Baking for a crowd can get tricky, especially when you’re trying to accommodate people with a variety of different restrictions. Things might be gluten-free or grain-free, but it’s hard to get something that’s also free of nuts, dairy and eggs at the same time.
The recipe came to me over time. I knew I wanted to do a tart crust that was made with tiger nuts. I’ve seen so many recipes for pies and crusts with nuts and dates, but that’s about it. The chocolate pudding filling is actually adapted from my vegan fudge recipe (which I will have to share later) and I use variations of it in all kinds of desserts to get that rich, creamy, chocolatey texture without tons of cream and butter.
This isn’t AIP-friendly (autoimmune protocol), as it uses chocolate, but if anyone does try it with carob, I would love to know how it goes, since everything else in here is totally AIP-compliant.
I have to give props to The Organic Dietician for inspiring the crust recipe. I’m not a baking whiz by any means, so it was a great starting point to guide me.
Before we get into the full recipe, we let’s talk about tiger nuts. I have been asked about these weird little guys a million times, since I use them both in ground form for baking and whole (on top of smoothies, in trail mix) quite often.
For starters, they aren’t nuts at all; they are actually tubers that grow under the ground, like potatoes. Eating them whole requires some effort, since they are dried and pretty dense and fibrous. I like the texture as a slow snack, but I’ve had some polarizing opinions from friends who have tried them. However, once they’re ground up, they work really nicely as a grain-free non-inflammatory flour. I like this one. They’re also used in Spanish horchata, which is a creamy and delicious drink.
Tiger nuts are incredibly high in fibre—particularly, resistant starch fibre, which acts as a prebiotic. Prebiotics are integral to digestive health, because they feed the probiotics (which you can get from fermented foods and more) to keep your gut happy. Without prebiotic fibre, the good bacteria in your stomach wouldn’t be able to thrive and would eventually die off. As a bonus, if you’re trying to lose weight, resistant starch keeps you full longer than other foods with a similar caloric load because it passes through your body without being digested.
If you’re wondering about the lack of sugar in here, tiger nuts do happen to have a small amount of natural sugars, but they are 100% worth the extra few carbohydrates for their delicate sweetness and other health benefits.
You will notice that the filling is sweetened with monk fruit, a natural zero-sugar sweetener that comes from a gourd native to Southeast Asia traditionally called lo han guo. The fruit’s sugary compounds are extracted and sold either granulated or as liquid. You may use a regular sweetener instead, such as honey or coconut sugar, but I wanted to make this as low-glycemic as possible so it wouldn’t spike my blood sugar and tempt me to eat the whole thing. (Still, it’s pretty addictive and I wanted to eat the whole thing, so no promises.) I use this monk fruit sweetener.
If you want to do a quick version of this recipe, you could forgo the crust and just make the pudding. It’s great on its own. Or you could double the filling recipe to keep some reserved for healthy pudding snacks.
The buttery-crumbly crust, combined with a super-creamy filling, makes for a nice contrast of textures. You could amp up the pie further by adding toppings like berries and coconut whipped cream, but it’s great all on its own and lasts for several days in the fridge. It will get melty if you leave it out for more than a couple of hours, though, so definitely keep it chilled.
This simple recipe has plenty of room for creativity. Let me know what you add to it to make it your own!
Chocolate pudding tart
Prep Time 20 mins
Cook Time 35 mins
Chilling time 6 hrs
Course: Dessert
Keyword: chocolate, dinner party, egg-free, gluten-free, grain-free, keto, nut-free, paleo, tiger nuts, vegan, vegetarian
Servings: 10
Ingredients
The crust
1 ½ cups tiger nut flour
½ cup arrowroot starch
½ tsp sea salt
¼ cup coconut oil slightly chilled
½ cup very cold water
The filling
2 cans full fat coconut milk 400 ml each
2/3 cup cocoa powder
3 Tb monk fruit sweetener
Pinch salt
1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
Instructions
The crust
Preheat oven to 375F.
Whisk together the tiger nut flour, arrowroot starch and salt.
Mix in bits of coconut oil using your fingers or a spatula (like with pastry) until crumbly.
Add ⅔ of the water and mix. Add more until it becomes a non-sticky dough. You may not need all of it.
Press evenly into a tart pan and bake for 35 minutes, or until golden around the edges.
The filling
Scoop out the cream from the coconut milk and add it to a small saucepan; it should be 1.5-2 cups of cream.*
Warm the cream with cocoa and monk fruit in a saucepan over low heat.
Remove from heat and stir in vanilla and salt.
Let cool slightly and pour into the crust to set in the fridge overnight.
Notes
*Reserve the water for smoothies.
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