Paleo(ish) Banana Cream Pie
Otto’s Cassava Flour has been a game changer for me this past year. I first tried them at a grain-free fair I went to in Denver last Fall and let me tell you, it’s worth every penny. Most Paleo flour substitutes are grainy and trying to find that perfect blend for any type of baking is nearly impossible. Enter Otto’s. The pie crust on this banana cream pie? You wouldn’t know the difference between it and a normal, gluten-y pie crust. Really, I’m not joking (and NO, I was not paid in anyway for this post or this write-up. I bought and paid for my bag of flour. I just like this product that much!).
You may be wondering why the title of this post is Paleo(ish) Banana Cream Pie. That’s because I ran out of coconut cream while making the filling for the pie and the whipped topping is homemade whipped cream with regular milk. So it has dairy in it. But you could easily sub out the whipped cream for coconut whipped cream. So Delicious even has a prepared coconut whipped topping if you’d prefer. It’s definitely not as clean as making your own but works in a pinch.
The filling for this pie is a homemade custard made with a combination of coconut cream and almond milk. It does have egg in it but looking back, I don’t think it really needed them. The eggs give it a more custard-y flavor, I guess, but the arrowroot starch thickens the custard up just fine without the eggs. Put them or leave them out, it’s up to you. The custard tastes fine either way.
The only thing different I would do next time is don’t pour the filling in till the last minute. I poured it in the night before I went to serve it, so the custard could set in the crust overnight but grain-free crust tends to soak up any liquid it can find, leaving this crust mush on the bottom. So learn from my mistakes and don’t pour the filling in till you’re getting ready to serve it! Let it set up in a separate container overnight. Then transfer the filling in at the last minute and top with whipped cream. I brought this into work and my team just loved it. You can find the recipe for the pie crust over on the Paleo Mom’s website HERE. I followed the recipe exactly and it came out great.
Paleo Banana Cream Pie
Ingredients
- 1 can full-fat coconut cream
- 3 C almond milk (I used Califia Farms)
- 1/2 C coconut sugar
- 4 T arrowroot starch
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 2 large eggs
- 1 egg yolk
- 1 T vanilla extract
- 2 over-ripe bananas
- 2 firm bananas, sliced
Directions
- Whisk whole eggs and egg yolk together. Set aside.
- In a blender, blend 2 overripe bananas to a puree and set aside.
- In a large saucepan, combine sugar, salt, and arrowroot together over medium heat. Slowly add in coconut cream and almond milk and whisk until heated through and mixture thickens.
- Add heated milk mixture to eggs slowly, a tablespoon at a time while whisking briskly. You need to temper the eggs so the eggs don’t curdle and scramble by adding hot mixture slowly. Don’t just pour the eggs all at once into the custard.
- Continue adding about 1 cup of the hot liquid to the eggs to bring the eggs slowly up to the same temperature as the custard.
- Once you’ve added a cup to the eggs, pour the custard/egg mixture back into the saucepan and continue to simmer for a couple more minutes.
- Remove from heat, add vanilla and blended bananas to custard and transfer to a large mixing bowl.
- Cover custard with plastic wrap and chill in refrigerator overnight.
- Once you’re ready to serve, slice firm bananas and place on the bottom of your prebaked pie crust shell.
- Pour custard over the bananas. Top with whipped cream and serve immediately.
Notes
Because of the coconut sugar, the filling tends to be slightly brownish in color. Feel free to sub out light-colored honey or stevia if you’d like to avoid the color change.