while wearing my 24 hour blood sugar monitor! We use the best quality ingredients available including organic coconut oil, grass-fed butter, free range eggs and 90% Lindt chocolate. Our rule of thumb with our brownies is to only use ingredients you would find in a normal kitchen- nothing that sounds like it belongs in a lab!

Dan & Basma, the wonderful husband and wife behind Deliciously Guilt free

5) What are the typical nutritional details for one of your brownies?

Our brownies are typically less than 1g of naturally occurring sugars, 1.6 grams of carbs, and 120 calories.

6) What flavours do you currently offer?

Right now we have brownies in Chocolate Orange, Chocolate Raspberry, Double Chocolate, Salted Caramel and nut, vegan chocolate fudge, vegan raspberry. We have just released our first biscuit too! A Millionnaire’s Shortbread with a caramel and chocolate topping.

7) Do you have any new flavours in the pipeline?

We are about to release a strawberries and cream blondie, and I think we will be making some more biscuits, as the Millionnaire’s shortbread has been very popular!

Deliciously Guilt Free Millionaire Shortbread

8) Which flavour is your favourite?

That’s a tough one, but right now I’m pretty obsessed with the strawberries and cream blondie! It reminds me of jam roly poly from school dinners.

9) What can we expect from Deliciously Guilt Free in the future?

We will keep innovating and bringing out new flavours- because the keto community deserve choice, and variety! We also hope to get out and about more to meet the keto community- as nothing excites us more than chatting to people following this way of eating and building a thriving community. We will be going to the real food rocks festival in Cumbria on the 20th of July 2019, to do just that- and hopefully more events will follow! Its sometimes lonely following a low carb way of eating- and its so much more fun if we all get together to support each other.

10) How can we stay up to date with you?

Visit our website www.deliciouslyguiltfree.com and sign up with the pop up box to be on our mailing list- for lots of news about new products, events and offers. We are also on instagram @deliciouslyguiltfree. If anyone has any questions for us our email is hello@deliciouslyguiltfree.com and we would be delighted to hear from anyone in the low carb community.

I would like to thank Deliciously Guilt Free for their time, and for creating such tasty products for individuals following a low carb diet. There aren’t many places offering low carb options that are suitable for diabetics and I think it is so important we support the businesses that do. If you haven’t already, I highly recommend giving them a try. You won’t look back…