Tag: food

Autumn

Comforting Cinnamon-Vanilla Applesauce

by Rebecca1 Comment on Comforting Cinnamon-Vanilla Applesauce

The leaves outside are perfect.  Early November is my very favorite bit of year.  Foggy and crisp.  Yellow and brown and orange.  And full of misting rain, lilting music, cups of tea, and hours of quiet contemplation.

This time of year, I cozy down and make comfort foods; ones I remember having back home.  I also forge ahead as always and make new comfort foods- Fennel soup, pumpkin curry, roasted sweet potatoes, orangey-plum cake. Scanning some of my dear friends’ pinterest food pins the other day, I realized though, my cooking has changed.  Back in the early years of college, when I first began to truly stretch my cooking wings, I had a theme:  “healthy.”  I was intent on making every recipe low-fat, low-sugar, high-fiber, blah blah blah.  The food still looked and mostly-tasted like what most of us eat regularly.  Lots of butter, cream, cheese, grease.  I enjoyed cutting out or substituting with lots of products to get the same result.  I probably cooked with fat-free cheese.  Seriously.  I know I ate copious amounts of the sickeningly sweet fake yogurt crap.  Then, it was so good.  Now, I can’t even smell the stuff without wanting to run in the other direction.

Somewhere in the past couple years, probably as a direct result of my new food restrictions and growing more comfortable in myself rather than following fads, I don’t enjoy going to the grocery store anymore.  I don’t enjoy teaching the clerk the names of the vegetables I’m buying, being an inconvenience to the other customers as the clerk searches for the bulk bin code, and answering questions about why I’m “so healthy.”  Probably one of the best food moments for me this past year was feeding my little kindergartners greens and having them ask for more, leaf by leaf.  Then, I definitely did enjoy teaching their veggies.

I try not to judge others, though I know I still do.  I try to eat for me.  What is going to make me feel good?  What do I need?  Lately I’ve been eating apples.  Well, okay I always eat apples, but right now they’re at their very best.  I had a crisper full of golden delicious from my aunt that were slowly becoming a touch too soft to my liking.  So I decided to make one of the simplest autumn comforts–applesauce.  When younger, my siblings and I used to eat it by the quart full.  My grandparents would bring us a couple boxes of apples and my mom would get out the food mill and we’d take turns pressing out the peels.

I don’t have a food mill.  But an awesome vegetable peeler resides in my kitchen.  And some vanilla beans and cinnamon sticks.  We weren’t that gourmet back then.  It was straight apples and perhaps some sugar for good measure.  I was going for a bit of texture so I pureed half the cooked apples and stirred them back in with the others.  It was perfectly comforting.  Simple, and I didn’t even have to go to the grocery store.

Comforting Cinnamon-Vanilla Applesauce
about 9-10 large Golden Delicious apples, peeled, and roughly chopped
half a cinnamon stick
half a vanilla bean
 
1. Turn the chopped apples into a large stockpot.  Add a small bit of water, about 1/2 to 1 inch.  Toss in half the cinnamon stick and the vanilla bean.  Turn to medium-low and cover. 
2. Take out the vanilla bean after about 5 minutes.  Save the inside for another use.
3. Cook apples until soft.  Cool slightly and then puree half in  a blender.  I left the cinnamon stick in until the applesauce was gone.  It added subtle cinnamon flavor.
4. Turn pureed apples back into the pot and spoon it up!  Perfect with a cup of tea!
Autumn, Spring, Summertime, Winter

Gluten-Free Flour Mix

by Rebecca9 Comments on Gluten-Free Flour Mix

I find that mixing up a big batch of your own gluten-free flour mix is really the way to go in most recipes, as  the gluten free mixes out there to purchase often have flours and flavors that I inevitably find too starchy or beany in taste. I like to mix up a big batch to store in the pantry, and use a kitchen scale to get exact weights.

For the most part, I substitute this mixture cup for cup with all-purpose flours in non gluten-free recipes. Or if I’m trying to be really exact, 5 ounces of all-purpose flour and 5 1/2 ounces of whole wheat flour equal a cup, so I’ll measure 5-5 1/2 ounces of gluten-free flour on a per cup basis in recipes.

Rebecca’s Gluten-Free Flour Mix

  • 200 grams brown rice flour
  • 200 grams sorghum flour
  • 200 grams millet flour
  • 100 grams buckwheat flour
  • 150 grams tapioca starch
  • 150 grams arrowroot starch
Summertime

Crisp Rosemary Crackers

by Rebecca4 Comments on Crisp Rosemary Crackers

It’s finally beginning to feel like real summer here!  And when it’s summer, my eating habits change a bit.  I eat later dinners each night (think 8:30-9:00 pm), dine on fresh Hermiston Watermelons, and make huge veggie salads for lunch.  I’m not sure if these habits are because of the season, or as a result of habit from growing up on the hot side of the state, where true summers actually exist!

Lately too, I’ve been craving crispy, savory crackers and yesterday had a snack-lunch of crackers, hummus, and fresh vegetables.  There might have been a couple slices of salami thrown in there too, but, ahem, we ate it!  The rosemary and black pepper give a small hint of uniqueness to these little rounds, but even so, they pair nicely with a variety of other foods!  (Think cheese board, if you’re fond of eating cheese).

Our July 2012 Daring Bakers’ Host was Dana McFarland and she challenged us to make homemade crackers! Dana showed us some techniques for making crackers and encouraged to use our creativity to make each cracker our own by using ingredients we love.

Crispy Rosemary Crackers, adapted from Smitten Kitchen.

3/4 cups gf flour mixture
1 cup Bob’s Red Mill gluten-free flour (about 8 oz. of gf flour all-together)
1 tablespoon chopped rosemary
1 teaspoon baking powder
3/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup water
1/3 cup olive oil plus more for brushing
Salt
Freshly ground black pepper

Preheat oven to 450°F.  Place a baking sheet on the middle rack to preheat.

Stir together the flour, minced rosemary if using, baking powder, and salt in a medium bowl. Make a well in center, then add water and oil and gradually stir into flour with a wooden spoon until a dough forms.

Knead the dough gently in the bowl.  It should be compact but not stiff.

Divide the dough into 3 pieces and roll out 1 piece (keep remaining pieces covered with a towel) on a sheet of parchment paper into a 10-inch round.  Cut into cracker rounds with 3-inch round cookie cutter.  Remove excess cracker dough from rounds on the parchment, so the crackers won’t have to be picked up and moved.  Gently score the top of each cracker with a knife with a design of your choosing, if desired.

Then lightly brush the top of each cracker with additional oil and sprinkle with sea salt and black pepper, if desired.  Slide round (still on parchment) onto preheated baking sheet and bake until pale golden and browned in spots, about 10 minutes. Once baked, transfer parchment to a rack to cool.  Continue this process with remaining cracker dough on fresh parchment.