AIP Beef Patties

These are real hand pies, the kind you can hold and eat standing up, made entirely inside the elimination phase. Boiled plantain and green banana mash with cassava flour into a grain-free dough that wraps around a savory beef filling brightened with green olives, garlic, onion and fresh herbs, then bakes until the outside firms. They travel, they reheat, and they make a stretch of meal prep feel like something other than another bowl of meat and vegetables. When the protocol has gone on long enough to wear on you, food you can pick up with your hands is a quiet relief.

The nourishment is built in. The beef is a source of zinc and iron, minerals your body draws on for immune regulation and for repairing the gut barrier. The plantain and green banana in the dough are a source of potassium and resistant starch, the kind of starch that helps feed a healthier gut community as it ferments. This is satisfying, grounding food that gives your body usable material while you keep moving an autoimmune condition toward remission. It is not a cure. It is a real meal you can carry with you.

An animal fed the filling, so cook it with care and let nothing go to waste. Crimp the edges by hand, line them up on the tray, and take a moment with the warm, golden patties before you eat. The attention you give to making food by hand is part of how you feed yourself well through a long process.

Ingredients

For the dough:

• 2 ripe plantains
• 4 green bananas
• 1/2 cup cassava flour
• Olive oil, for brushing the parchment

For the beef filling:

• 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
• 1 lb extra lean ground beef
• 1 small yellow onion, finely chopped
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 1/4 cup pitted green olives, chopped (clean-label)
• 3 tablespoons coconut aminos (clean-label)
• 1 tablespoon dried oregano
• 1 tablespoon dried thyme
• 1 1/2 teaspoons sea salt
• 1/4 cup cilantro, chopped

Method

Start the dough. Peel the plantains and green bananas, cut them into chunks, and boil in a large pot of water until very soft, around 20 to 25 minutes. Drain well and mash thoroughly, by hand or in a food processor, until smooth with no lumps. Work in the cassava flour while the mash is still warm until it comes together into a soft, pliable dough that holds its shape. Let it rest while you make the filling.

For the filling, warm the olive oil in a skillet over medium heat. Add the chopped onion and cook until soft, then stir in the garlic and cook another minute. Add the ground beef and break it up as it browns. Once it is cooked through, stir in the chopped green olives, the coconut aminos, the oregano, thyme and sea salt, and let everything cook together for a few minutes so the flavors meld and the liquid cooks down. Take it off the heat and fold in the chopped cilantro. Let the filling cool a little so it is easier to handle.

Heat the oven, around 375F, and brush a parchment-lined baking sheet lightly with olive oil. Divide the dough into even pieces and roll or press each one out between sheets of oiled parchment into a round about a quarter-inch thick. Spoon some filling onto one half of each round, fold the dough over into a half-moon, and press and crimp the edges closed with your fingers or a fork. The dough is more delicate than wheat pastry, so patch any cracks with damp fingers as you go.

Lay the patties on the prepared sheet and bake until the dough is set and lightly golden, around 25 to 30 minutes. Serve warm. They keep well and reheat for meal prep.

Air fryer variation

You can finish the patties in an air fryer for a crisper outside. Arrange them in a single layer, brush lightly with olive oil, and air fry at about 375F for roughly 12 to 15 minutes, turning once, until the dough is set and golden. Air fryers vary and the dough browns faster than wheat pastry, so check often and treat this time and temperature as a starting point. The filling still needs the skillet and the dough still needs boiling and mashing first.

Notes

Oregano and thyme are leaf herbs, not seed spices, so both are permitted on elimination. The filling uses olives rather than any nightshade, so no swap was needed. Choose coconut aminos and green olives with clean labels, free of nightshade spices or other excluded additives.

*Adapted from healmedelicious.com*

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*Provenance: source-derived (re-grounded). Method rebuilt in ARM's own words from the ingredient list in /Users/Christopher/Documents/Claude/01-Projects/ARM/aip-source-archives/heal-me-delicious/aip-beef-patties.md (healmedelicious.com, author Nicole Charles). Ingredient quantities used as factual reference. Introduction and health framing written fresh from ARM's food-as-medicine framework. No third-party method text reproduced. The dish is AIP elimination compliant as written and needed no swaps, since oregano and thyme are permitted leaf herbs and the filling uses green olives rather than any nightshade. The yield estimate, the untested oven and air fryer times, and the clean-label note for coconut aminos and olives are flagged in verify_flags.*