Ella Woodward’s sweet potato brownies are impossibly good! Initially, I was hesitant to try this recipe as there were a few ingredients that I couldn’t find in the supermarket, namely brown rice flour and raw cacao powder. However, it is absolutely worth it for a special occasion or even a gift. (My friend Molly bakes for me every birthday and it’s always one of my favourite presents!) You can also use conventional cocoa powder which is much cheaper, but just use double the quantity. It is also easy to switch in a different flour, but this may mean it’s no longer gluten free.

Once you’ve gone through the difficulty of finding the ingredients, it’s super easy to make. The only tricky part was blending the dates… I actually broke Jenna’s blender doing this! I walked to Argos this afternoon and treated myself to a NutriBullet (very, very excited) and this definitely did the trick. I decided to add orange to this recipe so putting the orange juice in the blender with the dates helps a little.

The recipe requires 14 medjool dates. Until this afternoon, I had never tried these beauties! I had heard so many people raving about medjool dates with nut butter (I used almond butter) and oh my, it did not disappoint! It was so rich and gooey, and surprisingly filling. 100% my new favourite snack! Medjool dates and almond butter are £2-3 each and you only need a couple at a time so it’s definitely worth the initial investment.

Once I realised I actually needed to save some dates for the recipe, I cracked on with my baking. It was a Wednesday evening, so of course Great British Bake Off was on for some inspiration.

The shopping list: 2 sweet potatoes, 14 medjool dates (pitted), 80g ground almonds, 100g brown rice flour, 4 tablespoons raw cacao powder, 3 tablespoons maple syrup, 1 large orange.

Let’s go Mary Berry:

1) Ella’s recipe tells you to peel the sweet potatoes, cut them into chunks, and steam them for 20 minutes. However, I baked my sweet potatoes with the oven on 180 Celsius for 45-60 minutes whilst I was prepping the rest of the recipe/eating dates with almond butter/watching Bake Off. This way, I didn’t have to peel the potatoes because it was so easy to scoop the flesh out once they had been baked. It also meant I could snack on the sweet potato skins afterwards! (Yes, I did snack on dates too, but that’s the point of baking right?!)

2) Add the flesh of the sweet potato to the blender with the pitted dates and orange juice. Make sure you grate the orange zest before you take out the juice, or it could get messy.

3) Add the remaining ingredients into a bowl (ground almonds, flour, cacao powder, maple syrup) and most of the zest of the orange. I kept a little zest to one side to make the brownies look pretty at the end. I also added a little extra ground almonds to balance out the added moisture from the orange juice.

4) Add the dates/sweet potato/oj mixture to the ingredients and mix.

5) Place the mixture into a linked baking dish and cook for 20-30 minutes, depending on how you like your brownies!

Once you’ve taken the brownies out of the oven, leave them to cool and stick together for 10 minutes. Don’t worry, they’re still deliciously warm after 10 minutes. You can now sprinkle over the rest of the orange zest, and post a photo of your amazing brownies on Instagram (optional).