Coo-coo for Coconuts!
What would be your reaction if you were challenged to come up with a coconut-themed recipe and you couldn’t crib someone else? Now self-constrain it further by desiring to keep it raw and it begins to get interesting.
You may be thinking, that’s… unusual. Well, it would be if it wasn’t part of a contest sponsored by one of my new favorite produce shops called The Coconut Hut Grocery.
For years, I’ve been looking for organic young Thai coconuts and The Coconut Hut has them! I was thrilled when I discovered that they were as passionate as I was! To help understand this obsession, the young Thai coconuts that you can buy in the store (even if you shop at smaller markets), the ones that look like a cylinder shaped into a cone, are supposedly dipped in a sulphate along with a fungicide. The sulphate is used to prevent them from browning and the fungicide is a known probable carcinogen. No thanks, do not want. I’d like to enjoy the sweet coconut water knowing that it hasn’t been poisoned.
On the other hand, the Young Thai coconuts from the Coconut Hut Grocery have the outer cone already stripped away and just the inner pod exposed. It looks like a softball. But the best part is that they’re tangibly fresh! I was driving home the other week after buying a stash and my car actually filled up with the sweet smell of live coconuts! That’s never happened with the other conventional ones. And drinking them? So tasty!
As for the coconut recipe contest that the Coconut Hut Grocery was putting on, I thought that it could work, or it may not, but with raw food, things tend to err on the “work” side of the equation, a huge bonus for a raw newbie like me.
So here’s my first-ever public recipe for one of my food creations. I’ve been craving a banana cream pie, and so I thought, why not coconut-ize it? In this concoction, the fat of the coconut meat gives the cream and the filling some body, and the fibrousness of shredded coconut gives the crust a density. I added some coconut oil to give the filling a bit more of a roundness. All in all, this is quite the treat.
Ingredients
The Coco-Bana Creme Pie has three, count ‘em, three layers: the whipped cream topping, the creamy banana filling, and the “crust.” That’s in quotes because it’s not really crusty, but rather crust-like. We’d have to work in an extra dehydration step to give the crust a crunchy, crispy bite. Maybe that will be in the 2.0 version of this recipe….
This will create one personal-sized 5″ pie, which is enough for two people, assuming you want to share it. For a 9″ pie, this recipe will need to be tripled.
Whipped Cream
½ of one medium young Thai coconut’s “meat”
½ small, ripe banana
2 tblsp maple syrup, raw agave nectar, or powdered sugar (powdered sugar will make it thicker and hold its shape better)
¼ tsp vanilla
flax gel: ½ tblsp ground flax seeds soaked in 1 ½ tblsp water for 4 hours
Filling
½ of one medium young Thai coconut’s “meat”
1 tblsp coconut oil
3 ½ small, ripe bananas
5 soaked Medjool dates
Crust
1/8 cup shredded coconut
1/8 cup almonds, soaked for 8-12 hours
1/8 cup cashews
5 soaked Medjool dates
flax gel: 1 tblsp ground flax seeds soaked in 3 tblsp water for 4 hours
Instructions
This is so easy to put together. You’re basically blending each part separately and then bringing it all together in the end.
Whipped Cream
Puncture your Young Thai coconut, drain the coconut water and have a refreshing drink. (No, the water’s not needed but don’t throw it away!) Scrape out the coconut flesh, the “meat”, and put half in a bowl with the small, ripe banana; the remaining half will be used with the filling. Add your sweetner of choice, vanilla, flax gel, and then blend, blend, blend until it becomes light and fluffy. My hand blender makes this quick, but you can use a food processor. Chill in the fridge.
Filling
Blend all the ingredients, the remaining half of the coconut meat, coconut oil, the bananas, and dates, with a hand blender or food processor until it’s creamy. If you’re not licking the bowl, then adjust the sweetness with more dates, but it should be fine. Chill in the fridge.
Crust
Again, blend all the ingredients, the shredded coconut, almonds, cashews, dates, and flax gel with a hand blender until it’s sticky. The cashews will give it a creamy richness, the shredded coconut will help give it form, and the flax gel will bind it together. Press into a small 5″ pie tin. Chill in the fridge.
1 + 1 + 1 = π
When the crust is firm, add the filling and top with the whipped cream. Viola! Pie!
More photos coming….
