Books and Food; two of my three favourite things.

I am remiss in posting for awhile, however work has kept me pretty busy and I hope that I will be able to share my foodie adventures over the Christmas holidays when I have more time to post.

Today, I am doing a fun little post on a book. There are three things in this world that I absolutely adore, if you don't count my nephew and I absolutely adore him no question. I also adore coffee, books and food in no particular order. When I was given a chance to become a book blogger for Penguin Canada I decided to give it  a try. I thought about reviewing a cookbook, but I did not have the time to cook my tried and true, let alone anything new, so it did not seem like a good idea to attempt first. So I went to the next best thing; a children's book. I am a teacher and it seemed like a natural fit. Penguin Canada has the December Delights promotion on right now and it is basically an advent calendar for book lovers, full of suggestions and contests for bibliophiles such as myself. Today is day #10 and it is The Day the Crayons Quit.

Drew Daywalt poses an interesting dilemma when he suggests that the crayons are not happy with Duncan, their owner. I read this book last night and I could not help but giggle for many reasons and I cannot wait to share this book with my nephew. I know he will love the green page. But I digress. Every year I put a big box of crayons on my desk along with markers and pencil crayons for my students to use and inevitably the crayons are passed over, because junior high students are too cool for crayons. I always feel sad because I love crayons! There is something about them and maybe it is nostalgia more than anything and the fact that they take me back to a time of innocence. I find crayons comforting and I was taught a long time ago that sitting and colouring is one of the greatest stress reducers because of the nostalgia involved. Unfortunately, it is the crayons in this book that are stressed out. All they want is to be used equally without having favourites played. When you think about it though; do we use all the crayons in the box? Sadly, no. However, Duncan comes up with an ingenious idea of how to keep everyone happy.

I like how Daywalt addresses all the problems individually and uses each colour to write the letter. The only problem I had was with yellow (but don't tell yellow crayon that). It was hard to read. Oliver Jeffers drawings combined with the letters were a perfect fit. I enjoy Oliver Jeffers illustrations. I first noticed his illustrations in a book that I gave my nephew for his birthday, How to Catch a Star. His illustrations are simple, yet powerful, and they recreate that sense of nostalgia by looking like a child has drawn the illustrations which fit perfectly with Daywalt's crayon dilemma as the crayons are trying to tell Duncan what it is that they need in order to be happy.

I cannot wait to share this book with my nephew and I am not sure if I will give him this copy of the book for Christmas or buy him his own copy and keep this one for myself. Sometimes we need a good children's story in our life to put our own lives into perspective and recapture some of the innocence lost with maturity. I think I need to go and buy myself a new box of crayons soon. ;) Hopefully I will be able to keep them all happy like Duncan finally does in the end. I love this book and hope that there will be a French translation of it soon, so that I can share it with my junior high students even though they are too cool for crayons. ;)

One potato, two potato, Sweet potato and more...

So a couple of weeks ago when I ventured back in to the pintrest realm and found the cauliflower crust to satiate my pizza craving, I stumbled upon a pin for sweet potato hash. I love sweet potatoes! And I don't mean that in the sense that I loved Bon Jovi, Nelson and dare I say it, NKOTB, as a pre-teen and teenager. You know the kind of love I mean, where you profess undying love and then it sours after a week or two. I would honestly take a naked, baked sweet potato over its fully loaded cousin, smothered in butter, sour cream and chives any day of the week.  I will even eat potato chips again, so long as it is the Covered Bridge Sweet Potato chip from New Brunswick. I don't remember not liking sweet potatoes, so when I found this recipe for sweet potato hash I knew that I needed to try it.

I did not follow the recipe, I'll admit it. If there is one thing that my mother dislikes the most about when I cook, it is that I don't always follow a recipe. Sometimes I see multiple ideas and I combine them in my head and then make them and they turn out beautifully. The trouble is though, that if I did not write it down or make notations somewhere then I cannot repeat it or tell people what I have done. I like experimenting though and not having to follow a recipe all the time.

I had a few sweet potatoes from Elmridge Farm in my fridge and since I do not have a food processor, I decided to use my little Kitchen Aid food chopper to chop up the potato. No way was I about to risk my knuckles and bits of skin grating the dense little suckers. So I chopped up two small potatoes and roughly a quarter of  a white onion and I let it sit in the fridge for a bit. I did not use any salt on this and this was my first mistake. I rarely cook with salt. The only time I use salt on anything is if it is for a recipe and a chemical reaction is required. Beyond that I rarely use salt. When it came time to cook it, I heated my pan for the hash and my grandmother's little cast iron pan; perfect for one egg. I added a little olive oil to my big pan and dumped the contents of my chopped sweet potato and onion into the hot pain and listened to it sizzle while I checked the heat on the other pan. I then added some extra spicy Mrs. Dash to the sweet potato mixture, and that was mistake number two. I then cracked the egg into the other pan and sprinkled a little Mrs. Dash there too. I like spicy and I thought it would pair well with the sweetness of the potato; it usually does when I roast veggies in the oven. I did not use my universal lid on my frying pan to allow the sweet potatoes to steam a bit, that was mistake three. I ended up undercooking the sweet potato and it did not brown up as much as I thought it would. So my first attempt at it was not a flaming success but it was not an unmitigated disaster either. It just required a few minor adjustments to the process.

Tonight I decided to try again. I went to the Halifax Seaport Farmers Market today and invested in some more Sweet Potatoes and this time around I decided to add some bacon from Sweet Williams to the mix. Unusual choice for me since I spent most of my childhood avoiding the bacon and egg brunches we would have at least one Sunday a month growing up. The only egg I liked was scrambled and unrecognizable with ham, peppers, onions and cheese added to it. The smell of bacon used to repulse me. However I have grown a new appreciation for bacon and even eggs. It is ironic that the things that I avoided as a kid are now the "safest" things for me to eat. Mind you, it doesn't mean that I gorge myself on them, it just means that I have grown to appreciate them and don't shy away from them as much anymore. Anyhow, tonight's hash was prepared slightly differently. I chopped it the same and added onion but this time I ground a little pink crystal salt and fresh black pepper into the mix before placing in to the fridge. When it was time to cook the mix, I heated the pan a little more because I had to cook the bacon first. I diced it, cooked it, drained the fat and let it rest on paper towel while I cooked the sweet potatoes. I added regular Mrs. Dash to the preparation this time. Much better option as it was not overpowering. I used my lid to allow the sweet potatoes to soften further. It steamed them nicely and I had more browning to the pan. I added the bacon back in towards the end of the cooking time and blended it well. I cooked my egg the same as before but used the regular Mrs. Dash on it as well. It gave it all a much nicer flavour. To top it off, I had some Schoolhouse Gluten Free Bakery English muffins in the freezer, so I toasted one and topped it with Thompson's Strawberry Jam.

I felt bad about not participating in I Love Local Halifax's City Harvest today, but I was not sure who had gluten free options and did not have the heart to traipse around only to be disappointed. So I did my own City Harvest meal today and it was worth it! Will definitely be making it again!

Attempt #1--Good but needed some adjustments

Attempt #2--Far superior!

 

As a kid, you could not pay me to eat cauliflower!

So this past week I made two pizzas, and neither of them contained bread in any form. I decided that I wanted to try a cauliflower crust pizza. I noticed about a year ago on Pintrest that it was becoming the popular gluten free pin and at the time I pinned it, like many other things, with every intention of trying it. Nearly a year went by before I re-entered the foray of pinning; shocking I know! My pin was still there however this time I decided that I was going to give it a go.

I went to the Halifax Seaport Farmer's Market last weekend and I made sure that I bought a good sized cauliflower from Elmridge Farms. It is funny but I would say that cauliflower in the last number of years has become my go to vegetable. I always throw it in a stir fry or steam it with broccoli and carrots or just dip it into hummus. I refused to eat it as kid and would pick the broccoli out from around it and eat the broccoli only if Mom steamed them for roast beef dinner. How times change. Now I want to use it as my pizza crust.

I found this really good recipe on Nutrition Stripped by McKel Hill, a dietician. I had every single ingredient needed and I even had nutritional yeast in my cupboard. I can't believe that I just admitted that but it's true. I needed it for a recipe last year and it called for it. The only thing I didn't have was the cauliflower, so I put it on my list when I went to the market.

When I got home I gave it a rinse and proceeded to grind up my cauliflower as the recipe directed. I put some cheese cloth in a bowl and dumped the cauliflower in as I ground up small batches in my food chopper.

One medium cauliflower ground up



I then let it sit over night and let any water drain out of it. The next day I squeezed off any excess and started to assemble the crust as per the directions in the recipe. As the crust was pre-baking as per the instructions, I chopped the rest of my ingredients. I had decided to make a Margherita-style pizza with fresh Basil from Riverview Herbs, Onion, Plum Tomatoes and Sweet William's Turkey Pepperoni all drizzled with Olive Oil and lactose-free Mozza.



Margherita-style

This pizza gave me four meals at one slice per sitting along side a various salad bought from either Fruition or Little Red Kitsch'n. So midway through the week, I still had cauliflower left and a need for another pizza because the first one was so good. This time, however, I decided to make a regular pizza with tomato sauce, Turkey Pepperoni, Bacon and Onion alongside the lactose-free Mozza. I decided I wanted to make a bigger pizza this time, so I doubled the crust and I had just enough cauliflower left for it. The only adjustment I was that I combine 2 eggs with a 1/2 cup of eggs whites instead of using 4 whole eggs and it worked.

#2 in less than week

 Although you have to pre-bake the crust, it really does stay quite moist but does not become saturated with the sauce to the point of becoming a gooey mess. I have become a fan of this crust in short order. You would never really know that it isn't bread until you bite into it. The nutritional yeast gives it a slightly yeasty smell when you are mixing the "dough." Best of all you are not left with a heavy, weighted down feeling in the pit of your stomach. I find that even a gluten-free crust can sometimes be too much for me. I like the fact that I can have my pizza toppings on a vegetable and I am satisfying my craving for pizza with less carbs than a regular pizza.

A slice paired with Broccoli Salad from Little Red Kitsch'n

All by itself

Finding New Things and Getting Creative

I like finding new things and experiencing new things and food is no exception. I love food! Unfortunately, I have to be very careful with my new food experiences. So I am always on the lookout for things that I can have.

There is one place in Halifax that is a very safe place for me and though I am not Vegan, there is not too much, if anything, that they make that I do not like. Fruition Natural Foods is at the Halifax Seaport Farmers Market. I love the fact that their offerings are Raw, Soy Free, Dairy Free and Gluten Free. They currently have a cozy corner of the upstairs at the market. I remember when they first came to the market and had a small little table and had Kale Crisps, Sundried Tomato Pate and Coconut Almond Bars. I had all three of them and I really enjoyed them. As they started to expand their line up, I kept trying things.  I even started to get really creative with their stuff when paring it with my own things or things from the Schoolhouse Gluten Free Bakery, who can also be found at the market.

The only pictures I don't have of things from Fruition are their Coconut Almond Bars, Chia Pudding, Blueberry Mousse and their Mocha "Cheesecake." These items are never around long enough for me to get a picture of them; but trust me when I say that they are awesome!

Beet Salad with a Broiled Chicken Breast, seasoned with Pepper

My favourite lunch of Sundried Tomato Pate with fruit and cheese on Schoolhouse bread.

A veggie burger with cashew mayo on Schoolhouse bread and Sweet Potato chips from Covered Bridge



Another variation on my favourite lunch with added chicken

 



Birthday without a cake?

We celebrated my Mom's birthday at the end of August and anyone who is friends with me on Facebook probably got a little tired of seeing my Instagram pictures about the cake I made for her.

The whole idea of the cake started at the beginning of August when we took a trip to Saint John and ended up in the Liquid Gold Store; never mind the fact that we have yet to frequent the one in Halifax. While perusing the titles of oil in the store, my mother happened upon a recipe for a cake which was pinned next to a vat of Meyer Lemon Olive Oil. Needless to say she was intrigued, bought a bottle of the oil, got a copy of the recipe both of which ended up in my possession, because you cannot be expected to make your own cake.

It was not a complicated recipe and I personally gave up using butter in cakes and cookies long before I had to go dairy free. It was an eggless cake though which worried me. I had never attempted a gluten free, eggless cake. I really did not want a disaster on my hands and a birthday without a cake. I looked through my cupboards to see what gluten free flours I had on hand. I thought about using all rice flour with a little bit of coconut flour to absorb any excess liquid, but that would have made for a high carb, low fiber content cake and resembling more of a sponge cake. I had Teff flour in my cupboard and while it is a really good flour for bread and I have used it with other flours to make muffins, it can be a little dense. I had Sorghum flour as well and that is what I normally mix with my Teff flour for my muffins. I like a dense muffin but I didn't want an overly dense cake. Lastly, I had Garbanzo and Fava Bean flour which is also good; but again, I was unsure of how it would react in a cake. I decided to mix Teff flour, Rice flour and Coconut flour together and crossed my fingers that they would work. I also decided that white sugar was not an option. I know my Mom watches her intake and I try to use it sparingly now that I am gluten free, just because it is such an additive in a lot of pre-packaged gluten free options. I opted for coconut palm sugar instead and then pretty much stuck to the rest of the remaining ingredients with the addition of xanthan gum.

 The end result was better than I could have hoped for. The batter did what it was supposed to do when the baking soda reacted with the vinegar as leavening. It wasn't too heavy, nor too light and it wasn't overly starchy. It looked and felt like a cake when I removed them from the pans. I frosted it with a classic vanilla buttercream and you can see the end result below.

 

It ended up being one of the best cakes that I have ever made and I would definitely make it again, with or without the lemon infused olive oil. It had a nice hint of lemon with a touch of vanilla in the frosting and it was very light and moist. My Dad went back for a second piece. I always know I have made something good whenever my Dad goes back for more.

 

Meyer Lemon Olive Oil Cake (Gluten Free Version)

2 1/2 cups Flour ( 1 cup Teff flour*, 1 cup Rice flour, 1/2 cup Coconut flour)

1 3/4 cups Coconut Palm Sugar

2 tsp Salt

2 tsp Gluten Free Baking Soda

2 1/4 tsp Xanthan Gum

1 cup Liquid Gold Meyer Lemon Olive Oil

2 3/4 cups Whole Milk (I used Ran-cher Acres Goat Milk Kefir)

1 tsp Vanilla extract
2 Tbsp Vinegar (I used Cider Vinegar)

* Make sure you use Teff flour, because Teff looks like a small seed in the bag whereas the flour looks ground.

Heat oven to 300F.

Mix dry ingredients together. In a separate bowl mix liquid ingredients and whisk. Add the liquid ingredients to the dry ingredients and mix to incorporate. Pour into two 9" round pans that you have greased with olive oil or lined with parchment paper.

Bake for 45 minutes or until baked through, rotating pans part way through baking.

Gluten Free for 1 and a 1/2 years

I have been toying with the idea to write a blog for some time now. What really sparked my interest was all the good food I had over the summer and the number of gluten free places and items I am beginning to find here in Halifax but also throughout Atlantic Canada. The other reason is to share some of the things that I have learned along my journey, and a few of the recipes I have found and adapted along the way.

Going gluten free for me was not an easy task; nor was it a quick, spur of the moment decision brought on by the desire to follow the latest fad. The journey began two years prior to my going fully gluten free.

In the fall of 2010 I didn't feel like myself, I was tired all the time and I had developed a rash all over my neck. Went to the doctor and all she did for my rash was prescribe hydrocortisone cream. The rash went away somewhat but I was still extremely tired. I slept through most of Christmas that year and I was starting to feel cold all the time. My hands literally felt like blocks of ice and my very core felt like cold water had been poured down it. I went back to the doctor, who ordered bloodwork; which led to the discovery that my ferritin levels were at 15. 5 points above the low end of normal. Most people have anywhere between 45 and 92. I could not be declared anaemic though as my hemoglobin levels had managed to stay in the normal range, which meant that my blood was oxygenated. Doctor told me to take iron supplements. Great! Problem solved! Just one thing was wrong with that curative; iron pills are nasty. I had developed nausea when eating and upper right quadrant pain in the area of the gall bladder. Iron pills were going to compound the problem in my opinion. I tried taking them at night and I tried taking them in the morning, however the lowest dose of iron made me so nauseous and I had a new problem forming.

I was still tired all the time and my fatigue was leading me to bed at 8pm on nights that I wasn't curling; the problem being that I was waking up anywhere between 1am and 2am with upper right quadrant pain and no way of getting back to sleep. So I went back to the doctor. I went through weeks of having different forms of sleeping pills prescribed to me, but my breaking point came when finally I was up to 150mg of Trazadone and I was still waking up, in pain. The doctor suggested an SSRI which really is a fancy title for an anti-depressant. All of my physical symptoms were suggesting to my doctor that I was depressed. It is funny thinking about it now, but it wasn't so funny at the time. I was the least depressed person that I or any of my friends knew and here was my doctor suggesting that I was depressed. I was getting anxious by the fact that they did not know what was wrong with me at this point, extremely frustrated and angry that I was being pigeon-holed into a category because I was not a textbook case of physical symptoms and I was rapidly losing faith in the medical profession as a whole. I was dropping weight like crazy, my hair and skin were an absolute mess by this point and family and friends were starting to worry, and I was still so incredibly tired, and I could not concentrate for more than 10 minutes at a time because I was so exhausted. I refused the SSRI and found a Naturopathic Doctor and made an appointment. At this point I had finally reached the two week break for the Canada Winter Games and I had lunch with two friends. They watched as I ate and then turned 50 shades of white within 15 minutes. The idea of me being depressed was already absolutely absurd to them, more so after that lunch date.

I met with the Naturopath two weeks after that lunch date.  She listened patiently and read all the paperwork that I had filled out and she concluded that I needed to come off dairy, gluten and start taking some supplements because I was clearly lacking nutrients. She put me on a form of iron that did not nauseate me, she gave me B12 shots to give me a little more energy and she wrote letters to my doctor explaining the tests that she wanted me to have done. I am glad of my decision to see her.

Going gluten free was not easy. When I first started I felt like I was in the woods without a map, compass or GPS to guide my way. I was given a few hints of how to get started and I even went so far as to purchase the Complete Idiot's Guide to Gluten Free Cooking. That book was money well spent because it gave me a list of all the things that I needed to have and all the things that I needed to avoid. A co-worker even loaned me Alyce Feindel's Living and Eating Gluten Free cookbook. I made some recipes out of that book but I noticed that my confidence in the kitchen had dwindled a fair bit because I was unfamiliar with the ingredients and it wasn't my normal way of eating and cooking. It took some time for me to realise that it was indeed my new normal but I still had tests that needed to be done, which meant a return to gluten and the sick and nauseous feelings.

I finally had the gastroscopy done in March of 2012 and I went gluten free for good on March 28th, 2012. I have not looked back since. Sure I have had a few setbacks when I have not read ingredients carefully but that goes for anyone really. I have regained a lot of my confidence in my cooking, especially this past summer and I have started to experiment with converting my old recipes into new gluten free creations. My hair and skin are finally beginning to look more nourished and I can actually sleep normally again. I still take some supplements to ensure that I am getting enough nutrients, but I am trying to eat as many of my nutrients as I can. I am beginning to find more and more things here in Halifax that I can have and am focusing more on that, rather than what I have to go without. Hopefully this blog will be helpful to those who are also struggling being gluten free in Halifax.