Apple Cream Cheese Cobbler (grain-free, lower-sugar)

I recently had an advanced reader copy of a new cookbook, Skinny Southern Baking: 65 Gluten-Free, Dairy-Free, Refined Sugar-Free Southern Classics by Lara Lyn Carter, which offers lower sugar versions of southern recipes and flavors. I took one of the recipes and adapted it slightly for a smaller dish and fewer servings, but taking advantage of the apples I can only get in the fall. Part of the challenge of baking this way is the look and feel of the final result. The pictures in the cookbook are accurate representations of the recipes, even when that means the bread doesn't rise as high or the coconut sugar turns your crumble pretty dark.

All to say, this dessert may not win any beauty awards, but it was really tasty. And the cream cheese in there is more like a pudding than a cheesecake, in a good way. It also keeps it from being all sweet.

Apple Cream Cheese Cobbler
(Credit: Lara Lyn Carter)

For the cobbler:

3 large sweet apples, cored and cut into 8 large slices*
1/2 cup honey or maple syrup
2 packages (8 oz each) plant-based cream cheese*

1. Preheat the oven to 350 F degrees and spray a 9x13 baking dish with cooking spray. 
2. Arrange the apple slices in the bottom of the baking dish.
3. Whip the honey or maple syrup and cream cheese together until smooth and spread the mixture over the apples. 

For the topping:

3 eggs
2 cups almond flour
1/2 cup coconut sugar
1 tsp vanilla
2 tsp cinnamon*
1 tsp nutmeg*
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp fine sea salt
1/2 cup chopped pecans or walnuts

1. Combine all ingredients together in a large bowl.
2. Pour the mixture over the apples and cream cheese mixture; bake for 45 minutes.

*Notes from JennyBakes:

I made a thirdish of this recipe by using one large Mutsu apple, the cream cheese and maple syrup as described, and roughly a third of the topping.

I'm not too invested in non-dairy, plus that's just hard to find where I live in the south. The reason I used this recipe in the first place was that I had a brick of cream cheese I needed to use. Regular old cream cheese works fine here (the eggs in the topping make it non-vegan anyway!)

I have this apple pie spice in my spice drawer that I always use with apples in place of the cinnamon and nutmeg. 

I added some walnuts but only to half the topping since my husband is mildly allergic.

 

Skinny Southern Baking
by Lara Lyn Carter

13 October 2020

Other recipes I've marked to try, because this is how we eat at my house:

-Ginger Cookies
-Pumpkin Spice Cookies
-Peanut Butter Banana Coffeecake
-Pumpkin Cranbrerry Nut Bread
-Gingerbread
-Almond Flour Pie Crust
-Chocolate Pie Crust
-Coconut Flour Pie Crust
-Pumpkin Cornbread
-Spinach and Feta Muffins
-Herb biscuits

(Can you tell I'm so ready for fall?! Get ready!)