Fall Pudding Just In Time For The Holidays!

Even though we follow a Whole Food Plant Based lifestyle that doesn’t mean that we can’t enjoy a holiday dessert. Everyone likes dessert and especially at the holidays. That doesn’t mean that you have to give in to overly indulgent unhealthy food that might send you right into The Pleasure Trap and cause you to crave more sweets. There are so many healthy yet delicious desserts that can be enjoyed but not derail a health promoting diet. Today’s recipe was created by a Mairead Reddy who is a fellow member of Chef AJ’s Ultimate Weight Loss  program. Mairead is a culinary genius and has created all sorts of amazing recipes that I use all the time. She takes simple everyday ingredients and combines them in a way that makes them spectacular. With her permission I am sharing her Fall Pudding recipe with you today.

 You Can decorate the top with fresh pomegranate seeds or fresh raspberries look pretty too.

 

Fall pudding fits in nicely with your a holiday meal. It is smooth, creamy and sweet with the warm fragrant flavors of sweet potato or pumpkin pie. Although it does taste indulgent it’s packed with nutrients and health promoting ingredients. Proof that you can have your pudding and eat it too!

 

Fall Pudding

• 2 pounds sweet potatoes oven roasted
• 2 small very ripe bananas
• 3 vanilla beans or use 1/4 – 1/2  teaspoon vanilla powder or 1/2 – 1 teaspoon vanilla extract (I use the vanilla powder)
• 1/2 – 1 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice (I use 1 1/2 teaspoons)

To oven roast the sweet potatoes preheat oven to 400 degrees. Scrub the sweet potatoes, place on a baking sheet and roast for 1 -1.5 hours – depending on how big they are. Oven roasting makes the sweet potatoes become sweet and caramelized. Wonderful!

When cool enough to handle, peel the sweet potatoes, ( Tami’s tip: Toss those sweet potato peels into your air fryer for a few minutes and make a crispy snack out of them.) Place the peeled sweet potatoes into a high powered blender or a food processor. Split the vanilla beans and scrape the seeds into the container with the sweet potatoes, add bananas and pumpkin pie spice. Blend until smooth and creamy.

Enjoy it served warm, room temperature or chilled. Serve it in pretty dessert dishes garnished with fresh pomegranate seeds or fresh raspberries. Fill your favorite plant based pie crust with the pudding for a lovely holiday dessert.

You might even be able to process it in an ice cream maker and make pumpkin soft serve but I haven’t tried it yet!

Thank you Mairead Reddy for a wonderful holiday recipe.

 

 

If you want to kick it up another notch fill your favorite plant based pie crust with Fall Pudding. Sprinkle some fresh pomegranate seeds or raspberries over the top.

 

My friend Christin Bummer has a wonderful blog called Beans Not Bambi where she shares whole food plant based recipes. This crust recipe is amazing and she shares how to make it in a video with her adorable pint sized kitchen helper. It has just the right amount of sweetness and is nut free, can be gluten free and has no sugar! Be sure to check out her blog and her other You Tube videos for wonderful recipes and tips on living a WFPB lifestyle.

 

Nutmeg Notes

We are off to a friends Thanksgiving Dinner today. I guess now they call that “Friendsgiving.” Friends are the relatives we choose for ourselves! I will be taking the pie shown above as well as a huge salad to share. Tom and I won’t be the only plant based eaters there but the majority of the people will be omnivores. I love how we have friends now that respect our choices in how we eat and don’t judge us for it. Just as we respect how others choose to eat even if it’s different from our choices. It doesn’t matter what we eat when we gather around the table as long as we enjoy each others company and want to spend time together. Love, kindness and respect know no boundaries.

My wish for you is that you experience harmony this holiday season. 

Tami

A Little Nutmeg Nugget: When I started this blog in January of 2010 I followed what I understood to be a healthy version of the standard American diet, ironically also known as the “SAD” diet. As interest in my own health and how it was affected by the food I ate evolved, I transitioned to a whole food plant based diet also known as “WFPB” diet. I have wrestled with the fact that this blog still contains all those posts and recipes from the SAD way of eating I have left behind. I no longer advocate for anyone to eat that way. At this time I am leaving those recipes and posts here. It is a record of my journey and how I came to follow a WFPB way of eating. It is my hope that those who still come here for those old recipes will be curious about what I am doing now. Perhaps they will dip their toes across the line as I did and try some plant based recipes and learn more about the health benefits.
I love hearing from you dear readers! Feel free to leave a comment or ask a question.