Category Archives: recipes

Curried Carrot Sauerkraut

food preservation, lacto fermentation, recipes

Here’s the recipe for my latest fermented vegetable experiment which I slightly adapted from Baden:

Curried Carrot Sauerkraut

  • 1/2 head green cabbage, finely chopped or shredded
  • 1/2 head purple cabbage, finely chopped or shredded
  • 6 – 7 carrots, shredded
  • 1 small onion, finely chopped
  • 1 – 2 cloves garlic, minced
  • 1 1/2 – 2 T. curry
  • 2 t. salt (I use coarse Celtic)

Mix all of the vegetables together, and then mix in the curry.  Pack the mixture into glass jars. Add filtered water until the combined vegetable juices (if any) and water just cover the vegetables; add sea salt to the top.  Make sure that all of the vegetables are covered with liquid.  When there isn’t enough liquid, the vegetables on top will get moldy instead of fermenting.  Leave about an inch between the top of the liquid and the jar to allow room for the juices to expand.

Cover with a tight lid or a cheesecloth and rubber band/ canning jar ring – the second option allows the gasses that build up to be released so you don’t find liquid leaking out all over your counter the next morning.  Sally Fallon of Nourishing Traditions says that because lacto fermentation is an anaerobic process, once the fermentation has started the presence of oxygen will ruin the final product, but I’ve tried it both ways (with tightly fitting lids and with cheesecloth) and haven’t found that to be the case.  Leave it on your counter to ferment for a few days or as long as it takes until the vegetables are all soft.  If the cabbage kind of squeaks in your teeth when you eat it, it needs to ferment more.

There are a couple of things to be aware of in the summer.  The first is that because of the heat, the liquid will evaporate more quickly from the jar, so if you don’t use a tightly fitting lid you need to check it daily to be sure that the vegetables are still covered.  The other thing is that things ferment much more rapidly in the heat.  The faster something ferments, the stronger the flavor will be.  Cabbage needs to ferment longer than some vegetables;  I like to let it ferment for 4 – 5 days on the counter, and then transfer it to the fridge to continue the fermenting.  Since it continues fermenting in the fridge, but more slowly, it has a more mellow flavor.  If you ferment it at room temperature in hot weather, the flavor will be stronger.

You don’t have to use a mixture of green and purple cabbage, but I think it looks pretty so that’s why I did it.  It has a nice medium purplish color when it’s done.  This is meant to be eaten as a relish or condiment to your meals; I enjoy it in small amounts but find the flavor gets to be too much if I have a large serving.

Avivah

Breakfast shakes

nutrition, recipes

>>Shakes for breakfast are my favorite things. What do you put in yours?
I generally like to put in either yogurt or milk or leben, whatever soft fruit i have in the house, like strawberries, grapes, peaches, nectarines, plums, apricots, etc… bananas (preferably frozen, but non frozen is also ok), and lately i’ve also been adding wheat germ, whole sesame seeds, and flax seeds. Depending on the sweetness of the fruit i either may or may not add some sort of thing to sweeten it. It comes out delicious.<<

What’s great about shakes is that they’re so versatile, easy, and tasty!  You can put just about anything in and it will turn out great!  For my shake today I’ll have 1 c. raw whole milk, 1/2 c. kefir, 1 raw pastured egg, 2 bananas, and 1/2 oz coconut oil.   For the kids I’ll be using bananas, milk, and peanut butter for the kids, with some coconut oil thrown in.  But really it can be anything that is around the house – if I had to say a recipe, it would be milk/kefir/yogurt with fruit and some kind of fat.  (Sometimes I prefer to have the coconut oil separately because when I use frozen fruit it clunks up into tiny pieces. )  I don’t add any sweetners – a ripe banana adds a good amount of sweetness. 

I find that a shake is a super breakfast – it’s very filling, packed with nutrients, and especially helpful to me with a month old infant, easy to make and to drink. 

Avivah

Green Popcorn

recipes

This is a fun light meal since it feels like a snack, but is loaded with healthy fats that fill you up.  Extra virgin coconut oil has a coconut flavor that isn’t always appreciated but I like to use it when making popcorn – it’s a good way to sneak in extra nutrition and it tastes great!

Green Popcorn

  • 1/4 c. popcorn
  • 2 T. coconut oil
  • 1 T. vegetable broth
  • 1 t. spirulina
  • 1/4 c. shredded cheese
  • 2 – 4 T. melted butter

Pop the popcorn in coconut oil. Mix the remaining ingredients, and stir into the popcorn.  I’ve only made this once, so there’s probably a better way to mix this al up, but this worked for today.

Avivah

Crustless Broccoli Quiche

recipes

Here’s the recipe for the quiche that was such a big hit at ds’s birthday dinner this evening:

Crustless Broccoli Quiche

  • 1 onion, diced
  • 2 cloves garlic, minced
  • 2 c. chopped fresh broccoli (can use frozen, too)
  • 8 oz cheese, shredded or diced
  • 4 eggs, beaten
  • 1 c. milk
  • 1/2 c. mayonnaise
  • salt and pepper to taste

Saute the onion and garlic in butter.  I cooked the broccoli in butter, too, but you don’t have to do that – I think it adds a good flavor, though.  Then mix the cheese, eggs, milk, mayonnaise, and spices together, and add to the vegetables.  Pour into a pie pan, and bake at 350 degrees for thirty minutes or until set.

Alternatively, you can use 1 1/2 c. milk instead of a combo of milk and mayo – I’ve been using mayo in quiche since I was married, and like how it sets.  But if I was out of it, I’d use the full amount of milk instead of making a batch of mayonnaise just for this recipe. 

We quadrupled this recipe, and it made three regular pie pans and one very full 9 x 13 pan.  That was just the right amount for dinner for us.  I also added a handful of chopped plantain leaves to the veggies that were sauteeing – nothing like having freshly harvested greens to add nutritional value to your meals!

Avivah 

Really Good Vegetarian Meatloaf

recipes

Really Good Vegetarian Meatloaf

Soak 2 c. of water and 1 c. dried lentils overnight.  In the morning, drain off the liquid, and boil 2 c. water for each cup of soaked lentils in a saucepan.  Simmer covered for 25 – 30 min, or until soft.  Drain and partially mash lentils.  Cool slightly. Stir in:

  • 1 small onion, diced
  • 1 c. quick oats
  • 3/4 c. grated cheese or bbq sauce

Add remaining ingredients:

  • 1 egg, beaten
  • 4 1/2 oz tomato sauce
  • 1 t. garlic powder
  • 1 t. basil
  • 1 t. parsley
  • 1 1/2 t. seasoning salt or to taste (can use regular salt)
  • 1/4 t. pepper

Mix well, and put in a greased loaf pan.  Bake at 350 degrees for 30 – 45 minutes until the top of the loaf is dry, firm, and golden brown.  Cool ten minutes before slicing.

Avivah

Challah instructions and recipe

recipes

>>Would you be able to post your challah recipe? I am tired of the one I am using and figure yours is probably really good. i always like your recipes. <<

My dd14 has taken over the challah making in our house – when she moves out one day, I might have to relearn how to bake challah!  But since I’ve made it for so many years, I think it’s more likely to be like riding a bicycle – once you learn you never forget. 

We use hard white wheat for most of our baking.  People always know that there’s whole wheat flour in our challah, but never guess that it’s all whole wheat.  The whole wheat flour you buy in the store is generally from hard red wheat kernels, and is darker in color, with a stronger flavor.  You can buy King Arthur’s white whole wheat, which is basically the same as what we use, but not as good quality because it’s not as fresh.  Nutritionally red and white wheat are comparable.

>> i have switched to coconut oil and palm oil (the same brands you mentioned in your previous posts), but the one area i am having difficulty in adapting to these new oils is challah. I don’t want coconut tasting challah and I cannot find the right measurement for the palm oil. <<

I use expeller pressed coconut oil for when I’m baking something that I don’t want to have a coconut flavor.  Expeller pressed coconut oil doesn’t have a smell or flavor of coconut.  (It’s also not as healthy as the raw coconut oil that retains the coconut smell and flavor, but it’s still very good for you.)  I like coconut a lot, but there are some foods where it just doesn’t enhance the final result!  We melt it first if it’s cold in the house; when it’s warm it melts so it’s not necessary.  We’ve found that it works just like regular oil, though I think the challah stays fresh for longer with coconut oil, but that’s my subjective opinion.  After the coconut or palm oil is melted, use the same amount that the recipe calls for. 

Here’s the recipe we’ve been using for the last year or two – it’s the amount that we make every week, but it’s a large recipe and most families will probably want to halve it.  You could make this size recipe and freeze of the challahs for the following week, but it’s best made fresh.  

  • 8 c. warm water
  • 4 T. yeast
  • 3 T. salt
  • 2 c. sugar (1 regular cup, 1 overflowing – we use sucanat)
  • 1 c. oil (I use expeller pressed coconut oil)
  • 21 – 25 c. flour (I use all whole wheat, but suggest you start off with half whole wheat and half white because it’s easier to be successful with; of course you can use all white if you like, too!)

Mix the warm water and yeast; add salt, sugar, and oil.  Add flour bit by bit – the stickier the dough is, the better the final result, but you can’t have it so sticky that’s it’s impossible to work with.  Let dough rise for an hour, punch down, then braid.  Put in loaf pans or on a baking sheet and let rise for an hour or until doubled.  Bake at 350 for 30 minutes for loaf pans, longer for larger challahs – dd rotates the pans so that they’re on the top rack for 15 minutes, then the bottom rack for 15 minutes to ensure even baking.  My dd prefers how the challahs come out when baked in a loaf pan.  The challahs will look underdone when ready, but sound hollow on the bottom when tapped.   This makes 6 – 7 loaf sized challahs.

I’ve learned that making challah is about getting a sense for what the dough should feel like when it’s ready – you can follow a recipe exactly, but you won’t get the same challah every time because it depends on a number of variables.  When using all whole wheat flour, this is even more important, because it’s easy to make the dough too heavy and then the final result will be dense.  

My dd said to tell you not to get discouraged if it doesn’t turn out great the first time.  You have to get a sense of what the dough feels like when it’s just right, but once you’ve got that, your challah will turn out amazingly!

Have a good Shabbos!

Avivah

Red raspberry pregnancy tea

pregnancy, recipes

Here’s the recipe for the pregnancy tea that I’ve mentioned drinking.  I got it from bulkherbstore.com.  I try to drink at least a cup a day in the last month, though I’ve seen it recommended to drink up to to 5 cups a day starting at 37 weeks.  One precaution I would make is that if you do drink a lot of this, to increase the amount of water you drink, as red raspberry leaves can be a diuretic.

I personally wouldn’t drink it until the end of the first trimester, and not more than a cup or two a day until the last month.  I’m aware of women miscarrying because they drink huge amounts of this daily in the early part of pregnancy, maybe under the misguided belief that if a little is good, a lot must be better.  This is a wonderful uterine toner, but like everything, should be used as it’s meant to be used, not indiscriminately.

  • 8 parts red raspberry lea
  • 3 parts alfalfa
  • 3 parts peppermint
  • 2 parts nettle (I usually leave this out)

You can make a cup of hot tea by adding 1 or 2 teaspoons of the premixed herbs to 1 cup of boiling water. Let it steep for 5 to 10 minutes, strain, and add honey (raw is best) to taste.

To make a pitcher of tea for storing in the refrigerator, use 10 teaspoons or so of the premixed herbs for 8 cups of boiling water. Let it cool for a while and strain. Discard the used herbs, and put the tea in the refrigerator to drink over ice or reheated.

If you use this in labor, then you’ll drink it as an infusion instead of as a tea.  Only drink an infusion in labor or when you’re ready to be in labor.  To make it, take one ounce of the herbs (it will be a lot), and pour two cups of boiling water over it.  Let it steep about 30 minutes, and drink as hot as you can, when active labor has started. 

Avivah

Homemade laundry detergent

frugal strategies, recipes

At the beginning of this week I finally ran out of the laundry detergent that I bought a year ago at a salvage store.  Before that, we had successfully once tried making our own detergent (a very large batch) and were quite happy with it.  I asked my ds to make this, and he enjoyed doing it.  It doesn’t take long at all and it’s very satisfying to know how to make something like this yourself!  And of course, it’s very economical. 🙂

Homemade laundry detergent 

  • 1 1/2 c. borax
  • 1 1/2 c. washing soda
  • 1 bar soap, grated (Ivory, Fels Naptha, Zote – I use Ivory because it’s easily available in my store)
  • optional – add 1 c. Oxyclean

Use 1 tablespoon per regular load, 2 T. for heavily soiled loads.

You might not have heard of washing soda or borax, but they are more common and thus easily found than you’d expect.  I was able to find the washing soda and borax in the laundry detergent of the local supermarket.  It might seem a bit pricey initially when you add up the cost of the supplies, but because you only need 1 – 2 T. of the homemade detergent (vs. 1/4 – 1/2 c. of store detergent), it lasts a long time and is actually very inexpensive if you figure out the cost per load compared to your regular laundry detergent. 

Avivah

Lasagna – Pesach

Pesach, recipes

It’s erev yom tov, and since we did so much cooking before Pesach, we’re able to pull a number of kugels, main dishes, and desserts out of the freezer.  We adapted our menu plan for the last days to have some more variety, so we added roast turkey, farfel stuffing, gravy, ratatouille, sweet potato wedges, and carrots with pineapple to the other things planned, but that’s made already.  We only needed to make two salads, two roasted vegetable dishes, and bake some butternut squash today, so we’ve all been able to enjoy a relaxing day.  But – because I know that days like this can end up with the most rushing at the end (because everyone assumes there’s nothing to do until an hour before it’s time to light), I want to be careful to avoid that frustrating scenario.  There’s a saying, ‘Failing to plan is planning to fail’, and if I didn’t learn something from the past and plan around that, I’d be inviting myself to have a frustrating late afternoon today.

I didn’t invite guests for this part of yom tov, since I was hesitant to invite people in advance, just in case I gave birth early again.  But we really enjoy having company!  Today I hopefully called a neighbor and invited her along with her visiting extended family for lunch tomorrow.  We have enough food made that an extra ten or fifteen people for lunch is no big deal, but they couldn’t come – their cooking is all done.  Since so many people cook on yom tov and either don’t yet have their cooking done or wouldn’t mind putting whatever extra they had into the freezer, plus she would be working all day today, I thought it was worth asking.  Her 9 year old niece visiting from NY and my dd8 have really hit it off and spent hours together during the time they’ve been here, so even though they can’t come, I know they’ll still end up enjoying each other’s company over the next couple of days.

Here’s the last recipe I’ll be posting for Pesach this year.  My kids love this recipe, but in the end I didn’t make it for this year – too many other tasty things to make!  I’ll probably make it for the coming Sunday, though, assuming I have enough matza left – my kids will be happy to have it even after Pesach!  A couple of years ago I made it for the first time for guests who don’t keep kosher or Pesach traditions, and they enjoyed it, too – so I guess that’s saying something for it!  It’s an easy recipe, and it makes a generous amount.  Some people find that a dairy meal on the last day breaks up the long stretch of meat meals, and this is a nice dairy main dish.

Pesach Lasagna

  • 4 eggs
  • 2 lb. cottage cheese
  • 1 t. salt
  • 1/4 t. pepper
  • 1 lb. shredded cheese
  • 2 cloves garlic, minced
  • 1 t. basil
  • 32 oz. tomato sauce
  • 6 whole matzos

Soak matzas in some milk for less than a minute – they should be wet, not soggy.  Beat eggs, and add cottage cheese, salt, pepper, garlic, and basil.  Mix well.  Pour a little sauce on the bottom of two 9 x 13 pans.  Layer the matza, then the cottage cheese, then sauce, then shredded cheese on top.  Bake at 350 degrees for 45 – 50 minutes.  Let cool ten minutes before slicing.

You can also saute some onions, garlic, and any shredded veggies of your choice, and add that as another layer.

Enjoy the last days of Pesach – so much work goes into preparing for this week, and then it zooms by so quickly!   I’ve enjoyed our Pesach so much and hope that all of you have, too!

Avivah

Pizza Pie – Pesach

Pesach, recipes

Since I ran out of matza meal by the time yom tov started, thanks to all of the cake and kugel making that’s been done, I’m committed to using only what I have on hand.  That means being a little more creative about what to make for some of the chol hamoed meals.  This recipe for pizza fills the bill since it uses matza farfel instead of matza meal, and I still have three boxes left of that.  This will be for chol hamoed lunch tomorrow.

Pizza Pie

  • 3 c. matza farfel
  • 2 1/2 c. boiling water
  • 5 eggs
  • salt and pepper to taste
  • 8 oz shredded cheese
  • 1 can seasoned tomato sauce (I use tomato paste, thin it with water, and season it myself)

To make the crust, pour the boiling water over the farfel to soften.  Drain well.  Beat eggs with salt and pepper, and mix with drained farfel.  Cover a large pan with this mixture.  Bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes.  Then remove crust from oven and cover it with the tomato sauce.  Sprinkle cheese on top.  Bake at 350 degrees for 5 – 8 minutes.

Avivah