Category Archives: recipes

How to make healthy recipe conversions

nutrition, recipes

I’ve been asked several times where I get my recipes from, but I don’t have one particular cookbook that I rely on.  Most of my recipes are my healthful adaptations of recipe calling for processed or low quality ingredients.  Something I especially appreciate about cooking in line with traditional guidelines and methods is how easy it is to convert recipes from any cookbook so that the final result benefits your health.  Once you know how to make conversions and substitutes, it’s easy to adapt any recipe you find and make a healthy version.

I know a lot of people find the idea of improving their diets intimidating and aren’t sure where to start.  I also know some people feel like they need special recipes that expressly call for the healthy ingredients they want to use.  I thought I’d share some basic guidelines so you can see how simple it is to improve the quality of your diet without introducing too much new and different stuff that the family may turn up their noses at, and easily expand your repertoire of recipes.

Shortening/margarine/vegetable oil – instead use butter or coconut oil.  This works wonderfully for baking and frying.   Substitute it in the exact measure for the unhealthy fat that the recipe calls for.  Cold pressed vegetable oils can be used in salads (I use extra virgin olive, flaxseed, and occasionally some others), but not for frying or baking, as they aren’t stable at high temperatures.  In my opinion this is the most important thing to get rid of and replace with something better.  Fortunately, this is easy to do and can be purchased at your local health food store.

White sugar, brown sugar – instead use organic sucanat (regular sucanat is usually glorified sugar) or honey.   Sucanat is easy to substitute for sugar because of its granular quality, and can be used in equal amounts to the sugar the recipe calls for.  Because honey has such an intense sweetness, you can use fifty percent honey for the amount of sugar called for (eg 1/2 cup instead of one cup) to have the same am9ount of sweetness.  Personally, my ratios are lower since I find most recipes too sweet for us; we use 1/4 c. of honey or 1/2 c. sucanat for every cup of sugar called for.  Organic sucanat is available at health food stores and sometimes found in the health section of large supermarkets.

White flour – instead use white whole wheat flour.  Nutritionally it’s the same as the darker whole wheat flour ground from hard red wheat berries, but the color is much lighter so the final product will more closely resemble the original recipe.  Substitute 7/8 of a cup of whole wheat flour for every cup of white flour.  I buy hard white wheat berries and grind my own flour, but you can buy King Arthur’s white whole wheat flour at health food stores.

For animal products – chicken, meat, eggs, milk – use the highest quality product you can find/afford (ideally, pastured eggs, free range meat, raw milk – but any small improvement in this area is worthwhile).

For any processed ingredients, substitute a homemade version or a healthful store bought substitute.  For example, instead of regular peanut butter I use organic peanut butter/cashew butter/almond butter that are pure nut butters with sea salt added, nothing else.  Instead of white flour pasta, buy a higher quality whole grain version or make your own.

All of these things are very, very easy to do – it’s using similar ingredients to replace the less healthful ones.   Small changes that result in major qualitative improvements in the final product.

In addition to using good ingredients, there are a couple of traditional preparation techniques that can be integrated into most recipes. I’ve written about several of these techniques in detail in past posts, and will just reference them here.

In most recipes that call for flour (quick breads, cakes, muffins), you can substitute buttermilk/thinned yogurt for part of the liquid the recipe calls for, and soak the flour overnight in the buttermilk or yogurt, adding the rest of the ingredients the next morning. Alternatively, you can purchase sprouted flour, that doesn’t require any soaking and or advance preparation, either online or at your local health food store.

When cooking with beans, soak them a couple of days in advance and let them begin to sprout before cooking as usual.

Cooking healthfully isn’t hard, and it’s fun to be able to convert any recipe into something that will nourish your family!

(This post is part of Real Food Wednesdays.)

Avivah

Chocolate Zucchini Muffins (gluten free)

Pesach, recipes

I’ve been enjoying learning to bake with nut and coconut flours.  The consistency is different but it’s nice to know that there are ways to make baked goods that are typically not gluten free.  These muffins are so good you could call them cupcakes and serve them for dessert!

Chocolate Zucchini Muffins

  • 1/2 c. melted butter or coconut oil
  • 1/4 c. applesauce (we used the applesauce we preserved from the apples we gleaned last fall)
  • 1/4 c. honey
  • 2 eggs
  • 1 medium zucchini, grated and squeezed dry
  • 1/4 t. baking soda
  • 1 t. vanilla
  • 1 c. almond flour
  • 1/2 c. coconut flour or finely grated dried unsweetened coconut
  • 1/4 c. cocoa or carob powder

Mix the butter, applesauce, honey, eggs, zucchini, baking soda, and vanilla well.  Mix the nut flours and cocoa/carob powder in a separate bowl; then mix into the zucchini mixture.  Pour into a muffin tin or muffin liners, and bake at 325 degrees for 20 minutes.  Yields 12 muffins.

When kids get yummy stuff like this for breakfast, you don’t hear complaints from them about having to eat healthy food. 🙂

Avivah

Homemade Eggnog

recipes

Last week I did my monthly shopping when ds10 noticed large cans of eggnog, reminded me of when I bought a few cans of it several years ago how delicious it was, and suggested I buy some. (This shows you how little processed food I’ve bought over the years, that a memory like this is so clear three or four years later!)  I told him we could make our own instead, that it would then be tasty and good for us.  This week is my ds16’s turn to make breakfast, and when I told him that eggnog was on the schedule, he said, “Eww – homemade?”  But since I brook no dissent 🙂 I told him to make it and then see what he thought of it.  Well, as soon as he tasted it he was singing a different tune!

Here’s the recipe we used:

Homemade Eggnog

  • 4 c. milk (we were out of milk and used 3 c. water and 1 c. heavy cream instead)
  • 1/4 t. cinnamon
  • 1/2 t. vanilla

Mix and slowly bring to a boil in a saucepan.

  • 12 egg yolks
  • 1 1/2 c. sucanat

Whisk these until fluffy.  Remove about a cup of the hot milk mixture and mix the beaten eggs into it.  Then return the egg and milk mixture back to the pot and cook over medium heat for several minutes, stirring constantly until thick.

  • 4 c. cream
  • 1/2 t. nutmeg
  • 2 t. vanilla

Mix these together, and when cool, stir into the above mixture.  Drink cool or warm. (We heated ours and then the kids mixed it with the freshly fallen snow for ‘snow ice cream’.)

If I had pastured eggs, I’d be comfortable blending the raw milk, cream, and eggs together without any cooking and this would be super fast and easy to make!  But my farmer has been having a hard time meeting the growing demand for his pastured eggs lately, so when I last was there I couldn’t get the amount I wanted and I’m using regular supermarket eggs to fill the gap.  You can only do what you can do! I won’t use these eggs raw; hence the more involved recipe.

I got a great deal on organic heavy cream last week; it was significantly marked down since it was close to the expiration date so I paid .79 for a pint! Since that’s a third of the price of regular non-organic cream, I was very pleased!

Eggnog isn’t exactly a traditional breakfast, but if you look at the ingredients, you’ll see lots of protein and high quality fats – perfect to feed your brain, give you energy, and keep you feeling satiated for hours!  (A cup of this easily will hold you over until lunch.)  And do you think the kids mind non-traditional when it tastes like this?!

Avivah

How to make coconut cream and milk

frugal strategies, recipes

When I discovered about three months ago that Trader Joe’s carried an inexpensive and kosher coconut milk, I was thrilled!  However, it’s light, not whole fat (which I prefer), and as you know, I’m always looking for ways to maximize my grocery dollars. 🙂  I bought a 50 lb bag of dried unsweeteened coconut a while back, and it occurred to me that I might be able to use it to make my own coconut milk.

However, in trying to make it, I actually ended up with coconut cream!  This is something I haven’t yet found kosher, and was thrilled to be able to try it out in our Thanksgiving pumpkin pie – it was rich and delicious!  I also used it to make pear crisp.

It was exciting to be able to make something so tasty and incredibly frugal; here’s what I did:

Homemade Coconut Cream/Milk

  • 2 c. shredded unsweetened coconut
  • 4 c. boiling water

Blend both in a blender.  Let sit for about fifteen minutes, to give the water a chance to absorb the coconut flavor.  Pour into a strainer lined with cheesecloth over a pot, and let it drip through.  Then press it so as much liquid as possible is removed – you want the pulp to be as dry as you can get it.  Put the coconut pulp to the side – I’ll tell you what to do with that in a minute.  🙂  Put the coconut liquid in the fridge, and in the morning the rich cream will have risen to the top and solidified, and the water will be left below.

If you want to use this as coconut milk, let it sit out and melt a little, and mix the water and cream together by hand – it’s very quick and easy to do.  If you want to use it as cream, scoop the top layer off and put it in a separate container.  Use in recipes as you would cream for a rich flavor.

Now, about the coconut pulp.  This is where this gets even more frugal and fun!  Put the coconut pulp into the dehydrator, and dry.  Blend until smooth.  I’m planning to use this as coconut flour for baking.  When you buy coconut flour, it’s been defatted and doesn’t have the coconut flavor anymore, so this seems like it should work well!  I haven’t yet purchased coconut flour because of the cost ($7 lb).  Now I can use dried coconut for which I pay less than $2 lb, and can make my own coconut milk/cream, as well as coconut flour for a fraction of what they cost at the store!

(This post is part of Real Food Wednesdays.)

Avivah

Mock Larabars (grain free)

Pesach, recipes, ,

This is delicious enough for a snack and nutritious enough for a quick breakfast!  This is our adaptation of this recipe, which was an adaptation of yet another recipe!   There are endless ways to play around with this basic recipe.

Mock Larabars

  • 2 c. sliced almonds (ideally soaked and dehydrated- can use different nuts according to your tastes), processed finely
  • 1/2 c. shredded coconut
  • 3/4 c. coconut oil
  • 2 t. vanilla
  • 2 T. cocoa
  • 1/2 c. pecan meal (you can use any nut flour)
  • 1/2 c. raisins
  • 1/2 c. dates

Melt the coconut oil, add in vanilla.  Mix all dry ingredients, then whiz in a food processor with the coconut oil.  Add the dried fruit, and whiz again.  (You might find it blends up better if you process the dried fruit alone, then add it in again and the end and process it again.)

Press the mixture firmly into a greased pan.  Bake at 350 degrees for 10 – 15 minutes.

When ds16 first mixed these up, he didn’t process the sliced almonds, which was why he initially thought they were a failure – they didn’t look like they’d hold together.  He added eggs and more nut flour to compensate, but if you do what you’re supposed to in the beginning, you won’t have to.  🙂

Thanks to the dates and cocoa combination, these have a sweet, almost chocolatey flavor.  At least that’s what someone like me who has hardly had any sweeteners in my food for two years thinks!  Seriously, though, my kids all loved these.  The biggest challenge is to wait after eating one to realize you’re satiated before gulping more down – they’re packed with healthy fats and are extremely satisfying.  If you want it to be sweeter, use a cup of dates instead of half a cup of raisins and half a cup of dates, or you can double the amount of dates/dried fruit. Or you could add some honey.  🙂

(This post is part of Real Food Wednesdays.)

Avivah

Pecan Pie Crust – grain free

recipes

The beauty of nut crusts, besides being gluten and grain free, is that they taste great and are easy to make.  I liked this recipe because it’s very uncomplicated and has only a few ingredients.  This is the recipe that I used for our pumpkin pie, and the baking times below will reflect that.

Pecan Pie Crust

  • 1 c. pecan meal (or any nut meal that you prefer)
  • 2 T. melted coconut oil
  • 2 T. honey

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees.  While it’s heating up, mix the ingredients for the crust until thoroughly combined.  Press into a greased pie pan and pour the filling on top.

Put the pie into the oven, and immediately turn the oven down to 375 degrees.  Bake at 375 degrees for fifteen minutes, then turn down to 300 degrees for 30 – 40 minutes, until the pie is almost set in the middle.  Remove from oven.

This was good served warm and cold.

Avivah

Pear Crisp – Grain free

Pesach, recipes, ,

>>Would you be able to share your recipe for grain-free pear crisp, and the pecan pie crust? I’m trying to cut down on flour and grain products as well, and it’s challenging to adapt my favorite recipes to this new way of eating.<<

I can relate to the challenge of adapting to a new way of eating!

The pear crisp was more of a concept that I tried out than a recipe, so I don’t have exact measurements.  It’s the kind of thing that will turn out however you make it, though!  Here’s what I did:

Slice up a bunch of pears, and put them into a greased baking pan.  Pour thick coconut cream (or dairy cream) over the sliced fruit and mix so the pear slices are thoroughly coated.  In a separate bowl, mix coconut oil, ground nuts, shredded unsweetened coconut, and some spices – ground cloves are good with pears.  This will be the topping; sprinkle it on top of the sliced pears.  Bake uncovered at 350 degrees until the pears are soft and the topping is crispy.

You can use other fruits for this, also.  The main difference would be in the spices you use.  If I were using apples, for example, then I’d use cinnamon and nutmeg. Summer fruits like peaches, apricots, and plums would also go well with cinnamon.

I made the coconut cream from scratch that I used for this; I’ll share the process sometime in the next couple of weeks.  If you can’t find kosher coconut cream, you can boil down coconut milk until it gets thick and rich.  How long you boil it down will depend on how high fat the milk that you’re using is in the first place.  You can also make this dairy by using heavy cream instead of coconut cream, and using butter instead of coconut oil for the crumb topping.

My family is used to less sweeteners than most, so I didn’t add anything to this.  But if your family is used to more sweetness, then you’ll probably want to add something to enhance the natural sweetness of the pears.

Avivah

Fermented Cranberry Relish (dairy free)

recipes

Last night I prepared this fermented cranberry relish so it will be ready in time for Thanksgiving.  The only recipe I’ve seen calls for whey, which is a problem for us, since I’m planning to serve this with turkey and we don’t serve meat and dairy together.  So I came up with my own version.

Fermented Cranberry Relish

  • 3 c. raw cranberries
  • 1 large navel orange, chopped into large sections (try to get organic since you’ll be using the peel, or peel it and use just the fruit)
  • 1/2 c. sliced almonds, soaked and dehydrated (you can also walnuts or pecans, too – the only nuts I had on hand that were ready to use were almonds)
  • less than 1/2 c. organic sucanat – be sure it’s the real stuff (I used half of a 2/3 c. measure))
  • 1/2 -3/4 c. grape juice (you can use any juice)
  • 1 t. cinnamon
  • 2 t. lemon juice
  • opt – 1/2 c. dried diced fruit
  • 2 t. coarse Celtic salt

Process the cranberries, nuts, and orange sections in the food processor until they’re processed to a medium consistency (not large chunks, not liquified – somewhere in the middle).  Stir in the sucanat, 1/2 c. of juice, salt, cinnamon, and lemon juice.  If it looks like it needs some more liquid, add another 1/4 c. of juice – this will depend on the size and juiciness of your orange.  🙂  If you want to add dried fruit, stir it in now.  (I didn’t – it’s sweet enough for us without it.)

Once everything is mixed well, put into a glass quart sized jar.  Press down so that the liquid rises up to the top, then add 2 t. coarse Celtic salt to the top.  (You can use any good quality salt, but I use coarse Celtic for all of my ferments.)  Cover and let sit on the counter at room temperature for two days to ferment.  Put it in the fridge after two days.

(Next time I make this I’m planning to blend up raisins and dates to see if I can eliminate the sucanat.)

Serve as a yummy side dish that will enhance your Thanksgiving dinner as well as your digestive system!

(This post is part of Real Food Wednesdays.)

Avivah

Amazing Almond Sauce over Yams

recipes

As I mentioned in the beginning of the week, I’m trying to cut down on grains in our meals, and since our breakfast meals tend to be heavily grain based, that’s a challenge.  Since the baby started solids a couple of weeks ago, I’ve been baking a lot of yams for him, and once I was throwing some into the oven for him, figured I’d put in a bunch more for everyone else!  I made this for the first time last week for a different kind of breakfast meal, but it would be great as a side dish for lunch or dinner.  The kids asked me to keep it on the list of things to put on the regular rotation because they liked it so much.

The first part of the recipe is to prepare the yams – use as many as you think you  need for your size family.  You can bake them if you want to keep it really simple.  We sliced them in circles about a 1/4 inch thick, then roasted them with coconut oil.

Amazing Almond Sauce

  • 1  c. milk (we used raw)
  • 1  c. nut butter (we used organic almond butter, which is just almonds and sea salt, but you can use peanut butter)
  • 4 T. honey
  • 1 t. cinnamon
  • optional – 1 1/2 t. cocoa or carob powder (I used carob since I was out of cocoa)

Put all the ingredients in a food processor and blend – it doesn’t get much quicker or simpler than this!  This was almost pudding-like when we made it, but you can adjust the milk to get the consistency you want.  Very easy and yummy.  You can use it as a topping for pancakes, waffles, or anything else that would be enhanced by a sweet topping.  If your kids are anything like mine, they might think this is good enough for dessert!

(This post is part of Real Food Wednesdays.)

Avivah

Quinoa Oatmeal Squares (Gluten free)

recipes

This is a recipe that was requested last week – I figured I’d better put this up before putting up anything requested for this week!

Quinoa Oatmeal Sqares

  • 1 c. uncooked quinoa, rinsed
  • 1  c. steel cut oats
  • 3 c. water
  • 2 – 3 T. yogurt

Soak the quinoa, steel cut oats, and yogurt in the water overnight.  The next morning add  1/4 t. of salt to the soaked mixture.  Cook over a medium heat until thick, about 25 – 30 minutes.

Pour the cooked mixture into a greased 9 x 9 pan.  Sprinkle the top with sesame seeds.  Refrigerate about 20 minutes or until cool – you want it to cool enough to congeal into a solid shape.  Then cut into squares, and fry the squares in butter.

I’ve had steel cut oats sitting around for ages and was happy to have a chance to use them for something!  This has a pleasant but simple flavor, as you can probably tell by looking at the short list of ingredients. To serve, I slathered mine with butter; the kids spread butter and homemade plum jam on theirs.

Avivah