Vanilla-Cinnamon Sunny Butter

There are lots of big signs around our house that summer has arrived. All of the winter sweaters get stuffed into boxes at the top of the stairs, the patio doors surrounding the house fling open and barely close till September, and they let in the sounds of birds singing, bugs buzzing and raindrops falling from the eaves. We rarely turn on the oven, opting to eat out in the garden instead. The freezer is filled with popsicles and hand-labeled pints of ice cream, both of which are enjoyed for snacks just as much as they are for dinner, and fresh vegetables and juicy fruits in all the colors, shapes and textures fill our plates at every meal.

There are subtle signs too; the kinds of things we eat are different in that I typically make meals, and having ingredients on hand, that will help to ease the pitta dosha that naturally rises during this season. We enjoy chia pudding instead of porridge, have cooked berry jams instead of stewed fruits, our beverages go from piping hot to just-warm, slices of lemon and cucumber in our water help to keep us cool, and I swap out the abundance of nuts I eat in all other times of year for seeds. And that’s where this Vanilla-Cinnamon Sunny Butter comes in.

Typically, I sprout my own almonds and grind my own almond butter with them in the fall, winter and spring. Almonds (and other sprouted nuts) are jam packed with superpowers and properties that bodies in motion like mine need to thrive. And I generously spread that nut butter all over toast in the morning, I drizzle it in my porridge, eat it stuffed in dates, and even by the spoonful when I’m deciding what to eat for lunch. But come the summer months, Sunny Butter stands in like a champ.

Why no nuts?

I LOVE nuts. And they’re really wonderful for my body! But because my constitution is already slightly pitta dominant, and because my schedule has a tendency to run hot, my body and have a tendency to overheat in the warm summer months.  To keep the heat at bay and prevent overheating, I do my best to avoid all things that would incite additional pitta and heat; I favor cool foods over warm or hot ones, I enjoy mild beverages over “hard” ones like coffee and alcohol, and I aim to make light, fresh meals (instead of dense or heavy ones) with seasonal ingredients. Nuts (and even many seeds) are very oily, which is a contraindication for pitta. Nuts aren’t the only very oily foods that we’re wise to reduce in a pitta-pacifying diet; fried foods, many cooking oils, hard cheeses and red meats as well as eggs are included in the short list. These foods are incredibly nourishing in other times of year, but during the summer they’re a bit too much for the body. This is seasonal eating at it’s next level!

How do I know if I’m overheating?

If your body is exhibiting any of the following symptoms, pitta may be high in your present state of being (vikruti) as well:

• Excess generation of heat in the body
• Acid reflux, gas, indigestion
• Inflammation of the joints
• Nausea, diarrhea or constipation
• Anger & irritability
• Bad breath
• Body odor
• Excessive sweating

Now, this Sunny Butter!

There are lots of sunflower-based butters out there…but frankly they’re quite an acquired taste. Astringent and bitter, I found myself stirring maple and honey into the jars of chunky, unspreadable sunflower butter I was buying at the store. After a few unsuccessful attempts at a creamy spread, Sunny Butter was born and this is just one of the ways you can *twist* Sunny Butter and make it your own – the sky is the limit! This particular concoction is one I whipped up before a bikepacking trip a few years ago, knowing that I love to rely on nut butter as a quick snack and protein supplement, and being determined to have one that tasted just as good as the almond butter I love eating from a jar.

There are a few added bonuses to eating more of these gorgeous seeds. Ayurvedically, sunflower helps to balance all three doshas, improves digestion and assimilation and helps to bolster the immune system as well. It’s a clean, less-oily way of lubricating the joints and neural pathways.

Because sunflower seeds are so much less oily than, say, almonds, the nut butter will not automatically turn creamy when you blend it in the food processor (as almond butter does.) Instead, we have to add an oil here and it’s a marvelous opportunity to get more omega-3 fatty acids from flax oil. Once the seeds are blended up with the oil and the mixture is spreadable, I use a spatula to stir in maple syrup, the scraped seeds from a vanilla pod, a little salt and spices and voila – you’ll never look at nut butter in the summer time the same way again!

In the photo above, you see my favorite way to enjoy Sunny Butter – on fat slabs of toast, with dollops of the Strawberry Chia Jam featured in my Essential Chia Pudding.