Special People, and Why I'm Not a Food Blogger (1)

I confess, it's hard for me to compose blogs on the road More precisely, it's hard for me to publish them; I usually compose at least two or three in my head. The drive up to Anchorage yesterday was blissfully uneventful for a winter Anchorage run. The winter expansion and contraction of the earth ruptures the heck out of tarmac, though, and there were long stretches with no snow on the road where the full extent of new potholes and cracks and chasms could be test-driven. My car "had my back" the whole way, and I wished I could have avoided more potholes in return, poor little wheels.

Apparently it's also hard for me to publish my long-ago-composed posts about why I'm not a food blogger, nor to write a recipe-oriented post, as promised for so long. Let me start like this. It gave me such a thrill to drive into town, head to Barnes and Noble, and pick up a copy of the newly released novel written by the friend with whom I was staying the night!

SO amazingly cool. And when we get together, the "food" we talk about is that which comes out from inside of ourselves, for which we get hungry if we don't write for a day (unmilked again!), that nourishes the soul--yes yes, the Greeks would for sure classify us as cicadas, feeding off the sweet dew of inspired voice... 
Yes, an opportunity to spend some time with Cinthia--and with her lovely partner and characterful four-leggeds, is always precious to me. I leave with a small treasure within myself whose brightness I can rub for days to come.

Since that's where my juice is, it's not surprising I haven't been using my writerly passion on food. Honestly, I haven't been using my creativity in general on food very much, which may be a shame as I do have significant creativity in the area, and I'm currently blessed with a big kitchen with running water. But here's a good example of how I fail as a food blogger.
Exhibit A

Cauliflower roasted in spices on a bed of greens with parsley garnish.

It looks lovely, doesn't it?

Exhibit B

The same ingredients, minus the green surroundings and garnish, dehydrated for two days.
Now admittedly the green garnishes do a lot to prettify the dried-only-by-roasting version; my hand is, frankly, hideous; and my photography skills are a little less deplorable in the first photo. (Which, btw, is another reason I'm not a food blogger. I don't photograph my food in a lightbox with a high-level camera. I pretty much point and shoot.) But even admitting all those things, these little niblets do not look so appetizing, do they?

I'm not going to sell them to you as Cauliflower Popcorn! What I will tell you is that they are delicious in an oily, salty, nutritional-yeasty way (which, NB, I do not call "cheezy" with a 'z'...); that they linger in your mouth so your mouth asks for a repeat of the taste. I will ask you to consider that whereas a head of cauliflower can fill a 9x13 roasting pan, once it's been dehydrated for two days it won't fill much more than a pint-sized Mason jar. Two tablespoons of olive oil on a head of cauliflower doesn't sound like much; it isn't much over a 9x13 pan. In fact, you have to really stir to get all the florets coated. Spread over a volume that fits in a pint jar, two tablespoons of olive oil, which does not dehydrate down, is a lot. Such a different mouth-feel, then, and a whole different niche in the eating experience; think garnish sprinkled on soup rather than part of the soup itself; think little appetizer nibbles rather than crudites. Nothing like popcorn whatsoever; another whole iteration of the salty-oily-dry snack. (Plus I don't really like popcorn and I do like this!) The process is exactly the same as that for making kale chips; cauliflower and kale are, in fact, different cultivars of a single species; this is just an extension of the same idea.
I will tell you that the first time I made them, I set the jar outside, which effectively meant "in the freezer" and that I really enjoyed the additional crunch so imparted; that I recoiled in horror at the realization that I was also enjoying the texture and mouthfeel of the frozen oil, and decided never to make them again. That I am now about to make my third batch (albeit over a period of almost six months (wow, it's been that long I've been carrying this post around!!)).

One medium-sized head of cauliflower
Two tablespoons each: extra virgin olive oil, nutritional yeast, chili powder.
Pinch of salt, up to a half teaspoon (depending on how much is in your chili powder)

Break the cauliflower into florets. Put the spices and oil in a bowl with the cauliflower and stir everything together--you can massage with your hands, or use a wooden spoon.
Now, Either
Roast in a 350 degree oven for approx. 45 minutes
Or
Dehydrate. Start at 145, turn down to 118 after the first couple hours. Let dehydrate until they are fully dry and crispy--depending on your locale's humidity, this will take something around two days (!)
If you don't have a dehydrator, you could try the oven, but it would have to be a very low temperature oven; otherwise you'd end up with, well, roasted cauliflower!
I might add that whereas it's easy to dress up the roasted cauliflower, as in the picture above, it's the caulflower chips that actually need more help presentation-wise. They've been my guilty pleasure eked out over the past several months because I haven't been able to come up with a way to present them visually to people I know, except in some underwhelming way like sprinkled on a salad. Presentation's just not my forte, and were I a food blogger, it should be.
And finally, for a really good example of passionate, practical, flexible food blogging from an avowed cauliflower lover, you should take a look at Amber's blog

OK. How did I do? Are you grossed out by the very concept, or do you get that it's something delicious in an odd, quirky way you might enjoy too?

Avocado Pie Teaser, Immersion Blender Talk Again; Cherry Smoothie

The avocado pie was not only perfect for Cinco de Mayo, but also ended up as the perfect birthday cake for Leslie!

I will share the recipe, but I want to talk about immersion blenders again, and I think it'll make this post too long if I try to cover both. The immersion blender talk is relevant to the avocado pie recipe, as I made the pie mostly using the immersion blender in order to ensure it could be made without a Vita-mix.


As much as I love my Vita-mix and wouldn't be without it, I also wouldn't be without an immersion blender. I love its lightness, convenience and easy cleanup. Over two years ago, back before I had a Vita-mix, I wrote a post including some tips for how to make goodies using an immersion blender, and I still agree with what I said then. However, the search for the right machine continues. At the time I wrote that post, I had a Kitchenaid handblender. But when my third one in three years bit the dust last December, I knew it was time to look elsewhere. 


My luck didn't quite turn around when I bought the Juiceman handblender. My hopes were up because it had 550W, so was more powerful, but when it arrived, the design turned out to be a bit flimsy, and the blade was too small to be really effective.

After a month or two, a more serious problem surfaced. The "on" button tended to stick in the "on" position, which was very scary, and the power level would surge without warning. An hour or so on the phone, and I was promised a refund (which I'm still waiting for).


Meanwhile, I went back and read lots of reviews both on Amazon and everywhere else I could find, and ended up ordering the MiTutto Miallegro, also 550W. This was so well reviewed, and I was excited.

Turns out, it's built on a very similar design to the Juiceman blender, which means the Juiceman attachments fit it, so I have some spare parts. But it's much better made. The "on" button is sealed so nothing could stick in there to make it stick in the "on" position (in case that was the problem). The motor sounds better, and seems more effective. 

I love being able to blend a thick smoothie right in the cup!

This was a Cherry-Spirulina smoothie:

1/3 cup unsweetened almond breeze

1/2 cup snow/ice

6 frozen cherries

3g spirulina

1t xanthan gum

stevia

erythritol

pinch vanilla powder

1t coconut butter

The blender coped with the ice just fine, crushed it right up. It's cold here, so the coconut butter was solid, and there ended up being little niblets of coconut butter throughout the smoothie. I actually loved that! I often sprinkle a few cacao nibs into smoothies like this for texture, and I didn't have to do that. My suspicion is that part of the reason why the Vita-mix homogenizes the unmelted coconut butter so thoroughly even in the presence of ice is because it heats everything up more, and it may be better, from the oxidation perspective, not to have stuff heated up. 

I haven't yet tried blending greens with it, but will report in when I have.

Bottom line: it's not the same as a Vita-mix, but as I said in my old post, I think it's better than a cheap upright blender, and it's a wonderful tool. Still early days with this model--I really hope it lasts longer than its predecessors.

Do you have an immersion blender that you like?

Tomorrow, the avocado pie!

HAWMC--Ekphrasis; Inspiration from Steve Almond, Connecting Joanna, and A Recipe

For today's HAWMC prompt, we're asked to go to http://www.flickr.com/explore, which displays a random image, and to write about that image, connecting it with our health focus. As a student of literature, especially ancient and medieval literature, I've thought a lot about the concept of ekphrasis, which is creative writing in response to works of art. I've written papers comparing passages from epic poems of different eras that do so, and even written some ekphrases myself. However, I haven't thought about ekphrasis in the connection of health writing before, so this should be interesting.


Before I get to that, I want to say two sentences about an inspiring craft talk in town last night, and relay a message for a friend. And after the ekphrasis talk, a recipe!


Steve Almond gave an inspiring talk at the college last night, titled "Funny is the New Deep,"in which he showed that the comic impulse is a deep-seated survival mechanism allowing us to deal with all that is humiliating, painful, tragic, or unbearable in life. He had some very important things to say about dragging your audience with you into your "dark corner" rather than "trying to be funny" in order to please the audience and flatter yourself, and drew a crucial distinction between writing and merely masturbating--yes, profane language was part of the toolkit! That was two sentences. One more thing: I appreciated that he had standardly published books, but also a selection of little self-published books, with the intent of returning to the model of personal connection between author and recipient. Awesome.


My friend Joanna Steven recently moved to Portland and is looking for likeminded people, especially parents of young children, with whom to connect. Here's what she wants you to know:

Raw Food Potluck & Playgroup in SW Portland (Oregon)!

Do you believe in the higher nutritional content of raw, unheated, unpasteurized foods, as well as sprouted foods? Do you enjoy eating sprouted seeds and nuts, sea vegetables, fruits, vegetables, and for some of us raw dairy? Do you get excited at the idea of juicing, blending green smoothies, and more? And most importantly, do you long to connect with like-minded families so our children can play together while enjoying nutritious raw snacks?

If so, this group is for you! Please join us in SW Portland so our children (from very small ones to 3 years of age) can play together in the backyard and parks when the weather allows it, or indoors. And we can chat together about our new health related findings, or anything we feel like talking about, make flax crackers, green smoothies, eat raw cakes and other goodies.

Please note: Open-mindedness is required to belong to this group. I don't expect every family to feed their children a diet identical to another family's diet. Still, we must have a few things in common! We believe that:
- Some of the most nutrient dense foods are raw and unheated
- We try our best to feed our children nutrient dense foods.
- If a food is not nutrient dense and is fed to the child, this dramatically lowers the child's chances of getting enough nutrition that day because the stomach is filled up with non nutritious foods.
- We try our best to eat organic, sustainable foods.

If you are interested in joining us, please go to our Meetup page. We hope to see you! 


Good luck, Joanna, and here's to many good connections.


Now, for the picture I'm going to write about:

This photo is titled Blossom Expectation and the photographer is Vangelis Bagiatis--a Greek, so I feel closer already! Right now, I'm taking all the apotropaics I can think of to avoid succumbing to the 'flu that prostrated Phil for two weeks (he's just now starting to get up, eat, etc, again), and I'm on my third day of sore throat/runny nose/sneezes. So right now, these expectant blossoms remind me of nothing so much as the expectant accumulation in my nasal passages building up to a sneeze. I hold my breath, pant a little--soon, soon--and am rewarded with the blossom of a sneeze. But of course, they also make me think of Anais Nin, and her eternal lines "And the time came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk to blossom." There's something joyful about coming into bloom, about the exuberant return of green to the northern landscape after a hard winter, about becoming functional again after sojourning in the world of the sick for a while. 
However, it's also scary. The inertia of winter and sickness becomes part of an identity--will the expectant blossom, furled tight, recognize itself with the winds blowing on it and the bees tugging at its petals? Will a recovering person be able to go out in the world again and knock elbows with all the people out there who have no idea of what she's been through and will treat her just as they treat anyone they encounter? Auden was skeptical that there's anything volitional about the process of coming into blossom--"perhaps the roses really want to grow," he says, a little sarcastically. But when we take the metaphor and apply it to people--such an apt metaphor as it is--not all people want to grow all the time. It takes courage. It takes willingness to look to the future. And sometimes, it takes a little push from the "beyond," to which we're more open when we pay attention to metaphor.


Recipe Time--Artichoke-kissed Quinoa
Every Wednesday evening, we have dinner with Phil's daughter. I usually make a salad, some sort of veggie, and a gluten free dessert for her. I'm not much for dinner or dessert, so I usually make the dessert gf but not vegan so that I don't have to eat it. Last night, I didn't go to the dinner because I was at Steve Almond's talk, but I did make some goodies worth sharing. I appreciate these evening writing events as a nice opportunity simply to skip dinner, and I have some tricks to make that even easier that I might share sometime.


The salad was super-simple and beautiful, featuring green-leaf lettuce from Full Circle Farm, tomatoes, avocado, and half a red grapefruit also from Full Circle Farm. Some minced dill. A drizzle of balsamic vinegar over it--light and lovely!

I also decided to make a quinoa dish. We love to use all parts of whatever food we buy, and when my friend Jeanie made a quinoa dish one time using the liquid from a jar of artichoke hearts, and Phil, who's not usually a quinoa fan, loved it, I knew that I'd have to do that at some point! Since I wasn't going to be there last night, and I'm not a fan of the artichoke hearts or the liquid, it seemed a perfect opportunity.

The quinoa was cooked in the artichoke liquid (with a few artichoke tendrils remaining also) and gently sauteed Full Circle Farm veggies went in there too. This is a very simple, adaptable recipe, and comes together quickly.

1 cup quinoa, well rinsed
2 1/2 cups artichoke liquid (if there isn't enough in the jar, rinse the jar with water and use the rinse water) NB--veggie broth or plain water would work fine here too
1 teaspoon coconut oil (optional)
1/4 medium onion, chopped
1 small carrot, chopped
1 small zucchini, cut into half moons
4 medium mushrooms, chopped
1/3 cup slivered almonds
salt and pepper to taste


Cook the quinoa in the artichoke liquid. Keep the lid on for the first 20 minutes and then remove it to let excess water evaporate. 
Around the time you remove the lid, saute the onions and carrots in the coconut oil (or in a drop of water). 
Set aside, then saute the zucchini, and then the mushrooms. You could probably do these all together, but I had a tiny pan to work with, hence the serial processing!
When the excess liquid has evaporated, gently stir the veggies into the quinoa, together with the slivered almonds (save a few for topping, if you like). 
Test for taste and add salt and pepper as needed. The artichoke liquid is pretty flavorful and has herbs and spices too, so the mix should be pretty well seasoned from the get-go.


This was well enjoyed. It would be good with any combination of veggies--try bell peppers and corn, or broccoli and peas--or whatever your favorite veggies are!


Oh, and for dessert I made my version of Lori's version of Bodyrocked Banana Bread, which is very popular with Amy! Thanks again, Lori!

Signing off here--what would YOU say about that photo?

Irish Cream Mousse Recipe, Kneeling Moose, Phil Adventures

Homer is known as the town at the end of the road. Well, there's a long road out the end of Homer, opening into the back fold of the bay, a huge and gorgeous wilderness. I dropped Phil there yesterday with his loaded sled, jury-rigged with skate-ski poles for him to pull it by.

He's headed out for a couple days in this glorious wilderness. It'll be a combination of reconnecting with something he's loved doing every spring, and discovering new territory. He used to go on a lot of ski-camping trips in the backcountry around Anchorage all the years he lived there, come March, when there's still lots of snow but the days are luxuriously long. But the backcountry around Homer is less explored for him, and he's excited to change that.

His playground: (and this picture doesn't do justice to the mountains on the horizon and the gorgeous sweep of valley below--two river drainages).

When I was driving home, I saw this moose in our neighbors' yard. Snow had melted or gone away under this spruce tree, revealing some tired, brown grass from last year. Apparently, that was the best food available right now. Moose are browsers, not grazers, so they have to get down on their knees to eat from the ground. Pretty poignant.

I've had several requests to share recipes recently, and will work on catching up on that. First, the "Irish Moss Mousse." I threw this together from off the top off my head when we got back home and had a St Patrick's Day party to go to. We shared it with some other friends the next night, and then Tuesday was Amy's birthday party, so it got another outing then--and now it's all gone! And this is the only picture ;)

Note: this is not a "pristine purist" raw food recipe. It contains some instant coffee, and some whisky! It is very low sugar, though, and my Naturopath recently told me that whisky and other hard liquors don't bother candida (not sure why he was telling me that, lol)! But I'm sure you could sub out both of these if you didn't want them in--I'll offer some suggestions for how to do that.

I also did this in such a hurry that I used warm water to soak my irish moss and nuts. Ideally, I would have soaked the irish moss for longer, in cool water; ditto the nuts.


Irish Moss Mousse (mostly raw, vegan, gluten free, low sugar)


1 cup irish cream irish moss gel *subrecipe below
3/4 cup whisky! Or use nut milk, or water with butterscotch extract (if you can find it gluten and dairy free, if that matters to you), or water with more vanilla
1 cup young coconut meat (I get frozen young coconut meat in Anchorage. It does have a little added sugar, so I don't use it often. If you're anywhere but AK, you probably have easier access to young cocos!)

1 cup soaked cashews

1/2 cup coconut sugar (for the tawny color)--or use a half cup erythritol if you want it sugar free

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 tablespoon vanilla
2 tablespoons non-gmo lecithin granules (or use sunflower lecithin)


Put everything in the blender except the lecithin. Put the ingredients in in the order listed--it blends more smoothly that way. Blend until very smooth. Test the flavor, add a little stevia or a pinch of salt if the taste isn't quite "in focus," add the lecithin, and blend again.

Pour into a 9-in pie plate and chill. I sprinkled cacao nibs on top as decoration--some coconut whipped cream or similar would have been beautiful too.


*Sub-recipe: Irish Cream Irish Moss Gel
2 cups irish moss, soaked (approximate measurement)
3/4 cup brewed coffee, cooled (you could brew up some chicory or maca instead of real coffee, or you could use a few drops of Medicine Flower coffee flavor extract in water).
1/2 cup erythritol
Blend all three together in a Vita-Mix or high speed blender, on high, until a smooth gel is obtained.

Notice, this recipe has no coconut oil or cacao butter in it! This means it doesn't set up quite as firm as a recipe with oil added--it's more of a spoon pudding really, but it also means it's way lighter! So, low or no sugar, light on the fat, and that really brings out the kick of the coffee and whisky. I couldn't eat very much of it because I'd have gotten drunk and buzzed, probably, but a little went a long way, and it received rave reviews from everyone else! If you did want it thicker/richer, you could use nut milk in place of the whisky, and add either some coconut oil (half a cup)--or even cacao butter for a chocolatey flair--or some xanthan gum (one teaspoon).

Let me know if you try it! And thanks for the encouragement to post the recipe before I forgot what I did!

ABCD Moon Medallions and Anchorage Snow

Happy Friday, everyone! We've been in Anchorage since Wednesday, so I'm a little out of the loop. Had a couple serious appointments--some intense processing to do as a result. But I've been enjoying the face of Anchorage at this stage of the winter (yes, it is still winter, bright sun this afternoon notwithstanding). This moose cow and calf pair were right downtown, enjoying a tree that wouldn't normally be their first choice...

 And here's our friend Lynn's deck--the table and chairs have been the site of many a gorgeous late summer dinner, and now they are a little snow-toadstool! We hiked on trails where the level of snow was as high as the benches, which you could see buried every here and there along the way. I'll post some more pics when I get home.

For now, though, a new recipe that seemed too good not to share. With all the complex breakfasts I've been posting lately, low on calories and long on mineral-rich fillers, I wondered how to make a similar breakfast on the road as we are. The answer has been to eat a granny smith apple and one of these "ABCD Moon Medallions," which are about 35 calories apiece. Holds me all the way to lunchtime!

 

A-is for apricots--AND Amazing Grass
B-is for brazil nuts
C-is for chia AND carrot pulp
D-is for dates AND delicious

And what about the Moon? Well, the reason I included brazil nuts in these medallions is that they're so incredibly high in selenium, and with my thyroid condition especially, it's a good idea to get plenty of selenium in. Oh, and "selene" is the moon. You know I'm terrified of omega-6, and brazil nuts have lots of those, so they're balanced out by ground chia seeds, which have more omega 3 than omega 6. I'm more comfortable eating one of these medallions than eating a straight brazil nut. I dehydrated the rest of my carrot pulp so that it could feature in these "instant" recipes and cut the denseness of nuts/seeds and dried fruit.

Like my fig bars, these also feature dried nettles for extra mineral richness, and in addition these have some chocolate Amazing Grass powder for the same, and for a subtle chocolate flavor.

ABCD Moon Medallions (raw, vegan, soy/gluten/dairy free) (Makes 20 medallions)
1/3 cup apricots, chopped
1/3 cup dates, chopped
1/4 cup brazil nuts
1/4 cup ground chia seeds
3/4 cup dehydrated carrot pulp
2 tablespoons powdered dried nettles
2 tablespoons Amazing Grass chocolate flavored green powder

Whiz the brazil nuts alone in a food processor until chopped. Add the nettles, then the dried fruit, and gradually add the ground chia, carrot pulp, nettles, and Amazing Grass. Process until everything comes together into a ball.

Roll the "dough" into two thin logs and refrigerate for an hour or two.

Slice them into medallions--I got 20 out of this recipe.
That little sweet, nutty, mineral rich boost combines perfectly with the juicy apple for a lasting breakfast.
They're a little lighter than the typical lara bar, with the addition of the greens and the pulp. Also, because they use chia seeds and pulp in greater proportion than smooth, creamy nuts, and because of the nettles, they have a slightly grittier texture--but in a good way! It's kind of an earthy, good for you but delicious kind of taste, and they're more satisfying for less calories.

Sound good to you?

Since I seem to be transgressing my chocolate interdict at the moment anyway, I might as well confess to another treat I've enjoyed in the past week--chocolate coconut water, who knew?

There's real cocoa and coconut cream in there with the coconut water, as well as some cane sugar and ??natural flavors (a bit of a red flag). I enjoyed this over two days--smooth and yummy. I was surprised by it--all the coconut waters flooding the market at the moment tend to run to mango or pineapple flavors if they're not plain. I wasn't sure it would be good, and was pleasantly surprised.

I'm going to sign off so I can get back to preparing my classes for next week and also maybe do some of the processing I need to do. I hope you enjoy the medallions--and have a great weekend!

Belated Valentine's Mint Chocolates, Out of the Woodwork

...but first--this is the snow pile in our cul-de-sac after almost two weeks of thaw! It's almost as high as the alders. I am so grateful for plow trucks--without them, we would be buried!

I had this post ready to share yesterday, a Valentine's delight as I'd hinted on Monday... 

...but yesterday was a "packet deadline" day, and by the time I'd gotten my packet in, finished up a lecture, and sat in rehearsal for over three hours, not having slept much the night before, my very sensible husband insisted I go to bed instead of posting!

Rehearsal? Yes! I'm going to share a couple poems as part of "Out of the Woodwork," a variety performance here in town on Saturday night. Two short poems, one of them I just wrote for our friends Tom and Jeanie as an elegy for the death of their son. Here's the local newspaper's announcement--it even mentions me and what I'll share a little ways down!

I used to spend many hours of every week at rehearsals. Showing up for these few, and as a poet, not a singer or instrumentalist (although, like everyone else, I do get to sing for the Finale of the show) is an interesting revisit of what used to be so central to my life. There are several wonderfully versatile musicians who are really anchoring the show, playing several instruments, supporting and shining in turn. In the past, I used to be in that kind of role. I don't at all mind not being; it's just interesting to observe how it is to be a small part of a team, briefly individuated when I come onstage and perform my poems, and otherwise in the background.

I have to be careful with my eye contact: I tend to pay close attention, and when the director is looking around for someone, my eyes are right there--but in this case, I'm not the one she needs!

OK, about those mint chocolates. They were an experiment, and I'd say a successful one, sort of along the lines of the pomegranate fondants I made at Christmas, utilizing Irish Moss gel for a soft but creamy texture.

This time, I tried using pili nuts. They were a delicacy when I lived in HI--several farmers at some elevation grew them. They're even fattier than macadamia nuts, and like mac nuts, seem to have mostly monounsaturated fat and very little omega 6, so good in my book. Phil doesn't care for them because they don't have a distinctive flavor, but coupled with their creaminess, that makes them a great base for raw desserts!

Mint Chocolate Fondants (sugar free, vegan, mostly raw, gluten free)
For the filling:
1 cup pili nuts (cashews or macs would also work)
1 cup Irish Moss gel
1/2 cup nut milk
1/2 cup erythritol
2 teaspoons peppermint extract
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup cacao butter
1 tablespoon lecithin

Blend together all but the last two ingredients in a high-powered blender. To make it easier on the blender (but dirty more equipment), process the nuts into butter in a food processor first.
Then, add the cacao butter and lecithin and blend again until very smooth.

I used only 1/8 cup cacao butter, and it meant that the filling took a very long time to set, and really needs to be kept refrigerated or frozen. The extra cacao butter will provide more solidity.

Pour the filling into a bowl and refrigerate until it firms up a bit. Then, either form into balls, or put in molds--I used my heart-shaped ice cube trays from IKEA again. They'll need to be frozen for some time before coating.

For Coating:
Homemade raw chocolate or your favorite high quality dark chocolate
And/or homemade carob chocolate (here's my recipe).
(I did both)

Melt the chocolate gently, and dip the fondants in it, ensuring they are thoroughly coated. Set them on a nonstick surface so that they don't break apart when you pick them up. Our ambient temperatures are such that it's quite a challenge keeping the chocolate melted enough, and with the lesser amount of cacao butter, the fondants were also softening up quickly. Best to keep them in the freezer and pull out a few at at time, with chocolate-covered fingers!

I'm not the best at coating chocolates--they never seem to come out perfectly smooth when I do them. But homemade-delicious-looking, you betcha!

These are creamy, smooth, not overpoweringly sweet, with a lovely mouth-feel.

I'll be back tomorrow with the post, also promised on Monday, about food and what counts as "good" for me...

Have a beautiful day!

Community Gratitude and Stuffed Eggplant/Squash

I'm here to share some gratitude for our community, and a delicious (also super-nutritious) recipe.

I love the wildness of clouds and pinkish sky--even if you can barely see the eagle I was trying to capture in the photograph above!

I'm grateful for the community of this town too. Over the weekend, we attended the 28th Annual presentation of the Nutcracker Ballet. The music is recorded, so there isn't the extra complication of an orchestra (and the flexibility of a sound system enabled some truly startling choices of soundtrack--not sure what Tchaikovsky would have thought). But the choreography required to arrange all those wonderful kids (and some adults) in intricate detail for each dance, and have some coherent storyline overall too, blew my mind. The result? Just spectacular, success for sure. And I'm a fairly tough critic when it comes to musical performances, and am not even taking into account the fact that this is a tiny town. Imagine? Some kids have performed in it ten years in a row, working their way up from mice to princesses.

This is the only picture I took of the event, that really shows how community it was. As soon as the show was over, about 70% of the audience streamed onto the stage, with many bouquets and flowers in tow. Audience and performers melded together to say "community."

We've had a few gatherings of our own little community lately, and I wanted to share something I did with some of that Full Circle Farms bounty.

This stuffed eggplant/squash featured some of the beautiful cremini mushrooms that came in the CSA box. It was well enjoyed both in a small gathering and a larger one. As well as the earthy texture of mushrooms and eggplant, it features the crunch of carrots and water chestnuts, and the nutritious goodness of amaranth and urid beans.

Darn winter coloring--this was much prettier than it looks in the photo!
This recipe is really very easy, but it involves several stages of preparation. These can be done in advance, not necessarily all in one go.
 You need:

1/2 cup amaranth, soaked a few hours or overnight
1/2 cup urd (urid) beans, soaked a few hours or overnight (You could use mung or adzuki beans too, which are a similar size--I love the flavor and texture of urd beans but they're not always easy to find. Try an Asian market.)

1 medium eggplant
1 medium acorn squash

1 teaspoon coconut oil
1 teaspoon turmeric
2 teaspoons smoked paprika
1 medium onion, finely chopped
1 medium carrot, finely chopped
1 small can water chestnuts, chopped
1/2 cup cremini mushrooms, chopped
1 cup broccoli, chopped
3-4 cloves garlic, chopped
1 tablespoon tomato paste
1/2-1 cup water or vegetable broth
1 tablespoon black pepper
1 tablespoon hot sauce (optional)
salt to taste

Drain the soaked beans and amaranth. Boil the beans on the stove in plenty of water for about 20 minutes, then add the amaranth and cook them together. Cook, adding water as necessary, until the beans are soft and the amaranth's sprouts are unfurled, and they are crunchy but tender. This can be done ahead of time.

At least 30 minutes before you want to assemble the whole thing, slice the eggplant in half down the middle and carefully scoop out the flesh. Chop the flesh roughly and salt both the chopped flesh and the hollowed insides. Leave for 30 minutes to let the acrid juices ooze out, then rinse thoroughly.

Heat the oil and turmeric in a large, heavy-bottomed pan and add the onion, eggplant, carrot and water chestnuts. Add the paprika and saute, stirring occasionally until the onions are becoming translucent.
Add the mushrooms, broccoli, tomato paste, garlic and black pepper, and incorporate.

Add water or broth gradually if the pan seems too dry. At this point, you can add the amaranth and beans, and stir all together, adding more liquid if necessary. Taste, and adjust--add some salt, some
hot sauce, maybe some lemon--whatever it needs.

You can use this pan of veggie deliciousness for other applications too, and can definitely make ahead.
The only other "advance preparation" is precooking the squash. I tried both ways, baking the stuffed veggies with the squash raw and precooked, and precooked is better. Give it 20 minutes at 400 degrees.

And now, you can scoop generous dollops of the stuffing into the waiting eggplant and squash cavities, and bake the whole thing for 20 minutes at 400. Cover with foil for the first 10 minutes.

These weren't out of place at the tamale party I brought them to!

Nor was this pumpkin parfait, with a macadamia-vanilla cream and pumpkin seed-date 'crumbs'...

 ...which was so good first time round, I had to make a second batch!

I'm loathe to post the recipe, since there have been so darn many pumpkin recipes all over the blog world lately, but I may just end up doing so, since readerships over- and underlap...

Interestingly, although I loved making both of these, I wasn't as interested in eating them. That's partly because of my current goals and preoccupations, of which more soon, and partly, I think I genuinely get more of a kick out of other people enjoying the food I prepare.
Here's Roxy giving me a good licking.

 Do you enjoy preparing food more than eating it?

Wild Mushroom Chili (What Makes Chili Chili?) and Party Poopers

Thanks for all the good wishes for my upcoming journey! It is cold, snowy and icy here, and windy enough that our thermometer blew off the wall and our heaviest ladder blew down. But as far as I know, we are not in line to get overly pounded by the forecast superstorm down here. I put out the hope that everyone up in Nome will be safe.

Huge storms like this, and the smaller ones last week, with their power outages and downed trees, are a reminder not to take anything for granted. Planning makes life so much more manageable for me, but so much of planning assumes that things are going to go a certain way, which they may not. I intend to remember that this upcoming week, as I prepare to travel away from here, with the long, sometimes treacherous drive to Anchorage and a couple of tricky flight connections to make.

Speaking of changing plans, Phil and I were headed to a party on Sunday night. It was the 'Chili Cook-Off' party, and I was pretty proud of my creation. We arrived, and Phil took one look at all the cars parked around the house, on the street, down the next street, and turned the truck around and drove us back home!


Party poopers? Maybe, although probably no one missed us, there were that many people there. Introverts? Well, I certainly am. Phil wouldn't ordinarily answer to that description, but he has a streak of it.
Noise-phobes? Why, yes indeed. A major deterrent was the thought that we wouldn't be able to hear anything that anyone said in a throng that size. Phil also remarked that the home in question only had one bathroom, which would likely be permanently tied up. I was surprised that he thought of that, but it was a good point.

I was slightly disappointed, and I was upset about the unnecessary gas consumption from driving. But I was also soon glad to have the evening clear to get some work done. And I'm grateful for the encouragement: I wouldn't have made this chili without the prompting, and I think it's a good one!

Honestly, though, it may not really be a "chili" as most people think of it. I wasn't raised with chili, so I don't have a stereotype of it in my mind. To me, this is chili because it utilized lots of chili powder and beans. Not it? OK. But it was really good, whatever you want to call it.

Wild Mushroom Chili (or What You Will)

1 cup dried wild mushrooms soaked in two cups boiling water

1 tablespoon coconut oil
1 onion, chopped
3-4 cloves garlic, minced
1 inch ginger, minced

2 teaspoons chili powder

1 tablespoon crushed chilis

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 tablespoon black pepper

2 cups cooked pinto beans (or one can)

1 cup cooked adzuki beans

2 cups mixed vegetables

While the mushrooms are soaking in the water, saute the onion and garlic in the coconut oil, and add the ginger and spices. 

Put the mushrooms and water in the crockpot with the beans. 

When the onions are translucent, add the onion mixture to the crockpot. 

Cook on low for 3-4 hours

Add the mixed vegetables and cook for another hour.

It feels funny to me to be using mixed frozen vegetables--it seems like such a shortcut. But it is winter here.

When we got home from our snowy abortive ride to the party, this was delicious and warming. The wild mushrooms give it a great texture and flavor. 

Have you ever left a party before you even arrived?

Berbere-Spiced Split Pea-Nettle Stew and its Reinvention

It's pleasurable to be flexible, even in the midst of a 'tetra-diet,' and it's pleasurable to introduce foods to other people. Not many people know nettles.

Nettle pesto and all that can be done with it is obviously a great intro, but I wanted to make something closer to my own culinary roots: a different take on spinach and lentils.

1 cup yellow split peas, soaked overnight and then cooked, long and slow, with a piece of ginger

coconut oil for the skillet

half an onion, finely chopped

three cloves of garlic

two teaspoons berbere spice

one teaspoon ground ginger

one teaspoon ground turmeric

sprinkle of salt

big bunch of nettles (maybe six cups?)--roughly chopped with scissors.

Two burners is all I have, so sometimes there's pot-juggling here.

Saute' the onions with the berbere. Once the onions are translucent, add nettles and garlic and remaining spices, and a little water if necessary.

Stir all together; once the nettles have wilted, add the whole contents of the skillet to the pan of split peas.

Stir through and season to taste.

Of course, I was retrofitting and hadn't added the ginger and turmeric at the beginning! I thought they looked a little pale in the above stage, and so my 'season to taste' was the ginger and turmeric: 'season to eye' also--but they'd have been better added to begin with. 

I adore the taste of berbere. Spicy, with cardamom. How could it be better? (Sorry, Phil...) And since I'm playing around with eating spices more seldom than every day, it's fun to go straight for the yummiest.

This stew was enjoyed just like that, and then it underwent a rebirth as part of a salad. Also featured in the salad were about four cups of spinach, chopped tomato and avocado and julienned beets.

The stew (about two-three cups of it) is just mixed in with everything else: the nettles begin to disappear at that point, but they're in there, playing their quiet and steely role.

Do you replay, reinvision, rebirth your creations? Or is a cheesecake always a cheesecake and never a smoothie?

Captain Cook Hike and Carrot Coconut Bars

Yes, I can't help it--I love alliteration. But sometimes it comes and finds me. 'Captain Cook' was the name of the state park we were hiking on Saturday, and carrot and coconut, two of my favorite foods, were the main ingredients in the latest spin on ela-bar-ate (recipe below).

We were graced with broad blue skies, volcanos and mountains barely visible across the inlet.

 Check out the shelf of ice that hadn't yet melted on the landward side of the beach--and obviously, check out that hanging cabin! Someone had an architectural brainstorm, for sure!

 We were most thankful for that ice shelf: as I mentioned in my last post, the big low tide of the morning was matched by a big afternoon high tide, pulled by the waxing moon, and if not for the shelf, we would have been wading. Actually, the ice was melty and punchy, and we were almost wading in spots anyway, but we stayed mostly dry.

In terms of general logistics and convenience, the hanging cabin would be even more challenging to live in than our cabin. You have to pull yourself up a rope to get to it: anyone love hauling six-gallon water jugs and bulk groceries up a minor bluff?

I popped up the rope to check it out--it's currently deserted and the outhouse in the background (to the left of the pic) has fallen down. You can see me below the cabin, rockhopping not-so-gracefully.

 I'm glad I went up, camera-in-hand, because the owner clearly had a sense of humor and it's good to share--

I bet they're fully booked all  year.

One of the main attractions of this beach were all the beautiful rocks, agates, quartzites, jadeites, fossils that could be seen and found there. We came home with heavier pockets and packs than we started with, but some of the rocks just had to be enjoyed in situ...

 We pushed on past our determined 'turnaround time' to make this headland, and it afforded a wonderful view up and down the bay as well as locking us into a race against the tide.

 As I said before, I'm so proud to have completed this hike--twelve miles would have been far beyond me even quite recently. The next day was also busy and hectic, and by the end of it I was cranky and melted-down/frazzled: good feedback for the importance of rest and recuperation.

We enjoyed several snack breaks, delighting in the view and the warmth of this northern sun. I made chocolatey oaty bars for Phil and our friend, adapted from this recipe, with lots of orange zest, and decided that I wanted some bars that would work for my tummy too.
I liked them so much I'm making a second batch already--here's the recipe!


Carrot and Coconut Bars (gluten free, vegan, sugar free, can be raw)
(1)
1 cup finely shredded carrots (about three medium carrots)
1 cup shredded coconut
1/3 cup mesquite meal
1/3 cup maca
1/3 cup tapioca starch
2 tablespoons flax meal (yes, PUFAs, but I wanted something other than xanthan gum to bind this time)
2 tablespoons nutritional yeast
2 tablespoons orange zest (or to taste)
1 tablespoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon ginger
1/2 teaspoon cloves
1/2 teaspoon white stevia
pinch salt

Mix all of these together in a bowl and stir in:
(2)
4 tablespoons coconut butter
2 tablespoons coconut oil
(it's been easier to do this up here lately with the warm sun through the windows!)
When well incorporated,
(3)
Add liquid until it all holds together. I used cooled herbal tea, about three quarters of a cup; but you could use nut milk, or water, or whatever you prefer.

Spread out on a parchment paper-lined baking sheet. I used the spatula and spoon pictured, but mostly spread it out with my hands, keeping a bowl of water handy and working with wet palms.

 I don't have a dehydrator, the heat of the sun isn't enough to do the job alone, and our heater isn't coming on so much anymore (I've shown in the past how I dehydrate in front of the heater)---but dehydrating would be a great option for these.

Instead, I baked them at 300, and flipped them over to remove the parchment paper half way through.

They taste great, have a good texture, hold together well, are satisfying.
Variations
They'd be just as good without the orange zest.
Could vary the liquid used.
I think they would be wonderful with some dried fruit chunks in there, whether raisins, dried cranberries, dried apricot pieces... (when I'm done with the yeast cleanse, I'll surely make them that way too).
As I said, could be dehydrated or baked.
Now I'm going to try a savory version, with onions!

What size of rocks do you like to pick up and bring home with you? Our friend Terry tends to be drawn to fist-sized rocks that fit in her hand. I always seem to pick up jellybean-sized ones!