This easy and delicious low carb keto apple crisp doesn’t use any apples! To keep it keto friendly, the recipe is made with zucchini but your taste buds will never know the difference!
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Sweet and tender pieces of sliced zucchini can have the flavor of apples by adding a sweetened spice blend. You’ll get all the taste you love without the unwanted carbs.
The delicious keto apple dessert is a simple and easy way to enjoy the crunchy, sweet flavor of apples on a low-carb diet. It's also a tasty way to get in your daily does of vegetables.
If you are trying to get your family to eat more veggies, this treat is a great way to do it. They may not even be able to tell you didn't use real granny smith apples or fuji apples in the mock apple filling.
Ingredients
You only need a few basic ingredients and a little time to make this low carb apple crisp recipe. In fact, you may already have everything you need right in the kitchen!
Mock apple mixture
For the low-carb apple pie crisp filling, you'll need the following:
- zucchini
- lemon juice
- keto sugar substitute
- cinnamon
- nutmeg
You can also add a keto-friendly thickener like xanthan gum to make a thicker filling and apple extract for a stronger apple flavor.
Apple crisp topping
I use a nutty topping for the zucchini apple crisp. It’s just a blend of these ingredients:
- Chopped pecans
- Almond flour
- Oat fiber or coconut flour
- Granulated keto sweetener
- Cinnamon
- Melted butter
Quick tips
- Keep the zucchini slices at least a quarter inch thick. If you cut them too thin, the squash will get soft and mushy when cooked.
- Use a coarse almond flour. Low carb baked goods are generally better with fine almond flour, but for an apple crisp, a coarser grind works best. You can even use almond meal with the skin still on.
- Add apple extract. The lemon juice provides a fruity taste to the zucchini but you'll get a more believable taste if you add in a little apple flavoring.
- Use a ball shaped squash. There are round ball varieties of zucchini that you can grow yourself. The shape and size is more like an apple.
Instructions
To make the recipe, simply prepare the zucchini mixture then add the crumb topping. Then simply bake it in the oven. That's it!
Mock apple filling
Before using the zucchini, it needs to be peeled and sliced in half lengthwise. Then the seeds need to be removed using a spoon to scrape them out.
Cut the zucchini into half moon slices to look like apple slices. The summer squash pie filling will look just like apples!
Once the zucchini is sliced, it’s mixed with lemon juice, cinnamon, nutmeg, sweetener and optional apple extract. Then it’s poured into a baking dish.
Combine the dry ingredients in a mixing bowl. Then cut in the butter using a pastry cutter until the mixture is crumbly.
Sprinkle the topping over the filling and baked until the zucchini is tender. It takes about 45 to 50 minutes to cook completely.
️ Serving suggestions
This keto zucchini apple crisp is perfect served warm or cold. When warm, it tastes great with a scoop of keto vanilla ice cream on top. Topping off with some whipped cream is also a great option.
Variations
It’s easy to modify this recipe into a keto mock apple pie. Just add my almond flour crust or coconut flour crust and bake in a pie pan. You’ll end up with a low carb Dutch apple pie!
If you’d rather have a traditional apple pie, add a top crust too.
FAQs
Before getting to the printable recipe card, here are some answered to questions people have asked about the keto apple crisp dessert.
Apples are avoided on a keto diet because even a small apple can have over 20 grams of carbs. That’s twice the limit for what’s recommended for each low carb meal and it’s likely to knock you out of ketosis!
I’ve made various keto apple recipes using chayote squash, jicama, and yellow squash in addition to zucchini. I use chayote in my keto apple pie uses chayote and I use jicama in my keto apple pie filling.
Related recipes
This keto apple crisp is a must try low carb dessert for late summer or early fall! It’s definitely something you'll want to make over and over again. For more delicious treats, try one of these:
- Keto apple bread has all the flavor of apple fritters in an easy loaf recipe.
- Starbucks caramel apple spice recipe is a delicious coffee house drink without all the sugar.
- Keto peach cobbler is made with real peach slices but carbs are kept low.
- Low carb blueberry cobbler is incredibly easy to make with just a few simple ingredients.
- Keto spice cake zucchini muffins are a perfect sized treat when topped with cream cheese frosting.
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Recipe
Keto Apple Crisp
Video
Ingredients
FILLING:
- 6 cups zucchini peeled and sliced about ½ inch thick
- 3 tablespoons lemon juice can sub half with apple cider vinegar to add apple flavor
- ⅔ cup low carb sugar substitute or 4 tablespoon 2 teaspoon Truvia
- ¾ teaspoon ground cinnamon
- ½ teaspoon ground nutmeg
- ¼ teaspoon xanthan gum optional thickener
- 1 teaspoon apple extract optional
TOPPING:
- ½ cup pecans chopped
- ½ cup almond flour
- ¼ cup coconut flour or oat fiber
- ¼ cup low carb sugar substitute or brown sugar substitute
- 1 teaspoon cinnamon
- ¼ cup butter
Instructions
- In medium bowl, combine zucchini, lemon juice, sweetener, cinnamon and nutmeg until well blended. For a stronger apple taste, stir in apple extract too. Pour mixture into a greased 9 x 9-in. baking dish.
- For topping, combine pecans, almond flour, oat fiber, sweetener and cinnamon in a bowl then cut in butter until crumbly. Sprinkle over the zucchini mixture.
- Bake at 350 F for 45-50 minutes or until zucchini is tender.
Notes
Low Carb Sweeteners | Keto Sweetener Conversion Chart
Nutrition
Additional Info
Notes on Nutritional Information
Nutritional information for the recipe is provided as a courtesy and is approximate only. We cannot guarantee the accuracy of the nutritional information given for any recipe on this site. Erythritol carbs are not included in carb counts as it has been shown not to impact blood sugar. Net carbs are the total carbs minus fiber.
Copyright
© LowCarbYum.com - Unauthorized use of this material without written permission is strictly prohibited unless for personal offline purposes. Single photos may be used, provided that full credit is given to LowCarbYum.com along with a link back to the original content.
First published August 26, 2011. Last updated July 15, 2022, with new images and additional recipe information.
Teddy
Interesting recipe, very ingenious. I did make this today, with Swerve brown sugar, apple extract, ACV etc, and I mostly liked it. But there was a chemical taste to it that was off-putting. I'm wondering if it was from the apple extract??? Or perhaps the Swerve brown sugar. In any case, I'm going to try making it again without the apple extract and I'll use Lakanto golden sugar, to see if that helps rid this of that chemical taste.
Janice
This was an easy dessert to whip up. Since we have 4 adults in the household eating mostly low carb I am always looking for new takes on recipes. I used yellow squash and cubed it. Topping was tasty and crunchy. This recipe is a keeper!
Karissa
As great as this recipe is (it really does taste like apple crisp!), I would like you to find me someone on this planet who can peel, core, and slice six zucchini in 5 minutes (in addition to the other steps required before this goes in the oven). I think saying 5 minutes of prep time required is a little unreal. The zucchini process alone took 30 minutes. Plan ahead.
Lisa MarcAurele
I'll get that changed. It took me more like 15 minutes.
Shelli
Would replacing the almond flour with pecan meal work?
Lisa MarcAurele
I haven't tried it personally, but it should work out.
Diana
I know my apples. I am an apple crisp lover (instead of birthday cake I prefer apple crisp). Friends and relatives say my apple pie is the best they ever tasted. With this said, I was an absolute skeptic this would taste like apple crisp but thought I'd give it a try. To my surprise it did taste like apples! I took advice of other reviewers and used a 1/4 tsp xanthan gum, ACV for part of the lemon juice and brown sugar swerve in the topping. I did not have apple flavoring (used vanilla) pecans or oat fiber but used coconut flour. Turned out perfect. ( sliced zucchini thin rounds, then halved, salted (waited 20 min) drained and dried with paper towels. Excellent! would make again try to find apple flavoring just to see if it makes a difference.
Lisa MarcAurele
Using apple cider vinegar for some of the lemon juice is a good way to get in a little real apple flavor since apple extract is not that easy to find. I should add that in to the notes. Thanks for sharing!
Marie
This recipe is absolutely delicious. Made it last night for dessert. My husband said he could not believe it was not actual apples.
TMarie
Made a believer out of the skeptics.
This was so good warm and cold.
Used suggestion of ACV and vanilla extract, as that's what I had. Also added a bit of xantham gum to filling. And used 1/2 brown 1/2 granular Swerve in both filling and topping. Thanks for this great recipe!