Sunday Noodle Salad

Simple, punchy and fresh this vegan gluten free lunch won over my whole family even the picky little one (who actually made the dressing for this)

If I had tempeh or tofu I would have grilled it up like this earlier recipe for orange glazed tempeh and added that as well, but this simple lunch is  great straight up with any combination of veggies you have kicking around!

I used rice vermicelli noodles and I think I finally have a reliable way of cooking them without being disappointed, as has happened all to many times. So here is what you’ll need to make 4 portions:

Sticky Ginger Tofu, with Swiss Chard and Cashews

Sticky Ginger Tofu, with Swiss Chard and Cashews: Wheat & Gluten Free, Vegetarian & Vegan.

This dish makes a wonderful meal with a nice grain like quinoa or brown rice. It takes only minutes to make and is packed with vitamins and flavor. Also it is some of the only local fresh veggies I can get these days, So i try to cook with Kale and Chard as much as possible.

Divine Hemp Chocolate Brownie

Divine Hemp Chocolate Brownies: Gluten Free, Lactose free, High Protein, Ultra gooey.

Yum, the other day I was totally inspired by this cocoa-ee brownie recipe I found online here and I gave it a whirl at the cafe, and it turned out pretty darn good… I wanted to make it a little more chewy and I really wanted to use my great new Organic hemp flour… So I gave it a SOLE kick at home and it turned out just right! Super dense, really rich and the dates I added injected a caramel sauce like element which threaded it’s way through the whole brownie. When I remake this I will use a dark chocolate, cut into little chunks and sprinkled on the top rather than the milk chocolate bits I had in hand… alternatively a boozy chocolate gnache would be elevate this brownie to white tablecloth dessert!

The only dairy in these brownies came from our sweet little hens.

In a mixer bring together;

2 fresh eggs

1 Tbsp vanilla

1 tsp sea salt

9 whole dates, pitted and torn into quarters

2 Tbsp each: unsulphured molasses, honey, and brown rice syrup

1/2 cup of almond butter

1/2 cup of organic hemp flour

1/2 cup pure cocoa power

1/2 cup of chocolate pieces (I just cut up a chocolate bar)

1 tsp baking power

Combine everything together and pour into a prepared small square pan.

Sprinkle the top with organic hemp seeds and more pieces from your chocolate bar.

Bake at 325º for 20-25 minutes. Don’t worry about pulling a toothpick clean, the inside will set as it cools. Just make sure the top is firm-ish

dig in while they are warm.. its so worth burning your fingers for!

 

Goat Cheese Please!

Gluten Free Penne with creamy goat cheese, peas and pesto. Our plates were licked clean all round, poor dog didn’t even get a crack at them!

This was really quick to throw together:

Start by boiling salt water to cook about 2.5 cups of organic corn penne. Once the pasta is cooked drain and quickly add 2/3 cup of frozen peas (from the garden), a dollop of butter (we used goat butter and it is really really nice, it adds just a little of that goat cheesey taste) 2 tbsp of goat cheese, S+P, and 2-3 Tbsp of pesto (I have found a pretty good locally made organic pesto that will cover me while there is no fresh basil to be had… but this summer I vow to make and freeze a whack of pesto’s while the basil and arugula are fresh and abundant) That is it, stir and serve. This delicious dish takes about 16 minutes from start to finish. Enjoy.

 

 

Storing Solar Energy, in Mason Jars!

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Store & Capture Energy : A Permaculture Principle

It dawned on me the other day, as I was digging around my pantry for some yellow pickled beets, that my pantry is full of stored solar energy. The foods in those jars are a harvest of sun power delivered to my veggies and herb, stored and waiting to deliver their vital nutrients to us on a cloudy winter day. A taste of the summer sunshine and abundant harvest.

Back in the summer I made the following commitment in an earlier blog and I am still striving to follow it each day;

The whole bird, and everything from the bird.

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Truly nothing grosses me out more that seeing yellowy pink chicken breasts in a foam tray wrapped in plastic film on the grocery store shelf. Nothing, well aside from mayo, but that stems from a lifelong issue I have yet to uncover, and no desire to get into at this time. From this I am sure you can assume you will not find a “super chicken salad sandwich” recipe here, ever!

But lets get back to the bird. I can’t tell you when the last time I ate conventional chicken was. The thought of beakless caged, medicated almost translucent ghost birds eating old battery house hens, cows and often times mercury and lead rich fishmeal, had all driven me to vegetarianism for years. But in the past 5 or so years I met a number of really stand up poultry farmers, who’s farms I toured and who’s birds I came to enjoy.  Now I always laugh (sickly to myself) when I see pictures of a quant little farm on the packaging of any conventional meat & dairy products, as if the food in those containers comes from anything but industrialized processing compounds. Compounds where animal health and the impact on the health of the humans who eats those animals, is never calculated in to profit projections.

Well now I have my own little farm and a lovely flock of chooks which I have raised from 2 day old chicks through the slaughter, and the plucking, and the cleaning right to the fryer (as was the case for many of our roosters). We enjoy the chicken-ness of the chickens fluffing away in the garden, and we cherish the warm fresh multi-coloured eggs we collect each morning from our little feathered friends.  I have learned a thing or two about chicken keeping and eating this year, but more than anything, all of this chicken-ness has given me cause to celebrate the full life cycle and all the bits of a whole bird.

Seedy White Bean & Feta Veggie Balls / Burgers and Winter Kale Pesto

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I made this stellar veggie burger mix and turned it into burgers the first night and bean balls the next days, both worked out great. The veggie patty is a white bean and nut burger that came together pretty quickly. The next day I whipped up a winter pesto with kale, artichoke and sunflower seeds and used that as my sauce for corngetti and bean balls.

Seedy White Bean & Feta Burgers / Balls

Soak and cook 1 cup of white beans. I just learned that if you don’t add salt or acid to beans while they boil they cook way way faster! Why didn’t I know that before?  Set beans aside to cool, meanwhile toast 2 slices of gluten free bread cut in small cubes over medium heat with a glug of olive oil and sea salt. Remove the bread crumbs and in the same pan brown 1/2 or a large yellow onion sliced thick, cook until soft and  brown.