I recently experimented with a special diet called the Autoimmune Protocol (AIP). I won’t go into tremendous detail about it here, but basically it’s an extreme restriction diet with a twofold goal: to identify foods that irritate your gut, and to incorporate foods that heal your gut. It’s been known for a long time how important your gut is to your overall health and wellbeing (I wrote about that more in my yogurt-making post), and the AIP diet seeks to restore the gut to a state of maximum efficiency.
So if you suspect that you have a food sensitivity that could be triggering an autoimmune response like joint pain, brain fog, gastrointestinal issues, or skin conditions, the idea is to eliminate ALL foods that could be potential culprits. It’s a somewhat intimidating list that includes grains, dairy, eggs, beans and legumes, nuts, seeds, nightshades, certain herbs and spices, refined sugar, and alcohol. After a period of at least 30 days (or longer, if your symptoms haven’t shown improvement in that time), you systematically reintroduce the foods in order to identify which ones do or do not cause issues for you.
But the AIP diet is as much about incorporating nutrient-dense, healing foods as it is about eliminating irritants. Fermented foods, organ meats, wild-caught fish, pastured meats, bone broth, a variety of colorful vegetables. . . . All of these earn the AIP stamp of approval and make your gut happy. There’s a definite learning curve with this plan, but it did get easier to follow each day.
I followed the AIP diet for about eight weeks, and after the initial adjustment and grieving period for coffee and chocolate had passed, I liked the diet quite well. I learned about some new ingredients and foods, and experimented with a lot of new recipes. Being so restrictive, the AIP diet is not necessarily designed to be a lifelong dietary strategy, but even now that I’ve transitioned out of the elimination phase, there are many aspects of it I plan to continue.
There were, of course, things that were hard about it. I met some friends for lunch and realized ahead of time that there was literally nothing on the restaurant’s menu that I could eat. Had it come to this? Smuggling food into restaurants? Luckily my friends weren’t too weirded out, or if they were, they did a good job hiding it. Then my brother threw a birthday party for his wife—who is kind of a food slut—and the theme of the party was All Her Favorite Junk Foods. Pizza, chicken wings, Chinese take-out, chocolate chip cookies. . . . That was a tough one. And in an especially cruel twist of fate, he asked me to pick up the wings for him on my way to the party.
Yeah. I ate some carrots and celery off the veggie tray.
But the hardest part of the AIP diet was my evening treat. I like to make healthy treats to enjoy with my husband as an evening snack. Simple fruit cobblers, black bean brownies, things like that. Of course there are recipes for AIP desserts and treats, but a lot of them called for exotic ingredients that were hard to find and rather expensive. Over the course of my eight weeks of AIP experimentation, however, I developed a couple of very solid treats that I am confident anyone would find delicious!
Treat #1: Coconut-Carob Balls
These take about five minutes to make, and they are the perfect bite when you need a quick snack, a little something sweet, or are really craving a hit of chocolate. There are tons of recipes out there for energy balls and bites, but none that I tried got the texture of the dough quite right—they were always too wet, or too dry. This one is just right.
Ingredients:
1/4 cup coconut butter* (soften just slightly)
1 mashed banana
1/4 cup shredded coconut
1/4 cup coconut flour
1/4 cup carob powder**
1/2 tsp cinnamon
Directions: Mash together the coconut butter and banana. Add all remaining ingredients and mix until you have a stiff dough. Roll into one-inch balls (you should get about 10-12), and refrigerate them for at least an hour. If you are a sweet-salty fan like I am, you might also sprinkle some sea salt on the bites.
*Coconut butter might also be called “Coconut Manna,” and it is not the same thing as coconut oil. It is coconut oil along with some of the coconut fiber, which gives it a stiffer texture.
**Carob powder is a good AIP substitute for cocoa powder. I find it to be naturally less bitter than raw cocoa and to have a pleasant apple-y smell and taste. If these balls are not sweet enough for you, you could compensate by adding a little honey or maple syrup to the mix. The banana and cinnamon in this recipe, paired with the carob, provide all the sweetness I require.
Treat #2: Brownies (Zoo-kies)
I still haven’t hit upon the perfect name for these treats. Maybe you’ll have a suggestion. I tend to refer to them as “Zoo-kies,” but I feel like a better name is out there. . . . At any rate, once you try these, you might never go back to regular old brownies again!
Ingredients:
1 zucchini, cut into chunks
1 banana, cut into chunks
3 Medjool dates (make sure to remove the pits!)
1/4 cup oil (olive oil, avocado oil; either is good)
1 cup unsweetened applesauce (this is your egg substitute)
2/3 cup coconut flour
1/3 cup carob powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp cinnamon
Directions: Place the first five ingredients in a food processor. Blend these for about 30 seconds, then scrape the bowl down and run it for a few more seconds. Add the dry ingredients and run the processor again until everything is combined (you might need to pause and scrape here too).
Spread the batter into an 8×8 baking dish prepared with a thin coating of coconut oil to prevent sticking. Bake at 375° for about 45-55 minutes.
(The texture of these can vary slightly from batch to batch, depending on how big your zucchini and banana were. But it’s all good! In general, though, these turn out more custard-y than a typical brownie.)
Now, these zoo-kies are good on their own, but I wanted to make them a little more special. Have you ever made icing with powdered sugar and milk? I wondered if I could create something like that using my AIP ingredients. The answer? Yes, yes I could.
AIP Icing
1/2 cup carob powder
Several Tbsp of coconut milk
Directions: In a small bowl, add coconut milk just a tablespoon or drizzle at a time to the carob powder. Mix until you have a smooth, spreadable icing. You will know it when you see it! After the zoo-kies have cooled, spread this icing on them and store them in the fridge. My husband and I agree that they taste best when refrigerated.
So whether you are on the AIP diet yourself or simply a hostage to it like my husband, hopefully you will enjoy these simple treats as much as we do!
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