roasted acorn squash mashed with apple butter and cinnamon, a warm naturally sweet AIP side

Reading the ingredient panel on a jar of apple butter twice, hunting for hidden cane sugar or a stray excluded spice, is a small, specific tax of this way of cooking. It is worth paying every time. What lands on the plate afterward tastes enough like dessert that you stop thinking about what the elimination phase took away: just roasted squash, apple butter, cinnamon, and salt, soft enough to feel like real comfort on a weeknight.

Beta-carotene concentrated in the acorn squash is what your body works with to build vitamin A, useful for skin health and for keeping the gut's lining intact, the same barrier this whole practice is aimed at protecting. Vitamin C rides along too, doing its own quiet, ongoing repair work in the background.

There is real pleasure in scraping the soft flesh out of the shell and mashing it by hand until it turns gold and creamy. A whole food made this simply, with your own hands, earns a slow bite instead of a rushed one.

Ingredients

• 1.5 lb acorn squash
• 2 Tbsp coconut oil
• 1/4 cup unsweetened apple butter
• 1 tsp ground cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp sea salt
• apple slices for garnish, if desired

Method

Heat the oven to 400F. Cut the acorn squash in half and scoop out the seeds. Rub the cut faces all over with the coconut oil.

Set the halves cut-side down on a baking sheet or in a roasting pan. Roast until the flesh is fully soft when pierced, around 40 to 45 minutes depending on size.

Let the squash cool just enough to handle, then scrape the flesh out of the shells into a bowl. Add the apple butter, cinnamon, and sea salt. Mash until smooth and creamy. Taste and adjust the salt.

Serve warm, with a few thin apple slices on top if you like.

Instant Pot variation

Add a cup of water and the trivet to the pot. Set the seeded squash halves on the trivet, seal, and cook on high pressure for about 8 to 10 minutes, then quick-release. Scrape the flesh out and mash with the coconut oil, apple butter, cinnamon, and salt. Pressure time is untested and is an estimate.

Notes

The apple butter must be unsweetened and clean-label, with no added cane sugar, no nutmeg, no allspice, and no other excluded seed spices. Check the label, since many commercial apple butters carry those. Cinnamon and clove are fine for elimination; nutmeg and allspice are not.

Servings and roast time are estimates, not stated in the source. Roast time depends on the size of your squash.

*Adapted from wendisaipkitchen.com*