Paleo He’s Alive Buns {Gluten, Grain, Nut, Dairy & Seed Free}
Have you ever had a He’s Alive bun? They are really fun to make with your kids around Easter time to be symbolic of Christ’s empty tomb when He rose from the dead. Plus, they taste delicious and will be gobbled up in no time. He’s Alive Buns are divinely mouthwatering and out of the three test batches we made we had a hard time not eating them all!
He’s Alive Buns is a Family Tradition
Making and eating He’s Alive Buns on Easter week has been a family tradition since my ten-year-old was a baby. We used to make the gluten-filled ones with the list of harmful ingredients, then, my diet changed and I had to go gluten-free. At the time I didn’t know how to make them gluten free so I would watch with a long, sad face as my kids made them and ate them in front of me. That feels like eons ago though. Eventually, to save my life, I had to do the GAPS Diet and then moved on to eating Paleo. I wanted to participate in our fun family tradition so I created a fantastic Paleo version of He’s Alive Buns that I can enjoy too and that we’ll use forever.
What is a He’s Alive Bun?
These sweet, hollow buns symbolize an empty tomb. Since we eat them at Easter time when we celebrate the resurrection they help us remember and talk about Jesus rising from the dead and how He lives today!
After tinkering with my recipe and making batch after batch I was able to perfect my Paleo He’s Alive Buns. They should be slightly chewy, sweet and with a crisp outer shell that crunches with sugar when you bite into it. It should also be hollow inside because, “He is not dead, He is risen!” (Mattew 28:6) As shown by His empty tomb, Jesus has risen indeed!
Why You Want to Make These He’s Alive Buns
Something glorious is that my recipe does not have all the chemicals, preservatives and dyes that the old junky version we ate had. We used to use Kraft marshmallows which have blue dye in them! Aggghhh. Kraft Marshmallows got an 8 out of 10 on the EWG rating. Food with a rating of 10 is the worst, most health hindering thing you can put in your body. No thanks! I don’t even want to get into the ingredients in the pop-can biscuits we used to use or the GMO sugar. Yuck. You couldn’t pay me to eat that or feed that to my family anymore. Once you make these you’ll never want to go back to the kind with the lousy ingredients again. If you want to learn in depth about which ingredients are harmful to your health and why then I strongly recommend reading this book.
Credit Where Credit’s Due
The recipe and part of the technique for the bread dough were inspired by Kelly Bejelly author of A Girl Worth Saving. Often times when we have Italian food I like to make her Paleo Garlic Bread for a side. The dough is a total miracle in my opinion with ingredients I would have never thought of combining to get the results she gets.
My recipe is adapted quite a bit from hers but I wanted to give credit where credit is due. My goodness, her garlic bread is good! You should try it!
Tips You Must Know
These He’s Alive Buns are a different kind of beast if you’re used to working with regular bread dough or even gluten free bread dough.
1 When you are at the first stage of making the dough in the saucepan – you’ve boiled the organic palm shortening with organic maple syrup, water and salt and then you add the tapioca flour, it’s ok if your dough looks like this. Once you add the egg and the coconut flour the liquid will soak up. Chances are, it won’t look like this but I just wanted to warn you! It’s ok.
2 When the dough comes together it should look like the picture below. You will be able to handle the dough and roll it. It’s ok if it feels greasy, trust me!
3 There are two possibilities for baking these, either way, works it just depends on the kitchen tools you have. You can use a baking sheet with a favorite tool of mine – the Silpat. Or you can use a heavily greased muffin tin lined at the bottom with circles of parchment paper that is also greased. I use this fat to grease my pans. Also, using ceramic or stone muffin pans are preferable.
4 You should be able to place a marshmallow inside a smidge over a tablespoon of dough, fully cover and seal the marshmallow inside and roll the whole dough ball in coconut sugar.
5 When your He’s Alive Buns come out of the oven it’s okay if the marshmallow has come out and looks a bit explosive! This is the time you want to grab a utensil, like a dull knife, and gently scrape away the melted marshmallow. You can eat it of course! Don’t burn your mouth though because it’s stinkin’ hot. The bun should resemble an empty tomb.
6 If you want to enjoy these while they’re chewy, crunchy and melt in your mouth good then enjoy them about 5 minutes after they come out of the oven. If you eat them right out of the oven you will burn the roof of your mouth, and the entire surface of your tongue will be numb. Not that I know or anything! If you let these cool fully, they are still absolutely amazing, however, they will be very crunchy and more candy-like. Either way, we all gobbled them up and I’m sure you will too!
Very Important Notes About Ingredients
- I use this Organic Palm Shortening.
- I use this Tapioca Starch.
- I use this Coconut Sugar. You can use different brands if you want. This is just what I happened to have at the time I made these.
- I use these Marshmallows (they are the cleanest I can find and as a general rule we do not eat Carageenan or Soy but once a year we use these) They are still way better than the GMO, corn laden, blue dye-filled ones we used to get. You can also try your own homemade marshmallows! I have made them before and they taste amazing!
- I get my Organic Maple Syrup here.
- This is the Coconut Flour I use and love the most.
Paleo He’s Alive Buns
- ½ C. Organic Palm Shortening
- ¼ C. Filtered Water
- ⅛ C. Organic Maple Syrup
- ½ Tsp. Sea Salt
- ¾ C. Tapioca Starch
- 1 Organic Egg
- ¼ C. + 1Tlbs. Coconut Flour
- 2 Tsp. + ¼ C. Coconut Sugar (1/4 C. to roll your buns in)
- 5 Full size, non-GMO Marshmallows, cut in half
- Preheat your oven to 350 degrees.
- Choose which method: A cookie sheet lined with a sil pat or line your muffin tin with parchment circles at the bottom and grease the entire cup heavily with palm shortening. Either way works.
- In a large saucepan, add palm shortening, water, maple syrup and salt. Bring to a boil and remove from heat.
- Stir in tapioca starch until well combined and there are no lumps. Don't worry if not all liquid is incorporated. It will be eventually.
- After stirring let it rest off the stove for 5 minutes. (This is to cool it for the next step)
- Now add in all the coconut flour, 2 tsp. of the coconut sugar and the egg.
- Stir until it is all combined thoroughly and no lumps remain.
- Let the dough sit for 2 minutes to allow the coconut flour to soak up some moisture. It should look like the ball of dough in the picture in the blog post.
- Meanwhile, place the remaining ¼ C. of coconut sugar in a small bowl.
- Take a little over one tablespoon of dough and wrap it around your half marshmallow. Be sure that all parts are sealed and there are no holes and no marshmallow showing. Do this for all the dough. You will probably have one half marshmallow left as this recipe makes 9 He's Alive Buns.
- Roll the stuffed dough ball in your coconut sugar and place on either a cookie sheet lined with a sil pat or your heavily greased muffin tin.
- Place in the oven and bake for 30-35 minutes. Check it around 25 to be sure it is not getting too dark. A good brown color is great, black is not! It's ok if you see marshmallow oozing out. Read my blog post for the note on that!
2. It's ok if in the first stage of the dough making there seems to be too much liquid. It probably won't happen but just in case I wanted to mention it.
3. Be sure the dough is sealed all around the marshmallow.
If the dough is too sticky to handle add 1TLBS Tapioca and alternate with 1TLBS Coconut Flour until you can handle the dough without it sticking to your fingers.
4. It's ok if marshmallow is oozing out of your buns while they cook. When they come out of the oven be sure to scrape that marshmallow away from the bun with a dull utensil because it hardens exactly the way it is.
5. Don't burn your mouth on these! They come out hot and sticky!

Thanks for this recipe! They turned out delicious, but it didn’t seem like my marshmallows melted to leave the inside empty. They puffed up, broke out the top of the bun, and remained — didn’t melt! My kids didn’t care because they’re delicious, but I just wonder if this was supposed to go differently. I used the same brand marshmallows you mention. And I made 9 buns, so I don’t think I used too little dough.
Hi Nicole,
That’s great to hear that they turned out well. It’s likely that the marshmallows popped out the top because that’s where the weakest seam was. As far as the marshmallow not fully melting, sometimes that happens but what we have found is that as we pull the marshmallow out (and eat if of course 🙂 ), we see the hole in the middle for the “open tomb.” The only other thing I would consider is maybe your oven wasn’t hot enough? It sounds like you did it right though and I am super happy they were delicious and you all had fun!
Thanks for creating a paleo version! Looking forward to trying it out.
You’re welcome Amy. I hope you enjoy it! We will be making them this weekend!
So excited to try this recipe! I also have been making these for years but with all of our recent diet restrictions I didn’t thing we were going to be able to have them this year.
Hi Jen! I’m excited for you! It was so glorious when we were able to enjoy these again by using this recipe. I know how you feel. I hope you enjoy them! If so, I’d love for you to come back and rate them with 5 stars here! Happy Easter to you all!
Curious if you’ve tried an egg free version? Like chia egg or gelatin egg?
Hi Katie, sorry, I have not tried an egg free version. If you do, let me know how it turns out!