No Bakin' Required!

Vegan Gluten Free No Bake Peanut Butter "cookies" (that really ended up being a brittle/toffee)

Here's a recipe that I altered to make vegan and gluten free. For the original recipe check it out here: Suzie The Foodie.

I have quite a few people on my holiday goodie list that have food restrictions (specifically vegan or gluten free, or both!) so I am always up for the challenge of finding recipes that look good to me that can be altered to meet my needs. This recipe is one such recipe. The original is full of glutens and corn syrup- I did my best to take that all out without sacrificing any of the yummy taste. So here's what I did.

Ingredients:

1 cup Brown Rice Syrup (**** here's the reason why the ended up crunchy like brittle. apparently brown rice syrup hardens like in candy making. So stick to the corn syrup if you want them to be like the original recipe. I'm going to play around with this and add some coconut oil and see if I can keep them from being hard and crunchy)

1 Cup sugar ( I actually substituted some of the sugar with Maple Sugar- which is a little *less* bad for you)

1 teaspoon of vanilla extract

pinch of sea salt

1 1/3 cup peanut butter

4 cups of gluten free flake cereal ( I used Arrowhead Mills Sweetened Rice Flakes)

handful of non-dairy semi sweet chocolate chips (I used Trader Joes Brand)

In a large saucepan heat the brown rice syrup, sugar, vanilla and a pinch of salt. Bring to a boil and then reduce heat. Simmer for 2 minutes. Carefully add the peanut butter- I do mean carefully, the previous mixture will be very hot and you don't want to splash yourself with it while you add the peanut butter. Stir to melt into mixture.

Add 4 cups of cereal to mixture. Stir to combine. Add a handful of chocolate chips (optional). Stir until melted. Using a greased ice cream scoop ( I "greased" mine with earth balance vegan "butter") scoop cookies onto parchment paper. Let cool. YUM!! *see my note below the photo for an accidental variation I found!
* These actually turned into more of a peanut brittle type consistency. Next time I make them I will spread them out into a thin later and break them up like brittle. These scoops were too hard to eat and I had to break them up. So this recipe needs to go back to the drawing board.

The Smoothie of Mixed Feelings....

The Fruit and Vegetable Smoothie

as seen as part of a detox diet from Whole Living Magazine

I'll start off by saying this smoothie is the most glorious color I have ever seen. I had really high expectations for this smoothie because the ingredients are so packed full of flavor I couldn't imagine it being anything but a flavor explosion in my mouth! But alas this was not to be so.

Last night I steamed the beets and carrots (as seen below in all of their glorious jewel like colors), in preparation for making the smoothie this morning before work. I am not a morning person therefore I do not give myself enough time to get ready in the morning as is without having to chop and steam veg in the morn, so when I make smoothies or pack a lunch everything must be done the night before.
I got up 15 minutes earlier this morning so I could assemble and drink this before my normal morning ritual begins. I eagerly grabbed all of my pre-chopped fruits and veg and dumped them into the blender.
I pulsed that baby and watched as the ingredients combined together to the most beautiful raspberry, magenta color- this was exciting!! This is where I also became a bit wary.... "hmmm, I thought, "doesn't this look a bit thin and watery?" I poured a wee bit into a little juice glass and had my first taste. BORING! I mean just bland! I felt like I was drinking flavored water. So I added a banana, cuz you know, bananas can sweeten and thicken up any smoothie. So the below result is the smoothie after the addition of the banana.

My final thoughts? Well the addition of the banana helped but it was still too watery and still not packed with flavor. It wasn't the worst thing I'd ever had but also wasn't delicious. So what I'm thinking is this- this was included in a detox diet regime so I'm thinking that this isn't supposed to taste spectacular its just meant to fulfill the detox or nutritional side of that regime. After talking to some girls at my work about it we came to this conclusion- half the amount of water. I think the water just diluted the flavors of the fruit and veg and also made it the consistency that of amped up water. I would try this again but I would tweak it. So not an absolute failure but not a big thumbs up either.

Here's the original recipe:

1 small beet, peeled and coarsely chopped

1 med. carrot, peeled and coarsely chopped

1 sweet apple, cored and coarsely chopped

1 ripe pear, cored and coarsely chopped

2 cups water

2 tbsp lemon juice

2 tsp. ginger

1. Steam beets and carrots until tender, about 10 minutes. Let cool

2. Combine all ingredients in a blender and mix until smooth.

A Salad For the Adventurous

Creamy Kale Salad

from a recipe as seen in Whole Living Magazine

Above you'll find a photo of all of the ingredients in this salad. Once again this came from the recent issue of Whole Living Magazine like my previous post: Subtle and Fresh. This salad looked amazing to me but I knew that there was a chance I wasn't going to like it. I've never been a big fan of using kale as a salad green, but it just sounded so interesting and healthy that I thought I'd give it a go. Plus I knew that I would use all of these ingredient individually if I didn't like them all together. (I've got a recipe from the same mag that is a fruit and veg smoothie that will also contain the beets- which will most likely be my next post). Below you'll find my review after the recipe itself. Here goes!

Ingredients list:

1 ripe avocado, halved, seed removed

2 tbsp white wine vinegar

2 tsp. Dijon mustard

3 tbsp. Extra Virgin Olive Oil or Walnut oil

Salt and pepper to taste for dressing

1/2 bunch kale, stemmed and coarsely chopped

1 small red beet, peeled and thinly sliced ** Leah's note: I peeled this like an apple. My beet was hard as a rock so it was hard to slice it evenly. I decided to steam my beet to soften it up a bit- oh and beware- beets stain like the dickens!!! I now have a section of my cutting board that will forever be magenta!

1 sweet, crisp apple, cored and cut into thin wedges (I used organic Fuji)

1/2 cup toasted walnuts chopped.

Directions:

Combine avocado, vinegar, mustard and oil in a food processor or blender. Pulse til smooth. (this will be thick) Season with salt and pepper. (*see photo below)
Stem the kale and chop or rip into coarse pieces. (note on stemming kale if unfamiliar. lay kale leaf bottom side up on cutting board. take a sharp knife and cut leaves along base where it meets the stem. for a visual of this see my Kale Chips recipe blog: I'm Dipping My Toes In )

In a large bowl (so you can toss the salad with the dressing) combine kale, beets, apple, and walnuts. Toss with the avocado dressing and season with salt and pepper if necessary. The below photo is the finished product without the dressing. After I tossed it everything was stained red from the beets and it wasn't very pretty! I did take a photo but my camera said it didn't recognize it when I tried to transfer.

Here's my review:

This salad was actually good and I would make it again! The mustard and vinegar help to balance the sweetness of the apple and beet. I found that eaten with every component on the fork it was delicious! I was unsure about how the apple and beet would be together but combined with the toasted walnuts they were really good! As I said in the title this salad is for the adventurous eater who likes to think outside of the salad box. I have some friends that are huge fans of kale as a salad green so this recipe is definitely for them. I'm not quite sure what I would replace the kale with exactly- perhaps peppery arugula?

All in all a good addition to my health food repertoire, my husband was all thumbs up as well!!

Subtle and Fresh!

I just bought a copy of Whole Living Magazine (formally Body +Soul) and was inspired by some of the recipes I found inside. Tonight I tried the Linguine with Toasted almonds, parsley and lemon. Here's the recipe and my review:

I added another ingredient to this recipe that it didn't originally call for: Greek Kalamata olives. My husband is not a big "nut" fan so I didn't think he'd want the toasted almonds on his, so I had to think of something else that would compliment the flavors that I knew he would like. It was a welcome addition and in the end we added the toasted almonds with the kalamata olives- it was a great combo!!!

Here's the recipe and ingredients list:

8oz of whole wheat linguine (I couldn't find linguine so I used spaghetti. I used Ronzoni Smart Taste pasta)

salt for pasta water

1 cup raw almonds toasted and chopped

1 cup parsley leaves, chopped

zest of one lemon

juice of one lemon

2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil or almond oil

freshly ground black pepper

1/4 cup grated hard cheese- I used an asiago, parmesan, romano mix. delish!!

cook pasta according to directions on box with the salted water. Toss pasta with the remaining ingredients. Season with salt and pepper. Serve with cheese.

The above photo of the finished product is without the toasted almonds. This dish was subtly flavored and really light! The combo of lemon and parsley really made it taste fresh. It is a dish I would definitely make again.

my Cafe salad, yum!!

I have two favorite salads from two different but equally expensive restaurants in the county (one in SLO and one in Paso). I decided to combine my favorite elements from each and create my very own cafe salad. So here's my fusion salad:

My maple candied Walnut, Apple, Apricot salad.

(super easy!!)

First you need to make your own candied walnuts. You can make them however you prefer but I wanted a recipe that didn't contain either refined sugars or eggs. I found a recipe which I modified to my tastes and to fit the restaurants recipe. The expensive restaurant salad has pepper on their candied walnuts and it's a really nice touch.

Maple Candied Walnuts:

2 cups raw walnut halves

3 tablespoons grade B organic maple syrup

1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil (my fav is Pasolivo)

(optional ingredients: cinnamon or pepper. also

optional: a pinch of sea salt)

preheat oven to 400 degrees. mix all ingredients into a glass baking dish. Coat the walnuts completely and bake for 12-14 mins, check often to make sure they don't burn. When done immediately transfer to a plate to cool. yum, they're sooooo good!!

Now for the salad itself.

My version of the two salads

contains:

1/2 a granny smith green apple, sliced

3 organic dried apricots, diced

handful of the candied walnuts

spinach

arugula (adds a delicious peppery taste)

honey mustard vinagrette

(instead of making my own from scratch I use the Annie's Organics Lite Honey Mustard Vinagrette)

And the finished product- soooo good and tastes really similar to the restaurant salads I was trying to recreate- not quite as sweet but so delicious!!!

Today's Food Adventure Brought To You By: Gwyneth Paltrow

Gwyneth Paltrow's site Goop.com has some amazing stuff on it. That is where I found the recipe for this yummy (yet time consuming) dish called Bibimbop. (final product pictured above). Bibimbop is basically a rice bowl with lots of veggies. This dish is pretty labor intensive, as you have to saute and blanche vegetables, make a spicy miso sauce and cook a separate dish called Kinpira. Now that I've made it once it will be easier but doing this for the first time it took up quite a bit of time. So for the ingredients list and detailed instructions see Gwyneth's website by following this link: Bibimbop

Here's my attempt, with photos. See captions for descriptions.

The first thing I did was blanche the broccolini and baby bok choy (which I over-cooked and ruined- so it's not in the final photo). I had never blanched veggies before so I had to look online for instructions. It's pretty easy (except for bok choy, LOL). Basically you boil the veg, but for a short time, you don't actually cook it all the way. Then you remove it from the boiling water, straight to a bowl of ice water.

next I sliced up the zucchini, mushrooms and minced the garlic. For some reason I didn't take photos while making the spicy miso sauce, but it was at this stage that I made it. That sauce was really easy to make- reminds me of bbq sauce. I like mine spicy so I put in a lot of hot pepper sesame oil.

I chopped up some baked tofu and fried it in some sesame oil. I had never had fried tofu before and it's super yummy!!!

Here's a shot of all of the veggies that will be tossed in with the rice. So we have: blanched broccolini, sauteed bean sprouts & zucchini with garlic and ginger, sauteed mushrooms (also with garlic and ginger) and the fried tofu. I couldn't find sesame seeds (crazy I know- I went to 2 different stores!!!) and I also couldn't find the kimchi from the original recipe so those two things are missing from mine. Below are the photos for the second dish in this recipe- Kinpira.

KINPIRA:

Here is the burdock root. It looks like a tree branch before you peel the skin. It peels just like a carrot.

cut the burdock root at an angle as thin a possible. My knife wasn't really sharp enough to properly do this with the burdock or the carrot, but it worked fine, I'm not too picky. Stack the burdock rounds in a row to prepare for "julienne" cuts. This is explained visually on the video on Gwyneth's website.

here is the "julienne" cut for the burdock root. I didn't take photos of the carrot as it's the exact same thing as the burdock root.

saute the burdock root for 5 mins before adding the carrot.

after adding the carrot, add water (or the japanese stock explained in Gwyneth's recipe). At this point you will also add the Mirin, Soy Sauce and agave nectar. Let this mixture boil, cover and reduce heat to low. You'll cook this for 15 mins. After the 15 mins you'll put the heat back up to high, remove lid and sauce until sauce is reduced and veggies are shiny.

here is the finished Kinpira.

in a bowl, put brown rice and top with all of the ingredients. The sauce is hiding underneath the veggies. The picture above is everything but the fried tofu and shredded nori. Below is the final product with all ingredients.

YUM!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Let's Talk YUMMY!!

Below are the ingredients to make the most amazing treats you'll find this side of the International Date Line. (and they're vegan to boot!!!)

Let's hear a woot! woot! for Alicia Silverstone's Chocolate Peanut Butter Cups!

here's the ingredients and recipe to make these dangerously delicious treats:

1/2 cup earth balance butter

3/4 cup crunchy peanut butter

3/4 cup graham cracker crumbs

1/4 cup maple sugar

1 cup grain sweetened non dairy chocolate chips

1/4 cup soy, rice or nut milk

1/4 cup chopped peanuts, almonds or pecans

directions (with photos):

line a 12 cup muffin tin with paper liners.

melt butter in a small saucepan over med. heat. stir in peanut butter, graham cracker crumbs, and maple sugar and mix well. remove mixture from heat. evenly divide the mixture among the muffin cups.

combine the chocolate and milk in another pan. stir over medium heat until chocolate is melted. spoon the chocolate evenly over the peanut butter mixture. (*I personally felt that I needed to add more milk to mine next time, as my chocolate chips were dark chocolate and it ended up being a bit too rich for me. ) the photo below illustrates these previous instructions. (recipe continues below)

Top each with the chopped nuts. I chose almonds as the chopped nuts. I had quite a time chopping those nuts! they flew everywhere!! Below are the cups with the added chopped nuts before they set up in the fridge. They were perfect and ready to eat after 2 hours.

Here are the finished product after a little over 2 hours in the fridge. *Note that there are already 3 missing!!!!! They are sooooooo good!!!!!!!

My husband and I have decided that these treats are going to be for special occasions or just not a regular thing because they are irresistible!!!! I CANNOT be trusted with these in the house!!!!!!

I'm Dipping My Toes In

In my previous blog I talked about changing my diet and lifestyle. I'm dipping my toes into the vegan pool, cuz I'm not quite ready to dive. My friend Phoebe introduced me to this particular kale chip recipe (I've tried others but this wins hands down!!) This is actually a combination of 2 different "raw" diet recipes. I don't own a dehydrator (which I will now have to purchase after realizing how very time consuming this recipe can be without one!), so I had to devise a different way of doing it. I have another kale chip recipe that you bake at the low temp of 300, so I used that instruction with this. Here's what I did folks (with photos too- oooo, how very cooking show of me!!)

Nacho Cheesy Kale Chips:

Ingredients:

1 bunch of curly kale

1/2 teaspoon each of: garlic, onion and chili powder

pinch of cayenne pepper

1 teaspoon sea salt

1/2 teaspoon dried basil

1 teaspoon nutritional yeast

1 cup of raw organic cashews (soak for 2 hours in water to soften) ** see note below

1 red bell pepper- seeds removed and chopped

juice of 1 lemon

Instructions (with photos!!):

1. pre-heat oven to 300 degrees. slice the leaves of kale away from their stalks. tear leaves into large bite sized pieces. discard the stalks.

2. **(note on cashews. the recipe says to soak the raw cashews for 2 hours, but they are assuming you have an amazing Vitamix, which I don't have. I soaked them overnight, cuz I just have a Kitchenaid blender- this worked perfectly!!) combine all ingredients (except kale) in blender or food processor. Puree these ingredients. This mixture becomes a hummus-like consistency and looks like the photo below. (this tastes delicious on it's own! I bet it would taste awesome on some pita bread!!) I found this mixture to be a bit too thick to get all of my kale chips crispy. I would add a little olive oil or more lemon juice to make it a bit more runny- or add more kale.

3. in a large bowl combine the kale leaves and coating mixture. You can use your hands but I get eczema so I can't have my hands moist for too long, so I used some tongs to toss everything together.

4. arrange the coated leaves in a single layer on a cookie sheet. It's important that they are a single layer. I made the mistake of having some overlap and the ones on the bottom never got crispy.

5. bake in the oven for approx. 30-40 mins, but check them often!!!! My original kale chip recipe only baked for 20 mins. but because of the coating on these they take longer. These are so delicious and worth the wait, but I do want to invest in a dehydrator so it's done properly and I can walk away from them for several hours and get some other things done (*someday when I get that dehydrator I'll update this recipe with the instructions for that). For those of us without the dehydrator this recipe works just fine! Below is the finished product. They're crispy, crunchy and honestly they taste like nacho cheese chips (without the massive calories and the guilt)!!!!!!!!!! Simply divine!!!!!

Naughty Little Cheese!

(*this could be a long one.....) So I've been on a quest for a year and half to eat healthier both for weight loss and for my health (I don't want any nasty cancer or diabetes coming my way!!!). I started this journey after I read, "The Omnivore's Dilemma" by Michael Pollan. As cheesy as this sounds that book changed my life because it made me change the way that I looked at food. I wanted to cut out all the processed junk, send high fructose corn syrup into the trash, and was determined to not eat anything that's ingredients list was long and full of things I'd never heard of and sounded like plastic. I wasn't entirely sure where to start and then an amazing little publication came my way, landed in my lamp and saved my taste buds!!! It's a fabulous magazine called "Clean Eating"

So that's where I started. I got excited about cooking and discovered that I love chopping veggies!!! Daniel loved it because we had homemade tasty meals every night that were healthy and good for you. Tosca Reno is a contributing columnist to the magazine and she had a book called the "Eat Clean Diet" so I got that, read it cover to cover and started my eat clean diet lifestyle. I was eating well, drinking TONS of water (and peeing like crazy)- I was stoked... and then.....da, da, duuuummmm- I gained 15 lbs!!!! yes that's right I GAINED on a diet!!!!!!! sooooo not stoked about that!!!!

So I had to re-evaluate what I was doing. Why was I following a diet to what I thought was a "T" and gaining weight? Well here's the answer. After really looking at what I'd been eating I realized that it wasn't the food at all but my portion sizes and my free- for- all attitude, because I thought "well these are healthy good- for- me foods, so I can have meals and snacks and some more snacks!". So I went back on weight watchers (which I had done once before successfully 2 years ago) BUT I was doing it with my "eat clean" foods. So, still no processed foods etc.... but using the weight watchers points system to keep me from overdoing my portions.

Fast forward 10 weeks and 10 lbs less (yeeesssssss!!! and below is my inspiration picture that I keep on my fridge!) and I'm still exploring healthier eating habits.

A little background before I get into the next and current leg in my journey (and the WHOLE reason for writing this particular blog). My fabulous co-worker and friend Jenn became vegan around the same time I started eating clean. I've been inspired by her and am so glad I've been able to witness her journey too!! I've been flirting with the idea of becoming vegan, so I went back to being a vegetarian, which I was for 10 years, in the hopes that I could make the leap to being vegan.

So I picked up a copy of Alicia Silverstone's book, "The Kind Diet" which is a vegan cookbook (and explains the reasons to be vegan and why meat, dairy, etc... is bad for you). I wouldn't say it's mind blowing because I am aware of all the information in the book BUT the way she writes has really inspired me and I feel I can relate to her and she makes me feel like I can make the leap. She's also not judgmental about just dipping your toes in and not just jumping into the lifestyle. That makes me happy because I'm not quite ready to go all vegan all the time. I have an addiction to dairy that I need to kick. I can't help it, I love me some good creamy ice cream! Oh and I can't forget that naughty little cheese. Cheese and I have had a strange relationship over the years. When I was a kid I didn't like cheese at all (or eggs for that matter cuz they smelled yucky) because it was gooey when melted (except for mozzarella on pizza). Then I had a grilled cheese sandwich (can't say what age this was) and from then on I never met a grilled cheese I didn't like. I would love to turn back the clock and not have that grilled cheese that started the love affair, but honestly it was going to happen anyway, you addictive little lump of goodness! So this my friends is why I'm not quite ready to go completely vegan- goat cheese stuffed mushrooms, feta crumbles in salad, cheddar cheese and crackers, jack cheese on a garden burger, blue cheese and apple slices in salad and mozzarella on pizza- the list goes on... Anyway it's a process and we'll see how I do. If nothing else I hope to at least be eating lots of whole grains, veggies and things I've never tried (like nutritional yeast which tastes like parmesan cheese!!!!!!!!)