Every year at Christmastime my mom makes these amazingly delicious pecans. She boxes them up and gives them as gifts to her friends and family during the holidays. Our box rarely lasts to New Year’s. They’re just that good.
Pecans make a wonderfully healthy gift. The nuts are rich in “good” heart healthy unsaturated fats. When eaten in moderation, pecans have been shown to have a protective effect by lowering total blood cholesterol. Plus, they contain no cholesterol or trans-fat.
Pecans are also loaded with more than 19 vitamins and minerals—including vitamin A, vitamin E, folic acid, calcium, magnesium, phosphorus, potassium, several B vitamins and zinc. And, they’re a good source of fiber and protein. In fact, just one ounce of pecans provides 10 percent of the recommended Daily Value (DV) for fiber.
One note: this recipe does include sugar, but you can easily swap that sugar with a healthier alternative like stevia. Due to stevia’s high sweetness (it’s actually sweeter than sugar), when you use powdered stevia in place of sugar, it’s a ¾:1 ratio. That means for every cup of sugar your recipe calls for, use ¾ of a cup of stevia.
Ingredients
- 1 pound of pecans
- 1 egg white
- 1 tablespoon of water
- 1 cup of sugar
- 1 teaspoon of salt
- 1 teaspoon of cinnamon
Directions
Preheat oven to 300°. Mix sugar, salt, and cinnamon together in a small bowl and set aside. In a larger bowl whisk egg white and water together until frothy. Add pecans and stir until all nuts are coated. Add sugar mixture and stir gently until all ingredients are blended evenly. Turn out pecans onto foil-lined jelly pan or rimmed baking sheet. Bake for 45 minutes, stirring and shifting the pecans every 15 minutes. This is important because if you don’t move the nuts around, they will stick to the pan. Cool, serve, and enjoy!
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