I’m a firm believer in pumpkin. Year-round. I love integrating pumpkin into all manner of recipes. I recently created a low carb pumpkin pancakes recipe (grain free, dairy free, nut free, and Paleo) with a creamy coconut-pumpkin-spice topping.

It was a definite share-worthy thumbs-up.

Not only does this recipe nix grains and dairy, it also eliminates nuts.

This is kind of a big deal, when you consider how omnipresent of a staple almond flour is in grain-free / Paleo recipes. I see people going nuts with nuts far too often with grain-free and “Paleo.”

Let’s be clear, the Paleo categorization isn’t too accurate for many recipes made primarily of almond flour (i.e. pancakes, bread and other baked goods) because our ancestors would likely have never eaten the amount of nuts found in such recipes in one sitting, let alone one day.

Unfortunately, many people flat out can’t eat nuts. And many people don’t even know they shouldn’t be eating them (this goes beyond nut allergies), or at least minimizing them.

People can develop sensitivities to nuts without realizing it (remember: sensitivities are different than allergies). Why? Because…

• food sensitivity responses can show up days to weeks after you eat an antagonistic food, making it hard to pin down the culprit.
• We also don’t always interpret less-known food sensitivity responses as food sensitivities (think: elevated blood sugar, headaches, interstitial cystitis (aka non-infected inflamed bladder)).
• And when a sensitivity does develop, it tends to be found with foods we eat most often.
• Furthermore, while it’s important to avoid antagonistic foods to allow the gut to heal and the immune system to calm down,
  • (1) food sensitivities can and do change,
  • (2) most food sensitivity testing is not accurate, and
  • (3) food sensitivities are merely symptoms of deeper root causative issues that all too often are never investigated, or narrowed down, let alone healed.

To boot, nuts contain high levels of mineral-blocking antinutrients. Soaking and sprouting can reduce antinutrient content, but doing so doesn’t eliminate it. Allow me to be clear: adequate mineralization is not something you want to screw around with; it governs cellular voltage in the body, which governs everything.

What’s more, nuts are primarily unsaturated fats (largely monounsaturated, with a good amount of polyunsaturated fat). To ensure optimal health, including arterial plaque prevention and minimizing belly fat (the latter of which is a marker of disease risk, not only an aesthetic-factor), unsaturated fats should be limited.

Nuts are also high-histamine foods. Even if you don’t have an allergy, this can spell antagonism for the gut and immune system for a range of chronic conditions.

Case in point: nuts are not universally “healthy” foods, and at least they should not be consumed in such large quantities as many seemingly progressive dietary trends endorse, or in the manner in which some people interpret such trends.

For all these reasons, I try to make sure my recipes feature more inclusive ingredients, and/or provide options.

Now, for the ingredients I did use in this recipe…

Anyone who knows me knows most of what I whip up in the recipe-creation process is done via eyeballing and tasting as I go.

The first batch I attempted tasted good, but fell apart. Second time was the charm.

Scroll down for the recipe.

Whisk all pancake ingredients but egg and coconut milk together in small mixing bowl first. You can also use an immersion/hand-blender.

Add in egg and whisk/blend.

Add in splash of coconut milk to thin batter. Whisk/blend until batter is a consistent texture. Batter will appear a little thin; this is OK.

Grease skillet with coconut oil, butter, or ghee.

Heat burner to medium-high heat.

Spoon multiple silver-dollar-sized amounts of batter onto skillet.

Flip when golden brown. Stack on plate, and cover with down-turned bowl to retain heat.

Stir topping ingredients together in small bowl until consistency is smoother.

Butter/coconut oil the hell out of each pancake. Stack. Top. Enjoy.

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Image copyright Erika Herman.