natatat
food for the intolerant
i’m really fond of eating almond butter on slices of apple as a treat. the other week i happened to buy raw almond butter (charlotte was going through a short lived raw phase. i blame her.) and it was so, so good. especially on apples. and then i thought it would be even more delicious with a bit of cinnamon. and manuka honey. and suddenly i found myself making little apple, almond butter, cinnamon honey sandwiches. and started thinking that it had to be possible to combine these somehow into a delicious baked treat.
i’ve also been meaning to make something for my gluten-and-dairy-unfriendly friends. i feel really badly when i bake something delicious and have to tell someone that they can’t actually eat it because there’s butter or regular flour in there somewhere. one of said friends was having a potluck, so it seemed a perfect time to experiment! while i have never made a flourless treat before, it didn’t seem too hard to throw something together, and came up with a recipe that seemed like it would work … and then came across pretty much exactly what i had thought up on the internet. this was partially a good thing because it meant that i was capable of making up recipes that would actually work! but was also annoying that someone had figured it out first.
one apple, peeled and grated
2 tbsp freshly squeezed orange juice
1 cup raw almond butter
1/4 cup honey
2 eggs
1 tbsp vanilla
2 tbsp cinnamon
combine the above ingredients and press into a greased pyrex pan. you may want to sprinkle some sliced almond pieces on top. bake at 350 for about 40 minutes (depends on how big your pan is). make all your gluten and dairy hating friends happy!
i’ve also been making these cookies a lot. considering the amount of almond butter in them, it seemed like it would be possible to make them suitable for the celiacs and lactose-intolerants in my life. i didn’t have celiac-friendly baking powder in my house, so opted to sub in an egg to give raising power. they ended up a lot cakier than i’d expected, but still were really good. i think the next time around i wouldn’t bother with the egg, which would them make them vegan! (except for the honey, i suppose).
1/3 cup honey
3/4 cup almond butter
3 1/2 tbsp oil
1 tsp ginger, peeled and grated
1 1/3 cup brown rice flour
1/2 tsp salt
3/4 tsp ground ginger
1 tsp cinnamon
3/4 tsp baking soda
one egg
sugar
combine the honey, almond butter, egg, oil, and ginger together. in a separate bowl, combine flour, spices and baking soda. add the dry to the wet. use your hands to roll the dough into little balls (it will be rather sticky) and roll them in the sugar. place on a pan about an inch a part. bake at 350 for about 10 minutes.
green soup and cinnamon buns
one of the first things i did once i got back from new zealand was spend a lot of time in the kitchen. it’s not like i didn’t do any baking while i was over there - i actually made this twice, and this, and also spent some time making things like chili and curry and french toast and lots and lots of sandwiches. but i guess i needed some quality kitchen time to feel like i was home.
since then i’ve been making a lot of soup. i make soup at least once a week for wednesday night yoga, and it seems like in the winter soup is the easiest and quickest way to eat lots and lots of vegetables and still keep warm. i have a bit of an obsession with green food (i guess because it feels healthier?) and am particularly drawn to green liquids like smoothies and soups. so essentially i decided to make a soup that crammed as much green as possible in it.
leeks
kale
spinach
zucchini
potatoes
garlic
ginger (real is best but ground can do in a pinch)
lemon
veg broth/water
other herbs/spices/toppings
i tend to make soups with leeks because i don’t like onions (they make me cry and give me headaches) and potatoes keep things nice and thick without adding any cream - but essentially you can put anything you like in this. it’s basically a variation of potato leek soup and prepares essentially the same way (most soups are basically the same, really). start by cooking the leeks, potatoes, zucchini, ginger and garlic in a large pot with a bit of oil. once they’ve started to look a bit cooked, add in some broth or water (about 6 cups should be good). bring the mixture to a boil and let it simmer. once the potatoes are mostly cooked, add in the spinach and kale. also add in any other herbs and things you would like (pepper, rosemary, thyme etc). i like to use an immersion blender or a regular blender to, um, blend everything together. before serving, squeeze some lemon juice in.
i also made these cinnamon buns. the freezing method worked perfectly and was really good for sunday brunch.
i can’t seem to stop watching this.
correspondence
so i’m drinking a post-yoga mug of whisky and was in the process of half-heartedly rearranging/cleaning my room, and got distracted by a large box of letters. letters that my gramma and grandpa wrote to each other during the second world war. letters in faded blue envelopes written with faded blue ink. letters on fragile paper, bound together with string into appealing little packets.
in the middle of the box there is an envelope filled with letters from my grandfather’s french penpal, georgianna. the letters start when she was 18, and end a couple months after her 20th birthday. the last letter is dated january 25th, 1940. in it she mentions that life is slowly returning to normal: cinemas and the theatre are now open and there haven’t been any alarms recently requiring her to run down to the shelter in the middle of the night. this is a good thing, as it has turned out to be one of the coldest winters she can remember. her uncle had also recently had 10 days leave from the front and seemed to be in high moral, telling funny military stories without disclosing any more information than they needed to know.
of course, paris fell a couple months later on june 14th. i wonder what happened to her.
You may think that a fried breakfast is something that doesn’t need a recipe but I guarantee that if you follow this one you’ll never regret it.
1. Wake up in a Georgian country house with a hangover of biblical proportions. Slide your arm from beneath the slender alabaster neck of the recumbent debutante and silently pick your way through the detritus of last night’s party to the kitchen.
2. As soft golden sunlight arcs low across the paddock and gilds the chromework of the Aga like melted butter, find a big pan.
3. Heat an unconscionable quantity of oil to a gentle simmer and slip in the freshly made local sausages. Sausages should not be pricked and never fried. The intention is that they should poach in the oil.
4. As the sausages poach make tea. If it is a proper farmhouse there will be a gigantic ‘Brown Betty’ teapot of the type used to fortify British battalions throughout the last Great Unpleasantness. Add a spoonful of leaf tea (need we mention the sordid subject of bags?) for each person and ‘one for the pot’. At this point the kettle will start its song, beginning the process of gently awakening the recovering partygoers. Pour the water over the leaves. The tea serves the same purpose to a hungover Englishman that chicken soup serves to a Jewish New Yorker with a headcold and hives. This is not cooking…it’s an emergency clinical intervention. An Englishman’s mother will offer him tea as first response medical aid even if his arm has been severed by a combine harvester.
5. Move the sausages to the warming oven, pour off all but a light glazing of the oil and begin to brown the bacon. Much has been written about good bacon and I do not propose to repeat it. Suffice it to say…smoked…streaky…thin…crisp. Place in the warming oven when done.
6. Open a can of Heinz baked beans -accept no substitute- these are not so much a foodstuff as an architectural element of the finished plate. Think of beans as colour and a concealer of disheartening flashes of empty plate between meats.
7. Mushrooms and tomatoes may be grilled at this stage but no gentleman would consider eating them. They are vegetables. Vegetables are a form of table decoration. They aren’t food - they go next to food. As the great Dr Johnson should have said ‘Vegetables are what food eats’ and I have no intention of disagreeing.
8. Americans eat hash browns at breakfast. They are disagreeable to an Englishman. I understand that the French, who can make food out of almost anything, use them to sole espadrilles.
9. There are many different ways to cook eggs but most of them are purely of interest to invalids, children and the feeble-minded. The correct or ‘proper English egg’ is fried with lightly browned edges in the fat left over from the bacon. At the last minute, oil is flicked over the top of the yolk to seal it. This dangerous procedure causes the yolk to form a perfect, golden, viscid capsule, the violation of which with a rough shard of toast, is the nearest that an Englishman will permit himself to unbridled sexual ecstasy.
10. While the eggs are being coaxed into tumescence the first of the walking wounded will have arrived in the kitchen. Ignore the bashful looks and tousled hair and administer tea in large quantities. Mugs enable fingers to thaw and many a tryst has been sealed by a coy glance over the chipped china rim. The more robust may be set to the simple task of toast.
11. Working quickly, lay down toast, top with an egg, flank with bacon and sausage and fill the spaces with beans. Serve forth.
the blogosphere!
i’ve recently become slightly obsessed with blogs. other people’s, that is. while i’ve been a fan of food blogs for ages, it is only lately that i’ve discovered the joy of diy, crafting, fashion, architecture and photography blogs. and, by association, etsy - which is very, very dangerous. it’s a good thing i have no disposable money at the moment.
i love these images from solid frog.
i am terribly pleased anytime i see the words ‘pale’ and ‘beautiful’ together.
