Strawberry Pie in July

We had a bunch of strawberries left in our fridge from my Mom visiting; she always buys a ton of berries. I needed to use them before they went bad and for some reason Ethan was berried out, so I figured a pie was the way to go. Being that I eat low carb I immediately turned to Google to find a decent recipe for sugar-free cream cheese strawberry pie, with really limited results. I decided to just give it a go, I have made standard strawberry pies before so I just kinda converted it to suit my lifestyle. It wasn't the most beautiful pie when it was finished (my presentation skills need work) but it was actually really amazing and best of all guilt free.  

Sugar-Free Strawberry Cream Cheese Pie!

For the Crust:
1/3 cup walnuts
1/3 cup cashews
1/3 cup pecans
4 packets splenda
4 Tbsp butter, melted

For the Cream Cheese Filling:
1-8oz Cream Cheese, softened

1 tsp vanilla extract

4-5 packets of splenda (tastes vary)

For the Fruit Filling:

fresh strawberries (1.5- 2 lbs)
1 cup Splenda
1 packet of plain sugar free gelatine
juice of 1/2 lemon

Start with making the crust, combine all the nuts in a food processor or blender and grind until very fine. The natural oils of the nuts should make them start to clump up. Then add in your Splenda and melted butter, blend again. The crust should be fairly mushy so pour it in a pie pan and put in the fridge to harden until ready to use.

Next, wash strawberries and hull (removing the green tops and core). Chop 1/2 of the berries with into small pieces them mush with a fork or process in food processor. 

Place mushed berries into a sauce pan and begin to cook over medium heat. Mix Splenda and gelatine in a small bowl; add to pan with mushed berries. Add lemon juice and cook on low heat for about 10 minutes or until mixture thickens. Cut remaining strawberries into halves or quarters (depending on size) and mix with the cooked mixture. Just get them nice and coated in the mixture then remove from heat.

Now for the cream cheese, in a separate mixing bowl  add the softened cream cheese, vanilla and splenda. Use a hand mixer and mix thoroughly. If the cream cheese is very soft you can just mix it by hand. Then pour and spread the mixture over your pie crust.  

Pour strawberry mixture over the cream cheese and pie crust. Chill in refrigerator for 2 hours, or until pie is set. Serve topped with frozen cool whip a yummy low carb "ice cream" option ;)