Apple Pumpkin Crisp

When you first go on the AIP diet, you have one of two approaches: 1) “this is going to suck and be a miserable 30 days,” or 2) “I can’t wait to start looking up recipes for everything I CAN eat!” I started in the first for a couple of hours, but eventually my love of cooking took over and I went to town. I looked up every recipe for hours, used up all of my data on my phone with a week left until a new month starts (damn you, Pinterest!), and before I knew it I had been to Beyerly’s, Target, and Trader Joe’s all in one evening trying to recreate a dessert I saw that said “AIP friendly”. After swelling up like a bee-hive, looking 5 months pregnant (weight 120), and starting to get the shakes… something wasn’t right.

I text my friend Alex immediately saying I followed the directions and everything! Coconut cream (said from a website to be AIP friendly), raw, unsweetened coconut, coconut flour, and some crushed up dates, cinnamon and unsweetened cocoa powder. The culprit? Coconut cream. It’s not dairy, but it turns out there are only 1 or 2 brands that you can use to make it qualify… or you can make your own. Canned coconut cream has additives like Xanthium Gum which could be why I reacted. So, the bad news is my mother was right when I was ten years old: “you can’t believe everything you read on the internet.” The good news (that had to be pointed out to me by Alex) is that my body is able to tell what it likes and what it doesn’t. So… beware. But there are fun things to do instead… I prooomise!

We need more dessert, don’t we? Well as I mentioned in my last post, my boyfriend and I currently have about 8 lbs (at least) of apples in my kitchen, so I started out baking some with cinnamon. Then I was really craving an apple crisp, but clearly with sugar and oats, it’s just not for me.

So, we need to improvise. I call this “Pumpkin Apple Crisp”, and it sounds strange, but if you’re like me and just DYING for a yummy gooey dessert, this will help.

Pumpkin Apple Crisp

Ingredients

3 apples, sliced in wedges – remove skin if you like, but I enjoy the extra fiber (not too thin so they get gooey)
1 C pumpkin
2 T coconut oil
2 ½ T Cinnamon
4 T unsweetened shredded coconut (optional)

Directions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease the inside of an 8x8 pan with coconut oil (Trader Joe’s has coconut oil spray, like Pam, just double check the ingredients to make sure it’s JUST coconut oil in there). Place your apples in the pan and sprinkle with 1 T of cinnamon; it doesn’t have to be organized! In a separate bowl, mix coconut oil, cinnamon, and coconut. First lay the pumpkin on top of the apples (dollops work, then spread around evenly), then top with the crumble. You will bake this for 30 minutes. Remove and let cool for 10-15 minutes.

I can’t wait to go home and make this tonight! Enjoy!