Paleo Popovers (grain free) - part 2 - individual popovers

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As promised, I decided to try my popover recipe using muffin tins (instead of a baking pan) and it turned out even easier than I'd expected.

I used the same amounts of all ingredients and split them up into the twelve muffin compartments. If you're using butter it's quite easy to cut each tablespoon of butter into quarters which equals 3/4 teaspoon (three tablespoons divided twelve ways) per popover.

Paleo Popovers (grain free)

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Our chickens have started laying again, which means we have an abundant supply of eggs. Several of our customers went on vacation and at one point we had more than eight dozen and hadn't yet collected that day!

While I've previously made egg-based almond flour cakes that use at least a handful of eggs, I wanted to make something that would be less of a dessert while still being a treat. My thoughts turned to popovers and I came up with the following:

Paleo Popovers!

Lemon Drop Chia Pudding

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I've been experimenting  with different types of chia puddings for a bit and this was too delicious not to share. Another plus is that just about everyone I know could it eat! It's vegan, dairy-free, gluten-free, grain-free, chocolate-free, has no refined sugars, and is nutrient dense to boot! Perhaps I'll try a grapefruit flavor next and see how it does.

Lemon Drop Chia Pudding 

Mix together:

• 1 can of coconut milk (I used full fat)
• Juice and zest of 1 organic lemon (if you're using the peel it's best to get organic)
• 1/3c chia seeds 
• Sweeten to taste (I used about 1/4 cup of maple syrup)
• 1t Vanilla extract. 

It'll take about an hour to fully soak up the liquid and won't solidify until it's been chilled for a bit longer. It's delicious for days - although I can't honestly attest to longer than a couple as it's never lasted longer in our house.

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Modern Foraging and Sumac Lemonade

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One of the many things I love about having access to wild land is the ability to forage.  

On a walk the other day, I came home with blackberries, a few raspberries (the last of the season), wild grapes, and a big pile of staghorn sumac drupes 

(not to be confused with poison sumac).

Quick Cucumber Salad - CSA Veggie Challenge

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Between our veggie CSA and our own garden we have lots of cucumbers! We've been enjoying blueberry cucumber smoothies, cucumber and dip, and of course, cucumber salad! 

Homemade Hard Cider - made with wild yeast

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Hard cider is not only delicious and easy to make, it is a traditional and historic New England beverage. While I only find some of the commercial ciders worth drinking, they hardly compare to the crisp, slightly sweet and bubbly beverage one can make for oneself. 

Meringues - what to do with all those egg whites

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 So, you've made eggnog or custard or flan or any other of the delicious egg-yolk heavy recipes I'll hopefully get around to posting this sometime this year.


You now have a bunch of egg whites.

Meringues are a simple, easy, and taste like the most-delicious-air-that-just-melts-in-your mouth treat!

The basic recipe is very simple. Beat egg whites with a teeny bit of vanilla, a little (dry) sweetener and an optional tiny bit of cream of tartar which helps the egg white bubbles from dissolving back to liquid.



I used six egg whites,
1/4tsp of vanilla,
4Tbsps of powdered maple sugar and
1/4Tbsp of cream of tartar.

I have a copper round-bottom bowl that is wonderful for beating eggs and cream and as I'd just purged my hand-held electric mixer (I hadn't used it in well over three years and have a stand-mixer) I chose to whisk the whites by hand. It took far less time and effort than I'd imagined and I will, with pleasure, make these by hand in the future.

When peaks form (even if the droop over) in the egg whites, spoon them in generous amounts onto a parchment paper lined cookie sheet. Bake at a low temperature (I set our oven to 200, although I know it's not accurate) until the outside of the meringues are golden and hard. Try tapping on them with a knuckle and if they give they're not ready. I baked mine for about an hour and a half.

When firm, turn the oven off and leave them in there with the door shut for another hour (or two).

My grandmother used to make a similar meringue cookie that she called "Nighty-nights" where you bake them, turn the oven off and go to bed. In the morning you pull out perfectly crisp and airily delicious meringue cookies.

A NOTE about fresh eggs: Egg shells are porous and moisture naturally evaporates over time. Store-bought eggs are normally, at the very least,  a couple of weeks old. Fresh eggs whites still have too much moisture to properly stiffen. You can experiment with the age of the eggs but I would recommend waiting at least a few weeks from the chicken to meringues.

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Seasonal Treats - (non-dairy) Eggnog

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I do love me some 'nog. Even better when I can still breathe after.

After a slightly less amazing test batch last week, I triumphed last night:

Non-dairy Eggnog
1can coconut milk
4 raw egg yolks (we get our eggs from a local farm)
2 whole raw eggs
2Tbsp maple syrup

blend or mix ingredients thoroughly - make sure to pierce yolks otherwise they may happily shake around but not incorporate themselves into the mix.

Add ground nutmeg to taste and enjoy!

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Happy Bunny Home Theater - Peanut Butter Cups

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For the second edition of Happy Bunny Home Theater we have peanut butter cups!

While there used to be many more of them, we may or may not have eaten all of them.








 To make your own you will need:
Peanut Butter
Blanched Almond Flour (or crumbled graham cracker)
Powdered Maple Sugar (or any granular sugar really)
Chocolate

Optional: mini baking paper cups and mini muffin tin

 Directions: Start chocolate melting in a double boiler or heat-safe glass jar in a shallow pan of water. Make sure to keep the heat pretty low to keep the chocolate from seizing.

Mix peanut butter filling: add a small amount of sugar and crumbly stuff to the peanut butter until the filling is stiffer and sweetened to your taste.

Roll peanut butter mix into teaspoon size balls. Place them on a plate and flatten slightly. Put the peanut filling nuggets into the fridge to stiffen.

If using paper cups spoon a small layer of chocolate into the bottom of each of the paper cups and put in freezer to set. Once the cups each have a disk of hardened chocolate in the base put a peanut butter nugget into each cup and spoon melted chocolate to cover.

If you're not using papers, you can simply dip each cooled peanut butter nugget into the melted chocolate. A good method for this is to lay the nugget on a fork and submerge it in the chocolate. Place the peanut butter cup on parchment paper and carefully slide the fork out from underneath.

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Happy Bunny Home Theater - Peppermint Patties

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Popcorn with all kinds of fixings is one of our favorite treats. About once a week we put in a movie, make a big bowl of popcorn and snuggle 'til it's all done and gone.

We also have a standing tradition of date-nights, and to make this past Friday evening special, we had the first edition of the Happy Bunny Home Theater.

Our living room is complete with two wired-in wall lights to which I added red paper complete with bunny-shaped cutouts.

I pulled out the couch and rounded up all the pillows in the house for a family-style lounge home theater experience.

To recreate the movie theater consumables, I made peppermint patties to go with our popcorn, lamb-kielbasa, spiced pecans and punch.

I mixed creamed honey with coconut oil and added peppermint oil. Once the mix had cooled I spooned it into little portions.

When the portions have solidified even more (I put them in the fridge to speed the process) they can be formed into patty shapes.

Using a fork I carefully dipped them in melted chocolate (mix of bittersweet and unsweetened to balance the honey) and slipped them onto parchment.

Not a single one survived the evening.

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Spanish Cauliflower "Rice"

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On my list of things to try has been cauliflower "rice." It's been on my list for a while. I do like cooked cauliflower, and rarely ate rice when I did eat rice.

I have made an amazing discovery: cauliflower "rice" is more amazing than rice rice.

I kid you not.

Spanish Cauliflower "Rice" is incredible!

In the words of my husband, "I like it even better than real rice." It's more flavorful, more betterer for you, and easy! Instead of cooking rice at the beginning (or happening to have leftover rice) you merely grate up a head of cauliflower.

For this recipe, I chopped up farmer's market onion and garlic and sauteed them. I used clarified bacon grease although any frying oil would work.

Once the onions started to clear I added approximately two large tomatoes worth of chopped tomato left from the bruisers of our tomato sauce project (a post on that once I get good pictures) and left them to simmahdown.

I then grated the cauliflower and chopped up a farmers market green/red bell pepper.

To the pan I added cumin, coriander, basil, oregano, cayenne, and a teeny bit of turmeric.

As cauliflower does not absorb as much liquid as rice, I waited for the tomato to cook mostly to a sauce before adding in the grated cauliflower. I'm not much of one for mushy peppers so I added the chopped peppers near the end.

This is sure to return soon to our dinner rotation and I can't wait to try asian-inspired fried cauliflower "rice"!

Almond Crusted Poached Eggs

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Let me introduce you to something amazing:

Almond Crusted Poached Eggs.

They are AMAZING.

Especially if you can't just fall back on a piece of toast to catch all the goodness from your poached eggs.

Recipe taken from the Primal Blueprint Cookbook (a fantastic cookbook with nothing in it I can't eat!) and pictured here in the back of the photo.

The basic process: poach an egg, sprinkle one side with an almond flour and herb mix, brush with raw egg and add another layer of almond flour mix.

Flop over onto a well greased pan and cook until crispy and brown.

Turn over onto pan and then do your best to not die from how delicious it is.

(Pictured here in a photo by Joe with yellow zukenoodles and homemade tomato sauce)

Perfect Cuppa

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One of my favorite hot beverages is a combination of Mayan Cocoa Spice tea from Yogi and Roastaroma from Celestial Seasonings. It makes a delicious non-dairy, sugar free and wonderfully full of flavor mocha-like concoction.

I found a way to make it even better.

Inspired by a coconut-milk chocolate pudding recipe, I decided to make some cocoa "syrup" to have on hand. In a saucepan I combined coconut milk, cocoa powder and maple syrup.

Mixed all together, I have found my perfect hot drink for chilly mornings.

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Zukenoodles and pesto

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I have been daydreaming about a (hand-held) julienne slicer for some time now.

As many of you know, there are many things I don't eat - I have (almost entirely) been off dairy for over ten years, eat little to no refined sugar, soy, pork, etc and have been mostly off grains for over a year.

The answer to the missing pasta gap?

Zucchini pasta!

I give you zukenoodles!

Here they are raw on the counter, fresh from the julienne slicer peeler thingy. :)

In a pan, I sauteed some scallions in oil and tossed the zucchini right in. (Photo by Joe)

(photo also by Joe) After adding a good healthy portion of pesto (from my last little tub from Garlic and Arts last fall!) and simmering down the liquid we ate most delicious piles of zukenoodles with pesto!


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Four color tomato salad

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I love tomatoes, especially heirloom. I love the colors, flavors, and patterns.

At our local farmer's market we picked up four different colors of tomatoes and made a delicious salad. I dressed them with a little bit of raw cider vinegar, olive oil, salt, fresh ground black pepper, and a tiny bit of maple to soften the vinegar.

Absolutely delicious!

This once again supports my position that delicious food tastes better when it's beautiful.



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mmm (grain-free, paleo) homemade freezer waffles :drool:

As many of you know, I've been experimenting with almond flour as an alternative to blood-sugar-crash-inducing grain flours and must say - I can now make a mean waffle I can eat.

This is partially inspired by an almond flour cookbook, partially by waffleizer ("30 answers to the question 'Will it waffle?'") and most importantly my love for our waffle iron. There's just nothing like bacon and waffles for dinner - especially when you still feel well an hour later. :)