So tired...

I haven't been posting much lately.

It's because my schedule hasn't really permitted it. I remember a time when I could spend hours typing fanfiction and blog updates and not even blink. The past two weeks haven't been anything like that.

My apologies.

I've got tons of great recipes languishing in my camera's eye, waiting to be blogged about. But for now, I'm sitting tight and trying to hang on even tighter. My guess is that tomorrow I'll be able to navigate to a shoal on the rapids of paperwork long enough to actually post something.

Thanks for your patience!
naomi

Burrichaladas (When Enchiladas and Burritos collide)

Pretty?

Maybe not.

Tasty?

ZOMG!

This recipe was super good, and relatively quick and easy to make (I always make extra beans to store for make-over meals like this)

Warm, homemade corn tortillas (use storebought if you don't want to make them) are topped with a really savoury bean and eggplant-meat filling (there's that pesky eggplant, again!), loads of cheese, and a nice GF enchilada sauce.

This is really a cheater meal for me... so I didn't bother making homemade enchilada sauce.

The Carnivore liked it...said it needed more cheese (and come to think of it- note to self- probably lettuce!) The boys scarfed it down.

Burrichaladas
1 can gf enchilada sauce or homemade

8 corn tortillas (we made them, using masa, water, and a hot griddle, but you can buy them)

1 pound colby-jack cheese

1/2 pound/4 c cooked, mashed beans (we used canary beans)
1/2 pound eggplant 'meat from the marinara recipe, mixed with a healthy few tbsp of Goya Adobo -- essentially salt, garlic powder, and dried oregano

optional: guac, sour cream, lettuce, tomatoes-chopped





Not in the mood for that?
I also made a fun raw loaded-nacho that was pretty good.

Spaghetti Squash With "meaty' Marinara

Beautiful, isn't it?

I fell in love with the raw vegan way of preparing 'meat' out of nuts and eggplant, and began to experiment with cooked versions of the same thing.

I've made this meat sauce several times, with the same reviews -- it looks and tastes very, very, VERY close to the real deal. Which is a good thing if you've got a Carnivore in the family.

THe spaghetti quash on the other hand... well, that was at the request of my six year old, and the Carnivore wasn't too happy with that.

Tonight I altered my usual 'meat' sauce, by using almonds instead of walnuts, and adding two green peppers to the food processor. It was a more subtle sauce -- less meat, more marinara -- and it was soooo good.

We served this with imported, grated Parmeseano-Reggiano, but shaky cheese or a nice vegan nurtitional yeast/almond cheeze will do nicely.


Meaty Marinara
1 pound eggplant
about 2 c walnuts or almonds
2 green peppers (optional)
2 tbsp gf soy sauce (I hear that all soy sauces made by the traditional method are actually GF, but if you're nervous, stick with a safe one)

Chop all of these on the pulse section of your food processor, or grate/chop finely. Stir into a nice organic marinara sauce (we bought one...Ragu Organic).

Serve on top of cooked spaghetti or spaghetti sauce.

Naomi's Take on Taku: Peruvian Comfort Food Reconstructed

New Englanders have hash, The English have Bubble and Squeak. Peruvians... well, Peruvians take comfort food to a whole nother level. Taku Taku, which is a sort of leftovers-done-over was originally a Creolle food (read:slave) but it's been adopted by the richest, smarmiest restaurants in the United States (granted, they serve it with foi gras or some other ridiculous accompaniment).

Essentially taku taku in its original glory, is mashed beans and rice, seasoned with all kinds of oniony/saffrony goodness, fried until it has a crisp crust, and topped with a fried egg and plantains. If you're into over easy or 'up' eggs, it's a textural mouth-orgy waiting to happen.

I happen to think that the original presentation of taku taku is ugly as sin, and the preparation is ridiculously long and exhausting; so I took it upon myself to reconstruct the recipe for a friendlier, more attractive approach.

For those of you familiar with Puerto Rican Quisine, this has a similar feel and taste to Mofongo (but without the intense garlic overkill). Which means that it's notoriously heavy and filling.

A few notes on AUTHENTICITY:
CANARY beans are an absolute must for this recipe, at least if you want to be authentic. I dunno, after cooking, it seemed like they were terribly close to Great Northern Beans or even Limas; but I don't want to offend any purists more than I already am, so... use Canary Beans. :)

Naturally I didn't use the authentic pork fat and bits because a) pork is nasty and b) this IS a vegetarian blog. You can find plenty of real, pork-happy taku taku recipes on the net, if you want. Knock yourself out.

Aji Amarillo (which, to the best of my knowledge is a peruvian yellow pepper sauce) is hard to obtain here, so we used a regular yellow pepper, sauted and pureed, instead.

Here's my recipe, in any case:

Taku Taku Reconstructed
1 pound canary beans, soaked overnight and cooked till soft.
3 c cooked rice

4 tbsp olive oil
1 very large onion, minced into very fince fragments (we used a food processor)
3 cloves garlic minced
salt
pepper
1/2 tsp oregano
1 tsp American saffron (annato)

1 yellow pepper, sauteed in olive oil till very soft and pureed in a blender till smooth
more olive oil


very ripe, sliced Plantains
eggs

Heat the oven to 375 degrees. Prepare four oven safe soup bowls or casseroles on a cookie sheet.

In a small saucepan saute the minced onion and garlic in the olive oil, and add the annato, oregano, salt and pepper to taste, until soft. Remove half of the mixture and set aside.

Add the yellow pepper puree to the mixture that remains in the pan, along with enough olive oil to coat the bottom. Turn up the heat to medium high.

In the food processor, or by hand, mash the beans until they're a chunky paste. add to the mixture in the pan and stir for several minutes, until the paste begins to thicken. Add the rice, and stir some more. When the mixture looks like it's starting to brown/stick to the bottom of the pan, carefully spoon the mixture into the bowls and set them in the oven. Bake for at least 30 minutes, or until a golden crust forms. (this took me 45 minutes).

Meanwhile, fry plantains in butter or oil until caremelized.
About 3-5 minutes before taku is done, fry your eggs.

Slip the taku taku onto a plate, cover with an egg and some of the reserved onion sauce. Add plantains to the dish, and serve.

Vegetarian Not-Quite Gumbo

So we had an abundance of squash. An abundance of tomatoes. And a friggin motherload of okra. Didn't really know what to do with it, so I created a recipe that is a melange of influences, from Puerto Rican rice and beans and Louisiana Gumbo.

We're not really doing fish anymore... price and mercury levels not really permitting... so I used dulse flakes to give the not-quite gumbo a sea taste without the sea-meat.

Pinto beans provided protein and body.

We used a large no-idea-what-it-is squash, which looked rather like a pumpkin. Feel free to sub in any firm fleshed winter squash you choose.

Everyone liked this dish, and it was even better the next day.


Not-Quite Gumbo
1 pound of pinto beans, cooked in water

1/2 c olive oil
1/2 c Better Batter Gluten Free flour, or really good cup-for-cup substitute
2 c diced onion
2 c diced green peppers
1 c diced celery
3 cloves minced garlic
4-6 cups chopped tomatoes
4 quarts vegetable stock or water
1 tbsp dulse flakes
1/8 tsp dried oregano
1/8 tsp thyme
1/8 tsp black pepper
1/8 tsp cayenne
1/8 tsp celery salt
1 tsp paprika
1/4 tsp basil
1 large winter squash, cut into 1/2 inch cubes
1 pound okra, with the stems cut off

1 large pan warm cooked rice.

Keep pinto beans aside.

Saute the olive oil and flour, until the flour thickens. Add the onion, green peppers, celery, and garlic and saute until soft, about 5 minutes. Add the tomatoes, water, and seasonings and saute for another 5 minutes. Add the winter squash, okra, and beans, and simmer over low heat for about 30 minutes. Or until okra is tender and squash is beginning to soften.

Serve over rice.

Vegetarian Dirty Rice

Vegetarian Dirty Rice

Dirty Rice was one of my favourite things to order at the Bojangles Restaurant growing up. Eggplant and sunflower seeds replace chicken livers for a seamless trasition to vegetarian. This is a great meal, especially if enhanced with some GF chile beans.

1/2 cup oil

1/4 cus Better Batter Gluten Free Flo, or a really good cup-for-cup gf flourur

1 cup minced onions

1 pound eggplant AND 1/2 pound hulled sunflower seeds, chopped into a very slightly chunky paste (use a food processor)

1/3 c celery, minced

1/2 c finely minced parsley

1/2 cup diced green pepper

1 clove garlic, minced or crushed

2 tsp salt

1 tsp pepper

1/8 tsp cayenne pepper

4 1/2 c vegetable stock

2 c long grained rice

Cook the rice in the stock.

IN a large pot, heat the oil and simmer the flour in it till the flour thickens. Add the onions and saute for several minutes. Add the eggplant pate and saute for several minutes. Add the celery, parsley, and garlic and saute for a minute or two, then add the salt, pepper, and cayenne and cook for another 3 minutes. Mix the cooked eggplant mixture into the cooked rice. Put in a 350 degree oven and allow flavours to meld for 20 minutes, then serve warm.

Optional, add 2 cans of GF chile beans for a full meal.

Watermelon Sorbet And Chocolate Mint Ice Cream

The weather's finally starting to fluctuate between cool and abysmally hot, which means at any given point in time I've got hot tea brewing and ice cream churning at the same time. Not a bad thing, mind you, but slightly schizo, if you ask me. I made these two delicous cold treats on the same day, and we ate ourselves into an ice-cream headache. Totally worth it. I don't have pics for the chocolate mint ice cream (it was scarfed too quickly). Sorry!
By now you should realize how ridiculously easy it is to make ice cream, if you have one of the new, handy-dandy ice cream makers that don't need salt and ice.



Watermelon Sorbet
1 large seedless watermelon
3/4 c agave nectar or, if you must, sugar

Blend watermelon and agave in blender till smooth. Freeze according to directions (about 25 minutes). Put in a separate bowl and let 'cure' in the freezer for another 2-3 hours, if desired.


Chocolate Mint Ice Cream
2 c coconut milk
1 c nutmilk
3/4 c agave nectar
1/4 c raw cacao (or 1/4 c chocolate chips)
several sprigs fresh mint (I like chocolate mint for this, but peppermint is dandy) or a few drops mint extract.

Blend all ingredients in your blender. Freeze in your ice cream freezer. Let cure for several hours in the freezer and top with magic shell, LOL.

So I had a Day Off Today

So today was my day off.

HAHAHAHHHAHHHA


Sorry, had to get that out of my system. People who are stupid enough to own businesses don't get days off in the middle of the week. Silly me.

I looked at locations from which to launch a smallish factory. Found one, for a lovely price. Needs a bit of work, but what doesn't?

Also heard from several distributors and a university who are going to carry my product.

(Dear me mother, I've officially gone into Trade! What would Fitzwilliam think of me????)

Which of course means I'm going to rule the world.

You may not know this, but secret messages (written backward in latin, no less) are encoded my blog. World taking-type messages. I'd tell you, but then they wouldn't be a secret.

Okay... I'll tell you one: It says.... never mind.

So where was I? Oh yes, I worked 10 hours. And not 10 hours-but-I'm-secretly-surfing-the-net-and-chatting kind of hours either.

Good thing it was my day off.

Oh and had a huge order come in right as I was finishing and starting to make dinner.

Which means several more hours of work in addition to the ones I already had planned for tomorrow.

I've had a few weeks of this, btw.


So now you know where I've been and why there's been no updates.

Anyone want to buy a small manufacturing firm for several million dollars?

Fun with Raw Foods: Berry Sorbet and Lime Daquari Sherbert

Have I mentioned lately how hot it is?? So hot. Soooo hot. Too hot to do anything hot. Well, to do anything but make lots and lots of frozen goodies. I've come up with two more icy treats to tempt your tastebuds... Berry Sorbet and Daquari Ice Lime Sherbet. Take a moment, wipe your mouth, and print out these recipes to try:


Mixed Berry Sorbet
2 quarts assorted mixed berries
3/4 c agave OR 1 Tbsp Stevia w/Inulin
Water

Blend Berries and Agave or stevia. Add enough water to make 1 1/2 quarts.

Pour into Ice Cream Maker and Freeze.

Daquari Ice Lime Sherbet
Zest of two limes
1 cup agave nectar
2/3 c freshly squeezed lime juice
1 1/2 c water
1c fresh nutmilk
3 Tbsp Rum OR 1 tsp rum extract

Blend all ingredients together and freeze in Ice cream maker.

Pizza Night at the Poes

We have a semi-regular pizza night (semi, because in the summer it's usually too danged hot to cook), where I set out all kinds of colourful veggies and toppings and just let the kids go wild building the pizza of their dreams. Usually I have to yell at them to stop hogging up all the toppings, because they like to pile theirs somewhere in the 2-3 inch category, leaving cheese for the rest of us. Fortunately for me, mozzarella still does okay for me. Unfortunately for them... I want my stinkin' toppings!

Something I like to do, to make things easier, is to make pizza crusts in individual sizes and freeze them in a stack. Then I can just thaw out what I want, build my pizza, and pop it into the oven. If I'm feeling really rushed, I'll pull out a pre-built pizza and cook it from frozen. My recipes for pizza crust (BOTH normal GF pizza crusts and Better Batter Flour Pizza Crusts) and full techniques and instructions for making pizza and crusts ahead, with every variation you can think of is on my regular GF, sadly neglected, blog.

This particular night, I was also experiementing with RAW food, and I tried a dehydrated pizza recipe from one of my favorite raw foods cookbooks, the Rainbow Green Live-Food Cuisine Book.

Okay, Let me just say... this was possibly the worst pizza I've had in my life. Bad enough not to give you the recipe... The toppings were pretty good (I picked them off and ate them), but the crust was like a huge, thick slab of pesto-flavoured nut-butter. It was rough, I tell you. ROugh Rough. Make-something-else-to-eat rough.

Fortunately, I'd grabbed a bunch of toppings from my sons (eggplant, onion, green pepper, tomato, chantarelle mushrooms, shaved brazil nuts, black olives, basil) and was able to peg together a Pizza Salad.

Pizza salad is essentially all those ingredients in a nice italian vinagarette, especially heavy on the fresh oregano. Even better after it's marinated for several hours. I ate this for two days.

As for the rest of the family, they had a really great time chowing down on real, cooked, hot pizza.

If you're inclined to make pizza, feel free to follow my basic directions on my blog.

Add whatever toppings you desire, and it's pizza heaven! The pictured pizza below had artichoke hearts, fresh bufaletta mozzarella, black olives, green peppers, chantarelle mushrooms, thinly sliced fresh heirloom tomatoes, and minced onions-n-garlic, oregano, and basil. Like Pizza Hut, only scads better for you!

Fun with Raw Foods: Mock Fish Sticks...Because I'm on a Nori kick

I'm trying all kinds of fun and exciting ways of using (read: hiding) everyone's favorite (or least favorite), ubiquitous summer veggie.... and this one is , to say the least, a very original idea.

I got the original idea, for mock fish sticks from a fabulous forum that I've been lurking in ... The Raw Freedom Community.

There was a great looking recipe for mock fish stick, but of course, me being me, I couldn't leave it alone, and this is the result. Be warned: This recipe take a good bit of work, and a loooooong time to dehydrate, but I have to say, it was pretty good, even by the Carnivore's standards. Which means, he'd eat them.

They're also pretty cheap.

Don't be alarmed by the amount of cayenne pepper in the receipe. It's necessary in order for your mouth to perceive 'heat' but not "hot" in the OMG I've got to have a gallon of water NOW kinda way. Even the Carnivore, who hates spicy, didn't get overheated. But, erm... if you don't believe me, feel free to halve the amount.

Mock Fish Sticks

2 cups Eggplant
4-5 cups zucchini
2 tsp finely minced onion

Raw nori sheets

Marinade:
1 cup extra virgin olive oil
1 tsp paprika
1 tsp cayenne pepper
1 tsp dried basil
1/2 sheet nori, torn up
1 tsp sea salt

Batter:
2 cups raw sunflower seeds
1 tsp sea salt

1/2 cup golden flaxseeds

Cut eggplant and zucchini lengthwise into fillets about 1/3 inch thickness and soak them for at least 24 hours.

Press excess water out with a paper towel.

IN the bowl of your food processor, combine eggplant with the onion and marinade ingredients and process till smooth.

Remove to a mixing bowl. IN the food processor, chop the zuchinni until it resembles fish flakes (slightly coarse but very small.)

Mix the ingredients the eggplant mixture and the zucchini. This is your "fish" mixture.

Cut each nori sheet into quarters. Fill the nori strip with about a Tbsp of the mixture, in a long strip. Roll the nori into a cigarette shape (it will be like a 4 inch long cigarillo, actually!), and gently press the sides down.

Place the fish cigarillos on food dehydrator sheets and dehydrate at 145 for 2 hours.

Remove from the dehydrator. Flatten gently with your fingers until the cigarillos turn into little rectangles that resemble....fish sticks!

In the bowl of your food processor, grind the Sunflower seeds and salt until smooth, adding water if necessary, to make a 'pancake batter' consistency.

Grind the flaxseed until it resembles a meal.

Dip the marinated, nori cigarillos in the batter and cover completely on both sides, then roll in the flaxseed, pressing to adhere.

Place on the dehydrator tray and dehydrate at 105 degrees for about 2 hours and then flip it over and dehydrate for another hour.

Extreme PB&J (peanut free)

It's hot. It's too dang hot. It's too dang, dang hot to cook. So I made an ice cream we could eat for lunch. If you really wanted to round this out, you could slather this between two slices of GF bread and freeze, or if you wanted to be eeeeeeviilllllll you could make GF cookie bars and slap it between those, and freeze.

We just eat it in a bowl because, like I said... it's too dang hot.

This ice cream is (of course *eye roll*) dairy free, boys and girls, and tastes almost exactly like peanut butter and jelly (which is weird because there's not a peanut or grape in sight... didja know grapes give me migraines, too??). It's also raw (whaddayaknow!)



Extreme PB and J Ice Cream

1 c raw cashew butter (you can make your own by processing cashews with just enough oil to flow)
1 c brazil nuts
4 c very ripe blackberries
1/2 c raw agave nectar


Optional: Keep 1 c of the berries reserved, blend into the agave nectar, and stir into the ice cream AFTER it's done, then let cure. Otherwise...

IN a blender, blend the cashew butter, brazil nuts, and blackberries till smooth. Stir in the agave nectar. Freeze per your manufacturers directions, or put in a bowl and stir every 10 minutes for 2 hours.

Fun with Raw Foods: Mock Tuna Salad

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I'll get around to posting the huge array of recipes I promised, But first...

You're not going to believe how good this is, and how close it tastes to real tuna fish (can anyone out there remember real tuna fish?) I mean, even if you're not a vegetarian, the thought of all that mercury and overfishing... and the cost of 'safe' tuna? *shudders* Here's a tuna salad you'll love. Don't be weirded out by all the ingredients... they all combine to make the best mock tuna ever.



Mock Tuna Salad
1 Cup Almonds (with skins, soaked and air dried)
1 Cup Raw Walnuts (soaked)
1/4 fresh lemon (and I mean ALL parts)
1/2 Tsp. Garlic (minced)
1/2 sheet Nori (NOT toasted, obviously!lol)
2 Tbs. GF Tamari or dark miso
1/4-1/2 c water
*******************************
In FP blend seeds, nuts, garlic, nori & Tamari, until the mixture resembles very dry tuna fish (I use the pulse button about 12 times. It may take more). Remove 2/3 of it and transfer to bowl. Add the lemon and water to remaining 1/3 and process until it's very smooth. Mix this into the coarser mixture.

Add:

1 pickle chopped (Bubbies pickle)
1 Tsp. Ume Plum vinegar
1/4 c Bubbies pickle juice
1 tsp. fresh Dill Weed (chopped)
1Tbsp fresh parsley (chopped)
1/4 Cup Onion (chopped)
1/4 Cup chopped Celery


Stir until mixed!

All Right.... hang on tight!

I'm going to be posting a lot of recipes tomorrow:

Vegan, Raw cheesecake (tastes like girl scout samoas, yum! at least to me)

A Pizza Recipe.

A Raw, vegan Pizza recipe review. And the really good supreme pizza salad that came out of that disaster.

A nice pepper slaw

a recipe for Extreme PB&J (you'll have to wait and see what that one is)

Chips Ideas

I've decided to make several kinds of the same dish (regular vegetarian and raw vegan) at the same time, mostly to see if it can be done (to have similar tastes with different techniques), but also because I DEFINITELY cannot have dairy (MIGRAINES!!!) ugh...the mouring ove rthe lost cheese is unbelievable.

Granted, I can have mozarella...but might as well try new things, while I can, right?

I'm also trying a new, raw, vegan Fruity Pebbles recipe, and I'll let you knwo how it goes, once it's finished dehydrating.


Dunno how long I'll be in the mood to cook this much (raw food has crazy prep times attached, in general... like 4 hours for a single pizza, ugh)


I'd post tonight, but really.... I'm toast. Too much dehydrating and cooking for one day. Seriously.
*kisses*

Fun with Raw Foods: Spaghetti Bolognese and Blackberry Sorbet

I've been so fascinated by raw foods that I've decided that I'm going to 'go raw' at least one day a week, if for no other reason than to learn new 'un'cooking techniques.

This morning I started my day with a large, beautiful bowl of summer fruit salad and a large glass of nutmilk. Somewhere in the middle of the meal I decided to dip my plums into the vanilla nutmilk -- Holy Mother of Yum! Vanilla and Plums is a great combination.

On another note: Vanilla and Mangos...not so good. *shudders at the memory of curdled nutmilk*



For lunch we went to our usual Chinese restaurant, where I feasted on watermelon and Kimchi. For those of you who don't know, Kimchi is a fermented cabbage slaw with a lot of kick (from crushed red pepper and garlic).

Of course somewhere along the line something went terribly wrong...and I got glutened (suspecting hidden soy sauce?)...I dunno. When I make kimchi I don't use soy sauce, so... it's all speculation.


For Dinner I was really in the mood for some pasta. I've read over and over again that summer squash, zucchini, and young coconut are really great for pasta, so I took one of my handy-dandy summer squashes, peeled it and then used the peeler to shave linguini noodles from the squash. This yielded about a pound of 'pasta' -- I'd probably make twice as much in the future, because you get huuuuuuungry very quickly with this kind of food.

For the sauce I used: 2 ripe tomatoes; 1/2 cup of sun dried tomatoes in olive oil, pureed;
2 cloves garlic; several tbsp fresh oregano, several tbsp fresh chocolate mint; 1/2 c fresh basil; 1/2 c fresh parsley; 1 tsp sea salt; 1 small carrot; and 2/3 c nutmilk. I blended all this up.

Now you might be wondering about the mint: It adds a complexity to the dish that is welcome and makes up for the subtle 'meat' flavour you'd expect from the sauce.

Now I had a great tasting 'Bolognase'... but it was ice cold.

This is where thinking outside the box paid off for me. The theory behind raw cooking is that you really don't want to cook anything over 110 degrees (120 degrees is the max). I figured that most people don't want truly 'hot' food -- they usually wait for it to come to a comfortable temperature. All I needed to do was to get this food to a comfortable (read: warm) temperature, and it would be golden!

To do this I set my oven to 110 degrees, made up my plates, and put them in the oven till the food was warm (this took me all of 7 minutes). Bam! Instant, palatable raw food.

Another trick: add some crushed red pepper instead of 'parm.' the heat of the pepper really does fool the mouth (in the aftertaste) into thinking it's had a 'hot' meal.


Of course when you're eating this way you can really afford to do the dessert thing, so I cranked out some sorbet made from fresh, wild Blackberries that my children picked.

To Make:
1 quart fresh blackberries
1 1/2 c agave nectar

Blend the agave nectar and blackberries. Sieve out the seeds. Freeze in your ice cream freezer or, alternatively, whisk every 15 minutes for 2-3 hours in a bowl. Cover with plastic wrap or some airtight seal and let 'cure' at least 3 hours.

Kids love it.

Big Mouth Veggie Burgers

Okay, so I'm really, reaaallly excited about this one for so many reasons.

For one: I've found a way to hide eggplant and zucchinis (which are cloning themselves in my backyard, and apparently are the same thing in my CSA farm, which means there's entirely too much to go around. *le sigh* It's kale month all over again...).

For another: This thing tastes pretty darn close to real, and it looks pretty darn close to real, and... The Carnivore liked it. 'Nough said.


I picked up a lot of tips and tricks from my raw-foody friends and decided to use them in the making of these burgers. The whole dehydrating thing solves a lot of the problems we Martha-Stewarts tend to have with homemade veggie burgers-- you know, too wet, too crumbly, won't stay together, gets soggy... whatever.

If you wanted to make the burger vegan, you could easily sub in flax-egg for the eggs. And, I suppose you could make this raw by simply dehydrating the things for an extra couple of hours.

Also, feel free to sub in soaked, chopped walnuts for the soy protein. (we're using up what we've got left before dropping soy)

As for me and mine, we chose to go all the way and ate these, cooked, on nice fluffy fresh GF white hamburger buns with lots of crinkle fries and some cucumbers.

One note -- the last minute frying/sauteeing in oil of these is really really key to making the mouth feel of a real burger. If you're not against cooking, please try this! Recipe instructions below:

Big Mouth Veggie Burgers

5 cups eggplant, with skins, cubed
1 large zuchinni, cubed
1 onion, minced
3 cloves garlic
1 healthy tsp black pepper
1tsp DRIED oregano
3 eggs
1/2 cup (generous) Worcestershire sauce
1 1/2 cups almond-Parmesan mixture (from my other recipe)
1 cup Better Batter Gluten Free Flour (or really good GF flour with xanthan gum in it)
2 cups tvp, reconstituted with hot water

1. IN blender, grind 3 cups of the eggplant, the zuchinni, the onion, garlic, black pepepr, oregano, and Worcestershire sauce, until smooth.

2. Add the rest of the eggplant and blend until chunks the size of peas remain.

3. Add the almond parmesean mixture, flour, and tvp. Let sit for 10-30 minutes.

4. Line several baking sheets with parchment paper. Using a spoon and your hands, form the mush into burgers on the paper (this will be soupy, like soupy oatmeal).

5. Dehydrate in the oven at 110 degrees for 6-8 hours, flipping after three hours (carefully!) to ensure both sides get done.

6. Fry in oil right before serving (we like coconut oil!). Assemble burgers and eat.

Delish.

How to Do Really Good Fried Rice

Fried Rice is pretty straightforward-- take leftover rice, fry it with other leftover tidbits, and serve.

But there's a difference between fried rice you'd serve along side of a dish and fried rice you'd serve AS a dish.

This is one thing I've got down to a science. Even the Carnivore actually REQUESTS this as a main meal.

There are a few secrets to really good fried rice, and being the generous gal I am, I'll share them with you.

First, make sure you sprout your rice. This will, of course, make the rice stickier when you fry it...but it will also stick to your ribs and satisfy you. To sprout rice, just soak it in water for at least 24 hours (this is only going to work if you use a fresh, nice brown rice, not that white stuff).

Second: Make sure your rice is really stale. It helps to keep it in the fridge, uncovered, for a day or so.

Third: Essential... sesame oil (abou t1/4 tsp in your cooking oil), ginger (not powder), garlic, soy sauce/tamari (gluten free, of course!).

Fourth: Not essential, but great...1/4 tsp of saffron or american saffron added to the cooking oil.

Fifth: If you're going to add eggs, make them separately, in OIL (NOT butter)

Sixth: Peas and Carrots. Dunno why, but peas and carrots make the best fried rice. Oh...add a really finely diced onion.


Here's the basic ratios:

2 quarts stale brown rice
1/2 c coconut oil (or other oil)
1/4 tsp sesame oil
1/4 tsp saffron (yellow colour)
1/2 tsp ginger paste or grated
2 cloves garlic, crushed
pinch salt
1 onion, minced
2-3 c mixed frozen peas and carrots
2-3 eggs, scrambled separately

sesame seeds for topping.


Fry everything and mix together. YURM

Because it's hot... Bananas Foster Ice Cream

Yeah, so that's a really zoom up of the picture. But Good Golly Miss Molly, do you see how luscious that ice cream is? And it's dairy free. I have to crow a bit because the Carnivore took a single bite and exclaimed (exclaimed, mind you!!!) "That's good!"

High praise, indeed, from the man who might possibly say "That's decent" for something utterly divine. If the Carnivore calls it good, it's really good. Company good. Forget-company-and-shag-your-wife good.

Anyway, I think you'll like this one: it's easy, quick, and as I said before, DAIRY FREE!!!! (Having such a happy summer, I am). That 50.00 ice-cream maker was soooo worth it.

Bananas Foster Ice Cream

1 Cup Nut Milk (feel free to use rice milk)
2 Cups Coconut Milk, full fat
3/4 cup agave nectar
2 tsp vanilla
3 large bananas
1 tsp cinnamon
1/4 c golden rum

In your blender, mix the milks, agave nectar, and vanilla. Freeze according to your manufacturer's instructions (mine takes 30 minutes), or pour into a bowl and freeze, beating every 15 minutes for three or so hours.

Clean your blender.

Place two bananas and the cinnamon and rum in the blender and blend til smooth.

Cut up the remaining banana into small dice and mix into the smooth sauce.

Remove the ice cream from the mixer and fold the banana sauce into the soft ice cream. Place in the freezer (top with an airtight seal or plastic wrap) and freeze til firm.

Homemade Magic Shell

See the incredibly guilty looking dessert on the left? That's health food, ladies and gents! I kid you not.

When I was growing up I was literally addicted to Magic Shell Topping. You remember Magic Shell, right? It was a really sweet, watery chocolate syrup that miraculously hardened on ice cream to produce a coating that was strangely reminiscent of Klondike Bars.

The taste was weird... kind of like really bad Easter candy. And that's what made it so good.

As a kid I remember sneaking into the kitchen to add extra Magic Shell to my ice cream. This degenerated into pouring Magic Shell into a spoon and freezing the spoon. Things only continued to spiral downhill from there. Somewhere along the journey, I found myself drinking the stuff from the bottle, warm... I told you I was addicted.

Anyway, since going healthy, I've religiously avoided the stuff. Avoided and missed it terribly.

Tonight the craving got too bad, so I decided to make some for my family. How hard could it be, I mused...

Magic Shell's main ingredient seems to be oil -- all kinds of scary, hydrogentated oil. Scary, hydrogenated COCONUT oil.... I wondered if I could use coconut oil (the real, unrefined, beautiful kind that I could literally eat plain) and real chocolate and achieve the same results.

Obviously you can guess from my pics that................I DID IT!!!!!!!!!!!! And the best part? It's good for you. Coconut oil is a great thing to take for metabolism and general health, and darker chocolates are also supposed to be good for you... so I can rationalize this one into eternity.

The weirdest part? It tastes 'right'... guess that taste was the coconut oil all along. For those of you who are wondering, 'right' is weird at room temperature, and divine frozen.

This shell goes only satiny smooth and very thin, and freezes to a perfect shell-like finish.

Now, if only someone would stop me from drinking it from the canning jar (old habits die hard, I suppose).

Homemade Magic Shell Topping

1 cup coconut oil

about 1-2 cups semi-sweet, bittersweet, or dark chocolate chips or chunks



1. Melt the coconut oil over very low heat in a small saucepan.

2. A little at a time, whisk in the chocolate chips, until the mixture resembles very thin, chocolate syrup (those of you who've had Magic Shell know exactly what this looks like). We needed about 1 1/2 cups.


That's it! This stuff stores at room temperature. IN a cold room, make sure to heat over very low heat on the stove.

Oven Baked Chiles Rellenos

Of course pepper season is upon us, and I was really excited (and in the mood for) some serious mexicano fixin's. Chiles Rellenos is something I always order when out.... and usually find disappointing. Most of the time I get a slimy, soggy, greasy sodden mass of cheese and egg on a mush-thats-supposed-to-be-peppers.

There are exceptions. One night, coming home on a winding, mountain back road from a celiac support group that was several hours from my house, I stumbled on a little diner. I walked in, expecting to order my traditional "salad, no croutons PLEASE with a side of fries, but only if they've been in a dedicated fryer and by the way can I see the seasoning on them?" and found instead Rellenos Nirvana. I highlight the words because the food was that good.

Turns out this hole in the wall is the property of a native Mexicana and OH MY GOSH could that woman cook. Real mexican food (and gluten free???) in Pennsylvania? There is a God.

I'd try to describe the dish, but really I was in a haze of food ecstasy and only remember flashes of brilliance -- it is those flashes that I tried to recreate here.

Anywhoodles, what you need to know is that this meal was so delicious and easy that it deserves a special place in my recipe collection. Slightly softened Poblano chiles highlight fresh bean puree, seasoned with fresh herbs. Coriander provides a hidden, special flavour accent. A light batter poured on top of the chiles and baked helps lighten the dish, somewhat, before cheese and sour cream weigh it down.(Hey, they help take the heat...and the migraine...was totally worth it).

For a special flavour, try using a good Gouda cheese (like Vincent). The nutty flavour brings out the taste of the batter.

One note about chiles: Poblano, the most commonly used chiles for Rellenos
vary widely from pepper to pepper in heat. For this reason, I don't reccomend adding additional cayenne or other spicy seasonings to the dish. If you find the dish too milk for your taste, load on some hot sauce and go to town!

Feel free to use dried herbs, but remember to reduce the amount by at LEAST half.

Here's the Recipe:

Chiles Rellenos

4 Poblano Peppers (use large chiles), green peppers will do, but won't be as good
2 tbsp coconut oil
cumin

2 1/2 cups cooked or canned abichuelas rosadas (pink kidney beans)-- feel free to use any bean
Several teaspoons fresh cilantro
1 teaspoon fresh coriander ( you can use 1/4 tsp dried)
several teaspoons fresh oregano
several teaspoons fresh parsley
1 teaspoon salt ( we use sea salt)

3 eggs
3 tbsp Better Batter Gluten Free Flour

4 ounces Gouda Cheese, or feel free to use any mild, white cheese
1/2 cup sour cream
salsa

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

1. Heat the coconut oil in a heavy saucepan. Cut the peppers in half and seed and de-vein them. Fry the peppers in the oil ONLY until the peppers blister. Sprinkle with cumin, remove from heat, and place in a casserole dish.

2. In your blender mix the beans, herbs, and salt.

3. Spoon this mixture into the peppers, filling completely.

4. Mix together the egg and flour and pour over the peppers. This will be thick. Feel free to thin it with a bit of water to preference.

5. Place casserole in the oven and cook for 15-30 minutes, or until batter sets and peppers are softened to your preference (we like them still firm...al dente).

6. Remove from oven, top with cheese, sour cream, and salsa, and serve.