PeJu's Super Yummy Biscotti

Right out of the oven!

Our friend Chris emailed us a chocolate almond fig biscotti (gluten-free, dairy-free, grain-free, refined sugar-free, vegan-adaptable) receipt the other day, so we decided we would bake some biscotti this weekend after returning from our morning errand-hand-holding bike ride (Christmas Market, Foi Epi, Fantastico, and Mother Nature's Market) to go with our afternoon tea.

We altered the original ingredients:

• Coconut flour and quinoa flour for some of the almond meal 
• Maple syrup for honey
• Candied ginger for figs

We ended up with two versions, fig and cacao, and almond and ginger.

Ready for first baking!

Both taste great with afternoon tea. Don't let the whole gluten-free, dairy-free, grain-free, refined sugar-free, vegan-adaptable scare you off. I guarantee no one will notice if you don't tell them they aren't packed with refined sugar and glutenous flour!

Next up:

Our own version of ginger bread biscotti:

• 1 c sorghum flour
• 1/4 c almond meal
• 2 t tapioca flour
• 1/4 t salt
• 1/4 t baking soda
• 4 t ginger powder or candy ginger
• 3 t ground cinnamon
• 1 t ground cloves
• 1/2 t ground nutmeg
• 6 T maple syrup or agave syrup or honey
• 3 T almond slices (you can add these by hand after)
• Add water if it is too dry

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In the food processor, add all ingredients. Pulse to combine until the dough comes together in a ball. Remove the dough and press the dough together with your hands. The dough should be barely moist enough to come together. If it is too moist, add a bit of tapioca flour. If too dry, add a sprinkle of water.

Pat the dough together on the baking sheet into a log about 2 1/2 inches wide and 10 inches long. Place in the oven to bake for 15 minutes.
Remove and allow to cool on the baking sheet for at least 30 minutes. Lower the oven to 300 degrees.

Once cooled, slice the dough with a serrated knife into pieces about 1/2 inch thick on the diagonal. Separate out the biscotti onto the baking sheet and bake again for 15 minutes. Remove and allow to cool completely before serving.

Makes about 10-12 biscotti.

Any other suggestions for ginger bread flavour tips?

Do you think we should dip the ends in chocolate or a white glaze? 

Note: you can add any spice you like to change the flavour from sweet to savoury. It good with cacao to. 

PS, It was sunny in Victoria yesterday in case you easterns are wondering!

I Can't Believe it is July Already

Really?  July 1st?  What happened to June already?  Let's see ....

It was a glorious day, although not
bathing suit temperature

Visit to Vancouver - Peter and I had a quick weekend visit to Vancouver. We managed to take time to share some sushi at Spanish Banks and make the obligatory visit to Granville Island.

Getting my hands dirty

"Empress of the Underworld" - hey,
I 'earned' that title the hard way!

Two weekends on Hornby Island - as Peter's parents are staying there now that the weather is better, we went up to visit and help them get ready for summer.  We managed to clean the roof, plant some flowers in pots, replace some fencing so the deer can't get in and eat the flowers we just planted, and move some things into storage under the house.

Peter in his natural habitat.

Right out of the oven - yummy!

To balance it out (it was the weekend after all), we made a loaf of gluten-free crusty boule that I absolutely had to try (Peter found the recipe and it was quite good), the hot tub was up and running so we tested it out, we made dairy-free ice cream with sugar-free hazelnut flavour, went for a walk in Helliwell Park early one morning, walked along Tribune Bay and saw the new tennis court surface.

Looking southeast towards Vancouver

New court surface!

We even had some time to visit with  friends and wander around the farmer's market both weekends. It was sunny both weekends but just a little cooler than one hoped it would be.  Looking at the selection of fresh flowers and strawberries available, the sunshine was more important than the temperature.  It was a good month.

Fresh flowers from Maia at the Hornby Island Farmers Market

Who'd of thought?

Last week our favourite green grocer had pineapples on sale so we purchased two, one almost ripe and the other to ripen later.  Tonight, the second pineapple was finally ready to eat, and we were ready to eat it! As I grabbed it from the fruit bowl, I started thinking about how to cut it up this time - big pieces or little pieces?  Then it dawned on me!  We own an apple slicer and if I was lucky, the pineapple with it's outer skin cut off, might be a perfect fit for the apple slicer.  Sure enough, it fit perfectly.  Don't know why I didn't think of this sooner.  It's a time saver.  Besides, a pine-apple is a kind of apple, right?

Now I know how they fit pineapples in a can so nicely!

Chocolate Peanut Parfait

It's so simple, and so wonderful!  And, dairy and gluten-free too.

Step 1 - roasted organic peanuts with a hint of sea-salt

Step 2 - whip up some raw Chocolate Sauce

Step 3 - churn some homemade ice cream

Layer together in whatever order and quantity you prefer and enjoy!
(Oh boy, my mouth is watering all over again)

Love those coconuts

One of our favourite treats is to share a young coconut.  They make a wonderful snack, drink, or dessert.  Until a week or so ago, we found them quite a challenge to open  - which has been one of the few drawbacks to enjoying a young coconut.   The other main drawback has been trying to find them in a grocery store, and harder yet to find them on sale!

Young Coconut, fresh from the store, individually wrapped

Amazingly, we found them on sale today at 3 for $5 so we brought some home to eat.  Luckily, Peter found a website with a video showing us an easy way to open them - this, after years of trying to find that perfect little spot to stick in a really strong knife, and then forcibly cut it open.  Lots of wasted effort.  The new way is MUCH easier and I'll try to show it here.

Shave the fibrous covering from the top part with knife - the sharper,
the better. Shave following the angle of the coconut top.

This is what it looks like 'shaved' or bald.

Take the butt end of a big knife and slam it into the top,
just above the widest part, where it will crack open just a wee bit.

Once the lid is cracked, it will crack all the way round and is easy
to pry off bit by bit all around.
Be careful to not spill too much coconut water!

Here you can see the clear water and thin layer of soft meat.
Or, can you?

Use a spoon to scrape the soft, young meat from the lid.

Pour the water into a glass or bowl, and scrape the young meat
from the inside of the coconut. I use a spoon.

Voila!  Fresh young coconut to enjoy! Nutrition from coconuts is off the map! Potassium, manganese, lauric acid, zero cholesterol, less fat than whole milk, a small amount of natural sugars, and very little sodium - all wrapped up into a liquid that has the electrolyte equivalent of our own plasma.

Spring Ahead Salad Rolls

vermicelli noodles, jicama, lettuce, cucumber, 

carrot, peanut sauce ready to go together

Today we spring ahead an hour and Salads Rolls seemed the obvious choice for dinner on such an occasion. 

SALAD ROLLS

Start by making a dipping sauce. Here are two examples of ones we have enjoyed. You can use anything that resembles salad dressing that you enjoy. So don't worry too much about it!

PEANUT 

1/4 to 1/2 cup organic peanut butter

2 cloves minced garlic

1 tbsp minced ginger

1 tbsp honey (optional)

Juice of 1 lime

1 tbsp oil (sesame if you have it)

1 to 2 tsp (to taste) sambal oelek (very important in my opinion)

1/4 cup soy sauce (wheat free tamari if you have it for gluten free)

Blend by hand or in a food processor / hand blender.

OR 

CHILE LIME

Juice of two limes

1/4 cup fish sauce 

1/2 cup water

3 tbsp brown sugar

1 tbsp sambal oelek 

Blend by hand. 

Next the rolls. You will need:

1/2 package rice vermicelli (thin rice noodles)

Round rice paper wrappers  (22 cm/8.5 inch)

Shredded carrots

Shredded lettuce or kale

Shredded cucumber 

After the salad basics you can add anything you like. For example, we love jicama, so we add shredded or julienned jicama. 

Sometimes, we also add BC Spot Prawns when we're feeling flush, or fruit (mango) and vegetables such as green onion or sprouts, and fresh basil. Any salad fixings you have on hand. Experimenting can be fun!

DIP, BITE, DIP, BITE, DIP, BITE ...

Directions:

Bring a saucepan of water to boil. Remove from heat. Place rice vermicelli in boiling water, remove from heat, and let soak 4 minutes. Drain, and rinse with cold water to stop the cooking process.

Fill a large bowl with hot water. Dip one rice wrapper in the hot water until soft (only a couple of seconds). 

Lick your lips and enjoy!

Lay wrapper flat on work surface and place desired amounts of noodles, carrot, lettuce etc., etc., in the center. Roll the edges of the wrapper slightly inward. Beginning at the bottom edge of wrapper, tightly wrap the ingredients (think burrito). Repeat with remaining ingredients.  

Serve the Salad Rolls with dipping sauce of your choice, and sit down and enjoy.  The wraps also keep well for lunch the next day if you wrap them in plastic wrap.  That is, IF you have leftovers!

Sunday Night dessert

Sorry for the poor photo -
we almost forgot to take it!

This past week we conspired with Peter's parents to share our "Sunday Night" Japanese style.  We prepared a little miso soup, rolled some sushi, sliced some tuna and salmon sashimi, and finished with freshly made Banana, Lime and Coconut ice cream. 

We've mentioned the gluten and dairy free ice cream once before and have made some adjustments to the recipe that we were most happy with.

Banana, Lime and Coconut Ice Cream

All ingredients ready to blend.

1 tin coconut milk

1/4 tin vanilla almond milk  (I measured in the coconut tin)

1/2 tsp vanilla

1 mashed ripe banana

juice of 1 lime (approximately 60 ml including the pulp)

2 tsp orange zest (homemade preferably)

1 tbsp agave syrup (or maple syrup)

Put all ingredients in the blender to puree for a couple of minutes, and store in the refrigerator until cold.  This part you can make up to a day ahead of time.  Then follow the instructions for your an ice cream maker. 

 

This makes a lovely, creamy and tasty ice cream.  Next time I may experiment with coconut milk and different fruits, and, of course, chocolate!

We use the half pint Donvier that was thoughtfully gifted to me by my aunt a number of years ago.  

I imagine that if there was any leftover ice cream, one could keep it in the freezer for a rainy day.  But I can only imagine that part.  The leftover part, that is.

Blueberry Pancakes

This being Saturday, we have time to make lattes and take our time deciding what we want to eat for breakfast.  Today over coffee, we quickly narrowed it down to oatmeal or pancakes.  The last few times we'd made pancakes, we had tried either a gluten-free pancake mix or a recipe labeled as gluten-free.  Turns out most of these contain some form of potato or corn.  Since we have became aware of Peter's various food sensitivities, especially corn, we have chosen to search for a new gluten-free recipe.

Sesame-Rosemary Crackers

With the success of the Sesame-Rosemary Crackers we have been making and enjoying lately, we decided to search for a pancake recipe that includes sorghum flour.  We found one and today was the first attempt using the recipe below.  We added blueberries because we can, and I have to say plates were licked in satisfaction!

Sorghum Pancakes

The sorghum blend is 2 cups sorghum, 2/3 cup arrowroot, 1/3 cup tapioca (I sift this together into my sorghum blend container).

Blueberry pancakes in the pan

In bowl mix:
1 cup sorghum flour
½ cup sorghum blend above (I used tapioca flour instead)

1 packet Stevia powder (= 2 tsp sugar)

1 teaspoon xanthan gum
1 teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon salt

In another bowl:
Beat 1 egg (or egg replacer)
2 tablespoons oil
1 cup milk (I used almond milk and needed more than 1 cup)
1 tablespoon lemon juice

Mix egg mixture into dry mixture. Make sure your pancake grill is nice and hot before you pour your batter on the grill. They will be flat if you don’t heat your grill enough.

Note: I added more milk a tablespoon at a time until the batter was thinner than in the photo.

Homemade Crackers

Further to our last post, here is the recipe for the gluten-free, corn-free, homemade crackers. We have finally got it right so they are a delight to eat, one by one, until they are almost gone!

Sesame-Rosemary Crackers

1/2 cup sorghum flour (NB - other flours don't work as well)

1/4 cup tapioca flour
1/4 cup almonds/pecans, finely chopped (I used my food processor/hand blender/coffee grinder to make them finely ground, almost into a coarse meal)


1/4 cup flax seeds
1 tsp. kosher salt
1/4 cup sesame seeds


2+ tsp. extra virgin olive oil
2+ tsp. dried rosemary, finely chopped (or dried basil)
1 tsp. cider vinegar


Toast sesame seeds until golden and fragrant, about 5 minutes in a toaster oven, hot fry pan or hot oven. Watch carefully so that they don't burn.


Soak flax seeds in 1/4 cup warm water for at least 15 minutes, or until they have swollen to absorb the water. The longer the better and I have even left them overnight.


In a medium mixing bowl, blend together sorghum, tapioca, pecans and salt. Add flax seeds, olive oil, sesame seeds, rosemary and cider vinegar and mix into a ball of dough. If dough is too dry, add a tsp. or two (or more) of warm water to make dough ball stick together. Divide dough ball in half.


Place a sheet of parchment paper on your counter and place first dough ball on top. Cover with another sheet of parchment paper. Roll with rolling pin to rough rectangular shape to fit a cookie sheet. I rolled this out to a little under 1/4 inch thickness. Remove top sheet of parchment paper and place bottom parchment layer and dough on cookie sheet. Score crackers into serving size with sharp knife or pizza cutter (about 1/5 x 2.5 inches).


Bake at 400 degrees F for 10 minutes, or until slightly brown at edges. While first batch is baking, roll out your second cracker batch as above.


Makes about 60 crackers. Once cooled, store in airtight container to keep fresh ... if you have any left over! I easily doubled the recipe.

Chocolate

Pure Chocolate Wafer

Chocolate Mint

This past weekend we got to talking about chocolate and what makes good chocolate.  Peter and I both love our easy homemade raw chocolate so we shared some with Rob and Doug during their Great Victoria Adventure.  I think they're both sold on the idea, as they asked for the recipe.  So, here it is:

Ingredients:

½ cup melted Cacao butter

½ cup melted coconut oil (for firmer chocolate, sub coconut oil with cacao butter)

½ cup maple or blue agave syrup

1 ½ cup cacao powder (cocoa works too)

½ teaspoon vanilla powder (or flavouring)

Preparation:

Melt Cacao butter in a bowl that is placed over a large pot of hot water. Once melted remove from heat and stir in other ingredients .  Put it in the freezer to firm.

Voila, you’re done!

Notes: 

-       Do not get any water in the chocolate mixture or it could separate

-       We pour it over a sheet of parchment paper for thin wafers

-       You can add nuts, jelly beans, or whatever to suit your tastes

-       If you want to get fancy you can make wafers stuffed with mint or peanut butter or coconut or cashew butter or … well, you get the idea.

Chocolate Peanut Butter

ENJOY!

Jelly Bean Bar

Sunday Dinners

Today was a real winter day for us.  There was a dusting of snow on the ground and it was downright chilly at only 1 degree above zero Celsius.  However, the sun was shining and there was a little breeze. 

Tonight we had our first traditional-style Sunday dinner this year.  And, I am happy to say it was both good for us and fit our budget!  In fact, it almost met all the dietary restrictions we are trying to meet these days.  We roasted a pork tenderloin we'd found on sale at the local Thrifty's Store, then sliced it thinly to serve on top of our homemade gluten-free buns that were served open-faced, then drizzled with tasty gluten-free gravy.  There was a side of Mock Mashed Potatoes (i.e. cauliflower mashed), and Romaine lettuce with our new house dressing - which is very 'Caesar-like'.  For dessert, we ate some of the ripened (finally) Vancouver Island kiwis (which were also on sale).  Very tasty and quite satisfying.

Christmas Day 2011

I never heard the reindeer!  Again.

We woke up early on Christmas morning this year, and we were pleasantly surprised that Santa had, yet again, managed to find time to drop by the Elkins' household.  He even figured out that Frank and Mary Jane would be dropping by after church for breakfast and left packages for them as well.

So we got busy and prepared our special big breakfast of eggs, bacon, home fries, blueberry/banana pancakes, freshly squeezed orange juice and famous Lavazza cappuccinos, timed just right for Frank and Mary Jane's arrival around 10 am.  While we were preparing this, we Skyped with the Snikles in AB to share in their morning opening of presents. It was almost like being there. Gotta love Skype.

Night Watchman Smoking

After breakfast we opened all the gifts under the tree and had a wonderful time.  Peter surprised me with a new Christmas decoration that he had been able to get his hands on while in Vancouver visiting with his long-time friend Andy.  It is a genuine Steinbach Night Watchman Smoker and here is a picture. I hope you can see the smoke coming out of his mouth.  This is just one of the many hand-crafted collectibles made by the Steinbach family in northern Germany.

Later in the day, Frank and Mary Jane came back to our place to share in Christmas dinner.  Instead of roasting a complete turkey this year, we decided to have a turkey roll. We made the roll with a boneless breast, a boneless leg and pork sausage sandwiched in the middle of the two.  I have to say it is much easier to prepare, carve, serve and clean up than a fully formed turkey.  Also, we were able to only cook a quantity that suited the four of us better.  I would happily do that again sometime.  Our Christmas dinner ended with Frank sharing the Christmas pudding (and hard sauce) that Santa had brought to him this Christmas.  I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas and holiday time this year.

Christmas dinner 2011

New Juicer to try out

Yesterday Peter scooped a Juice Factory 2000 for us to try - free of charge!  Best kind of scoop.  It has a little bigger capacity (but smaller counter space required) and definitely squeezes more juice from the veggies/fruit than our Viking attachment.  Here is a photo of Judith cleaning up after the Juice Factory overfilled her juice glass this morning.

October 15, 2011

The weather in October was pretty nice this year.  It got quite cool on many days but I was still able to ride my bicycle to work most days.  I bought fenders knowing that the rain is going to start pretty soon and I will be needing them.  One of these days, I'll actually attach them to the bike!

On Saturday the 15th, the sun was shining and it was warm outside. We knew it would be foolish NOT to take our tea to our favourite beach for one last picnic in the sun for the year.  So we made the tea and to celebrate we stopped at our favourite bakery (okay, one of them) and picked up a sweet for each of us to enjoy with tea.  Well, it was such a magnificent day, that we were obviously not the only ones with the same idea.  Not to be scared off by this, we found a different beach just a short distance away.

Fruit tart with custard

Thanksgiving

We were lucky enough to be invited out to our friends pub for Thanksgiving dinner today, so I had the opportunity to take my sweet old time doing whatever I wanted.  We slept in and had a late breakfast with our Sunday latte.  It was the Victoria Marathon today so we also spent some time looking out the window at the runners and their families coming back from their run.  Some had medals around their necks, some were limping a little bit, but almost everyone was enjoying the sunny Fall day.

After breakfast I started to clean up by washing the dishes.  I do this 'chore' almost daily, usually in the evening before bed as we have no automatic dishwasher in our little kitchen.  This is not an unusual situation for a rental apartment, especially in an older building like ours.  I don't mind as it reminds me on a regular basis how to be careful about how many dishes we use, how much soap we use to clean our plates, and besides, we only have so much counter space!  Because the dishes need to be done daily, I like to do them once only and leave them to air dry.  In the morning I put them away and start the whole process over again.  One of the things I enjoy the most about 'doing the dishes' is finding a way to put all, or at least as many as I possibly can, on the dish rack.  I treat it as a 3D spatial puzzle.  First I have to plan the order in which to wash the various pieces that require cleaning so they can be appropriately layered on the drying rack.  Since the best laid plans do not always work, I have to find a way to actually make them fit. I try use every available inch of the rack but still provide enough room for the air to actually dry the dish.  Included here is a photo of today's creation.  Can I really call it a creation? I'd like to think so.

Another of today's creations was we made our first batch of almond milk.  Yup.  Grind your own almonds, add water and little something to sweeten and/or flavour it and strain it through a nut bag .... ta da!  So no more hunting around for the best price on Almond Milk.  We make our own.  No extra packaging either.  Probably fewer calories, too!  However, I will have to find room on the drying rack for one more bottle, won't I? You can see the gauze nut bag hanging to dry beside the rack of dishes above.

Well that's it for today - a glimpse of some of my life's small things.  I have so much to be thankful for.  Happy Thanksgiving to all Canadians!

Pie Confessions (or is it Concessions?)

Blackberry/strawberry pie

Seems I have a confession to make about this past week.  It is almost embarrassing to admit it, but hey, that's how it goes with confessions, isn't it?  Well, here goes .... it was 2 pie week!  Yup, I first felt the urge last weekend and because I had Monday off from work, I took the time to make gluten-free pastry and fill the cake with the last of the frozen blackberries we had hiding in the freezer.  I considered making it a bumbleberry pie as we didn't have quite enough blackberries for one pie filling, but ended up just adding some strawberries that were crying out to be included.  Since I wanted to make a pie with the lattice top, I doubled the recipe.  To roll out the pastry, I cut the ball in half and started rolling.  It became obvious that I had enough pastry for both the bottom shell and the lattice.  (Now, you know where this is going, right?)  Result:  One delicious blackberry/strawberry pie!  Plus the added bonus of one ball of pastry in the freezer ready for an impromptu pie baking at some later date.  I was very happy with this result and Peter agreed, although he didn't know about the frozen supply. Yet.

Well, maybe it was because I was generally pretty happy having a Monday off AND having some lovely pie that we easily consumed on our own in just 2 days, or maybe it was because Peter felt the same way, but I must have let it slip at some point that there was the 'backup' pastry in the freezer.  Maybe it was because Peter loves blueberry pie and he knew we had filled the freezer with this years bounty of frozen blueberries.  I don't know how it happened, but on Thursday I came home from work and Peter had made dinner including the best potatoes I have ever had, and had pulled the frozen pastry out of the freezer to thaw.  So, of course, we had blueberry pie that night before we went to bed.  All in all, a good time was had by all.

Blueberry pie

Saturday September 24th

Last week PeJu were smart and purchased a case each of Campari tomatoes and freestone peaches.  All BC grown.  Naturally, our meal choices this week have been influenced by these purchases.  Friday night Judith realized the box of frozen puff pastry in the freezer might make a nice companion ingredient for some of the peaches.  Besides, it really had been in the freezer too long anyway!  It HAD to be used up.  So, Judith did her best to make some peach strudel.  Needless to say, it was heavenly.  Unfortunately, we neglected to take a photo of it and it was gone by 10 am Saturday morning.  But we wanted you to know that these kind of good things happen and brighten up our lives.  May you all be blessed with strudel too!

Monday September 19th - Flex day

Every second Monday is Judith's scheduled flex day at work.  Theoretically, this means a 3-day weekend every other week.  We think this is a great idea!  On September 19th, it was a gorgeous day so PeJu headed down to one of their favourite spots (Clover Point), folding chairs and picnic in hand for a wonderful gourmet lunch (quinoa salad with fresh salsa).

Monday September 5th - Labour Day

Labour Day was quiet for us.  PeJu needed to relax and recover from the Saanich Fair. Did I mention it was really hot and dry? Anyway, part of R&R was juicing fresh local bounty. Mmmmm!

Here is our juicing machine and setup.  It is an attachment to the Viking mixing machine.