Desserts I Would Have Made

I had big plans for this holiday season. Plans to make healthful alternatives to bring with me to gatherings so that I could "indulge" but stay on track. Then I got smacked upside the head by first trimester fatigue and nausea. And let's be honest, I sorta deserved it for trying to be the annoying healthy girl during Christmas anyway.

But I might want to try it again next year, so for posterity:

The Easiest, Healthiest, Most Scrumptious Fudge Ever (Haven't made this, but it looks awesome.)

Cocoa Jingle Balls (I've made these and really enjoyed them.)

Homemade, Healthier "Reese's Peanut Butter Cups" (Haven't made these, but how could you go wrong with peanut butter and chocolate? HOW?)

Apple Zucchini Almond Meal Pancakes

We eat eggs for breakfast almost every day, but on the weekends, I like to cut loose and make something a little fancier. I’ve been using this basic almond meal pancake recipe for the last year, and when I follow the instructions (something I’m not always good about doing), they come out great. Adam was shocked how much they tasted like regular pancakes.

I used to use Stevia as my sweetener, then honey, but often I just skip the sweetener entirely. I’ve also experimented a bit with adding different fruits to the mix (since I try replace other sweeteners with fruit as often as I can).

Last w I decided to add some grated apple and cinnamon since it was a rainy morning that finally felt like fall. There was some zucchini on my cutting board, so on a whim, I decided to grate a bit of that too. Like zucchini bread, right?

(One of my college roommates always kept zucchini on hand to grate and add to pretty much anything. It’s a lovely, inexpensive and neutral-tasting vegetable that stretches meals without adding a lot of calories.)

These smelled so good that Adam and Agustin came wandering in from the next room, Agustin signing “food, food,” to see what was cooking.

RHH Almond Meal Pancakes

1 cup almond flour

2 eggs

1/4 cup water

2 T coconut oil (plus extra for greasing the pan)

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup fruit of your choice (bananas, apples, etc.)

Optional: 1/4 cup coconut flour if you’re adding fruits/vegs with higher water content

Combine all ingredients in bowl. If you’re using coconut oil and it’s cold out, take extra care to get all of your coconut oil mushed in (CO is solid at cooler temps).

Cook in a pan or griddle just as you would with standard pancakes.

Keep your pan at a lower heat because these do take a little longer to cook through, I find, and keep an eye on how brown they’re getting (they won’t bubble like normal pancakes; you just have to keep checking them).

This has to be the worst “end product” picture in history. These pancakes do crumble more easily than standard pancakes, but if you handle them just a little carefully, they’ll hold their shape. I am just incapable of handling anything carefully. They were quite yummy though. Agustin and I had ours with just butter on top, and Adam had butter and honey on his since we were out of maple syrup.

Chicken Cashew Curry

People actually requested this recipe when I left Australia. I felt like such a big girl! This was my “comfort food” meal when I was off dairy, and I’d make it at least once a week (I need a lot of comfort).

I started making this when I was trying to figure out how to use coconut oil. If you read any of the hippy health blogs, you will hear people talking about coconut oil like it’s a Magical Elixir of Life. I think it’s probably a good thing to include in one’s diet (better than most other oils), and certainly it’s been consumed by healthy people groups for a long time. So I use it quite a bit.

I’m okay with the taste of coconut (I just hate the texture of shredded coconut…AGHPHHT), but I just couldn’t bring myself to use coconut oil in place of oil or butter in just any dish. The safest way to start seemed to be to do a curry.

Chicken Cashew Curry

You will need:

• Coconut oil
  
• Coconut milk
• Curry paste (check ingredients and make sure you know what everything is)
• Vegetables (whatever is seasonal and sounds good, but if you need suggestions: bell pepper, snap peas, cabbage, carrots, broccoli, eggplant, zucchini, etc.)
• Chicken
• Cashews
• Rice (optional)

If you’re including rice I usually start that in a large deep sauce pan.* That way I can just pile everything on top once the rice is cooked (I am a very lazy cook and I hate doing dishes). Your next step or first step is to dump a boatload of coconut oil into your pan** and about a third of the amount of curry paste you intend to use. I used to use raw chicken, and I’d add it at this point. If your chicken is cooked,*** add the vegetables first. Stir, stir, stir. If your chicken was raw, add veggies when it’s cooked.

Check your email. When the veggies are done to your liking, add the rest of the curry paste and the coconut milk. Stir, stir, stir. Turn off the pan; it’s best to let everything sit for a bit so that the flavors blend or whatever (check Facebook; post smug status that you’ve just made a delicious curry dish). Just before serving, top with cashews.

*When I’m making rice, I use homemade chicken stock instead of water.

**I’ve been reading Good Calories, Bad Calories by Gary Taubes, and it’s convinced me to be a lot more liberal with my fat. The book is rather dense, but if you want a snapshot, I think his 2002 article What if It’s All Been a Big Fat Lie gives you the gist of it. Or just take my word for it and mindlessly dump coconut oil into your friggin’ pan.

***This is a great way to use up all of the cooked chicken you end up with when you’re making stock all of the time.

Stock

At least once a week I make a whole chicken and use the bones for stock.

I make it exactly as described here, but I do it in the crockpot like she says she used to do it.

Raw chicken. You are welcome.

Homemade stock tastes better than store bought, and I know what's in it. I've heard that you end up with more nutrients in homemade too. Hard to know for sure if that's true--I'm sure it varies. I heard it's high in calcium in particular, which is why I started making lots when I was off dairy, but if you try to confirm that in a Google search you mostly find other people trying to find out if it really is a good source of calcium. It seems like it would make sense since there's calcium in bones, but what do I know.

Broth (which I also use a lot of), chicken meat, and bones/fat/meat for stock.

Anyway, I continue to make it so that I always have some on hand since it's the base of many of my meals.

Blogging for Apples

Last week was a significant “first” in my journey of motherhood: Agustin had to bring a snack to share. (They grow up so fast, right?)

I had just seen this Cheesy Apple Rings idea on Frugal Granola and wondered if could make it a bit more portable and bite sized. I did a test run and the answer was no.


You may notice, however, that few pieces are missing. Though I’m avoiding fruit during my sugar detox, I had to try one for research purposes. And it was so delicious, I had some more. And then I quickly took the picture because I wanted finish them. You should probably go make some now. I’ll wait.

So I went with Plan B which was baking some apple slices with some cinnamon on top (and I sent the cheese separately).



The issue with the cheesy apples is that they really need to be eaten right away. And I’m not just saying that because I have no self control. It’s the melted cheese that causes the issue, which is what I was afraid of and why I did the test run.

The cinnamon apples, on the other hand, are delicious warm or cold. And I needed them to be good cold because our activity was in the morning and I wanted to make these ahead since I’m useless in the mornings.

We got back some leftovers, and they were still yummy (again, I had to test for research purposes). When I reincorporate fruit, I think I’ll try these with crème fraiche for dessert. They could be good with yogurt too.

As simple as they are, I'm convinced these are "guest worthy." The fact that they make your kitchen smell like heaven in the fall is an added bonus.

Baked Cinnamon Apples
You will need:
Butter
Apple slices
Cinnamon

Preheat your oven to 350. Grease a cookie sheet with butter, line up your apple slices, sprinkle cinnamon over them, and pop them in the oven for 10-15 minutes.

Reflections

Working on some posts on stock, beef sausage, soup, and some yummy fall snacks… In the meantime, I thought I’d unload on y’all the stuff that’s been rattling around in my brain.

I’ve gone on occasional health sprees since high school when I gave up butter. My last year of college, I adopted a very low fat diet that consisted mostly of organic fruits and vegetables. I tried to avoid meat and have fish when I did eat meat. I visited health food stores, used a lot of apple cider vinegar and tofu, and ate a handful of plain almonds when I was so hungry I couldn’t go on. I slimmed down, became very self righteous, and was hungry much of the time. I was also briefly Kosher at some point, and I’ve been low-carb several times.

In December of last year I gave up dairy, sugar, and gluten all at the same time to try to help my son's reflux problems and prevent thrush. It worked; it also helped me shed the baby weight and then some. And I collected several new recipes--mostly because going without dairy was not something I'd ever tried before.

In the past year I’ve read a lot of alternative viewpoints on nutrition; the Paleo/Primal and Real Food/Slow Food/Nourishing Traditions perspectives were the ones I concentrated on the most. There’s a lot of overlap in what these different camps espouse, but there were many places they disagreed with each other. And I disagreed about a few things too just based on what I feel like my body needs (and I’m willing to really question a lot about what we “need”).

Eventually I started to go a little crazy. I wanted someone to give me the “right” answer.
I just don’t think that there is one right, tidy answer. I hate that.

This summer I finally read The Omnivore’s Dilemma (had been meaning to read it since, uh, since it was published in 2006). You’ve probably heard the author’s conclusion: Eat real food. Not too much. Mostly plants.

I really resonated with his more laid back (in comparison) approach. Particularly the part about asking yourself how long a certain food has been eaten by humans and if the populations that ate this food appeared to be healthy. I’ve also been hugely guilty of what he calls “nutritionism” in the past—concentrating on a certain nutrient or superfood. I’ve always believed that we don’t know everything about what makes certain foods healthy and what synergies are at play when we eat foods whole and in certain combinations, but it’s easy to get caught up in the latest media hype.

Adam read it with me, and he liked it too, and it really helped that he was in agreement. Then we read In Defense of Food, and I took away even more about how certain cultures have developed ways of dealing with food and how far some “food” products in the supermarkets are from actual food. And I realized that I was going to have to be very careful about where our food comes from. And that I would have to cook. A lot. And since I didn't grow up with anyone from the "old country" showing me any traditional cooking methods, I'd have to figure out a lot of things on my own.

I tend to freak out about what I should be eating and end up in one of my crazy health kicks or else I’m so discouraged that I completely stop trying. I’m working on keeping an even keel now and developing healthy habits. I’m experimenting with what works for our family, and maybe it’ll give you some ideas as you try to figure out what works for yours.

À votre santé and all that.

Wanna-Be Green Smoothies

Several weeks ago at the farmer’s market, I visited my greens vendor just before the market closed. I picked up a bunch of chard and he told me I could have two for that price—but the way he said it, I had a feeling people had been refusing this deal. After all, how much chard can you eat? When I readily accepted, he asked me what I did with it.

Well, I’ll tell you what I do with it.

I drink it. And so does the possum (who happened to be drinking it at the moment of that transaction).

Wanna-Be Green Smoothies
You will need:
1 banana
1 cup plain yogurt
¾ cup frozen fruit
½ cup of a liquid*
As many greens as you can stand**

Put in blender. Blend. They won’t actually turn green if you’re using fruit that has color; hence the “Wanna-Be.”


Actually, there is a little more background work that I do. I buy at least one bunch of greens each week, and the day I bring it home, I steam it.
I let it cool off in the pot, and then I just press it into an ice cube tray and freeze it (the tray I use has a cover). Then I pop 3-4 cubes into our smoothie.

Obviously green smoothies aren’t an original idea, but they were one that I’d forgotten about before. Also, when you try to find green smoothie recipes on the internet, a surprising number of people want to sell you their green smoothie books. I got annoyed and just started throwing whatever vegetables I had around into my smoothies. There are fancier ways to make them, particularly if you want to cut out some of the fruit, but I say bah, including any greens someplace where you otherwise wouldn’t, and making a habit of it is a good start. I plan on experimenting with upping the veggie to fruit ratio, and you’ll be the first to hear about it.

In the meantime, I’ve successfully enticed my greens-hating niece into drinking these (“What’s in it, Auntie?” “A banana.”), and Agustin chugs them.

*I used to use orange juice. Then I started experimenting with other juices like pure cranberry and prune. I’ve also used carrot juice. Since I give them to the possum these days, I use whole milk, which makes them a little more milkshake like. I prefer juice, but I appreciate the lower sugar level.

**I usually use kale, collard greens, chard and sometimes spinach in a pinch. The first three I use the most because they’re supposed to be really good for you, but I haven’t yet discovered any way I enjoy eating them, so this is how I get them down the hatch.