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

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

I adapted this from a recipe from fatfreevegan – despite ‘fat free’ and ‘vegan’ both being high up on my list of dangerous approaches to nutrition.  (I’m not a nutritional extremist, and I don’t use the word ‘dangerous’ casually.)    Though it’s not a site that I would turn to for nutritional guidance, they do have interesting ways to combine beans and grains.

Black Bean Quinoa Burgers

• 1 medium onion, diced
• 3 -4 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 carrot, shredded
• 1 c. cooked black beans
• 1/2 c. dry quinoa (cook in chicken broth)
• 1/2 baked sweet potato (use only the inside part)
• 1/4 c. arrowroot powder, crumbs, or flour (this is the binder)
• 1 T. caraway seeds
• 2 T. tomato paste
• 1 t. balsamic vinegar
• salt and pepper to taste

Saute the onion and garlic in lots of good fat – I used coconut oil, but you can use rendered chicken fat or tallow.  (Using a generous amounts Add the carrot when the onion and garlic are translucent, and cook until soft.  Add the beans and mash it all together.  Then add the remaining ingredients and mix well. You might need to increase the amount of binder to make the consistency firm enough to form into burgers.  Use a 1/4 measuring cup to scoop onto a greased baking sheet.  Gently press down with a fork to make the size of an average burger. Bake at 350 degrees until done.

I had baked sweet potatoes ready to go when preparing this, but decided to leave it out because the kids like eating them as is.  I used cooked carrots I had in the fridge, and mashed them in with the beans.  I decided to leave out the binder and serve this as a stew instead of a burger.  The taste is basically the same, but the preparation time is less and my kids don’t need it served in a burger form to be able to enjoy it.

If you want this to be gluten free, use arrowroot powder as your binder instead of something else.

Avivah

We had these for breakfast yesterday morning with homemade plum jam, but the kids said they think the sourdough flavor is better enhanced by eating them spread with butter instead of something sweet.

Sourdough Pancakes

• 1 c. sourdough starter
• 1/4 c. spelt flour (you can use another flour, if you prefer)
• 1 egg
• 2 T. sucanat
• 2 T. coconut oil or butter
• 1/2 t. sea salt
• 1 t. baking soda

Mix the starter and flour; let sit overnight.  Combine with the remaining ingredients, and drop onto a hot greased griddle/pan to fry.  When air bubbles appear on the surface, turn over and fry on the other side until done.

Avivah

This was supposed to be for breakfast today, but due to a couple of beginning of the month mix-ups (we change chores the first of the month), the person scheduled for dinner preparation made breakfast instead and made lemon ricotta muffins instead because she didn’t know where the bananas were.  So I unfortunately can’t share with you  how these turned out, but the muffins she made were great! 🙂

Though honey and sucanat are high quality sweeteners, any sweeteners are best used in moderation.  Though we already use sweeteners in small amounts, I’m experimenting with making baked goods with no honey or sucanat, and am trying out using blended dates as the sweetener.  (I bought fifteen pounds during my last shopping trip so that I have enough to experiment with. :))  I’m also trying to find alternate flours to bake with to minimize the gluten for my ds16.   If you like the taste of this, you can adapt other muffin recipes using this basic concept.

Banana Date Muffins (gluten free)

• 3 eggs
• 1/4 c. coconut oil
• 2 medium bananas
• 3 dates
• 1/4 c. coconut flour (I was planning to whiz some unsweetened shredded coconut in the blender to use)
• 1/4 t. salt
• 1/2 t. baking soda
• 1/2 c. chopped walnuts

Blend the first four ingredients.  Then mix the three dry  ingredients.   Mix the blended mixture with the dry ingredients until batter is smooth.  Fold in the chopped walnuts.  Pour into greased or lined muffin tins.  Bake at 350 degrees for 20 – 25 minutes.

Avivah

Some of you are probably wondering after reading my menu, ‘If you care about nutrition, why are you serving your kids chocolate pudding for breakfast?  It doesn’t sound too healthy to me.’

People seem to have an idea that eating healthfully means eating tasteless and unappetizing foods that have no visual or taste appeal.  Part of the fun of eating based on a traditional foods model is that you can make so many delicious foods that we tend to think of as junky and bad for you, simply by substituting high quality ingredients and using proper preparation techniques.

I find it easy to adapt recipes and transform them into something good for you.  Here’s my healthy version of homemade chocolate pudding that we made for breakfast today:

Homemade Chocolate Pudding

• 1/4 – 1/2  c. sucanat
• 1/4 c. arrowroot flour
• 1/2 c. cocoa
• 3 c. milk (I used organic non homogenized for this – didn’t want to use my raw milk since it would be cooked in the process)
• 3 medium eggs
• 1 T. butter

Combine the sucanat and arrowroot flour in a pan.  Stir in the milk (a whisk is very handy for this but mine was missing and I made do with a fork).  Cook over a medium heat until the mixtured is thickened and bubbly, stirring constantly to keep prevent lumps.

In a small bowl, beat eggs and gradually stir in a cup of the cooked mixture while whisking it. (Doing this keeps it from curdling or cooking into small chunks when mixed into the hot pudding mixture.)   Then return this egg mixture to the larger pot of pudding, continuously stirring. Cook until nearly bubbling, but not boiling.  Reduce the heat to low and stir a couple more minutes.

Remove from heat.  Stir in butter.  If you want to eat it warm, let it cool about five minutes and serve.  Also delicious after being refrigerated and served cold.

Notice that this includes milk, eggs, and butter – all typical breakfast foods.  It’s just mixed up in a different way than you associate with breakfast foods.  If you want to make this vanilla instead, leave out the cocoa and use 1/3 a cup of arrowroot instead of 1/4 c.  Also add in 2 t. of vanilla at the very end when you mix in the vanilla.

Next time I think I’ll make vanilla pudding instead – it will be neater to serve.  🙂

Avivah

I experimented with a new idea for a topping for the sweet potato pie on Shabbos, and dd14 followed my instructions and did five times the recipe I gave her.  I was trying for something without any sweetener or flour.  Unfortunately, I didn’t think to tell her not to increase the salt more than double the recipe, so we ended up with a large amount of salty topping.

Since it was not only a large amount but also used expensive ingredients (almost nine cups of almond flour), I didn’t want it to go to waste (an important frugal guideline – don’t waste food!).  I created this new recipe as a way to put the topping to use, and it ended up being a hit.  We served it as a rich and nutty breakfast loaf  but I think you can serve it as a dessert if you add the higher amount of honey.  Because of the cost I’d suggest making it for a dessert; that’s what I’ll do in the future.  I’m giving you the proportions I used, and leaving it for you to size it down to scale. 🙂

Avivah’s Decadent Nut Cake

• 2 c. dates
• 2 1/2 c. water
• 5  T. coconut oil
• 8 3/4 c. almond flour
• 2 1/2 t. baking soda
• 2 1/2 t. baking powder
• 2 1/2 t. cinnamon
• 1 t. ginger
• 1 t. sea salt
• 8 eggs
• 1 1/3 c. yogurt
• 1/2 – 1 c. honey
• 2 t. vanilla

Blend the dates, water, and coconut oil.  Mix the eggs, honey, yogurt, and vanilla and stir into date mixture.  Mix the almond flour together with all the spices, baking powder, and baking soda.  Combine the nut mixture with the date mixture until combined well.  Pour into a greased pan and bake at 350 degrees until done – it will be very moist inside, but a knife inserted in the center should come out clean.  Our large panful took a little over an hour to bake, but a smaller pan will obviously take less time.

I was debating adding in flour, to make it like a nutty muffin loaf, but decided not to. So this is not only filled with healthy ingredients, it’s gluten free, for those wanting to avoid wheat.  To make a non dairy option, use coconut milk in place of the yogurt.

Avivah

This is a recipe that I’ve used for breakfast but really could be a dessert.  🙂

Coconut Honey Pudding

• 1 c. unsweetened shredded coconut
• 1 c. boiling water

Pour the boiling water over the coconut, and let it sit for a minute. 

• 2 eggs
• 1/8 – 1/4 c. honey (we prefer the smaller amount)
• 1 t. vanilla
• 1/3 t. salt
• cinnamon
• raisins, nuts, berries – optional

Mix all of the above ingredients together, then mix into the wet coconut.  Stir in nuts and/or berries if you’re using them. Put in a loaf pan and bake at 350 degrees for 40 min.  This is a small recipe so I increase it by several times.

(I regularly find and make notes of new recipes and ideas/concepts that look appealing.  Unfortunately, I don’t usually make a note to myself where I find it.  I’m mentioning this since I want to be clear that I’m just sharing what I make, not claiming credit for making up the recipes themselves.)

Avivah

Mexican Lasagna

• 2 lb cooked red lentils/or red beans
• 3 – 10 oz cans of enchilada sauce
• 24 corn tortillas (I bought a bunch of these for the immediate postpartum period but didn’t really use them, so I have a couple of large packages still in the freezer)
• 4 c. shredded cheese

Dip the tortillas in sauce, and place on the bottom of a greased pan until covered.  Layer with beans, then cheese, then cheese, then tortillas.  Pour the remaining enchilada sauce over the top, and sprinkle the top with cheese.  Bake at 350 degrees for 25 – 30 minutes.

I haven’t yet made this recipe, but I’ve looked up an enchilada sauce recipe (since I don’t tend to buy prepared things like that).  Here’s the recipe I chose:

Enchilada Sauce

• 1 T. oil
• 3 cloves of garlic, minced
• 1 t. minced onion
• 1/2 t. oregano
• 2 1/2 t. chili powder
• 1/2 t. basil
• 1/8 t. pepper
• 1/8 t. salt
• 1/4 t. cumin
• 1 t. parsley
• 1/4 c. salsa (I have some that I canned from my green tomatoes)
• 1 1/2 c. water

Saute the onion and garlic in oil.  Add the remaining ingredients to the pot, bring to a boil.  Reduce to low, and simmer for 15 – 20 minutes. 

Avivah