Sunday 26 February 2012

Recipe Review

I've been in a cooking frenzy! Here is my review of Grain Free Nutty Carrot Breakfast Bread, Pumpkin Gingerbread Protein Bars, and Gingery Shiitake & Cabbage Soup with Edamame.

Grain Free Nutty Carrot Breakfast Bread from Daily Bites



Omm nom nom!! This is so absolutely delicious and it doesn't use any sugar other than that which is naturally stored in dried prunes and carrots. I added a little almond flour I had lying around and a little less stevia than called for. I will definitely be putting this into the rotation, this batter would also make great muffins.


Pumpkin Gingerbread Protein Bars from Cara's Cravings



Yummy! I made one batch of these last night, looked at the half empty can of pumpkin and decided to make another! There are tons of these in my freezer now. I must have eaten four or five when they were cooling and gooey so I have a feeling these will go realll fast. Aside from the pumpkin, I have enough for another future batch so this is another one for the recipe log.

Gingery Shiitake & Cabbage Soup with Edamame from Cara's Cravings



This soup is a great way to use that leftover cabbage from the borscht I made! I didn't add edamame and I cut the amount of tofu in half. Personally I don't like to eat a great deal of soy. I've read a lot of herbalists say it is really only good for you if you eat it in fermented form so that's what I go with normally. But the todu is great in the flavor of this soup which actually gets better int he fridge. The broth feels so great for me because its got so many mushrooms.

Happy cooking!

Saturday 11 February 2012

Three Resolutions Down -- Cabbage Soup and Yucca Fries

In learning how to do anything for the first time there are always things to learn from. Here's my update about my list of cooking projects to try this year.

So I liked my cabbage soup at first. I tried the recipe from Flying Apron's Gluten Free and Vegan Baking Book by Jennifer Katzinger. I made the Quinoa Loaf from that book and thought it was so great in the morning with peanut butter. REALLY filling and really not very complicated being that you only need one kind of flour. Vegan recipes are rather simple in this book, which I was suprised by.

I only used 4 of the recommended 6 beets in the recipe to cut sugar but I probably could have done a little less, beets are so powerfully potent! And to tell the truth, it took me until my last bowlful to make the cashew cream for the soup. And now I need to figure out something else to do with the half cabbage I've got in the fridge...

---

I also recently got water kefir grains, and I have made my first batch of apple cider kefir! I have another one brewing and I have a feeling there will be a post about that pretty soon...

---

Yucca fries have potential but need some work. The first time I boiled a yucca chopped and peeled for an hour and then fried it up with olive oil and butter. But I think that this is a plant that must be better roasted. It is amazing in soups, because it just melts in your mouth, but fried and eaten in large quantity (because its one big root) makes me feel a little queasy. But I would try it in a roast and in the oven, so we'll see how the next one goes.

National Certification!



Just passed my National Certification Exam! Yay no more studying

photo is - Leonid Afremov BEFORE THE CELEBRATION