Berry Season - Strawberry Cream Pie

Wow, it has been over a month since I posted anything. I had hoped to keep posting my weekly meal plans at least, but I've been lacking motivation. Pregnancy seems to do that to me, not to mention my husband's surgery and him being home for two weeks that really threw off my routines (but also enjoyed immensely).

Last week I finally got to go strawberry picking with my kiddos. I had hoped to pick two flats, but was getting a bit sore after just one. Then I heard someone say that they may not be open for picking again after that day. Suddenly I was motivated to pick two flats worth, ending up with just over 20 lbs of strawberries.

We were lucky to have a two day break from the heat, so I got to work right away making strawberry jam and fruit leathers/fruit roll-ups (they were fairly thin, and I rolled them up, so they were definitely more like fruit roll-ups than fruit leathers). We ate (and are still eating) a bunch of strawberries fresh, we have some in the freezer for baking and some for smoothies. My daughter finally got the pink ice cream she has been requesting for some time - fresh, homemade strawberry ice cream is hard to beat! Yesterday I created a Strawberry Cream Pie for a cookout and bonfire we hosted for our Bible Study. It was refreshing, creamy and DELICIOUS! For Father's Day I might make a strawberry mousse pie with a chocolate cookie crust (or we may just have strawberry ice cream).

After looking through a variety of strawberry pie recipes I hadn't found anything that really caught my eye or met all the desires that I had for the fresh, creamy strawberry pie that I was envisioning/craving. I took a chance and created one taking bits and pieces from various recipes that sounded interesting. The result was just what I hoped it would be.


Strawberry Cream Pie

Ingredients

Crust

• 7 Whole Graham Crackers*, crushed
• 1/2 cup Soaked & Dried Almonds, toasted
• 1/4 cup Coconut oil (or butter), melted
• 2 Tablespoons Sweetener of choice (dry would probably work best - turbinado, sucanat, palm, etc.)

Filling

• 8 oz Cream Cheese or Yogurt Cheese, softened
• 5 Tablespoons Maple Syrup, divided
• 1 teaspoon Vanilla
• 3/4 cup Heavy Whipping Cream
• 1 Tablespoon Unflavored Gelatin
• 1/4 cup Water, cold
• 1/2 cup Water, boiling
• 2 + cups Fresh Strawberries, crushed
• 1 Handful of strawberries for decorating pie

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. For the crust, crush graham crackers in food processor and empty into a small bowl. Grind almonds in food processor until fine, add to graham cracker crumbs. Add sugar to almonds and graham crackers. Melt coconut oil (or butter) and pour over crust ingredients. Mix until thoroughly combined. Press into a deep dish pie plate. Bake for 10 minutes and allow to cool on cooling rack.
3. Remove stems and wash strawberries. Use a potato masher to crush strawberries, set aside.
4. Whip heavy cream with vanilla and 2 T maple syrup until stiff peaks form. Place whipped cream on top of crushed strawberries, but do not mix yet. Set aside in refrigerator.
5. Sprinkle packet of gelatin over 1/4 cup cold water and let sit for one minute. Rinse out mixing bowl and beat cream cheese with 3 T maple syrup. Add 1/2 cup boiling water to gelatin and cold water; stir to dissolve. Slowly add gelatin water to cream cheese mixture while mixer runs at a low speed.
6. When water and cream cheese mixture are fully combined (should be very watery) add to whipped cream and strawberries. Fold ingredients together. Pour into cooled graham cracker crust and refrigerate for at least two hours.
7. Prior to serving slice remaining strawberries and place around edge of pie and in the center (for decoration). Eat slowly to fully enjoy!

Prep Time: 3 h Cook Time: 10 min Ready in: 3 h 10 min

Strawberry Cream Pie courtesy of Jamie Del Balso.

*My notes: I've always loved graham crackers, but am not a fan of the ingredients in most traditional brands and I haven't gotten around to making my own yet. I do, however, like the Back to Nature graham crackers or New Morning as they have all natural and wholesome ingredients. Here are some recipes to try and make your own: GNOWFGLINS, Smitten Kitchen, 101Cookbooks, The Nourishing Homemaker (gluten & dairy free), Deliciously Organic, Heavenly Homemakers.

The Best Cookies I've Made

My husband LOVES chocolate chip cookies.  They are one of the few cookies we do make.  Once my husband thought I had perfected the traditional chocolate cookie recipe I started experimenting with whole grains.  My skillet cookie recipe is good, but this is even better (for cookies that is).  And my husband would likely agree that these are even better than my non-whole grain version. In fact, he usually prefers frozen dough to baked cookies, but he said the baked version actually rivals the dough - that means they are darn good!  Okay, okay enough about how good they are.  I promised a recipe using coconut oil today and this does.  My plan, however, had been to share my soaked granola recipe, but since this was only the second time I've made it and I did not write down what I did the first time, I still need to tweak it a bit to get the same results as the first batch.

Even though we LOVE these cookies and sweets in general, we try to keep our sweet intake to about once a week.  Unfortunately the month of December often messes with this plan and lingers through January.  At the moment our goal is Sweet Treats only on Sundays, not after every dinner (or meal if the kids had their way).  Once sugar enters our lives it is so hard to get it out again.

This recipe was somewhat of a fluke.  We didn't have any oat flour on hand and I know the key to good chocolate chip cookies is the sweetness of the oat flour.  I did, however, have oats and decided to throw them in my food processor until fine.  The result, a deliciously oaty crisp cookie that was not quite what I expected.  Normally we prefer somewhat chewy, but I was shocked to discover that they were even better the next day than they were hot out of the oven.

Best Whole Grain Chocolate Chip Cookies

Ingredients

• 1 1/2 cup Rolled Oats, chopped until fine in food processor/blender
• 1 cup Spelt Flour
• 1/4 cup All-purpose Flour (could probably use spelt or other wheat flour)
• 1/2 Rolled Oats not processed
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup Turbinado/Demerra Sugar
• 1 Tablespoon Molasses
• 1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, softened
• 1/4 cup coconut oil
• 1/4 cup palm shortening
• 1 egg
• 1 egg yolk (save white for another purpose)
• 1 + teaspoon vanilla
• 1 cup chocolate chips (Callebaut are my favorite)
• 1 cup chopped nuts (optional)

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
2. Combine dry ingredients in small bowl and set aside.
3. Place Turbinado and Molasses in bowl of standing mixer and mix until fully combined.
4. Add butter, coconut oil and palm shortening, mix until creamed.
5. Add egg, yolk, and vanilla mixing after each addition.
6. Add dry ingredients and mix until fully combined.
7. Stir in chocolate chips and nuts (if using).
8. Line baking sheets with a silpat or parchment paper for easy clean up. Use a cookie scoop or a spoon to place small balls on cookie sheets. Provide space for cookies to spread. Should make about 3 dozen cookies or more, depending on how much of the dough you eat.
9. Bake for 8 minutes, rotating from top to bottom and front to back halfway through. Allow cookies to cool on cookie sheet for a few minutes before transferring to cooling rack. These cookies actually taste best when fully cooled and allowed to crisp up a bit. Pour a glass of milk and enjoy!

Prep Time: 30 min Cook Time: 30 min Ready in: 1 h

Best Whole Grain Chocolate Chip Cookies courtesy of Jamie Del Balso.

What's in your skillet?

One last "sweets" recipe for Fat Tuesday, then no more til May.

Ryan loves chocolate chip cookies, actually maybe the dough more than the cookies themselves, and he also loves those giant cookies with all the frosting on them from those places at the mall.  Around Valentine's Day (also his birthday) I came across a few recipes calling for making a larger cookie in either a pie plate or a skillet, so I thought I would try my hand at it since he was going to be out of town for his birthday and this would be something he could actually take a piece with him.  All we could say was, MMMM!  I did, however, try making it again for MOPS, but realized after I had already started that I didn't have all of the same ingredients (mainly I didn't have enough oat flour and I tried sucanat with molasses instead of the turbinado with molasses) - so it wasn't anywhere near mmm that time.

So I am a huge fan of America's Test Kitchen and Cook's Illustrated, not at all healthy recipes, but incredibly delicious.  If you aren't familiar with their publications, they test recipes over and over to find the best result.  They also test kitchen equipment as well as products.  In December we came across a test that they had done on chocolate and had already tried their number one - Scharfenberger, but it is extremely pricey and I can only find it in large thick bars.  The number two on the list was Callebaut and was much more reasonably priced.  I don't remember what came in third place, but it was something more familiar to me.  I searched online looking for somewhere that I could get ahold of this Callebaut baking chocolate, but could only find options for ordering huge quantities of it in chip and or bar form.  After giving up on the search for Callebaut and starting my couponing adventures I came across a Toll House coupon and deal, so I picked up a bag.  But we had been buying our chocolate chips in bulk from our local co-op and were really enjoying them, so the Toll House chocolate chips went into the cupboard for later.  The next time I was at the co-op buying bulk items I happened to look more closely at the label for the chocolate chips and found out that I had already discovered Callebaut chocolate and it was sitting in my kitchen!  They also had larger chunks of Callebaut chocolate, that wasn't even labeled as such in their baking aisle.  These chocolate chips are infinitely superior to Toll House and I considered donating the bag I had bought to a food pantry, until my stash of good chocolate chips was low and I needed to bake several items that called for chocolate chips.

For some reason when I make dessert I feel less guilty if I can make it with something that is of some nutritional value.  Of course when I am out and eat dessert that doesn't usually pertain.  I've been working on my chocolate chip cookie recipe over the years to get a chewy, moist, yet full (not flat) cookie.  I've found a few tricks to this and have had good results even with adding some whole grain flours.

Skillet Cookie
Ingredients:
1 1/2 cup oat flour
3/4 cup white wheat flour*
1/4 cup all-purpose flour*
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 cup softened butter (1 stick)
1/2 cup all vegetable shortening or coconut oil*
1 1/4 cup brown sugar*
1 tsp vanilla

1 egg + 1 yolk
1 - 1 1/2 cups chocolate chips
1/2 cup (or more) pecans or walnuts

Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  In a small bowl combine dry ingredients and set aside for later.  Combine butter, shortening, brown sugar and vanilla; beat until creamy.  Beat in the egg and egg yolk.  Gradually add dry ingredients and mix well.  Stir in chocolate chips and nuts (by hand or mixer - whatever you prefer).  Grease a 10 or 11 inch cast iron skillet or 9.5 inch pie plate with butter or oil.  Press the cookie dough

into the skillet or pie plate and bake for 30 - 45 minutes, be sure to check after 30 minutes, especially if you like gooey cookies.  Restrain yourself and allow the cookie to cool before cutting into it.

Side notes: You may want to use a little less flour, depending on your altitude.  I think the 2 1/2 cups is what I figured out when we lived in Boulder, CO.  I'd start with 2 1/4 cups and see if the consistency seems typical or not.  Awhile back I picked up some organic all vegetable shortening made from palm oil, which said it was lower in cholesterol and such, some out there say it isn't good for you while others do.  An alternative would be coconut oil which is extremely healthful, but also some out there will say that it is not.  The other option would be to use another stick of butter.  If you make your brown sugar out of turbinado sugar, I recommend letting the dough sit in the fridge overnight and then let it sit on the counter while you preheat the oven to make it easier to put into the skillet.  This will help the dough to be less granular in texture.  This is also the recipe that I use for chocolate chip cookies, but I increase the oven temp to 375 and bake for 8-10 minutes rotating the cookie sheets top to bottom and front to back halfway through baking.

I forgot to mention that you might want to save some of the dough in balls and freeze them for the occasional sweet craving - to eat raw or to bake, that is the question?  Of course if you decide to give up sweets for Lent this would only be allowed on celebration Sundays or after Easter Sunday!

Click on the title of the recipe to view a printable format of this recipe without the pictures.

Share the Love

Last year we started a Valentine's Day tradition of making cut-out cookies and taking them to friends and neighbors. The idea started from assembling a Valentine themed care package that we were sending to some friends in North Africa. Although we would have loved to send them some of these pretty little cookies I didn't think they would taste quite as scrumptious after their two week+ journey. And Valentine cookie care packages are a fond memory from my own mother in college and whenever I was away from home. This year we made the cookies a bit early as we were going to be out of town for Valentine's Day. Come to think of it we did it early or late last year as well since we were also out of town. This year the kids and I made the dough the night before and the kids were able to roll out, cut, bake and frost the cookies with their Oma (my mom). Aviella and I put the finishing touches on the cookies and we all took them to share with our neighbors together. The kids had a lot of fun wishing others a Happy Valentine's Day.

Several years ago I picked up the King Arthur Whole Grain Baking Cookbook as I wanted to incorporate more whole grains into our menu. Although I do enjoy many recipes from the book, it isn't exactly what I would be looking for today. The recipes aren't necessarily lowfat and/or healthy, but it is a good start to adding whole grains to your everyday food repretoire as well as trying out new whole grains - such as spelt, barley, whole wheat, etc. I do have a few favorite recipes from the book and this is one of them. The recipe below is adapted from King Arthur Flour Whole Grain Baking: Delicious Recipes Using Nutritious Whole Grains.

Chewy Oatmeal Decorating Cookies

Ingredients
1 cup (2 sticks, 8 ounces) unsalted butter
3/4 cup packed brown sugar (or make your own)*
1 large egg
2 tsps vanilla extract
3/4 tsp sea salt
1/2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp ginger
1 cup old-fashioned rolled oats
1/2 cup traditional whole wheat flour*
2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour*

Directions
Combine butter and sugar, then add the egg, vanilla, salt, baking powder, cinnamon and ginger, beat until smooth. After scraping the bottom and sides of the bowl beat in the oats and flours. The mixture may look dry, but it will work just fine. Divide the dough in half, wrap each piece in plastic wrap, and refrigerate for about 30 minutes. If you are using your own brown sugar made with turbinado sugar I recommend letting the dough sit overnight or for about 6-8 hours for the sugar to "meld" with the other ingredients otherwise it may be a bit granular. If you choose to refrigerate the dough longer or overnight you will need to allow the dough to warm up a bit before rolling out - it can get quite hard.

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper (or a silpat - gotta love these things) or lightly grease two baking sheets.

Take one piece of dough at a time and roll out to about 1/4 thick. Use your
favorite cookie cutters to cut out desired shapes, you can re-roll and cut the scraps. Place the cookies on the baking sheets; as they don't spread you can place them close together. If you have extra cookie sheets you can start the next batch right away otherwise I would recommend waiting until the first cookie sheets cool down.

Bake the cookies, rotating the pans halfway through cooking (moving top to bottom and bottom to top - and I like to turn them 180 degrees as well), 12 to 15 minutes - depending on desired crispness. Remove cookies from the oven and allow to cool on cooling rack. You can top these cookies with a simple cinnamon and sugar mixture right after they come out of the oven or as I prefer a simple powdered sugar icing.

My notes: You could likely reduce the brown sugar to 1/2 cup and still have enough sweetness - I think I will try this next time. Also, you could use sucanat in place of the brown sugar and add a bit of molasses. My most recent batch of these cookies I used 1/2 cup oat flour, 1 cup white wheat flour and 1 cup all-purpose flour and they tasted great! Don't be afraid to experiment with the flour options - but I typically start with about half the amount of all-purpose flour and adapting the other half to a mixture of flours or white wheat. If it works well and you want to try with more whole grain flour - make your changes in small amounts (1/4 cup) at a time as it can change the dynamics of a recipe drastically.


Icing
Powdered Sugar
Milk
Almond Extract (or vanilla)
Food coloring (preferably all natural)

Sorry, no exact measurements here. I typically pour some powdered sugar into a bowl, add a tiny bit of almond extract (a drop or so), a small splash of milk and a drop or two of food coloring and stir. You will want it fairly thick (add more powdered sugar to achieve desired thickness). It should be spreadable, but not too runny. I like to have it a bit less thick so that I can "drizzle" it on cookies and/or make designs. But if it is too thin it is hard to make designs that actually look like something. With my kids being so young it is also hard for them to spread the frosting, so drizzling can be easier for them. If you want some to look nice, set a few aside to do yourself and let the kids help with as many as they enjoy helping with. And of course let them enjoy their work too:).

Red Velvet Surprise Cupcakes

So, are you curious as to what the surprise is in these tremendous cupcakes? Or do you already know since I actually made them back in September for my daughter's third birthday?

I desperately wanted to make a red velvet cake without using food coloring (due to it being not healthy for you and two full bottles in a cupcake recipe sounds terrible to me) and since beets had been used during World War II due to food rationing I began my search for a chocolate beet cake aka Red Velvet. Oh and I happen to love sweet beets - they are almost like candy when cooked right with a bit of butter and salt. Yum, my mouth is starting to water. Anyway...during the process I found out that you did not have to use beets to get a reddish color, but rather a lighter unprocessed cocoa along with an acidic agent such as vinegar, lemon juice and/or buttermilk. The first recipe that I experimented with yielded a beautiful reddish purple batter, but alas the cake was totally brown after baking. The third batch yielded a truly red cupcake without food coloring, but the texture was a bit too mushy and not very chocolaty. So, I created my own recipe combining one that had great texture and taste with the one that resulted the best color. And here it is for you my friends to try. Beets are a cold weather vegetable so you shouldn't have a problem finding them in your local store, but since they are a root vegetable I try to find organic. Before you dismiss the beets entirely, just think of pumpkin bread/cake, carrot cake, banana bread/cake or zucchini bread - it is not uncommon to have fruits and vegetables in sweets.

Red Velvet Surprise Cupcakes

Ingredients:
3/4 cup flour*
1/4 cup unprocessed (non-dutch) cocoa*
3/4 cup sugar (sucanat or turbinado can be used)
1 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp sea salt
3/4 cup beet puree
1/4 cup canola oil
2 Tblsp lemon juice
1/4 cup buttermilk*
2 eggs, room temperature
1 tsp vanilla
12 frozen raspberries (optional)**

Directions:
Steam beets until a knife or fork pierces flesh easily (slides in without hesitation). Carefully peel beets, you can use gloves if you prefer. I like to make to slits on either side of the beet (after cutting off top and bottom) and gently rub the skin off. Puree beets in food processor and set aside (this step can be done in advance). Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease or line 12 wells in a cupcake pan. Combine first five ingredients and stir; set aside. Mix together beet puree, oil, lemon juice buttermilk, eggs and vanilla in a large bowl. Slowly add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and mix thoroughly. Fill the cupcake wells 2/3 full. Bake for 15 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean. Cool on a wire rack before icing.

*My notes: When I made these cupcakes I combined whole wheat pastry flour with "power flour." Power flour is a mixture of various whole grain flours - such as oat, spelt, barley, brown rice, sorghum, white wheat, etc. I make it with whatever I have on hand or whatever suits my fancy from the bulk section at the co-op. Typically I use equal parts of each type of flour that I am using, but sometimes I have just a little bit more of one so I add it all. The nice thing about mixing all of these whole grain flours together is that you don't notice any particular taste/quality of the individual whole grain. If I were making this cupcake today I would likely use 1/4 cup all-purpose, 1/4 cup white wheat and 1/4 cup power flour, but do whatever you want, just mix up the whole grains if you decide to use them. So the key to getting red cupcakes is the type of cocoa you use. If the label says Dutch-processed - do not use this! The acidity has been lowered using an alkalizing agent and will not net the red result you desire. The lighter the cocoa, the better the result. And although I am a huge dark chocolate fan, don't use it for this recipe. You shouldn't have a problem finding non-Dutch processed cocoa in your local grocery store, but be sure to read the label. There are some cocoas out there labeled cocoa rouge or raw/natural cocoa. Also, make sure it is unsweetened. And although for most recipes you can substitute a cup of milk with 1 Tblsp vinegar or lemon juice added to make your own "buttermilk" I would use the real thing for this recipe due to the existence of lemon juice in the recipe already. And I would prefer the real thing over powdered buttermilk as well. But, you could try and see what happens or since it is not much try plain yogurt instead.

**A unique addition you might like to try is freezing 12 raspberries and placing one at the bottom of each cupcake before pouring the batter in. Works best with cupcake liners. Which, you can actually make your own if you have parchment paper - just cut them into squares and fit into your cupcake tins. Oh and I like to spray my liners with a bit of oil so that they are easier to detach from the liner - not too much though or they will fall off immediately.

Now for the icing - there is much debate over this when looking for recipes. Some say it must be cream cheese frosting while others insist it should be boiled frosting. I went with a cream cheese frosting as I love cream cheese frosting, but I'm not sure that I was entirely happy with the result. So, I will give you two other icing recipes and you can decide which one to use. Now I did not try the boiled frosting because it sounded odd to me, but I've been told that it is wonderful! So, you decide.

Cream Cheese Frosting
8 oz neufchatel (or full fat if you prefer)
3 Tblsp butter, softened (optional)
maple syrup to taste or about 1 cup powdered sugar

If you are using full fat cream cheese then you will need to let it soften. If you are using neufchatel then you shouldn't need to. Using an electric mixer beat neufchatel and butter until smooth. Slowly add maple syrup or powdered sugar to desired sweetness and consistency. If you are really ambitious and don't mind what color your frosting is or if you plan to add some color to it anyway (I recommend natural food colorings) then try making your own unprocessed powdered sugar from sucanat.

The boiled frosting recipe below comes from my mother-in-law and may be more than you need for 12 cupcakes, so I would recommend cutting it in half. If you read up on the history of Red Velvet Cake you will probably find a story about the Waldorf Astoria Hotel. Hence the name below.

Red Velvet (Waldorf) Frosting aka Boiled Frosting
3T flour
1 C. milk (use organic whole milk)

Whisk the flour and milk in a small saucepan. Cook over medium. Heat stirring constantly until it thickens. Set aside and cool. (It is very important to cool or it will melt the butter and ruin the frosting.)

Cream together:
1 t. vanilla
1 C. room temperature butter
1 C. sugar

Once it is light and fluffy then add the cooked milk mixture. Mix on high speed until it has the consistency of whipped cream.

Another unique option is to add an egg to the cream cheese frosting and place a dollop of the "frosting" in the cupcake batter and bake it in. I actually did try this, using up the strange concoction of cream cheese frosting I used for my daughter's cupcakes and wow were these ever yummy. So my concoction also involved whipped cream and almond flavoring. Sorry I don't have exact measurements, but it was probably about a cup of whipped cream and a tsp of almond extract. I think I also added chocolate chips to the batter when I made this. The cupcakes weren't red - I used dark chocolate cocoa, but they certainly were tasty!

Apple Pie for Breakfast

I was trying to figure out what to eat for breakfast this morning and had this delicious guilt-free apple pie sitting on the counter and thought, why not? As adults we can eat pretty much anything we want for breakfast (at least when our kids aren't looking). But this apple pie is truly nutritious and with a glass of milk pretty much covers nearly all of the food groups (minus the veggies and fats/oils/sweets). Yep, that's right - no sugar or added fats in this recipe. Of course I know that you are thinking it must be disgusting, but oh how wrong you are!

Last week when I was at my parents' house I picked up some of their not so pretty yellow delicious apples for making some apple pies. When I got home I started my quest for finding a "natural" or "healthy" apple pie recipe. I found a Raw Apple Pie recipe by Ani Phyo that was rather intriguing given the fact that there was no baking involved. But of course I had to make my own adaptations to it as I wanted a baked apple pie. The result I am happy to say is quite delicious and as always, very nutritious! Aviella helped me with it, sampling all the ingredients as we went. And when she was able to sample the finished product she cleaned her plate! She sat at the table by herself until the whole thing was gone. I hope you enjoy this as much as we did. I must say that the finished product tastes best just after it is cool enough to eat - when the crust has a nice crunch to it. I was thinking that it might be good to prep the filling and crust and make smaller individual pies (in ramekins or custard dishes) while you are eating dinner. Then you can pull out individual crunchy pies for you and your family (or guests).

Although the apples in this version still have a bit of crunch to them, Ryan thought that if you used a slow cooker for the filling and syrup mixture you could get softer apples before baking. I think Ani Phyo mentioned letting the apples sit overnight in the fridge (covered) would soften them up some more too.

Healthy Apple Pie

Crust:
1 1/4 cups almonds (toasted)
1 1/4 cups rolled oats
2 1/2 cups pitted dates
1/4 cup boiling water
1 tsp sea-salt

Syrup:
1/2 cup pitted dates
1 orange pitted and seeded
1/4 cup boiling water

Filling:
5 to 6 apples, peeled and thinly sliced
1 cup dried fruit (I used cherries, but raisins and cranberries were also suggested)
1-2 teaspoons ground cinnamon (to taste)

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

For the crust, toast almonds (if not already pre-toasted) and let cool. When cool process the almonds in a food processor until coarse. Combine oats, sea-salt and almonds in a medium sized bowl. Combine boiling water and dates, stirring to soften. Place date and water mixture in food processor and process until fairly smooth. Mix by hand the oat mixture with the date mixture. Save 1/2 to 1 cup of mixture to sprinkle on top of the pie. Press the remaining crust mixture into a greased 9 inch pie plate.

Make the syrup by combining the boiling water with the pitted dates and stir to combine. Pour this mixture into a food processor with the pitted and seeded orange pieces. Process until smooth.

Combine the syrup with the filling ingredients in a large bowl then pour into prepared pie crust. Break up the remaining crust mixture and sprinkle on top of the filling. Bake for 20-30 minutes. Allow the pie to cool slightly before eating.