A New Food Resolution

The first week when I was thinking I'd have to cut out dairy, but before it really hit me, I was strolling through the grocery store looking for alternative sources of calcium. As I picked up a bunch each of kale and collards, pondering how to cook them, it occurred to me that I, like most Americans, had fallen into a rut of cooking the same things all the time.

I thought about making a (slightly late) New Year's resolution to introduce more variety into my cooking. And why not formalize that, like my abbreviated Year of the Dumpling experiment in 2010, with some blog posts?

So here it is: I'm going to try cooking with one unfamiliar ingredient every week. These might be common to other people (like collards) but new to me!

Chocolate is Out Too. Hi, Carob.

 Whereas Baby Bear responded to dairy with quiet intestinal bleeding, he reacts to chocolate with good old-fashioned Excessive Fussiness. Bedtime? Forget about it! The good news is that as soon as I cut out the chocolate, he went straight back to zonking out after his 8 PM nurse.

So, I pulled out the carob again. Chocolate it isn't, but it's close enough to trick my body into believing it's chocolate, and that chocolate isn't so great after all (same thing stevia does with sweets). One thing I do like about carob is that it isn't excessively bitter like cocoa so it doesn't necessitate tons of added sugar. And there's no caffeine or theobromine. Carob looks and acts like cocoa, but has a more fruity taste, almost like chocolate + honey.

Here's how I made the carob chunks pictured above:

1/2 cup palm oil, just melted and removed from heat
1/2 cup carob powder
1 Tbs turbinado sugar, finely ground in a coffee grinder
1 tsp vanilla

Mix everything together, pour into a parchment-lined 8"x8" pan and refrigerate! Break into chunks after cooling. I tried these in brownies, and the palm oil just melted away, leaving carob-lined pockets behind. Not the effect I was hoping for!  But tasty enough raw.

This Isn't So Bad

First lesson of the day: cereal + rice milk + splash of full-fat canned coconut milk is not half bad.
I reeeeaally miss butter. I could have buttered toast with raw milk for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and love it. In the early days of Baby, I'd often make just a tall glass of milk for a meal.
But when dairy's out.., thank God for coconuts. Coconuts are a close second to raw milk on the scale of food awesomeness.
So, pictured above, we have homemade graham crackers surrounding a bowl of COOKIE DOUGH DIP.

Graham Crackers:
4 oz palm oil (Spectrum shortening)
4 oz tropical oil blend (Earth Balance organic coconut oil spread... but since this is just a blend of coconut and palm oils, I might just substitute one or the other for this next time)
5 oz brown sugar

7 oz. all=purpose flour
4 oz. stone-ground whole wheat
1 t cinnamon
1 t baking powder
1/2 t salt

Blend oils and sugar in a mixer until light and fluffy.
Whisk together dry ingredients, and introduce to wet ingredients, mixing until fully incorporated. Pat into a disk, as for pie dough, and wrap and refrigerate 30 minutes, overnight, whatever.
Next day, preheat oven to 350. Roll out into 1/8" layer (thicker is okay... it still comes out crispy and ridiculously addictive), cut into squares with a pizza-cutter, prick THOROUGHLY with fork. Bake for about 20 minutes, start checking after 10. Kitchen will smell kind of like a movie theater concession stand, with the smell of cooking coconut oil (often used for popcorn). Break these apart and let them cool just as soon as they're out of the oven, and they'll crisp up like a dream!

Cookie Dough Dip: (warning - this recipe is VERY SNEAKY. Adapted from Chocolate Covered Katie, a super-skinny dessert-loving vegan genius blogger. I am tantalized by ALL of her recipes.)
The secret is hummus.

In a food processor, blend:
1 can chickpeas, drained and rinsed
Brown sugar: I used 2/3 cup, but could get away with less next time
3/16 t salt
1/16 t baking soda
2 t vanilla
2 oz almond butter
2 oz rice milk
3 T oats

After blending, mix in 1/3 - 1/2 cup chocolate chips. Dunk away!

Both totally dairy-free and delicious. Seriously. If we weren't having company this afternoon, these would not have lasted long enough for a photo op.

Bye bye, dairy

I LOVE MILK. I've been known to drive for hours in pursuit of the white stuff - rich creamy grass-fed life-giving immune-supporting raw milk. Rain, snow, gloom of night notwithstanding. And I love its many friends - yogurt, butter, sour cream, cream cheese, mozzarella, and all the lovely things to be made from those.
I drank raw milk throughout pregnancy and the first few months of breastfeeding. And then last week, baby let me know that the milk had to go.
Dairy sensitivity is pretty common among little babies. Cow/goat/sheep's milk protein comes straight through into human milk, and is very hard for immature digestive systems to process. There is a hope that eventually, the little one's gut will "seal" and be able to digest cow's milk protein once again. Sometimes it happens around six months, sometimes later.
So here I am, desperate for butter (melting into fresh-baked bread with cinnamon sugar, or a fried egg), but willing to give the casein-free diet a go. And since caregiving finds me often seated in front of the computer, why not document this stage of my culinary adventures with a few blog updates?

Ravioli with Roasted Butternut Squash, Lentils and Browned Butter

These are heavenly.  Since I already made the ravioli dough in June (Ravioli de Pesce), I used wonton wrappers this time.  Homemade dough is special (and time-consuming and messy) and the Nasoya wrappers are excellent.  These were utterly delicious and SO EASY.  Especially with three pairs of hands!

The filling is made from one roasted butternut squash mixed with 1/2 cup cooked green lentils (from 1/4 cup dry), 1/2 cup gruyere, 2/3 cup matzo crumbs, a pinch of cinnamon and 1/2 teaspoon of salt.  Mounded on top of the wonton wrappers, folded into triangles and boiled in salted water for five minutes, these were finished with a drizzle of browned garlic butter.  The only trick with these is keeping them from sticking together - cooking liquid and melted butter helps for this.  The flavor is rich, hearty and perfect for this time of year.

Pierogi Two Ways: Lentil-Onion and Sweet Potato Cheddar

I had made pierogi once before from this cookbook (with kasha-mushroom filling - March), and had forgotten how divine the dough is.  Teeming with sour cream, butter and eggs, (and I snuck in a little whole-wheat flour!) it smelled heavenly while I prepared the dumplings. I rolled it out, cut it in circles with a cup, and filled the circles with (a) boiled green lentils, sauteed onions, salt and pepper or (b) mashed sweet potato, cheddar cheese, sauteed onions, salt and pepper.  The sweet potato filling was much easier to manage, in part because it wasn't as wet as the lentils, which made it hard to seal the dumplings.  After folding the circles in half and chilling them in the fridge for a while, I boiled the pierogi for five minutes and tossed them in butter.  Hearty, toothsome and satisfying - the definition of comfort food - this is a recipe I'd definitely make again.  Yum!

Chicken Paprikash with Dumplings (Csirke Paprikas Galuskaval)

  

Another terrific stew.  This rendition of chicken and dumplings is brightly flavored with sweet Hungarian paprika, tomatoes and bell peppers.  The stew is straightfoward - brown the chicken parts in butter, remove the chicken and then cook an onion in the butter, eventually adding garlic, paprika, and tomatoes.  Add the chicken back to the sauce with a little water, cover and cook for about 30 minutes, add a sliced bell pepper, and cook about 10 minutes more.  I removed the chicken from the bones to make it easier to eat, but this step wasn't part of the original recipe.  

The dumplings are made of whole wheat flour, a beaten egg, melted butter and a bit of salt, mixed together and cooked in salted boiling water before being added to the finished stew.  Served hot with a generous dollop of sour cream, this stew is perfect.  I would make it again in a heartbeat.