Category Archives: nut/peanut free

With Gratitude: Savory Triple Squash Muffinsu

dairy free, egg free, gluten free, Holidays, nut/peanut free, reduced refined sugar, soy free Leave a comment

“Is your kitchen ready 4 the holidays?”

I was driving to meet some friends when I saw a sign outside a home design business asking, “Is your kitchen ready 4 the holidays?”

My immediate response was, “Of course not, but who cares?” Obviously, though, people must care, or the business would not be using the sign as part of its marketing strategy.

For me, the holidays are about the three “F’s” — faith, family, and food. I confess, though, that the priorities aren’t always in that order. If I’m hosting, I tend to focus a lot on the food because I care very much that everyone attending will be able to safely enjoy what they eat.

So, when I received an email this past week in response to the post about the pumpkin cranberry muffins, I understood the desire behind the question: “Do you have a savory muffin recipe for Thanksgiving? My grandmother doesn’t like her breads to be sweet.”

This particular person had found my recipe because she was looking for an allergy friendly muffin recipe for her grandmother whose diet was restricted, but as she mentioned, she wanted something savory instead. So, for folks who want a choice, I’m posting a savory triple squash muffin recipe which I made last week and had many, many folks taste test with good reviews. They also have the added benefit of being gluten, dairy, soy, nut, sugar, and egg free.

Triple Squash Muffins

Ingredients:
1 cup gluten free whole rolled oats
1 cup boiling water
2 tbsp golden ground flaxseed
6 tbsp water
1 cup gluten free oat flour
1 cup garbanzo bean flour
2/3 cup potato starch
1/3 cup arrowroot starch
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp dried oregano
1/2 tsp dried thyme
1/2 cup safflower oil
1 cup cooked, pureed winter squash (butternut, acorn, pumpkin, etc… your choice)
1 cup shredded zucchini
1 cup shredded yellow summer squash
1/2 cup boiling water
2 tbsp vinegar (white or apple cider)
Baking Instructions:
1.  Preheat oven to 400 degrees and line muffin tins with liners.
2.  Pour 1 cup of boiling water over 1 cup of gluten free whole rolled oats and set aside.
3.  Mix 2 tbsp of ground golden flaxseed with 6 tbsp of water and set aside.
4.  Combine 1 cup gluten free oat flour, 1 cup garbanzo bean flour, 2/3 cup potato starch, 1/3 cup arrowroot starch, 2 tsp baking powder, 1 tsp baking soda, 1/2 tsp salt, 1 tsp oregano, and 1/2 tsp thyme.
5.  Blend the oats with the flaxseed mixture, 1/2 cup safflower oil, 1 cup winter squash (butternut, acorn, pumpkin, etc…), 1 cup shredded zucchini, and 1 cup shredded summer squash.
6.  Add the dry ingredients to the wet, along with 1/2 cup of boiling water and 2 tbsp of vinegar (white or apple cider).  Mix just until the dry ingredients are fully moistened.
7.  Divide the batter evenly among 24 muffin cups.
8.  Bake for about 20 minutes until the muffins are puffed, golden and a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. (You may want to check after 15 minutes.  It could take up to 25 minutes.  It all depends on how accurate and well your oven keeps its temperature.  In my oven, it’s about 20 minutes consistently.)

With Gratitude: Thanksgiving Muffins

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“Only two weeks to Thanksgiving and then it’s Advent!”

My son ran into the kitchen today to announce that my time to pretend the holidays were not approaching was at an end. I could ignore his heralding at six months, three months, and even one month… but two weeks! Whether I was ready or not, it was time to begin thinking.

The fact is that when you have multiple food allergies, thinking about holiday meals can be something you’d like to put off if you can, because thinking about them means figuring out exactly which and how many dishes you’ll be making simply to ensure that you have food to eat.

If you’re new to the blog, you can search by category for “holidays” and find posts I’ve previously submitted about allergy friendly holiday cooking — everything from how to minimize stress to how to revamp pies, cakes, entrees and side dishes.

This week, however, a young mom wrote asking me about ideas for a Thanksgiving muffin. Her father-in-law cannot have eggs, dairy and wheat, so she thought muffins might be easier to make than rolls. She wanted the muffins to be “Thanksgiving-ish”, though, and I had just the recipe for her.

Thanksgiving Muffins. When I think about Thanksgiving, pumpkins, squash, apples, and cranberries always come to mind. So I have a recipe that you can make just about any way you want, varying the type of cranberries you choose, your choice of pumpkin, winter squash or even a homemade applesauce in place of pumpkin, and even the spices you decide to include. And the bonus is that they’re gluten, dairy, egg, soy, and nut free, too.

Thanksgiving Muffins

Ingredients:

4 tbsp ground golden flaxseed

12 tbsp water

2 cups pureed cooked pumpkin or winter squash (butternut, acorn, etc…) or apples

2/3 cup safflower oil

3/4 cup Agave

1 1/2 cup fresh cranberries, dried cranberries, or cooked cranberries (My kids like the cooked cranberries best because they’re softer and I usually cook them with a bit of agave to make them sweeter, but you can also use fresh cranberries if you want a tart/sweet flavor contrast to the muffins or dried cranberries if you want the muffins to have some chewiness and little more sweetness)

3 1/2 cup gluten free flour blend (I usually use a homemade mixture of sorghum, garbanzo bean, and oat flour with arrowroot starch but I’ve used Bob’s Red Mill and King Arthur and Authentic Foods)

2 1/2 tsp spices (any combination of cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger, cardamom, allspice and/or cloves are good)

1/2 tsp salt

1 cup boiling water

2 tbsp vinegar (I like to use apple cider vinegar but a white vinegar is fine, too)

Baking Instructions:

  1. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees and fill 24 muffin cups with cupcake liners. (The orange, red-flecked muffins look pretty in a white liner if you put the muffins in a bowl to put on the table for the Thanksgiving meal.)
  2. Combine the flaxseed with the water and let sit for five minutes.
  3. In a large bowl mix together the cooked pureed pumpkin or squash or apples with the oil, agave and flaxseed mixture. Set aside.
  4. In a food processor chop the cranberries, no matter what type you’re using, because this will distribute them more evenly throughout the muffin. Add to the wet mixtures.
  5. In another bowl mix the flour, spices, salt, baking powder, and baking soda.
  6. Add the dry ingredients to the wet, along with the water and vinegar. Mix until all the dry ingredients are moistened.
  7. Evenly distribute the batter among the 24 muffin cups. They will be filled almost to the top.
  8. Bake in preheated oven for 15 to 20 minutes. Muffins will be puffed and golden brown and a toothpick inserted in the center will come out clean.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Autumn Fruits: Easy Marinara Sauce

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website tomato sauce

“Are you going to do something with those tomatoes?”

A couple of weeks ago, my sister-in-law generously gave me several pounds of home grown tomatoes, the last picked of the season before the weather became cold. I was thrilled, but then my son became ill, and a week was lost at the hospital and helping him to recover at home.

Over the weekend, my husband looked at the tomatoes still taking up space on our counter, and asked, “Are you going to do something with those tomatoes or am I going to have to compost them?”

The idea of composting all those lovely tomatoes horrified me, so I quickly grabbed a cutting board and went to work….

Folks who have been reading the blog for a while know that I’m a big fan of the least amount of effort for great results. So, what’s something easy one can do when you have pounds of tomatoes and no idea what to do with them? Marinara sauce.

Marinara sauce is just a sauce made from tomatoes. If you make up a huge batch, though, you can freeze it and use it in a variety of ways: the base for a thicker spaghetti sauce, sauce for pizza, in Spanish rice, for ratattouille, the base for a cocktail sauce, for soups, to top enchiladas, in Sloppy Joe’s, the list is pretty never-ending. And what’s lovely is that unless you’re allergic to tomatoes, it’s allergy friendly, too – no nuts, dairy, egg, gluten, sugar, peanuts, etc….

Easy Marinara Sauce

  1. The Tomatoes: I simply cut the tomatoes into fourths and cook them as is, seeds, peels and all.
  2. The Flavoring: Whatever you’d like. I usually throw in about eight to 10 whole garlic cloves, two purple scallions quartered and a chili pepper.
  3. The Herbs: Whatever you’d like. I like basil, oregano, and thyme. Use dried herbs. If you want fresh herbs, those can be added when you actually use the marinara sauce for a recipe.
  4. The Pan: I have a lovely Circulon pan which is 12 inches in diameter and three inches deep which I use for making marinara sauce. I recommend a larger, shallower pan over a deeper but smaller pot, which is the use recommendations. The reason? Because the shallower pan allows all the tomatoes to cook down quickly without you needing to continually stir to get the top tomatoes down to the bottom where the heat source is.
  5. The Cooking: If you cook the tomatoes in the shallower pan, you only need to cook the tomatoes, with a lid on, for about 20 to 30 minutes.
  6. The Consistency: If you want a chunky marinara sauce, simply let the cooked tomatoes cool as is. If you like a smoother marinara, puree everything up in a blender or food processor. If you don’t like the seeds, strain them out after pureeing. If you want a thicker marinara sauce, add tomato paste or cooked, pureed vegetables like squash or carrots or pumpkin which also add another flavor dimension.
  7. The Storing: Marinara sauce will keep for weeks in the fridge and for years in the freezer. To store in the freezer, make sure the sauce is completely cooled and then put the sauce into freezer friendly containers or bags. I prefer to put two cups of sauce into freezer bags because that’s the amount I tend to use for most recipes and because the bags will then lie flat in the freezer, taking up less space.
  8. The Use: If you know ahead of time you want to use frozen marinara sauce, simply take the containers or bags out of the freezer the day before. If you decide at the last minute to use sauce, the sauce easily defrosts as it cooks in the microwave or in a pan.

 

Recipe Revamping: Oatmeal Crumb Cake

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“But it’s a craving….”

When I was pregnant, I never craved the unusual combinations like pickles and ice cream. I always craved one type of food. So, with my oldest I couldn’t eat enough whole grain bread, which was odd because I tended to prefer rice to bread as a norm – probably the Asian influence. With my middle child, I wanted vegetables all the time – fresh, cooked – how didn’t matter, but quantity did. My youngest seemed to want protein, chicken in particular, which struck me as ironic since with my middle child, I couldn’t eat chicken without feeling sick.

It’s been years since I’ve been pregnant, but I find that from time to time my body will crave something for days, and I usually take it to mean that I’m missing some nutrient or vitamin that my body needs.

Last week I wanted oatmeal. I couldn’t stop thinking about oatmeal, but I really wasn’t in the mood for eating a straight bowl of oatmeal. The weather was nice and sunny, and oatmeal for breakfast has always struck me as a cold weather food.

I started looking around for an oatmeal cake, but I discovered that most oatmeal cake recipes don’t actually have a lot of oatmeal in them, and the oatmeal cake recipes I found seemed to call for a lot of sugar, butter, and eggs. So, I set to work revamping a recipe….

Original Recipe:

Cake:  1 1/2 cups butter, 2 cups sugar, 4 eggs, 2 tsp vanilla, 2 1/2 cups flour, 1 1/2 cups rolled oats, 1 tsp salt, 2 tsp baking soda

Crumb topping:  2 cups flour, 3/4 cup light-brown sugar, 1/3 cup granulated sugar, 1/4 teaspoon salt, 1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
1 1/2 cups butter

Revamping the Recipe:

  • The oatmeal/flour ratio and substitution: Since I wanted a cake which had a lot of the goodness of the oats, the first thing I did was swap the oats to flour ratio. I opted to use 2 1/2 cups of gluten free rolled oats with 1 1/2 cups of gluten free sorghum flour. For the topping, I added 2 cups of gluten free oats to the recipe and cut the flour down to 1 cup of gluten free sorghum flour.
  • The butter: 3 cups of butter is just nuts! I decided to use 1/2 cup of vegan butter in the cake and added 2 1/2 cups of mashed, ripe bananas instead to help make the cake moist without all the fat. (You won’t taste the bananas in the cake, which was good for me because my middle child doesn’t like bananas but loved this cake!) For the topping I cut the butter to 1/2 cups of vegan butter, so that overall the new recipe had 1/3 the butter of the original.
  • The eggs:  4 whole eggs seemed a bit much so I decided to use only 2 eggs, but I added 1/2 cup of a homemade buttermilk (1/2 cup soy milk plus 1/2 tbsp of lemon juice) to keep my liquid amounts the same and to keep the protein I’d be losing from the extra eggs.
  • The sugar: Since I don’t use refined sugar, I swapped out coconut sugar for the refined sugar and cut the amounts, using only 1 cup of coconut sugar in the cake and 1 cup in the topping.
  • The spices: The cake didn’t call for any flavoring other than salt and vanilla. I cut the salt in half to 1/2 tsp, increased the vanilla to 1 tbsp, and added 1 tsp cinnamon, 1 tsp cardamom, 1/2 tsp nutmeg, and 1/2 tsp ginger. For the topping, I increased the cinnamon to 1 tsp.
  • The pan:  The original recipe called for baking the cake in a 9 x 13 pan.  I opted to use a 11 x 15 pan to increase the ratio of cake to crumb topping.

The results were wonderful. Everyone who tried the cake loved it, and my children decided it was their new breakfast choice and have asked me already if I can make it again, now that they’ve finished off the original. The complete recipe is below for anyone who wants to try it.

Oatmeal Crumb Cake

Ingredients:

1/2 cup vegan butter

1/2 cup mashed ripe bananas

1 cup coconut sugar

2 eggs

1/2 cup soy (or other milk) plus 1/2 tbsp lemon juice

2 cups mashed ripe bananas

1 tbsp vanilla

1 1/2 cup sorghum flour

2 1/2 cups gluten free rolled whole oats

1/2 tsp salt

1 tsp cinnamon

1 tsp cardamom

1/2 tsp nutmeg

1/2 tsp ginger

2 tsp baking soda

2 cups rolled oats

1 cup sorghum flour

1 cup coconut sugar

1 tsp cinnamon

1/2 cup vegan butter

Baking Instructions:

  1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and either grease or line a 11 x 15 pan with parchment paper.
  2. Blend the butter with the 1/2 cup of banana and coconut sugar; then add the eggs, milk with lemon juice, rest of the banana and vanilla.
  3. Combine the flour, oats, salt, cinnamon, cardamom, nutmeg, ginger, and baking soda.
  4. Mix the dry ingredients with the wet ingredients, and pour the batter into the prepared pan.
  5. Combine the oats, flour, coconut sugar and cinnamon. Using a pastry knife cut the butter into the dry mixture until all the butter is incorporated and crumbly clumps are formed.
  6. Evenly distribute the topping over the cake.
  7. Bake for 40 to 45 minutes until the top is golden brown. The cake would have puffed and will be firm to the touch and a toothpick inserted into the center will come out clean.
  8. Serve immediately or at room temperature. Keeps well on the counter top for days.

 

Creative Cooking: Chocolate Zucchini Cupcakes

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“They do look older!”

In our school district the fifth graders spend a week away from home, experiencing nature and science with their teachers. Having been through this before, when my youngest left for his trip, I wasn’t overly concerned. Some of the other parents, however, were anxious because this was their first time sending off a child, and they didn’t know what to expect.

I found, though, that sharing simple reassures from my own experience helped – the 1 to 8 teacher to student ratio, the highly competent and skilled onsite staff, being with friends and teachers whom they’re already comfortable with….

And I promised them that when their children returned, that not only would they have survived but that they’d come back having grown from their experiences. In fact, I told them that, even physically, their children would look older when they step off the bus. So, I had to chuckle when we picked up our children, and sure enough, several parents said to me, “They do look older!”

When I received an email this week, asking how in the world someone could create their own allergy-friendly recipe, it occurred to me that my response would be the same as it was to the parents….

Reassurances: Once you begin experimenting, the knack will come to you. As with everything, practice is the key, and you already have what you need. Refer to the early posts on this site about the standard ratios and patterns which exist for all baked goods. Re-read the information about individual ingredient substitutions. When you know that a cake always takes about 2 cups of flour and that you can substitute a ready-made gluten free flour blend in a certain ratio, experimenting does not need to be scary.

Promises: You will grow in your ability to create your own recipes simply by experimenting. The practice itself will give you a feel for what does and doesn’t work. Might a recipe fail? Maybe… but as Thomas Edison said about the light bulb, “I have not failed. I just found 1,000 ways that didn’t work.” Culinary mishaps are simply learning lessons.

I know, though, from many, many conversations, that folks will still be apprehensive about “experimenting” despite reassurances and promises, so I thought I’d walk folks through a recent experiment of mine.

Over the summer, I thought I had a coup because an online site was selling the allergy friendly chocolate chips I like for a ridiculously low price. I ordered several bags but was dismayed when they arrived because the company had simply shipped them in a plain box despite the 90 degree weather. The chips had completely melted and then re-solidified in square lumps. The company credited my money back to me, but I was still left with chocolate chunks instead of tiny individual chips.

Last week, my husband asked me if I could bake something for a colleague at work. I decided cupcakes would be good because they’re portable, and I could give some to the colleague and still have some for the children at home. I looked in the fridge and the pantry to see what I had on hand. Several zucchini were beginning to look a little sad, so I figured I should use them, but I wanted to jazz them up a bit. Mini chocolate chips would do the trick, but of course, when I went to the pantry, I only found my solid chocolate blocks.

Thinking I could break it, I started whacking at the block with a hammer, only to discover that the solid chocolate was stronger than me and the hammer. The few chunks I managed to break apart told me that I’d be there forever trying to created little chips. So, I pulled out my food processor. Obviously that would do the trick. I popped the chunks in and whizzed the blade.

Well, let me tell you now: When chocolate has been melted and re-solidified, and you pop it into the food processor with the hopes of creating little chips… you won’t get chocolate chips. You’ll make your very own sweetened chocolate powder. A 10 oz block will make 1 1/2 cups of chocolate powder, in fact. 1 1/2 cups of chocolate powder which I didn’t want to waste but wasn’t quite sure what to do with.

Not to be deterred, though, I plowed on. An average cupcake recipe usually takes about 2 to 2 1/2 cups of flour. I knew that if I swapped out 1 1/2 cups of that for the chocolate powder, my recipe simply wouldn’t work, because the chocolate powder wasn’t dense enough and lacked leavening, so I decided I’d just have to add it to the flour and then increase my liquid ingredients, because I knew that in cake recipes, the dry and liquid ingredients are always equal.

The chocolate powder plus the flour (I used a homemade mix of garbanzo bean, sorghum, potato and tapioca flours) came to 3 1/2 cups so I opted to use 1 cup of a homemade soy buttermilk (to add protein and help with leavening), 1/2 cup of unsweetened orange juice (to complement and bring out the zucchini and chocolate flavors), 1/2 cup safflower oil, 3 eggs (increased them from the usual 2 to 3 because the eggs and flour ratio are usually the same and whole eggs because I wanted a moist, dense cupcake), and 1/3 cup of agave (wanted a little sweetener but didn’t need a whole lot because the chocolate powder was sweetened).

My next consideration was the leavening powders. I knew that one needs about 1 tsp of baking powder and/or 1/4 tsp of baking powder per cup of flour, so I’d need something equivalent for the 3 1/2 cups of flour/chocolate powder. I decided to use a mixture of 2 tsp of baking powder with 1 tsp of baking soda (because I wanted my cupcakes to rise but not rise so high that it would sink, and a mixture does that best). I opted to add some spices – cinnamon, allspice and clovers – as well because they’d complement the chocolate and orange flavors nicely.

The final step was to think about the “sugar”. Most cake recipes call for two cups of sugar. I had already added 1/3 cup of Agave, so I knew I could cut back on the sugar to about 1 cup, but I didn’t want to use sugar because I never bake with it. Increasing the Agave at this point, though, would mess up the ratio of dry to liquid ingredients, plus make for a denser cupcake than I wanted; so I decided to use coconut sugar (which would help brown the cupcake nicely).

My experimental recipe was done, and I could only pop it into the oven and hope for the best.

They came out delicious. The chocolate powder made for a milder chocolate taste and for a lighter cupcake than if I had used melted chocolate.  My kids want me to make them again and sooner as opposed to later.

Yes, they could have flopped because it was an experiment, but using the knowledge I had about recipe patterns and ratios, I could methodically work my way through the changes, and the results were worth it.

If you begin experimenting, I both reassure you and promise you that you will find the same results.

Chocolate Zucchini Cupcakes

Ingredients:

1 1/2 cup chocolate powder*

2 1/2 cups gluten free flour blend**

1 cup coconut sugar

2 tsp cinnamon

1 tsp allspice

1/2 tsp ground cloves

2 tsp baking powder

1 tsp baking soda

1 tsp salt

3 eggs

1/2 cup safflower oil

1/3 cup agave

1/2 cup unsweetened orange juice

1 cup soy milk mixed with 1 tbsp lemon juice***

2 cups loosely packed shredded zucchini

Baking Instructions:

  1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and line 24 muffin cups with liners.
  2. Mix the chocolate powder, flour blend, coconut sugar, cinnamon, allspice, cloves, baking powder, baking soda, and salt and set aside.
  3. Blend the eggs, oil, agave, orange juice and buttermilk well and the zucchini to the wet mixture.
  4. Combine the dry and wet ingredients until the dry ingredients are fully moistened.
  5. Evenly divide the batter among the muffin cups. They will be quite full.
  6. Bake until the cupcakes are puffed and a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. Check at 15 minutes and adjust the time accordingly. Mine took about 25 minutes.

* A 10 oz solid chocolate bar processed in the food processor will yield the desired amount of chocolate powder.

** I made a homemade blend of garbanzo bean, sorghum, potato and tapioca flour, but you can use what you’d prefer.

*** It doesn’t have to be soy milk; you can use whatever type you’d prefer. Just be sure to add the lemon juice to make it a buttermilk.

 

 

 

 

Creative Cooking: Prunes and Beets

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“It’s so beautiful!”

My son has always been afraid of thunderstorms, despite everything my husband and I have done to convince him that he has nothing to fear.

Last week, however, we had a three day heat wave; and one night the hot temperatures brought severe thunderstorms. As I was driving home from a meeting, I noticed that the heat was causing an electrical storm to light up the sky a few miles away. I rushed home, yelled at my children to hop into the car, and drove back up to the main road.

As my son watched the “lights” in the sky, he commented on their beauty and suggested we put on some Beethoven to match the rhythm of the lightning. After several minutes of watching, he didn’t want to return home, though, finally, reluctantly, he did allow me to drive home.

As we drove, I asked him what he thought about thunderstorms now, and he said he never realized they could be so beautiful.

His reaction to the lightning storm is similar to what I hear people say about unusual foods like prunes and beets. So often, people “don’t like” them without having tried them. They think they know enough to make a finite decision about them, when really they don’t.

Prunes are high in fiber and don’t cause the same types of spikes in sugar levels while delivering a wonderful sweetness to anything you put into them. Beets are high in vitamins and minerals and fiber, and like prunes, have a naturally sweet taste. As such, both prunes and beets are great additions to desserts. Below are a muffin and a bread recipe I just recently created for the fun of it.

Banana Beet Bread

Ingredients:

1 cup mashed ripe bananas (ripe means they’re spotted brown on the peel)

3/4 cup roasted chopped beets (about two; roasting beets brings out their flavor more; then I just chopped them up in the food processor — you can also now buy the beets already cooked up in packages in the stores if you don’t want to cook them yourself!)

1/2 cup safflower oil

1/2 cup Agave

1 egg

2 cups gluten free flour blend of your choosing (I used a combination of flours which mixed garbanzo bean, sorghum, and brown rice flours with potato starch and tapioca flour)

2 tsp cinnamon

1 tsp nutmeg

1/2 tsp ginger

1/4 tsp cloves

1/2 tsp baking soda

2 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp salt

1 tbsp apple cider vinegar

Baking Instructions:

  1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Line a 9 x 5 pan with parchment paper so that the paper is sticking out of the pan for lifting purposes.
  2. Combine the bananas, beets, oil, agave and egg. Put aside.
  3. Mix the flour, cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger, cloves, baking soda, baking powder, and salt.
  4. Add the dry ingredients to the wet with the apple cider vinegar and quickly mix everything together until the dry ingredients are completely moistened.
  5. Pour the batter into the prepared pan and let it sit for about five minutes before putting it into the oven.
  6. Bake for 35-40 minutes until the bread if puffed, a golden red hue, and a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.
  7. Cool for five minutes on a wire cooling rack in the pan. Then use the parchment paper wings to remove the bread from the pan. Cool for another 10 to 15 minutes before removing the parchment paper and allowing the bread to cool completely.

Breakfast Prune Muffins

Ingredients:

9 ounces of pitted, chopped dates

2 tbsp garbanzo bean flour

1 cup gluten free rolled whole oats

1 cup boiling water

2 tbsp ground golden flaxseed

6 tbsp water

1 cup gluten free oat flour

1 cup garbanzo bean flour

2/3 cup potato starch

1/3 cup arrowroot starch

2 tsp baking powder

1 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

2 tsp cinnamon

1 tsp allspice

1 tsp ginger

1 cup blueberries

1 cup Enjoy Life mini chocolate chips (optional, but my children like it with them when I make them as a snack food for afterschool)

Four 6 inch bananas (comes to about 1 1/4 cups mashed)

1/2 cup safflower oil

2 tbsp apple cider vinegar

Baking Instructions:

1. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees and line 24 muffin cups with cupcake liners or grease them so the muffins won’t stick to your pan.

2.  Put the prunes and flour into a food processor and finely chop the prunes into tiny pieces. (This will distribute the prunes throughout your batter.)

3. Mix the finely chopped prunes with the oats in a bowl, and pour the boiling water over them, pushing the prunes and oats down into the water so they are covered. Let sit.

4. Whisk together the flaxmeal with the water, and set aside.

5. Whisk together the oat flour, garbanzo bean flour, potato starch, arrowroot starch, baking powder, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, allspice, and ginger.  Stir in the blueberries and chocolate chips and set aside.

6. Mash the bananas and mix with the oil and the prunes and oatmeal mixture and the flaxmeal mixture.

7. Make a hole in the center of the dry ingredients and pour in the wet ingredients along with the apple cider vinegar. Mix up quickly just until the dry ingredients are moist.

8. Evenly scoop the muffin batter among the 24 muffin cups and bake for 15 minutes or until the cupcakes are golden and puffed and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

9. Remove the muffins to a wire rack and cool completely.  These keep well in a tightly covered tupperware container.

Cooking Techniques: White Sauce

dairy free, egg free, gluten free, low fat, nut/peanut free, reduced refined sugar, soy free Leave a comment

Something simple yet versatile….

Every August finds me and my family up in the mountains of the Adirondacks where my husband’s family has been managing a forest for 60 years. Driving to the nearest major highway might get me two to three bars on my cell phone.  If I want to use the internet, I have to drive down into the local town to the library. Television viewing is limited to VHS tapes watched on a VCR. The radio picks up two stations, one of which is in Canadian French; and the house we stay in lacks modern amenities such as my coveted food processor, though we did upgrade the oven a couple of years ago from the kerosene/electric version to just plain electric.

For a number of years now I’ve been chief cook for the duration of my family’s stay, catering for dinners we have with the many folks who work for the family forest. While I enjoy the cooking, every summer I am reminded why modern conveniences such as food processors and hand blenders and Kitchen Aids are a joy to have in one’s kitchen. Chopping veggies for a ratatouille to feed 16 people takes about 5 minutes in my food processor — about five times as long by hand. A hand blender can turn lumps smooth in seconds — no matter how long you mash or stir with a masher or wire whisk, you’ll never get a puree. With a Kitchen Aid you can make a cake in minutes — creaming butter by hand takes a lot longer than one imagines it will.

As such, I love it when I can make something spectacular with little time and energy, so upon my return home I was thrilled to see a request for something “simple yet versatile.” My answer is just as simple: a basic white sauce.

White sauce is usually just milk, flour, and butter. On a stove top, you melt the butter (usually about 1/4 cup), stir in the flour (about 1/4 cup), add the milk (about two cups), and continuously stir until the sauce thickens. That’s it. Takes about 2 minutes.

But what you can do with a white sauce is amazing:

  1. You can adapt it to your needs: Have food allergies? You can use any type of “milk”, any type of flour, and any type of “butter” as a substitute. Trying to eat healthier? You can substitute 2 tbsp of olive oil for the butter or you can even omit the butter entirely and just stir about 1/2 cup of the flour into the milk and cook and stir until it thickens.
  2. You can add herbs and spices of any type. You want a curry sauce? Add curry powder. You want a garlic sauce? Simmer with minced garlic or stir in garlic powder. You want to try something a little different? Mix in a lot of thyme with a little bit of nutmeg.
  3. You can change-up the sauce: Want a cheesy sauce? Stir in shredded cheese or slowly melt in cream cheese. Want something with a more adult taste? Substitute a 1/4 cup of the milk with sherry or white wine or vodka. Want something a little less “milky”? Substitute half of the milk with a fat free, low sodium broth such as chicken or vegetable.
  4. You can add vegetables and meats: Looking for a veggie sauce to put over pasta or fish? Saute leeks, mushrooms and spinach and add to the white sauce with black pepper, thyme, and minced garlic. Want a nice sauce to use turn your leftover rice into a casserole? Chop leftover ham and chicken and throw it into a white sauce you’ve seasoned with curry powder.
  5. You can use it for anything: Like to make casseroles? Change up a white sauce to mix into any type of casserole — rice, pasta, veggie, meat…. Want to jazz up the side veggies or the chicken or fish? Make a sauce with freshly chopped herbs. Have just a little bit of leftover meats and veggies which you’re not sure how to use up? Throw them all into a more thickly made white sauce and serve them with toast triangles to the family.
  6. You can even use it for dessert: Want to jazz up your pie when you serve it? Make a slightly thinner white sauce sweetened with a little bit of agave with cinnamon, nutmeg and cloves. Looking for a nice topping for bread pudding? Make a vanilla white sauce by steeping vanilla beans in your milk before making the sauce. Want something to contrast with your chocolate cake? Make a sauce adding white chocolate which you can drizzle over the cake.

Recipe Revamping: Banana Cheesecake

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“I wouldn’t have thought of that!”

At a baking workshop I had last week where 32 people were present, the comment I kept hearing in response to my answers to their questions was “I wouldn’t have thought of that!”

I found this intriguing, because I don’t really think it’s that folks wouldn’t have thought of it. I think it’s more that sometimes we tend to accept things as they are as opposed to giving any thought to whether something can done be different.

This week I received an email asking if I could revamp a recipe, which always thrills me. I enjoy thinking about a recipe and seeing if I can make it healthier, allergy friendly, and yummy all at the same time.

It was a gentleman writing in this time about a cheesecake recipe. I was interested immediately simply because it was a banana cheesecake which I had never actually heard of before. He needed it to be dairy, nut and gluten free, but he also wanted to cut back on the refined sugar and fat.

The bananas:

Original Recipe: 2 large bananas, diced, cooked with 1 tbsp lemon and 2 tbsp brown sugar

I thought about the folks who said they “wouldn’t have thought of that” because one of the first changes I made to the recipe was to roast the bananas. The recipe called for cooking the bananas on the stove top with sugar. The easiest way to sweeten bananas without the use of sugar is to bake them so their own sweetness becomes concentrated.

The idea of roasting a banana, though, isn’t something people usually consider for home cooking. It’s quite easy to do, though. There are several different ways to go about it, but the way I prefer is to simply bake the banana in its peel. You preheat the oven to 400 degrees, put your bananas in a line on a cookie sheet and bake for about 20 minutes. Allow the bananas to cool until you can safely peel them, and then use the bananas as you’d like.

The crust:

Original Recipe: 1 1/2 cup finely crushed vanilla wafers, 1/2 cup chopped pecans, and 1/4 cup butter (plus 17 vanilla wafers for the sides and 1/2 cup coarsely topped wafers for the top) 

This recipe called for the use of a lot of vanilla wafers.  It needed crushed wafers for the crust, then more wafers for the sides, and finally coarsely chopped wafers for the topping. This is a lot of sugar, fat, and just plain empty carbs. It’s also not great for folks with food allergies.

For folks who want to use vanilla wafers, Kinnikinnick actually makes a gluten, dairy, nut free vanilla wafer. I’d recommend just using it for the crust, though, and forgetting about the sides and top. That alone will cut back on the calories, sugar and fat. Since I’m always in favor of adding something better if possible, I opted to use Jo-Sef’s gluten, dairy, nut free dark chocolate cookie squares, because these cookies are made with soy flour, which adds protein, and not just the usual rice flour. In addition, because it’s a dark chocolate cookie, the sugars in it are much less. I zooped an 8 oz box of cookies in my food processor for the crust.

To make it dairy free, I used a vegan butter instead. Since 1/4 cup is actually a reasonably small amount compared to most crust recipes, I kept the amount as is. To make it nut free, I simply omitted the pecans altogether, which also cuts back on the total fat, though nuts are considered good fats in general.

(FYI: If you want to make your own vanilla wafers, Gluten Free on a ShoeString actually has a gluten free recipe which can easily be adapted to also be dairy, nut, soy, etc… free.http://glutenfreeonashoestring.com/nilla-wafers/)

The filling:

Original Recipe: 3 8 oz pkgs cream cheese, 1 cup white sugar, 3 large eggs, 2 tsp vanilla

Since the crust was made with a store bought cookie which had some sugar, even if less than other cookies, I omitted sugar from the cheesecake filling, choosing to use Agave instead because I could then use half the amount of what would have been required of sugar.

To cut back on the fat, I replaced the whole eggs with egg whites, and to make it dairy free, I simply used tofu cream cheese instead. The vanilla, I kept as is.

The topping:

Original Recipe: 1/2 cup coarsely crushed vanilla wafers

As mentioned earlier, omitting the use of more vanilla wafers cuts back on the sugar and fat. It does, though, leave the cheesecake a little naked. So, I opted to make a sour cream topping with some amendments.

Usually a sour cream topping for a cheesecake calls for 2 cups of sour cream. I opted to use only one cup, though, to cut back on overall calories, and I used tofu sour cream to make it dairy free.

Sour cream topping usually also calls for anywhere from 1/4 cup to 1/2 cup of sugar. I used 2 tbsp of coconut sugar, and I added 1/2 tsp of cinnamon for some additional flavoring.

The size:

Original Recipe: Bake in a 9 inch spring form pan.

A simple trick for cutting back on overall calories, fat and sugar, is to change the size of the cheesecake. Instead of using a 9 inch pan, I used a 10 inch, which slightly spreads the cheesecake to thin the overall layer out. So when you go to cut the cheesecake, you can cut it into more slices which have a little less height to them, thus making for a little less of everything you’re eating.

Banana Cheesecake

Ingredients:

one 8 oz package chocolate cookie wafers (I used Jo-Sef’s gluten, dairy, nut free ones)

1/4 cup vegan butter, melted

three 6 inch bananas

three 8 oz packages Tofu cream cheese, at room temperature

1/2 cup agave

3/4 cup liquid egg whites, at room temperature

2 tsp vanilla extract

1 cup tofu sour cream

2 tbsp coconut sugar

1/2 tsp cinnamon

Baking Instructions:

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

2. In a food processor process the chocolate cookie wafers into crumbs. Empty the crumbs into a bowl and mix them with the melted butter.

3. Put the chocolate cookie mixture into a 10 inch springform pan, and evenly press the mixture into a bottom crust for the cheesecake.

4. Bake the crust in the preheated oven for 10 minutes. Remove and allow it to cool.

5. Increase the oven heat to 400 degrees.

6. Line the three bananas on a cookie sheet, and bake them for 20 minutes. They will be black and soft with some moisture oozing out of them when they’re done. Allow the bananas to cool.

7. Decrease the oven to 325 degrees.

8. In a mixer, gently blend the cream cheese until it’s smooth.

9. With the mixer on low, slowly pour in the agave until it’s all incorporated into the cream cheese. Be sure to use a rubber spatula to scrape the sides and bottom occasionally.

10. With the mixer on low, slowly add the egg whites until they’re fully incorporated into the cream cheese batter.

11. Add the vanilla.

12. Remove the roasted bananas from their peels, and mash them. Then add them to the cream cheese batter until they’re fully mixed in. Be sure to scraped down the sides and bottom with a rubber spatula once or twice.

13. Completely cover the bottom of the springform pan with aluminum foil and put the pan into a larger pan which will hold it.

14. Gently pour in the cream cheese batter into the prepared pan, and level off the filling so it’s even.

15. Pour boiling water into the larger pan until the water is halfway up the sides of the springform pan.

16. Bake in the oven for one hour.

17. Mix the sour cream with the coconut sugar and cinnamon. When the cheesecake is done at the hour mark, carefully spread the sour cream mixture evenly over the top of the cheesecake, and bake for 10 minutes.

18. Remove the cheesecake from the larger pan when it’s done, and allow it to cool for about half an hour to an hour on a cooling rack.

19. Remove the outside of the springform pan, and put the cheesecake into the fridge to completely cool. Usually it needs at least three to four hours.

20. Slice, serve, and enjoy!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Recipe Creations: Chocolate Chip Carrot Snack Cake

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“Yeah, but I’d rather eat that than cardboard.”

A couple of weeks ago, my son and I enjoyed a visit to a science museum where I was surprised by a new exhibit. They had created a room filled with information about healthy eating with a couple of hands-on activities for the children looking at skeletal bones and experimenting with food.

As we left the exhibit, we found ourselves behind a group of teenagers and overheard their conversation. One of the girls commented about the display that talked about how bad sugar was for our bodies, and one of the boys responded with, “Yeah, but I’d rather eat that than cardboard.”

I understood what he meant. Too often the “healthy” desserts don’t match up with our expectations for taste, and unfortunately, once someone’s had a negative experience, it turns them off to trying again.

Recently, my high school daughter had a couple of friends over, and they wanted something “sweet”. Since I don’t like to serve “junk”, I thought about what I could make, and carrot cake came to mind. The problem is that carrot cake in its traditional form is so utterly bad for you, despite the carrots. The fat content is really high because of the butter in the cake, the traditional use of nuts, and the cream cheese frosting, and to keep carrot cakes moist and binding, you use a lot of eggs.

I didn’t want to give up on this dessert, though, so I decided to work on a snack cake version, something without frosting and which would be considerably lighter in texture, taste, and calories — and of course, I wanted to eat it, too, so I made it allergy friendly for my allergies to wheat, dairy and nuts, making sure to add some flours higher in protein and fiber and minimizing the use of white refined sugar.

The result? My daughter, who has never actually liked carrot cake, loved it, and one of my daughter’s friends said it was the best carrot cake she’d ever had in her life. While I take that as the hyperbole it was, it is a reminder to me that if we continue to serve good tasting food which also happens to be healthy, then maybe, just maybe, we’ll find a way to reverse the trend of obesity, diabetes, and heart attacks….

Chocolate Chip Carrot Snack Cake

Ingredients:

1 1/2 cup gluten free brown rice flour blend (I used Authentic Foods)

3/4 cup gluten free oat flour

1/4 cup sorghum flour

2 tsp baking powder

1 tsp baking soda

1 tsp ground ginger

1 tsp ground cinnamon

1/2 tsp ground cardamom

1/2 tsp ground nutmeg

1/4 tsp salt

1 cup Enjoy Life mini chocolate chips

20 oz container crushed pineapple in its juices only

3/4 cup agave

3/4 cup safflower oil

1 cup egg whites

2 cups loosely packed shredded carrots

1 tbsp apple cider vinegar

2 tbsp agave

1 tsp ground cinnamon

1 tsp ginger

Baking Instructions:

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and line a 9 x 13 pan with parchment paper.

2. Mix together the brown rice flour blend, the oat flour and the sorghum flour with the baking powder, baking soda, ginger, cinnamon, cardamom, nutmeg and salt.  Add the chocolate chips. Mix well, and set aside.

3. Drain the crushed pineapple and remove 1/2 cup of the crushed pineapples. Reserve the remaining pineapple. Puree the 1/2 cup pineapple in a food processor until it’s smooth.

4. To the pureed pineapple add the agave, safflower oil, egg whites, and shredded carrots. Mix well.

5. Add the carrot mixture to the dry ingredients with the apple cider vinegar. Blend just until everything is incorporated together and the dry ingredients are moist.

6. Pour into the prepared pan and bake in the oven until the cake is golden and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. It took about 25-30 minutes for me, so I suggest setting the timer at 25 min and then checking.

7. While the cake is cooking, take the remaining crushed pineapple and mix it with the agave, cinnamon and ginger. You can put it into the fridge if you want it cold.

8. When the cake is done, serve slices of the cake with dollops of the spiced crushed pineapple.

 

 

 

 

Happy Fourth: Berry Crisp

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website berry crisp

“I want something easy….”

Happy Fourth of July! I received an email yesterday, asking for a dessert that could feed a large amount of people, would be allergy friendly, was Fourth of July-ish, and would be easy to make. Fortunately, I had just the suggestion.

Berry Crisp. It’s one of my children’s favorites, and my son always says that it reminds him of the Fourth of July because of the color of the berries. What I love is that if you keep frozen berries in your freezer, you can whip this up quickly and easily any time of the year.

Berry Crisp

Ingredients:

one 16 oz pkg frozen blackberries*

one 16 oz pkg frozen raspberries*

one 16 oz pkg frozen blueberries*

one 16 oz pkg frozen strawberries*

1/4 to 1/2 cup favorite GF flour (I use either garbanzo bean or sorghum or GF oat flour because they have more fiber and protein than others; use the smaller amount if you want a juicier crisp and the larger amount if you prefer a drier crisp)

1/2 cup Agave (if you like a sweeter crisp, increase this to 3/4 c)

1 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp nutmeg

1/4 tsp ginger

4 cups gluten free whole grain oats

1/2 cup GF flour (I use either garbanzo bean or sorghum or GF oat flour because they have more fiber and protein than others)

1 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp nutmeg

1/4 tsp ginger

1/2 cup melted vegan butter

1/4 cup Agave

Baking Instructions:

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Lightly grease an 11 x 15 pan with your favorite method. (If you don’t have a large pan like this, you can use several smaller dishes like the three pictured above.)

2. Empty into and mix all the frozen berries in a large bowl with the flour until they’re coated.

3. Combine the agave with the cinnamon, nutmeg and ginger and coat the berries with the agave mixture.

4.  Cover the pan tightly with aluminum foil, and bake the berries in the preheated oven for about half an hour until the berries are warm and soft and starting to bubble a little.

5.  While the berries are cooking, mix the whole oats with the flour, cinnamon, nutmeg and ginger. Mix together the melted butter and agave, and mix the oats with the butter mixture. Set aside and let the oat mixture cool.

6.  After the berries have cooked for the half hour, remove the foil from the pan, and reduce the oven to 325 degrees.

7.  Give the oat mixture a good stir. (The oats should be cooled now and have formed little clumps.) Evenly spread the oat mixture over the berries.

8.  Bake the crisp in the lower heat oven for another 15 to 20 minutes, just until the oat mixture has begun to crisp up and brown just a little.  The berries will be bubbling. (Be sure to check after 15 minutes because the oats can become too toasty very quickly.)

9.  The crisp can be served while warm with vanilla “ice cream” or “whipped cream” or just plain. It can also be eaten room temperature or cold.

If you have leftovers, you can wrap it and leave it on the kitchen counter or you can put it into the fridge.  My son thinks it’s a great breakfast food!

* NOTE: Obviously, if the season is right or if you simply prefer and don’t mind paying more, you can use fresh berries instead of frozen. If you use fresh berries, then you don’t need to use very much flour at all, so reduce the flour coating to about 2 tbsp or leave it out altogether, depending on how juicy or dry a crisp you prefer.

Cooking Techniques: Fish

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Wonder twins activate!

If you are of a certain generation in the U.S., you probably grew up watching the Hanna Barbera Saturday morning Super Heroes cartoon. In this particular cartoon, all the super heroes are working together to save the world, and the wonder twins are a boy and girl team whose powers must be activated by the two of them connecting in a certain way.  When they do, they become one unit which is better equipped to fight evil than if they had remained separate.

I thought about this the other day when a mom wrote in about my last super foods post, asking whether I had any suggestions for how to get her children to like fish. In my experience folks tend to either like or not like fish, but I do believe there are ways to get your children to tolerate fish. The trick is to combine ingredients in such a way that they become something better than the fish by itself.

Some Suggestions:

1. Coat the fish: Most children will eat fish sticks, but storebought fish sticks aren’t necessarily the healthiest and while they do make gluten free versions now, they don’t always meet other allergy needs. You can, however, make your own coating for fish. Use the type of wholegrain bread which fits your dietary and allergy needs and simply process them in your food processor to make bread crumbs. The best crumbs are flavored, so add fresh or dried herbs of your choosing and/or garlic and/or onions and black pepper as you’re zooping the bread crumbs.

The healthiest way to cook breaded fish is to bake it in the oven. If you crinkle up aluminium foil and use it to cover a shallow baking pan, your fish won’t stick the way it would otherwise. Coat the aluminium foil with a little bit of a healthy plant oil like olive oil before placing your breaded fish onto the pan.

For the fish itself, you can use beaten whole eggs or egg whites or a type of milk as your liquid for which the breading can stick to. I recommend double coating your fish for the best adhesion and taste. You can either double coat it with the bread crumbs or what I prefer is to coat the fish first with flour such as garbanzo bean or sorghum or gluten free oatmeal which I’ve mixed with some herbs and black pepper, and then I coat it with the bread crumb mixture.

After your fish is laid out on the pan, use a brush to lightly coat the top with olive oil so you’ll get that nice crunchy texture that kids tend to like.

The best way to bake the fish is at a high temperature such as 400 or 425 degrees for a shorter length of time. Most fish bakes in less than 10 minutes, as long as they’re not too thick.

When serving the fish, you can make up sauces for your children to dip with whether it’s a fancy homemade ketchupy type or a tartarish sauce or a yogurty, fruity type. If you have a few options, you increase the chances of your child finding a combination he or she likes.

2. Glaze the fish: The most common complaint folks tend to make about fish is that it’s fishy, so when making fish for children, you want to give them a different flavor that they can taste instead.

One of my children’s favorite glazes for fish is simply a mixture of soy sauce, agave, garlic, onions, and ginger. I mix the glaze well and let the fish marinate in the sauce for at least half an hour in the fridge. Then I either bake the fish, broil it, or grill it. Broiling or grilling the fish will allow the sauce to cook directly onto the fish. Baking it will make a liquidy sauce which you can spoon over the fish when serving.

You can experiment with different types of glazes. Maybe your children prefer something fruity and you could use an all fruit jam as a glaze. Maybe you like the taste of balsamic vinegar and want to make a glaze with that. Use your children’s taste buds as your guide.

3. Top the fish: If your children don’t really like fish but love salsa or spinach dip or tartar sauce, put it on top of the fish you cooked so that your children are eating something they like with something they’re not as fond of.

My children love when I put a roasted eggplant dip onto broiled fish. I make this dip where I chop up one eggplant into one inch pieces, mix it with a little bit of olive oil, and roast it for 10 minutes at 500 degrees, turning once or twice during the cooking time. I then puree the roasted eggplant with minced garlic and onion, black pepper, and one 14 oz can of diced tomatoes, preferably fire roasted but sometimes just plain or the versions which have herbs or garlic and onions mixed in.

When the fish is done broiling, I put as much of the eggplant dip as each child wants on top of the fish, and they love it.

When making a topping for your children, think about what they like. If they like salsa, experiment with different types of salsas, whether store-bought or homemade. I like to make a pineapple salsa where I simply puree up tomatoes, pineapple, onions, garlic, peppers, fresh cilantro and cumin. Sometimes we use mangoes or peaches instead. All are tasty on fish.

4. Stuff the fish: My children like stuffed fish because then you taste more of the stuffing than the fish. You can use leftover actual stuffing. You can cook up a mixture of spinach and vegetables with herbs and a type of cheese. You can even stuff the fish with fruits like dried figs or sauteed apples.

There are couple of ways to stuff fish. The traditional way is to put the stuffing ingredients on the fish and then to roll the fish up around the stuffing. Another way is to layer some fish in a pan, top with the stuffing mixture, and then top the stuffing mixture with a second layer of fish. Either way works. For both, simply bake in the oven until the fish is fork tender, usually about 20-30 minutes. For fish which is stuffed, I suggest baking at a lower temperature like 350 or 375 degrees.

5. Sauce the fish: You can top fish with just about any type of sauce. Tomato sauce, a white sauce, a cheese sauce, a spinach sauce, a tartar sauce – whatever your children prefer. One of the ways my children like to eat fish is when I bake it with a pureed, saucy salsa with cheese sprinkled on top.

Another way is when I make up a spinach sauce where I whisk 2 cups of soy milk with 1/4 cup of sorghum flour and slowly cook it over low heat until it thickens. Then I add 10 oz thawed frozen spinach, garlic, onions, oregano, and thyme. When the spinach has begun to warm, I add a couple tablespoons of Tofutti dairy free cream cheese. It makes a wonderful sauce for just about any type of white fish.

The key to getting your children to eat fish is to find something which they like to pair with the fish. Then the fish becomes more than just fish to their taste buds.

Menu Munching: Avocados

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KONICA MINOLTA DIGITAL CAMERA

“The best is an orchestra.”

At a recent event for writers, a gentleman shared a story about his grandfather who said that people should be like an orchestra, each complementing one another in harmony to make the world a better place for everyone.

I thought about this when I received an email this week asking me about the hype around super foods. If you look at the list of super foods, you’ll see that they’re fruits, nuts, veggies, beans, whole grains, fish, and spices – essentially and simply an orchestra of naturally existing, non-processed, complementary foods which when eaten make for better health.

It’s not that they’re super. It’s that we unfortunately have fallen away from eating them, and our bodies are craving them. For some folks, it’s the cost. The fact is that the natural foods are a lot more expensive than processed. For others it’s the maintenance. Fresh foods don’t last as long, so they need to be eaten quickly and replaced more regularly which requires more trips to the store. For many it’s that our lives are busy, and we need food which have longer shelf-lives because we’re simply not home to eat the fresh food in the fridge.

The fact, though, is that our bodies need certain vitamins and nutrients to function optimally, and eating a wide variety of fruits, veggies, nuts, whole grains, beans, fish and spices provides what our bodies need in ways that processed foods simply cannot.

In the email, the question was specifically about avocados and why the hype and how to incorporate it into one’s diet.

Avocados are high in fiber, nutrients like potassium, vitamin K and folate, and the good monounsaturated fats our bodies need, so yes, people are advocating it as a super food. Like all the foods on the list, though, it needs to be a part of a healthy varied diet to have any benefit. If you’re eating unhealthy all the time, simply adding avocado to your menu isn’t going to make your body super.

As an addition to a healthy diet, though, avocados can add variety if you’re in a food rut. You can add them onto salads and sandwiches, make soups with them, stuff them, put them into smoothies, and you can even add them to cake recipes. For most folks, avocados mean guacamole, though, so I’m going to focus on that today.

Guacamole often gets a bad rap because it’s most always associated with the tortilla chips people tend to eat with them. It’s the tortilla chips that are unhealthy; not the guacamole. Guacamole is actually a combination of super foods: avocado, garlic, onions, citrus juice, jalapeno peppers, and sometime tomatoes. So, eating it is a good thing, though one should eat it as a veggie dip or a sandwich spread as opposed to a tortilla chip dip.

Making Guacamole:

1. Purchase good avocados: You want avocados which are dark green, soft to your touch, but without any brown, overly soft spots. When you go to the store, though, the avocados are almost always unripe. So, look for ones which are green with no brown and/or soft spots in them, firm to the touch and heavy in your hand. When you bring them home, put them into a paper bag, and check them after a day or so. When they’re ripe, they’ll be soft when you press into the skin with your finger. If you have the time to wait, you can also simply leave the avocados in a bowl on your counter, and they’ll ripen over time.

2. Prepare the avocados: Avocados are easy to cut. You simply cut in half around the pit and twist. When the avocado is ripe, the seed will simply slip out with very little aid from a spoon or knife. If the pit is sticking to the avocado flesh, it’s a clear sign that the avocado isn’t ripe. When avocados are ripe, you can put a spoon around the edge between the skin and the flesh and the avocado flesh will simply fall out of the skin. If the flesh is sticking to the skin, it’s either unripe or overly ripe.

3. Decide on the ingredients: Guacamole is usually a combination of avocados, citrus juice, garlic, onions, and jalapeno peppers with folks sometimes adding tomatoes, too. You can decide what you want to use. Since I don’t always have fresh jalapeno peppers and onions in the house, I often use dried red pepper flakes and onion powder. I also prefer to use Meyer lemons over lime juice, and since my children don’t like tomatoes in their guacamole, I don’t include it. You can decide whether you want to use all fresh ingredients or some dried like me. You can choose whether you prefer the taste of lime or lemon juice. You can decide whether to be a purist or to add tomatoes or even experiment with other additions. Some folks like to add herbs like basil to their guacamole. Most add salt and pepper to taste.

4. Begin with a basic recipe: A basic recipe I follow is:  Put the flesh of two avocados into a large bowl. Begin with 2 tablespoons of squeezed citrus juice, 2 tsp of minced garlic, and 1/8 tsp each of onion powder, black pepper, salt, and red pepper flakes. Mash the ingredients into the avocados so everything is combined but the avocados are still chunky. Taste and see what you need to add more of to your liking. If you’re using all fresh ingredents, start with 2 tsp of minced onions and seeded, jalapeno peppers and then see if you need to add more or not.