apple pie for breakfast?

I have been on a mission this week.  I am attempting to find healthy alternatives to the sweets and baked goods that my family is used to eating. I love to bake, and I think I am pretty good at it, but now that we are eating more whole foods I refuse to use most of the ingredients that are in the baked goods that my family has come to know and love. Some of the many items on that list are vegetable oil, shortening, all purpose flour, and refined sugar.  When I look that list I see the ingredients for my family apple pie recipe which has become my signature dish.  That was a problem for me and I needed a solution.

From left to right: pumpkin praline pie, Nana's apple crumb pie.
           
So yesterday I decided it was time find a replacement apple pie. I scoured the internet for a healthy alternative and really didn't find much.  Even the recipes that said "healthy" still had refined sugar.  There were lots of recipes out there for vegetarians, vegans, gluten free, low fat, but almost nothing that was "whole food."  I came to the realization that for the first time in my life, I am ahead of the trend.  Hopefully this is more of a movement than a trend, but either way, I am going to have to figure out some of this healthy, whole food cooking stuff on my own.  After many google searches, I did find a recipe that came close to what I was looking for.  Here it is, its called No-Bake Apple Walnut Tart and other than the apple juice, all of the ingredients are ones that I approve of.  We don't have juice in the house any more unless its fresh and I didn't have time to make apple juice.

Side note: when the juice is removed from a fruit or vegetable, it loses all of the fiber and many nutrients that were in the actual plant.  The longer it sits, the less nutrients it has.  So essentially, by the time a juice is processed, packaged, sold and consumed you are left with sugar water.

I decided to give this recipe a try and instead of apple juice, I used water and an extra tablespoon of honey.  I LOVE walnuts so I was really excited about the crust.  Here is what the crust looked like, and I apologize for the poor photo quality, I am a much better baker than photographer so my pictures aren't that great.

I soaked the apples as directed, but it didn't really look like enough so I added an extra apple.  Next time I will put one or two more in. I like my pies to be really tall. 

Then I sautéed the apples as directed. It says no bake, but there is some cooking involved. Here is the final product! Again, sorry for the bad photography, I will work on it! 

I think it turned out pretty well but there were a couple things I would change.  Next time I would add more apples and maybe a little more water so that we got more syrupy sauce at the end.  Also, it slipped my mind that Hubby has some weird allergy to walnuts where his mouth gets all itchy and sore every time he eats them. Oops. So next time I would make it with pecans instead.  

I sampled the apple tart on children #2 and #3 last night and it went pretty well.  #3 ate some of it but #2 LOVED it and he was extra excited when he was allowed to have pie again for breakfast this morning! I can't begin to describe how exciting it is to know that the "treats" that my children enjoy now are a completely acceptable meal.  This dish is nuts and fruit with a touch of honey.  Breakfast doesn't get much healthier than that. Take THAT lucky charms!