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Soy-free – Page 22 – surviving the food allergy apocalypse (archive)

surviving the food allergy apocalypse (archive)

Tag: Soy-free

Contains no soy.

Marshmallows
Marshmallows

If I was going to a cookout B.F.A. (Before Food Allergies), one of the things I’d pick up is a bag of marshmallows to toast. With the corn allergy, that’s pretty much not an option these days. I’ve been pinning recipes on how to deal with this for about a year, but I hadn’t gotten around to it yet because there were other things that were much more high priority. Plus it was going to be a significant effort because I’d have to make the cane sugar syrup to replace corn syrup and the powdered sugar (stuff at the store generally has corn starch in it) from scratch and that seems like a lot of steps in advance for so little a thing. But I’m going to a cookout in a week, and it seems like it’s finally time. Normally I’d list out the ingredients in the order that you’re going to use them, but since you’re going to have to make some ingredients ahead of time, I’ve listed those first.

Our friend Fred M. makes beautiful, ethereal, fluffy, light marshmallows, but I wanted these to stand up to getting stuck on a stick for toasting at the cookout so I upped the gelatin amount a bit in the recipes I found and tweaked. These marshmallows are a bit sturdy, but if you want them to be lighter with a little less structure, knock back the amount of gelatin by a tablespoon.

Marshmallows:

Ingredients:
- 1 1/4 cup of cane sugar syrup (You will need to make it ahead of time – there are two good recipes and I’ve used both before. The one from thekitchn.com makes about a quart, and the one from justapinch.com makes about two cups.)
- 1 1/2 cups of powdered sugar (You will need to make it ahead of time – here’s a recipe from glutenfreegigi.com on how to do it. I used tapioca starch.)
- 2 teaspoons of vanilla extract or another extract might be fun, such as cinnamon (Here’s a bunch of recipes for vanilla extract, make sure to use safe alcohol if corn or wheat are an issue for you. I used Luksusowa Vodka because it’s made only from potatoes, where some vodkas may also use grain or corn. Also you can make cinnamon extract by using whole cinnamon sticks instead of vanilla beans. It’s totally killer in coffee.)
- 4 Tablespoons of unflavored gelatin powder (Knox or Great Lakes are generally regarded as being okay if you’re not super sensitive to corn, again no affiliation with Amazon, just linking for reference)
- 1 1/4 cups of cold water, divided
- 1 1/2 cups of cane sugar (make sure you use a safe-for-you brand)
- 1/8 teaspoon of salt
- 1/2 cup tapioca starch (You could also use potato or arrowroot starch, whatever’s safe for you)
- safe-for-you-oil for greasing the pan or you can use the oil in an oil mister as well
Kitchen Stuff you will need:
- Stand mixer with the whisk beater attached
- candy thermometer that will clip on the side a saucepan
- 3 or 4 quart saucepan
- 9 x 13 baking pan or another flat container to spread out your marshmallows
- a pizza cutter or a sharp knife
- the normal assortment of bowls, measuring cups, spatulas, forks or whisks and so on
Grease or spray your baking pan with the oil. Use a paper towel to wipe the pan and make sure that every surface is coated in a thin layer of oil. Put the baking pan and a spatula next to your stand mixer, which should already have the whisk beater on it and your splatter guard ready to go.

Mix a 1/2 cup of cold water in a measuring cup along with the vanilla. Put the gelatin into the bowl of the stand mixer, and pour the water and vanilla mixture over it while whisking it with a fork or a small whisk. Mix until there are no lumps. Put the bowl back into your stand mixer and attach it.

Gelatin, water, and vanilla extract well mixed

Place your saucepan on the burner and clip your candy thermometer to the side of the saucepan. Add the rest of the water (3/4 of a cup), and add the cane sugar, cane sugar syrup and salt. Don’t stir it up.

water, sugar, cane sugar, syrup and salt with candy thermometer

Place the saucepan over high head and bring it to a rapid boil. Boil until the sugar mixture measures some where between 245ºF and 250ºF. Don’t let it go any higher than 250ºF. Take the saucepan off the burner and remove the candy thermometer.

Sugar mixture at a boil

Turn on the stand mixer to medium and CAREFULLY pour the sugar mixture down the side of the stand mixer bowl. There will be some bubbling, so go slowly. Also it will freaking burn and hurt if you spill it on yourself, so please don’t.

When all the sugar mixture is in the mixing bowl and is mixed to together, make sure your splatter guard is down and increase the mixing speed to high. Continue to mix on high for 10 minutes. Make sure you do the full 10 minutes.

Whipping marshmallow mixture

Once the ten minutes is up, do not dally, get the marshmallow mixture into the baking pan as fast as you can as it will start to cool really fast, and you want to be able to spread it out in the pan. Use a spatula to scrap out the bowl, but it’s really think and sticky, so you won’t get every bit out. Once it’s in the pan, spray or coat your hands with your oil and spread out the marshmallow evenly.

Marshmallows spread evenly in baking pan

Let the marshmallows sit uncovered and at room temperature for 6 or more hours. Don’t let it go any longer than 24 hours though. Once they have cooled, mix your powdered sugar and tapioca starch in a bowl.

Powder sugar and tapioca starch mixture

Take a large cutting board or cookie sheet and sprinkle some of the powdered sugar mix on it. Then sprinkle the top of the marshmallow in the pan with the mixture and smooth it out over the surface. Flip the pan over onto your cutting board. Once you’ve got them out of the pan, sprinkle more of the mixture over the top of the marshmallow layer that was previously on the bottom of the pan.

Marshmallows powered before cutting

Cut your marshmallows using a sharp knife or a pizza cutter into small squares.

Marshmallow pieces cut by pizza cutter

Put each square in the bowl with the powdered sugar and tapioca and toss it until coated thoroughly. (If you have extra marshmallow coating afterwards, put it in a jar and use it the next time.)

Marshmallow being tossed in marshmallow coating

Store them in an airtight container at room temperature. They’ll last for a couple weeks if you don’t eat them right away. Take them to your cookout and toast them. If you can’t wait you can use your stove burner and a bamboo skewer 🙂

Marshmallow toasted over stove burner

Enjoy!
July 21, 2014
Blueberry Syrup and Bonus
Blueberry Syrup

So recently I’ve become concerned that I may be reacting to maple syrup. It stands to reason that with the number of types of tree pollen to which I am allergic that the sap of the tree might be an issue as well. I’ve noticed some correlation, but there were other potential issues during the same time frame, so I need to do some food challenges to verify whether it’s truly an issue or not. However, in the meantime, I need some syrupy stuff for waffles while I wait to do a challenge. As some you know, I’ve been canning to beat the band so that I have convenient, shelf stable, safe food and condiments, so I took a look in my canning books to see what I could find.

Now I’m not suggesting that you can this recipe, as I know that that’s a lot of work for most of you, and you might not be into the canning thing. But if you wanted to do that, the recipe is here. I’ve cut this down to a manageable amount for immediate use and made a suggestion for thickening it for a more substantial syrup. The recipe still makes 3 cups of syrup. Since that’s still kind of a lot, you can freeze a portion of it before you thicken it. Be aware that the pictures are some what deceptive because the batch I made was three times this size so that I ended up with 12 half pints of canned blueberry syrup. Also because there’s so much blueberry pulp left, I’ve provided you with some ideas for using it in other recipes at the end of this post. When food is so hard for many of us, we don’t want to waste anything.

Blueberry Syrup

Makes about 3-4 cups of syrup.

Ingredients:
- 4 cups of blueberries
- 3 cups of water (used divided, as described below)
- 1 1/2 Tablespoons of grated lemon zest
- 1 1/2 cups of white cane sugar
- 1 Tablespoon of freshly squeezed lemon juice
- 1-2 Tablespoons of arrowroot or tapioca flour (optional)
- 1-2 Tablespoons of water (optional)
Necessary equipment:
- Stainless steel or other non-reactive (ceramic or enamel, do not use aluminum or cast iron) pot
- Potato masher or large spoon
- Strainer or colander
- Cheesecloth (look in grocery stores where the utensils are, or in hardware stores or department stores where the canning stuff is)
- Candy thermometer
Wash your blueberries and pick out any squished or yucky berries or any stems or leaves. You need to crush your berries. Place a thin layer of blueberries in a large stainless steel stockpot (the pot needs to be stainless steel or another non-reactive surface), and mash the berries with a potato masher or the back of a large spoon. Make sure they are all squished. Then add another layer and mash them, repeating until all the berries are mashed to bits.

Once the berries are all mangled, add 1 cup of the water and the lemon zest, and over medium heat, bring the mixture to a gentle boil. Allow the mixture to continue to boil gently for 5 minutes.

Set up your strainer so that it hangs over a deep bowl or other non reactive pot so that the strainer does not rest in the bowl or pot, but so that all of the blueberry mixture will drip into the bowl or pot, without coming out the sides or making a mess. The bowl or the pot should also be deep enough that the strainer will not come into contact with the liquid as it drips out of the strainer. Line the strainer with several layers of dampened cheesecloth. You want several layers so that it prevents any seeds or pulp from dripping into your juice. The reason for dampening your cheesecloth with water is so that the cheesecloth doesn’t absorb as much of your precious juice. Once you’ve got your strainer and the container for the juice to drip into properly situated, add the mixture to the strainer. Let it drip for at least two hours. If you’re a purist and you want a clear syrup, you let it drip undisturbed for at least two hours. If you’re like me, and not a purist, you let it drip for at least two hours and then you use a spatula to get as much of the juice as you can. (Keep the pulp, I’ll talk about what you can do with it later.)

Blueberry Mixture in Strainer

Wash the stainless steel stockpot you used to cook the blueberry mixture, and in the now clean pot, add the sugar and the remaining 2 cups of water.

Sugar and water mixture before boiling

Over medium high heat, bring the sugar mixture to a boil and cook until it measures 230ºF (you may need to adjust for altitude, we don’t have an altitude issue here). Add your blueberry juice, and increase the heat to high, and bring it to a boil. Boil for 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Once your five minutes is up, remove the pot from the heat, and stir in your lemon juice.

Blueberry Syrup after cooking

At this point, if you’re going to put any of it in the freezer to save for later, pour that amount off into freezer safe and heat safe container and let it cool to room temp before sealing it and putting it in the freezer. If you’re satisfied with the syrup as it is, great, use it for pancakes, waffles, desserts, you name it.

(SAFETY NOTE: You CANNOT thicken the syrup if you are planning to can it, unless you use Clear Gel, which contains corn. No other thickening method is safe for canning, so if you are allergic to corn, just thicken it after you open the jars and when you are planning to use it.)

If you’d like to thicken the syrup, place the syrup back over medium heat. Mix 1 Tablespoon of tapioca or arrowroot with 1 Tablespoon of water to form a paste, and then whisk it slowly into the syrup. Continue to whisk until the paste is well incorporated with the syrup and the tapioca and arrowroot has cooked. If this isn’t sufficiently thick enough for you, repeat the process, until the syrup is the right consistency. Yay! You have blueberry syrup!

Now, let’s chat about that leftover pulp. There are a few ways you could use it:

(1) Put the leftover pulp in your pancake or waffle batter for blueberry overload. Yum!

(2) You can make yourself some blueberry butter/jam. Put the leftover pulp in a sauce pan with a cup of sugar and a tablespoon of lemon juice, and bring it to a boil over medium high heat, stirring frequently. Once it’s boiling, reduce the heat to medium, and stir frequently until the mixture thickens and holds its shape on a spoon. Store it in the fridge until you want to use it on toast, on ice cream, or just eating it with a spoon, haha!

(3) Make blueberry vinegar. Mix the pulp with 4 cups of white wine vinegar and put it in a glass jar, covering it with cheese cloth or a coffee filter and securing it with a rubber band. Let it sit on your counter top for a week or two, stirring it once a day to prevent any mold. Strain out the blueberry pulp, and you’ll have blueberry flavored vinegar to use for salad dressings or marinades.

Enjoy!
July 7, 2014
Berry Poke Cake (vegan, gluten-free)
Vaguely Patriotic Poke Cake

So this week is the both the classic summer holiday of Independence Day in the US. I know maybe cake isn’t the first thing one thinks of when you think of summer holiday picnics, but this week is also my birthday, so cake is important. So your theme is: BERRIES. Hah. Actually, berries are one of the more awesome things about summer, and cake is the one truly awesome thing about birthdays, so here’s a berry-themed cake that also just happens to be color-appropriate for a few upcoming holidays — nicely, this works as well for Bastille Day as it does for Independence Day. It’s multi-purpose. This is good, because every day is better with cake.

This is a riff on a cake my mother used to make — a poke cake, where you soak your cake with gelatin. Her “recipe” came from a magazine recipe (I’m going to guess Better Homes and Gardens, but it might have been the Parade magazine section from the Sunday paper) and involved box cake mix, a box of Jell-O, Cool Whip (which I absolutely adored for all of my formative years) and berries on top. My FrankenCake version involves other people’s recipes instead of boxes, but combined to make “classic” poke cake that is gluten-free, vegan, and completely without preservatives or weird flavorings. This is a dense, moist cake, flavored by the gel, topped with a whipped cream and berries. Served cold, this is great for summer. I mean, it’s berries. What is there not to love?

You’ll make the cake, cool it, poke holes in it, make a fruit gel, pour it on, cool it, and the “frost” and decorate it. Because it needs to cool completely, twice, this is a good make-ahead recipe. The day before is a good idea, adding the “frosting” and berries not long before serving.

Cake Assembly

IMPORTANT NOTE: In case you skipped reading to go straight to the recipe, this is not a “day of” recipe. You need to cool this twice, and the coconut milk for the topping must be refrigerated overnight.

Patriotic Berry Poke Cake

1 carton of strawberries or other fresh berries is also needed to decorate the top of the cake.

Cake (very lightly adapted from Gluten Mama’s GF Vegan Vanilla Cake)
- ¾ cup sorghum flour
- ¾ cup tapioca starch
- ½ cup coconut flour
- 1 cup sugar
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 teaspoon xanthan gum
- ½ cup plain almond milk (or other non-dairy milk)
- 1 teaspoon lemon juice
- 1 cup warm water
- 3 Tablespoons coconut oil
- 1 Tablespoon vanilla
- 4 oz (1/2 cup) unsweetened applesauce (I use the snack pack sizes)
Preheat oven to 375ºF. Lightly grease an 8″x11.5″ pan, or a 9″ square pan.

Add lemon juice to almond milk and set aside.

Mix dry ingredients. Then add wet ingredients and mix thoroughly.

Pour into prepared pan and bake 35 minutes or so — cake is done when lightly browned on top.

Cool completely, and then poke holes all over the cake with a fork. The more holes, the more your fruit gel will penetrate, so I’d suggest holes no more than 1/2 inch apart, all over the cake.

Vegan Fruit Gel (I used this recipe from Manjula’s Kitchen)

Poke and Gel the Cake
- 1/2 cup blueberry juice
- 1/2 cup water
- 2 Tablespoons sugar
- 1/4 teaspoon agar agar powder
If you need to, juice and strain blueberries to get blueberry juice. I just had a bag of frozen berries I picked last summer, so I defrosted them and ran them through a food mill and then a strainer. This made more juice than I needed, but this also makes more gel than you need for the cake.

Mix the agar agar into your water. Add all the ingredients to a saucepan and bring to a boil over medium heat, stirring occasionally. Boil for three minutes.

Pour very slowly over the top of your hole-poked cake (this is easier to do if you aren’t taking photos while pouring), letting it soak in, and stop when the gel stops soaking in. You may have a little leftover, so just make a serving of gel for later.

Put the gel-soaked cake in the fridge and chill for 3-4 hours or overnight.

Coconut Whipped Cream (see recipe here at Oh She Glows)
- 1 can full-fat coconut milk without guar gum, refrigerated over night
- 3 teaspoons sugar
- 1/2 teaspoon vanilla
- OR 3 teaspoons of vanilla sugar
- A chilled metal bowl and electric mixer, with whisk attachment if you have it.
Flip your can upside down in the fridge. To open it, flip it back upright and open it. Pour off the watery part (you can use this for things, but I don’t like it much, personally.)

Put JUST the solid part in your chilled bowl and whip it with your whisk attachment or mixer.

Add the sugar and vanilla (or vanilla sugar) and whip again. Taste it. It’s amazing. Add sugar or vanilla if needed.

Use the coconut whipped cream to frost the cake, being generous in your application. Top the cake with berries and keep refrigerated until ready to serve.

This cake is ready for its close-up
June 30, 2014
Quick Thai-Inspired Curry Noodle Stir Fry
Quick Thai-Inspired Curry Noodle Stir Fry

Thai food was one of the biggest losses for me. My husband and I had our first date at a Thai restaurant, and I used to get delivery there so often that the staff knew it was me just from my voice on the telephone. It was not uncommon for us to have Thai once or twice a week, especially when I was still in private practice. But Thai’s kind of hard without coconut.

This recipe’s kind of concept more than a recipe, because there are so many variables and and you can make so many curries, i.e. green, red, yellow, Massaman, etc. I used a commercial curry paste because it looked relatively safe for me, although we’ll see in the next few days whether I got corned or not (corned is like being gluten-ed but obviously with corn). However, there are tons of curry paste recipes on the internet that people can modify for their own diets, if the suggestions are not safe for you. Or you can use use a curry powder spice mix you like. I’ve also used the DIY Singapore Seasoning from our DIY Spice Mix Day post. Also, if you make curry paste, freeze it in an ice cube tray so you can grab a chunk when you want. You can use any meat you want, or not. You can also use whatever vegetables strike your fancy.

Quick Thai-Inspired Curry Noodle Stir Fry

Makes about 3-4 servings, depending on serving size.
- 1/2 of a 1 pound package of rice noodles (I used the kind that I would use for pho, but you can pick the width of rice noodle you like)
- 2 Tablespoons of olive oil, grape seed oil, or an oil that’s safe for you
- 1 cup of cashew milk or other non-dairy milk (If you can have coconut milk, by all means use it. I can’t use commercial cashew milk so I make my own, soaking 1 cup of cashews in hot water for a couple of hours, draining the water, and putting them in the blender with two cups of new water. It’ll make more than you need, but it freezes well.)
- 1/2 cup of water
- 1 package of Kanokwan Green Curry Paste (they have other flavors too, make sure you read labels); or 1 or 2 Tablespoons of Thai Kitchen Green Curry Paste (they have other flavors as well, read labels); or 1 or 2 Tablespoons of Mae Ploy Thai Green Curry Paste (ditto, other flavors, read labels) or 1 or 2 Tablespoons of a curry spice mix you like, similar to those available from Penzey’s.
- 1/2 pound of beef, pork or chicken cut into stir fry sized strips (Chicken’s out for me, but if you can eat it go for it.)
- 3 scallions, sliced into quarter inch pieces
- 1/2 cup of snow peas
- 10-12 asparagus stalks, trimmed and cut into 1″ pieces
- 2 carrots, julienned
- 1 small onion or half a medium onion, cut in half and sliced thinly crosswise to form slices in a curved shape
- 1 medium bok choy (about 6-8 inches long), sliced crosswise to form small bite size pieces
- 2 Thai chilies, de-stemmed and sliced (optional, leave out if really spicy is not your thing)
- 5-6 Thai basil leaves
First up, prepare all your vegetables. Keep the bok choy or any other greens separated from the rest of the vegetables because they will cook quicker and need to be added at end. To do the carrots, I cheat and use a peeler that juliennes.

Julienne Peeler

Fill a large stock pot with water and bring to a boil. Add your rice noodles, boil for 6-8 minutes and then drain. If you’re using smaller rice noodles, you might not need as much cooking time, so check your package’s instructions. Place the noodles aside until the curry is finished.

Prepared Rice Noodles

In a large skillet, add the oil, the cashew milk, water, and curry paste or spice mix. Stir to combine over medium heat.

Curry Paste and Cashew Milk Mixture

Add your meat if you’re using it, and cook until the meat is cooked through. Then add your vegetables with the exception of the bok choy (or other green of choice).

Curry before adding greens

Cover your skillet with its lid and let it simmer for a few minutes to let the asparagus and carrots cook. Then add your bok choy and simmer until the bok choy is ready. When the bok choy is ready, mix in your Thai basil leaves.

Completed Curry/Stir Fry Thing

Place a bed of rice noodles on a plate and spoon your curry over it. If you have extra Thai basil leaves and want to be fancy, garnish your dish with them.

Quick Thai-Inspired Curry Noodle Stir Fry

Hope you enjoy it!
June 23, 2014
Homemade Beef Jerky
Beef Jerky. Photo by J. Andrews

I don’t know that I was aware that beef jerky was a commercial product until college. It pretty much showed up in the Westerns I was forced to watch as a kid, in pioneer books, and about once a year out of the oven, right before the oven got cleaned. Homemade beef jerky was a tradition. Once, my mother tried to send me some in grad school. As far as I can tell, the delivery person literally kicked the package into my tiny mailbox, shattering the protective jar into a whole batch of fantastic jerky. I still mourn that poor jar of wasted tasty goodness (that was, I think, about 15 years ago).

Thinking about food for road trips and vacations, hikes or picnics, jerky is a pretty good staple. If it got people out to the Plains or the west coast by wagon train, it can probably get you through a long drive or a weekend at a remote cottage, and it’s definitely an airport security-safe food. I will say I have no idea how long this is shelf-stable, but I’m pretty sure that the last jar was hidden for a few months at home. So at least a few months?

Jerky is pretty easy to make. It’s a bit time-consuming, but most of that is just waiting around and doing nothing. My plan usually starts with throwing a frozen flank steak in the fridge to thaw all day while I’m at work. That night I make the marinade and slice the meat. The next morning, I stir/flip the meat in the marinade. When I get home from work, I throw it in the oven. So, yeah, it’s a two-day process, but maybe 45 minutes of that 48 hours is active work. One pound takes up about one oven rack, so if you like this, it’s easily doubled without overloading your oven. Know that you will likely need to and want to clean your oven afterward.

This is a variation on our family recipe, altered to removed the soy and a few other ingredients that can be problematic with allergies. If you can have soy, you can use it here — remove all other salt in the recipe; if you need to be gluten-free, use GF tamari, but to me it tastes quite a bit saltier than regular soy sauce. Adjust accordingly. I have not tried this with coconut aminos, but let me know how it works if you do. You will want to make the faux soy sauce (linked below) beforehand if you’re using it, but it does not take long.

Jerky in process. It isn’t pretty, but it tastes good.

Homemade Beef Jerky
- 1 lb. flank steak
- 1/2 cup dry sherry or dry wine
- 1/2 cup faux soy sauce (I used this recipe without the fish sauce and with a bit more salt, closer to 1/2 teaspoon, but I was doing it by taste at that point)
- 1 Tablespoon natural sugar (regular table sugar will work, but unprocessed sugarcane adds better flavor, likely from the natural molasses content)
- 2 teaspoons garlic powder
- 1 teaspoon onion powder
- 1 teaspoon dry mustard powder
- 1/2 teaspoon celery salt (use crushed celery seed if you are using soy sauce or tamari)
- 1 teaspoon lime juice (lemon is probably okay, I just have a lot of limes right now)
- 1/2 teaspoon hot sauce of your choice (absolutely optional)
- salt to taste
Freeze your meat for at least an hour. Alternately, take meat from the freezer and let thaw about 8 hours in the fridge. Having partially frozen flank steak will allow you to cut it more thinly and evenly.

Trim the fat from the flank steak. Then slice into approximately 1/8-inch slices, with the grain of the meat. Or, you know, do your best to slice it thinly, period, and call it “hand-cut” and “artisinal.” This is what I do.

In a glass baking dish, combine the ingredients for the marinade and whisk or stir with a fork until the sugar is dissolved thoroughly. Taste it and adjust the salt. You want this marinade to be salty, but not overly so. Your jerky will be less salty than the marinade.

Add the meat strips and stir to fully coat and mostly submerge. Cover and refrigerate at least overnight (again, I usually do overnight, stir, and most of the next day — that’s just how it works in my schedule).

Lay your meat out directly on the oven rack.

Turn your oven down to the lowest setting (mine goes down to 170°F), and leave the oven cracked. Let the jerky dry out for 5-7 hours — you probably know what jerky should look and feel like, so test it at 5 hours. 6 usually works for how I cut the meat and how my oven works. After one or two batches, you’ll know where this stands for you, too.

Remove jerky to an airtight container, glass if you have it, and travel on.

Beef Jerky is ready for its close up. Photo by J. Andrews
June 16, 2014
Watermelon White Wine Sorbet or Ice Pops
Watermelon White Wine Sorbet or Ice Pops

Sorbet is one of the things I miss terribly because almost all of the commercial versions have corn in some form in them. This is a fairly easy recipe, making it perfect for this weekend, when I was going away for my 20th college reunion. Also, just as a side note, you could also sub out the watermelon for a quart of strawberries or a quart of peeled sliced peaches. I bet they’d be awesome too.

Warning: Before you make sorbet, you need an ice cream maker and if it’s like mine, you need to have frozen the insert ahead of time. Also, it helps to make the simple syrup the day before and let it cool in the fridge overnight. If you’re just making ice pops, just cool the simple syrup to room temperature before mixing it with the watermelon juice.

Watermelon White Wine Sorbet

Makes about 10 or so half cup servings (who ever eats just half a cup though??)
- 1 1/4 cups sugar
- 1 1/4 cups water
- 1/2 cup of chilled white wine (anything will do, but a nice bright citrus-y Sauvignon Blanc or Pinot Grigio would work well. Also, don’t spend a ton of money on this wine, you’re mixing it with watermelon and sugar. Or if you don’t want to use wine because you’re unsure of the wheat or corn ingredients in your wine, you could use a vodka made only from potatoes, but I’d cut it down to a quarter cup. Or not, if you’re not driving. Also, if you don’t want to use alcohol, substitute the wine with some safe-for-you lime or lemon or other fruit juice.)
- 1 quart of watermelon, peeled and cubed
Again, make sure that your ice cream maker is ready to go according to the manufacturer’s instructions, whether that means your insert is frozen or whatever else you might have to do.

The day before you are going to do your sorbet, make the simple syrup. Place the sugar and water in a sauce pan and bring it to a boil without stirring. Turn it down to a low simmer and simmer until all the sugar has dissolved to make a simple syrup. Pour the simple syrup into a heat resistant bowl and put it into the fridge to cool.

Place watermelon in a food processor or blender (in batches if necessary) and blend until smooth. Pour the liquid through a strainer to remove any seeds making sure that you press any large fruit bits remaining through the strainer. You don’t want to waste any of the watermelon. Add the wine and the simple syrup to the watermelon mixture and mix until combined thoroughly.

Follow your ice cream maker’s instructions to make the sorbet, or make ice pops with the mixture by using paper or plastic cups or ice pop molds and placing them in the freezer until frozen.

Hope you enjoy it!

Watermelon White Wine Sorbet or Ice Pops
June 9, 2014
Macadamia-Pistachio-Cherry Raw Balls
Macadamia-Pistachio-Cherry Raw Balls. Photo by J. Andrews

Apologies to the nut-allergic. These are not for you. Come back next week for a nut-free recipe? For those of you who can have nuts, these are for you.

I rely on a few travel snacks to get me through times when emergency rations are necessary. Lärabars are one of those snacks, and I usually have one in my bag (as well as a few at the office). But because they are “emergency” food that I eat several times a month, I frankly get a bit bored of the few flavors I like. I wanted to see if I could make something along the same lines, using things I had in the house, and have some snacks for this week at work. Dried fruit and nut things have a good combination of sugar, protein and fat that, for me, at least, makes for a good snack that knocks down hunger for an appropriate amount of time. You know, until your next snack. I eat on the hobbit schedule.

Between occasional trips to Trader Joe’s and our local natural foods store, I have a great selection of seeds, nuts, and dried fruits. Sometimes they get used for cookies or oatmeal toppings or an attempt at trail mix (which I always think I’m going to like more than I actually do), but mostly, buying them sounds like a good idea. I pulled everything out of the cabinet for taste-testing before deciding on this combo of macadamia nuts, pistachios, and cherries, with some dates and cacao nibs thrown in. The macadamias and pistachios are pretty creamy, and the cherries are tart, and the combination works out well.

My version might not be fully raw — I don’t know how the cherries or dates were dried — but if that’s important for you, find raw versions.

Macadamia-Pistachio-Cherry Raw Balls. Photo by J. Andrews

Macadamia-Pistachio-Cherry Raw Balls

makes 16
- 1/4 cup raw pistachios, shelled
- 1/2 cup raw macadamia nuts
- 2 pitted Medjool dates
- 1/4 cup dried Montmorency cherries (pretty sure any dried cherries will work, but I like the tartness of these)
- 2 Tablespoons raw cacao nibs
Rough chop the pistachios in the food processor, and set aside.

Add the macadamia nuts and the Medjool dates to the food processor, and process until you’ve made a nut butter. Add the cherries, and pulse them into the mixture. Add the pistachios back in, and the cacao nibs. Pulse to mix.

Dump the mixture out onto a sheet of parchment paper and knead it together. Chill at least 10 -15 minutes in the fridge, wrapped tightly in the parchment. Roll into balls, about 1/2 a Tablespoon each. Store tightly covered in the fridge.

Macadamia-Pistachio-Cherry Raw Balls
June 2, 2014
Sourdough Waffles (Gluten-free & Vegan)
Sourdough Waffles (Gluten-free & Vegan)

As some of you know, I’ve been experimenting with gluten-free sourdough breads. And since I have gluten-free sourdough starter that I now need to use because you have to keep feeding it to keep it alive, and there’s only so much bread one person can eat as my husband is diabetic and gluten-free bread is not particularly helpful to his blood sugar, I need to find other ways to use it up. Someone in one of the fermenting groups on Facebook recently mentioned sourdough starter waffles, and I was off and running. I found a couple of recipes, but many of them had things I can’t have, so I’ve played around and substituted until I’ve gotten something I’m pretty happy with. Also, as a side note, these freeze great. You can make up a batch and when they cool, put a layer of parchment paper or plastic wrap in between them, put them in a gallon size zip top freezer bag, and put them in the freezer. You can warm them up in a toaster or in the oven on a baking rack when you’re ready to eat them.

You do have to make the starter ahead of time. I used this post from Art of Gluten-Free Baking to begin my starter. I started using sorghum flour when I was making the bread, but I had moved over to feeding it oat flour before making these waffles (I was running out of sorghum). Also, I cheated and didn’t do the cabbage leaf thing to get wild yeast, I just used a pinch of a safe for me commercial yeast. It worked fine, but do what makes you happy.

If you don’t have safe oat flour, you can take gluten-free certified oats and grind them in a blender or food processor.

Sourdough Waffles (Gluten-free & Vegan)

Makes 6-7 waffles.
- 1 cup of gluten-free sourdough starter
- 1 cup of non-dairy milk (I used homemade brown rice milk)
- 2 Tablespoons of grape seed or olive oil
- 1/4 cup of applesauce
- 1/2 teaspoon of vanilla extract (Here’s a bunch of recipes for vanilla extract, make sure to use safe alcohol if corn or wheat are an issue for you. I used Luksusowa Vodka because it’s made only from potatoes, where some vodkas may also use grain or corn.)
- 1/2 cup of oat flour
- 1/2 cup of glutinous rice flour
- 1/4 cup of tapioca starch
- 1/2 teaspoon of baking soda
- 1 teaspoon of baking powder (For corn free baking powder you can use this recipe)
- 1/2 teaspoon of salt
- 2 Tablespoons of brown sugar
- 1/8 teaspoon of cinnamon
- 1/8 teaspoon of nutmeg
Plug in your waffle iron and pre-heat it. If it has a temperature setting, I find that the highest temperature works best for gluten-free.

Add oat flour, glutinous rice flour, tapioca starch, baking soda, baking powder, salt, brown sugar, cinnamon and nutmeg to a mixing bowl and whisk it until thoroughly mixed. Now add your wet ingredients, the sourdough starter, non-dairy milk, grape seed oil, applesauce and vanilla extract to the bowl and mix until well combined, but there will be a few lumps.

Batter, mixed but not too mixed.

Pour the appropriate amount batter on your waffle iron, for mine it’s between a 1/3 and a 1/2 cup of batter, and cook according to your waffle iron’s directions. But I do find that I like to let it go a little longer after the indicator light has gone out until the steam stops to get nice really crispy waffles.

Hope you enjoy them!

Sourdough Waffles (Gluten-free & Vegan)
May 26, 2014