Pumpkin pie with lucuma fudge sauce

It's in season: Everybody's making it and some of us are even blogging about it. There are a billion recipes for making it, some healthier than others. Pumpkin pie was one of my favorite treats in my childhood, it still reminds me of years of special holidays - Christmas days, Thanksgivings, Halloween parties. It is one of the traditions I want to follow now that I have my own family. This recipe is a lot healthier than the traditional pie recipe, but not completely raw. I'm looking forward to trying all-raw pumpkin pie as soon as I get a more powerful blender. Ours has 700W and it is excellent for many things, but it would lose the battle against raw pumpkin hands down.

The crust:

About 2 cups almond pulp (left over from making almond milk)

1/2 C pumpkin seeds

6-8 dried dates and raw organic honey

Raw organic honey

Organic, cold pressed coconut oil

Cinnamon, cloves, ginger, nutmeg to taste

dash Himalayan Salt

In a food processor blend almond pulp, seeds and dates into a batter. Spice up, and enough honey and coconut oil for right texture and flavor. The crust should not be overly sweet, consistency should be thick and just enough moist to work with by hand. Shape into a pie tin, dehydrate until firm.

Filling:

4 C pumpkin meat (I used 1/4 of a large, traditional orange Halloween pumpkin)

roughly 10 dried dates

1 C thick, creamed coconut

0,5-1 tbsp psyllium powder

cinnamon, cloves, ginger, nutmeg, dash cayenne

Steam cubed pumpkin and puree smooth with a food processor. I only steamed the pumpkin for a couple minutes, just to soften up the surface of the cubes a touch. You should have about 4 C of pureed pumpkin. Allow to cool. Stir in creamed coconut. I use Biona creamed coconut which I mix with pure water to make my own coconut cream. If you can't find a similar product, try to buy a thick coconut cream that has as little additives as possible. Mix in spices, taste and adjust seasoning. Add psyllium, start with 0,5 tbsp and let it set for 10min. It should make the filling thicker and goo-like, if this doesn't happen you need to add some more. Be careful, adding too much will compromise flavor and texture (you don't want a slimy pie filling). Dollop the filling into the pie shell, chill until filling firms up and you can easily slice into the pie.

Many raw pies use lecithin as a thickener, but I like to avoid soy products when it's possible. If you can get non-GMO, organic lecithin somewhere, you could substitute it for the psyllium.

Lucuma fudge sauce

Almond milk

Dried dates

Cashews

Lucuma powder

Blend everything until smooth. I didn't measure exact quantities, but I think it was about 1/2 C almond milk, 5 dates, handful of cashews and heaping tablespoon of lucuma.

I was especially pleased with the crust and the sauce, which turned out to be a wonderful substitute for the whipped cream/vanilla ice cream I used to enjoy with pumpkin pie in the past.

The filling tastes exactly like the traditional, without being baked for hours. Yaelian gave me the idea of using slightly dehydrated butternut squash for the filling, so next time I'll definitely use grated, dehydrated squash.