Saturday, April 26, 2014

Whole Wheat Pancakes with Wheat Germ


These are lovely fluffy pancakes and they're whole wheat. What I love is that there's wheat germ in the batter. It adds a bit of a crunch and a nutty flavor. We love pancakes and eat them for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Usually I make vegan pancakes but once in awhile I try something new, and I really enjoy this recipe.

Wednesday, April 23, 2014

Jim Lahey's Pizza Book





I recently tried making pizza from the recipe in Jim Lahey's newest book, My Pizza. I love his bread book and the no knead pizza recipe is similar. You mix the dough and let it rise for 18 hours. One unique feature of his recipe is that he cooks the pizza under the broiler. I don't broil so I just cooked the pizza on the stone in a very hot oven. How was the pizza? Good. It had a nice crispy crust but the toppings weren't as browned as they would have been if I used the broiler. I think the most interesting thing about the book is all of the different topping recipes. For example Brussels sprouts and chestnuts, potato and leek, and corn and tomato. There are also recipes for non-pizza dishes such as salads and soups. One thing I made was the salt crusted beets. It's a bunch of coarse salt mixed with egg whites which encase the beets. The beets were okay, but rather salty. The worst part was the smell of the eggs and salt cooking. It was pretty gross. Overall, this is a good book for the budding pizza maker in you, as long as you have a broiler.


Tuesday, April 15, 2014

The Best Cornbread Ever--and It's Vegan


This is amazing cornbread. It's moist, moist, moist. I am not a cornbread fan because it's usually dry and crumbly. This recipe is so NOT dry and crumbly. It's really tender and delicious. This would be great alongside a bowl of hearty soup or chili, or for breakfast, but we just ate it plain for snacks because it's so wonderful. You can find the recipe here.


Wednesday, April 2, 2014

Pumpkin Seed Oil


I want to tell you about my recent foodie find. Pumpkin seed oil. It has a really intense pumpkin taste and a very little goes a long way. It's not really for cooking, it's more for finishing dishes though you can add it to things like pumpkin pie or pumpkin soup. I mainly use it to dress salads and veggies and to dip bread in it. It's really delicious but the downside is that it has a short shelf life.

Above I used it on a salad of palm hearts and heirloom tomatoes. Just a drizzle is all you need for a big punch of flavor. If you like the taste of pumpkin, check it out!

Wednesday, March 26, 2014

Maple Glazed Carrots


These are a great vegetarian side dish and they go especially well with rice or mashed potatoes. The maple flavoring isn't too strong, just a background sweetness which really complements the sweetness of the carrots. I like that you can just throw everything in one pot and it cooks perfectly. You can find the recipe here.

Wednesday, March 19, 2014

Acorn Squash Pie


I bought an acorn squash, baked it, and didn't love it. It was okay--the flavor was good--but the flesh was a bit stringy. To use up the squash I turned it into a pie. This is the recipe I used and it was surprisingly good. It tasted like a custard pie and not squashy (or stringy) at all. Highly recommended. (You can see that we liked it so much we ate it right out of the pie pan and didn't even bother cutting it properly.)

Sunday, March 16, 2014

King Arthur's Rustic Olive Flatbread (vegan friendly)


Jill and I both love baking bread and we both love olives, so we decided to try this King Arthur recipe that combines both. Heads up--this recipe uses certain King Arthur products that you'd have to order if you wanted to try the recipe exactly as written. One item is a flavored flour that contains herbs and dried olives. You can get around using it by adding extra all-purpose flour and herbs of your choice. Maybe a little herbs de provence? You could also add some finely chopped kalamata olives but don't add too many or the dough will be too heavy and wet. Maybe add a bit of extra yeast if you use olives. For the milk powder I just use powdered soy milk which I always keep on hand. The KA Easy-Roll Dough Improver is not a necessity but I ordered some and used it because I was curious to see what it did. The dough was super easy to work with and did not pull back on itself. I don't know if that was because of the dough improver or not. I still have to play around with it to see if it works.

The bread was delicious--crusty and chewy. The herbs were not overpowering and the dried olives actually tasted good. It's a recipe that I'd definitely make again though next time I will add some chopped kalamata olives.

Please check out Jill's blog to see her version of the bread.

Here's the link to the recipe.