sneaky pumpkin pie pudding
Misty is too young to work out what I feed him is healthy… Ha. I find it’s a lot harder to convince fully grown adults to try something healthy. Maybe it’s just the word healthy that freaks them out… the assumption that because something is good for you, it’s going to taste terrible. Or it’s rabbit food/bird seed/grass clippings. Yeah, I’ve heard all the jokes. Ha, ha. they’re getting pretty old now. Bite your tongue, Lou, bite your tongue.
Why do people get excited over food that is laden with sugar/trans fats/white processed flour/additives/E numbers?
‘Oh I’m being so naughty eating this, but it’s so delicious I can’t help myself!’
Yeah, I know your brain + mouth are telling you that it’s tasty, but is the impact on your body really worth it? What happens after years and years of eating in this way? Your taste buds are trained into thinking they need sugar/artificial flavours/trans fats to enjoy food. No wonder you screw your face up when offered a fresh salad or piece of fruit.
I’m not even going to start on a rant about kids that are fed this way from day dot… how are they meant to know that it’s not real food?
The best way to try and coax people into eating something relatively good for them is to not announce that it’s healthy. Sneaky? Who me?
Anyway, this recipe sneaks in a lot of nutrition packaged up as a pumpkin pie pudding. It’s also a good way to introduce a “new” ingredient (buckwheat) for those unfamiliar with one of my favourites. For fussy babes and boring adults alike, dressing anything up as a dessert can help in tempting those terrified of anything labelled “healthy.” Anyway, I don’t need any convincing, so I actually use this as a spread… a cereal topper… with fresh fruit…. or just as is by the spoonful.
Pumpkin Pie Pudding
(Vegan, gluten/wheat/soy/cane sugar/nut free)
- 1 + 1/2C cooked pumpkin
- 1/2t mixed spice (pumpkin pie spice)
- 1/4t sea salt
- 2Tcoconut butter (or sunflower seed butter/almond butter if you’re not sensitive)
- 6 medjool dates microwaved for 2 minutes in 1/4C water
- 1/3C soakedraw buckwheat groats (soak over night = covered with water… rinse off the ‘goo,’ discard water, and you’re ready to go).
- 2t maple syrup (or honey/rice syrup)
- 1/4C milk (I used almond)
- Blend in a food processor until smooth.
If you’ve had 3 hours sleep and 2 really really blow-your-face off strong coffees, maybe you could play with cookie cutters and make towers like me. Loser.
20 Responses to “sneaky pumpkin pie pudding”
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Vegan. Stay at home Mum of Misty. Yoga teacher in training. Passionate about REAL food - creating it, eating it, sharing it. I can never stick to a recipe.
I automatically like anything that has pumpkin, it’s like a rule. It’s so true about adults and the weird concept that healthy food means depriving yourself or it tastes like seedlings. Drives me crazy, I get it from my family and friends all the time. They also always tell my husband how they feel sorry for him since I cook the way I do, they assume he must feel like he is missing out.
I am happy that Holden will grow up knowing what REAL food tastes like. Hopefully he will automatically go for it instead of chemically fake processed stuff.
Oh I SO relate to what you say… everyone thinks, ‘Poor Viper having to deal with that crazy hippie of a partner (!) ‘ Poor Viper? I’m just feeding him REAL food, so maybe he won’t die of a heart attack at 55. Bah.
I’m so happy that Misty seems to really ENJOY fruits and vegetables… I mean he doesn’t have much to compare it to, but if you give kiddies the processed stuff from the word go, of course they are going to prefer that…. it’s all about letting your taste buds be educated to appreciate + love pure wholesome food, without confusing them with artificial crap
Not a loser- cute tower and gorgeous photo
I know exactly what you mean- used to tell people what was in things, now I just check if they have allergies and feed them yummy food without telling them the ingredients or that it’s healthy or vegan!
I’ve tried to explain to people that they’ve killed their taste buds with sugar fat and salt and they can re-boot them but will they listen?? noooo… I just become the freak in the corner fighting back tears. What can you do?… to each their own. I know I’m eating well and feeding the people I love well- I don’t care if anyone thinks i’m depriving them/controlling/insane, I know we’re doing the right thing.
Back to the point- I love buckwheat but have never tried it like this- I’ll definitely give this one a go! Thanks
Ha, freak in the corner fighting back tears? That’s ME for sure! I tend to get quite upset, but just hold it all in… and ignore the raised eyebrows (I’m a really sensitive person too which doesn’t help!)
I think you just have to be happy in the choices you make for yourself (and your kids when they are young) and as you say, know that you are doing the best thing for YOUR health/body/conscience. AND sneak in healthy bits to others and not tell them, HA.
Buckwheat is great like this… my favourite way to eat it though, is soaking it, sprouting it and then dehydrating it so it becomes nutty and crunchy – I use it as a cereal, it’s SO GOOD!
Thanks so much for your lovely comment
go ahead, rant away. I love it! and it’s good fo misty. Buckwheat puffs with cocoa powder and almond milk. My new favorite snack. The pie of course is a dream snack…. a dream of having you come cook for me. I’ll serve the wine, k?
Me, you, wine, cake = YES! I just got some buckwheat puffs to trial in some of the recipes I’m doing for the EBook, they are delicious… must try your combo
Have you tried sprouted and dehydrated groats? Amazing.
I’m so grateful to my parents for bringing us up on real food, home-cooked, always sitting down together every night, and no one being allowed to throw a tantrum and request a “separate” meal. We ate what we were served, and my mum has never had a screwy relationship with food. If I ever have kids, I truly hope to be able to do the same… except with a vegan bent more than I grew up with
Keep up the good work, Lou! I never announce that the things I make are “healthy” as their primary function, but that they’re delicious.
SAME… RE the being brought up on real food thing…. we sat down to dinner at the table every night too. Funny, we were just discussing this last night… how important it is to come together as a family at the end of the day to “break bread” and share our highs and lows of the day.
Misty will totally get more of a kooky-hippie up bringing than I did, but as long as he turns out as a happy, genuinely GOOD person, I know I’ve done an all right job
i design community intervention programs (particularly for middle schoolers) and it’s so frustrating how they’ve normalized eating pure crap. it’s perfectly okay to eat candy bars and sodas but god forbid i try to sneak a vegetable in their food! i’ve done the sneaky nutrition thing with j, too. i add pumpkin puree to his cheese sauces! it still produces the whole, “i’m being naughty” feeling … but it’s on my end!
Wow, your job sounds really interesting (yet frustrating!) It’s a lot different down under, as most school don’t provide lunches… every one brings their own, but the norm is still packaged + processed over whole and natural. I remember me and my sister were never allowed those little packets of potato chips, but it seemed like EVERYONE else had them… this was 20 years ago, so I shudder to think about what it’s like now!
Go ahead and rant away… it’s good for the soul, plus I can completely understand your mentality and thoughts here! Packaged/processed food has been normalized so much in our society and it is just not okay…. School lunches are just unbelievable at some schools!
Great recipe too, I am certainly saving this to make for later!
It’s so frightening what the next generation are going to consider “food” if we don’t educate them right. Most schools here don’t provide lunches so you bring your own… even then it’s brightly coloured packages of this and cartoon-covered packets of that… not much whole or natural in sight. THIS is meant to fuel our kiddies?! Argh…. so frustrating (hence my ranting!)
Oh my gosh, poor Lou with the sleeplessness! Thank goodness for coffee, eh?
That looks so delicious, I love the addition of coconut butter to the pumpkin, and maple syrup…with those three ingredients alone, I’d imagine this is divine! I totally know what you mean…so many people are like “you eat so healthy” when I pick a salad off a menu, say, or fresh fruit over some heavy pudding…but my taste buds crave those things, not the fake food! If I ever have a child, I would love to feed them as you feed MIsty 
xyx
Yup, thank goodness for COFFEE. My savour…. actually the sleep deprivation was my own fault, I didn’t end up getting home from work until 1am… sat up reading till 2am and then up at 5am for Misty. Ha.
I hate fake food, taste like chemicals and makes me feel WEIRD. Not good, not good…. especially for kids. As (some what) grown ups we should know better, huh?
What is the pudding layered over? Those look fantastic too.
I understand your frustration & pain. I once saw an infant with cola in his bottle. Are you kidding me?!?!?!
It’s layered over a version of my Vanilla Berry Love Bites…. basically a chickpea/brown rice flour/date paste based “cake”…. I really need to get round to updating my recipe page… I just keep cooking though
Oh yeah… sometimes in the supermarkets I have to restrain myself from marching up to parents when I see what goes into their trolley while their kids follow along behind them…. coke, frozen pizza, potato chips, candy…. not a piece of fruit in sight! Man, it’s frightening, huh? Kids have no real choice in the matter either
These? http://fridgescrapings.com/2012/02/10/2793/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+fridgescrapings%2FZWzm+%28fridge+scrapings%29&utm_content=Google+Reader because they look awesome & I want to make some right now.
Also, I tried your juice combo suggestions of beet, oranges, pear, & ginger. Oh my – a new fave!
Yes! That’s it…. I’m slightly obsessed with them… you do need something gooey to slather on them though, hence why I did it with the pumpkin pie pudding – coconut butter + jam is pretty darn tasty too though.
Oh hooray, awesome that you tried out my favourite juice…. so zingy huh? Love that ginger
If only there were more people that knew how good food like this tastes. I get the bird food, horse food, rabbit food, granola eating hippie comments all the time. I wouldn’t change my lifestyle for anything, eating chemicals has never been appealing to me.
yeah, eating chemicals and dying early of some preventable disease doesn’t sound like too much fun to me either, chick. At least we know we are doing the best we can for our bodies (and the earth!)