Breakfast Bites

Sometimes a little advance effort has a big pay-off. That’s most certainly the case with breakfast — the last thing most of us want to do first thing in the morning is spend a lot of time preparing/scrounging for something to eat. Specifically, something that will taste good, be healthy, and be satisfying enough to last until lunch. All three of those conditions are impossible to fulfill — although those with a sweet tooth would probably argue that the “tastes good” criteria would be met — with what you’ll find in the cereal aisle or the reduced-fat dairy section in most supermarkets. (Also known as the Aisle of Sugar and the Section of Sugar departments.)

If you’re willing to spend a little time making these breakfast bites while you listen to your favorite podcast, though, you won’t face a first-thing-in-the-morning crisis. With three kinds of whole grains, two seeds, eggs, extra-virgin olive oil, and natural sweeteners in the form of raisins and dates, these little guys taste great, are healthy, and won’t leave you hungry by 10 a.m. Plus, they’re bite-size and highly portable. How convenient is that?

Breakfast Bites
Makes approximately 60 bites.

1/4 cup sunflower seeds, coarsely ground in a food processor
1/4 cup pumpkin seeds, coarsely ground in a food processor
1/4 cup teff flour*
3/4 cup sorghum flour*
3/4 cup brown rice flour*
1 tsp. cinnamon
1 tsp. baking powder
1/4 cup date sugar
1/2 cup raisins
3 eggs, separated
1/4 tsp. cream of tartar
1 tsp. vanilla
1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil
Powdered sucanat for rolling (optional)

Preheat oven to 350F and cover 2 baking sheets with parchment paper. In a large bowl, whisk together seeds, flours, cinnamon, baking powder, and date sugar. Stir in raisins, separating them by hand if they’re clumping together.

Crack the egg whites into a large bowl and put the yolks in another large bowl. Whip the whites with the cream of tartar — since the cream of tartar is acidic, it helps set the whites faster — until you have almost-stiff peaks (the kind that very slowly and gently starts to fall over after you’ve lifted up the beater).

Using the same beater, whip the yolks with the vanilla and oil until the mixture is frothy and thick. Stir the dry ingredients into the yolks. The dough will be dry, but that’s okay — you still have to fold in the whites. After you’ve folded them in with a spatula, start rolling the dough into 1″ balls and placing them on the baking sheets. I find that the easiest way to do that is pinch the dough together, use your fingertips to form it into a rough ball, and then give it a little finishing “polish” roll in the palm of your hand.

Bake for 12 minutes until bottoms are golden brown. If you like, roll the hot-out-of-the-oven balls in powdered sucanat to give them a little more sweetness. I do like to roll them, so I bake the bites in 2 batches — that way, I can get the first batch sucanat-ed while they’re still hot. Let bites cool completely before storing them in an airtight container.

Enjoy!

* These are gluten-free flours. If you’d rather make a wheat-based version, use an equivalent of kamut, spelt, and/or whole-wheat flour.

Sunflower & Sesame Kale Chips

Kale chips seem to be the Hot Food Thing right now…and they’ve also been on my personal Obsessed with These Yummies list for the last two years. I’m always on the lookout for an ever-tastier chip. Last weekend, I found inspiration for my quest in the form of a side order of onion rings at The Raw Cafe in Detroit. Whatever blend of nuts and spices those crispy puppies were dredged in was culinary nirvana!

I decided to make a batch of kale chips using what I thought was on the onions: sesame, sunflower, nutritional yeast, tamari, and dried herbs. I think I’ve hit the nail at least somewhat on the head here. Or leaf, as it may be. If you happen to try those onion rings and figure out a way to reverse engineer them, by all means please let me know! Together, we’ll crack the code.

Sunflower & Sesame Kale Chips

The amount of seasoning will depend on how much kale you have, so it’s best to keep these general proportions in mind and tailor them to your needs. First, preheat the oven to 325F and cover 2 baking sheets with parchment paper. Rinse kale, whack dry against the edge of the sink (water pretty much bounces off those crinkly leaves), and rip tough ribs away from each leaf. Tear the leaves into small pieces and place in a large bowl.

To make the seasoning, grind equal parts sunflower seeds and sesame seeds (either seed/both seeds can be raw or toasted) with a hearty dash of dried Italian herbs. Add a heaping spoonful of nutritional yeast — it should be about half the amount of the seeds. For example, if you use 2 T. each of the seeds, use 1 T. of the yeast (along with a big dash of herbs). Drizzle kale lightly with tamari*/soy sauce and mix well with the ground seeds. The goal is to have just enough tamari to make the leaves a little bit wet so that the seeds will stick. Too wet, and leaves will never get crispy in the oven.

Spread chips out on baking sheets so that none overlap and bake for 25 minutes or until chips are crispy and starting to turn brown. Eat immediately. You’ll probably wish you had more.

Enjoy!

* Be sure to use wheat-free tamari if you’re making gluten-free chips.

Cinnamon & Honey Millet Cakes

I recently prepared these millet cakes for a cooking class, and reactions ranged from “This would make a good breakfast!” to “It kind of reminds me of rice pudding…except crispy.” My thoughts exactly! I also think these cakes would make a great dessert if you topped them with ice cream and/or fresh fruit and an additional drizzle of honey. Or a dollop of whole-milk Greek yogurt with some honey and cinnamon stirred into it.

You could make grain cakes with whatever grain you have on hand: whole-grain rice (brown, red, black, purple), millet, quinoa, amaranth, even wild rice. The key is to overcook your grain of choice just a little so that it becomes stickier and can better hold its shape when formed into a patty. Using two egg whites instead of one whole egg helps the cakes stick together, too — since most of the egg’s protein is in the white, that’s the part that helps things stick together when cooked. (Then again, all of the vitamins and most of the other nutrients are found in the yolk, so it’s better to use the whole egg from a health standpoint.)

Be sure to save your yolks and use them to make ice cream, custard, or even extra-rich scrambled eggs. Fresh yolks can be refrigerated for up to 3 days if you cover them completely with cold water before stashing them on a shelf where they’ll be in prominent, unforgettable, “don’t-forget-about-me!” view.

Cinnamon & Honey Millet Cakes
Makes enough to serve 4. Recipe can be easily doubled or tripled.

2 cups cooked millet (¾ cup will yield about 2 cups cooked)
2 egg whites, preferably from pastured hens
2 T. honey
½ tsp. to 1 tsp. cinnamon
½ tsp. vanilla
Dash sea salt

Mix all ingredients together in a bowl. Heat a dab of butter in a large nonstick skillet over medium heat until butter is melted and add millet to the pan 1/4 cup at a time, pressing the millet into the cup with your fingers and then tapping the compressed millet gently into the skillet. Press down lightly on the millet patty with a spatula to flatten it (aim for a 3” patty).

Cook for 5 minutes or until golden brown, then very carefully and gently flip over the patties. Cook another 3 minutes or until both sides are golden brown. Leftover patties keep quite deliciously in the fridge for up to 5 days.

Enjoy!

Coconut & Maple Macaroons

Macaroons are the hottest thing in high-end pastry and chocolate shops right now … but when you think “macaroon,” you’re probably thinking of something different. Although classic French macaroons consist of chocolate cream sandwiched between two disks of almond meringue, when the concept was translated to the American dessert lexicon, the recipe changed. Drastically.

Each kind of macaroon has its own charm, and both are irrefutably delightful. The French ganache-and-meringue version is crunchy and creamy at the same time; the American version is based on coconut and is charmingly chewy. Odds are that each will strike your fancy at a different time. When you want to make a quick and easy dessert, for example, you’ll probably have a hankering for the American macaroon. It requires zero heating of any kind and can be made in about two minutes. The French version is considerably more involved. While “project”-style desserts are ideal if you have some time on your hands and curiosity in your nature, sometimes a make-it-in-fewer-than-five-minutes dessert is exactly what you’re looking for.

Coconut & Maple Macaroons
Makes 12 macaroons. Recipe can easily be doubled or tripled.

1/2 cup + 1 T. unsweetened coconut flakes
3 T. unsweetened cocoa powder, plus extra for dusting
2 T. maple syrup
1 1/2 tsp. vanilla

Sprinkle some cocoa powder on a large plate and have another empty clean plate nearby. Combine all ingredients in a small bowl, mixing well. Use your fingertips to roughly pinch the mixture into 12 equal balls, then roll each ball into a smooth ball on the dry, clean palms of your hands. (Your fingertips will be sticky from having mixed everything together.) Place the macaroons on the clean plate as you go. Wash and dry your hands thoroughly — the idea is to ensure that the macaroons stick to themselves rather than your hands — and then roll each macaroon in the cocoa powder to finish. Alternatively, roll in almond flour or finely ground pistachios or any other finely ground nut.

Macaroons can be refrigerated for up to a week. They’ll dry out slightly and actually improve in texture upon standing. (Although I like them freshly made, too.)

Enjoy!

Chive & Spinach Pesto

It’s not just the grass and tulips that are in full bloom: the chives are growing like gangbusters, too. Seeing all of those tall-but-still-tender chives put me in a pesto kind of mood. (Green + herb = pesto in my mind.) It’s still a bit too chilly for basil, though, so I opted to use chives and spinach instead. Not only is spinach another early-growing tasty edible, its fresh, sweet flavor offsets the garlicky nature of the chives.

If you’d like to make a raw, spicy version of this pesto, use baby spinach and simply toss everything in a food processor. I prefer a more mellow taste, so I opted to steam the spinach and then wring it out before adding it. (You don’t want watery pesto!) I also adore the nutty, warm flavor of sautéed garlic. Either way, you’ll have a plateful of spring flavors.

Chive & Spinach Pesto
Serves 2. Recipe can easily be doubled or tripled.

2 servings whole-grain pasta of your choice (I used Tinkyada’s brown rice fettucini; be sure to get gluten-free pasta if you’re making a gluten-free dish!)
8 oz. baby or curly spinach (use baby if you’re making an all-raw pesto)
Garlic (optional)
Chives (if your chives are fresh and strong-flavored, start by only using about three individual chives; taste your pesto before adding more so as not to over-chive it)
Handful of pine nuts OR sliced almonds

Prepare pasta according to package directions. If you’re making raw pesto, toss remaining ingredients in a food processor — perhaps skipping the garlic altogether since chives are potent all on their own — and blend until smooth, drizzling in a bit of extra-virgin olive oil and a shake of sea salt before doing the final blending.

If you’re making a more mellow pesto, steam the spinach for 3 minutes or until wilted. Drain well, pressing the spinach into the side of the colander with the back of a large spoon to really get the water out. While the spinach is draining, chop the garlic and sautée it in a drizzle of extra-virgin olive oil over medium-low heat for 3 minutes or until just starting to turn golden brown.

Scoop the garlic into a food processor, add drained spinach and chives, and blend. Add pine nuts and blend again, scraping down the sides of the processor. Drizzle in a little more oil if you’d like a richer taste and smoother consistency. Salt to taste. (If you’re serving the pesto with cheese or something salty, you might want to skip salting the pesto.) Serve with cooked noodles, veggies, sautéed chicken, or as a dip for crudites or bread, garnishing with additional pine nuts if you like.

Since this pesto is made with chives and spinach rather than basil, it will keep longer in the fridge (basil oxidizes and turns black very quickly; chives and spinach do not). Leftover pesto can be kept for 4 days and is great for everything from flavoring soups — just stir in a spoonful! — to garnishing roasted veggies.

Enjoy!

Mediterranean Lamb Pizza with Roasted Red Pepper Sauce

If pizza had originated in Morocco rather than Italy, I have a sneaking suspicion that lamb would have been the meat of choice, not pepperoni. (Or perhaps pepperoni made with lamb. Hint, hint… I can only hope the American Lamb Board is reading this!) And perhaps the sauce would have been been made the way I made this one — with roasted red peppers instead of tomatoes. It’s a fun twist on the traditional marinara staple, plus it’s a handy way to go tomato-free if tomatoes aren’t on your dinner guest’s list of favorite foods. You could, of course, go with a combo sauce if you’d like. If you’re feeling particularly brave and happen to have some spicy Moroccan harissa on hand, you can include that, too.

I opted to maintain the Mediterranean attitude by topping the pie with goat’s-milk feta and rosemary-scented asiago cheese. (Sartori produces a sublime version of the latter, made with grass-fed milk and copious amounts of dried rosemary.) You could stick with the tried-and-true mozzarella, but if you’re going to go with generous amounts of herbed sauce and flavorful ground lamb, you might as well enjoy a cheese that makes it presence known.

Mediterranean Lamb Pizza with Roasted Red Pepper Sauce

1 pizza crust (store-bought or this easy whole-grain and gluten-free crust recipe)

For the sauce:
1 medium onion, chopped (1/2 of the onion reserved for the lamb topping)
4 cloves garlic, chopped
16 oz. (1 pound) of roasted peppers, either jarred (drained weight, not the total contents weight — just be sure to DRAIN THE PEPPERS BEFORE USING!) or home-roasted, run through a food processor until fairly smooth
2 tsp. dried oregano
1 tsp. dried parsley
1 tsp. dried mint
Sprinkling of crushed red pepper flakes

For the lamb topping:
1 lb. ground lamb, preferably pastured
The reserved onion from the sauce
4 cloves garlic, chopped
1 tsp. dried oregano
1 tsp. dried parsley
1 tsp. dried mint

Cheeses: about 1 cup of grated/crumbled goat’s- or sheep’s-milk feta AND/OR asiago (I used Sartori’s rosemary-scented asiago)

Prepare crust according to recipe (or package directions if store-bought). To make the sauce, heat a drizzle of extra-virgin olive oil over medium heat for 1 minute and then add onions. Sautée, stirring occasionally, for 5 minutes or until onions are starting to turn translucent. Add garlic and reduce heat to medium-low. Continue to cook for another 2 minutes or until garlic is fragrant. Add remaining sauce ingredients and allow sauce to simmer gently for 15 minutes, stirring occasionally. Reduce heat to low if the sauce starts to boil.

Meanwhile, heat the lamb over medium heat in a different pan. Cook for 2 minutes, stirring often to break apart meat, until lamb is starting to brown slightly. Add onions and cook for another 3 minutes or until the lamb is mostly no longer pink. Stir in garlic and herbs and reduce heat to low. Cook for another 2 minutes or until lamb is browned. Drain.

By now, the pizza crust should be ready to top and the sauce should be simmered. Make sure the oven is at 375F. Spoon sauce onto the pre-baked crust and spread evenly out to the edges. Add meat, spooning it on evenly, and then scatter cheese on top of the meat.

Bake for 15 to 20 minutes or until sauce is bubbling and cheese is melting and starting to turn golden brown. Use a pizza wheel or the tip of a sharp knife to cut the pizza into 8 slices. Serve and enjoy!

Triple Allium Pasta

You might not know what an allium is, but you’ve already enjoyed eating one. Or three or four. The allium family includes two of the world’s most popular ingredients: garlic and onions. Plenty of other beloved veggies are members of the allium family: leeks, green onions (often called scallions), chives, shallots, and ramps (i.e., wild leeks).  And of course just saying “garlic” and “onion” doesn’t really do those alliums justice, because eaters enjoy everything from sharply piquant wild garlic with its tiny cloves to mellow, oversized elephant garlic with its giant cloves … and likewise, everything from pungent red onions to sweet Vidalias.

In the spirit of welcoming an early spring with an early round of alliums — they’re one of the first veggies to come up as soon as the weather gentles — I made a triple-allium pasta dish with three of my favorites: leeks, onions, and garlic. In my case, I deepened the flavor by sautéeing them in schmaltz (the drippings off a recent roast chicken that I had collected and kept in a glass jar in the fridge), but a rich-tasting pastured butter like Kerrygold would work, too. Or rendered bacon fat should you have any on hand. I often do since I always save the drippings from bacon whenever I make it. Pastured bacon is much, much more lean than conventional bacon — not to mention FAR more delicious! — but a few strips will still provide a spoonful or two of rendered fat to keep on hand to enrich just about any dish you can think of.

Triple-Allium Pasta
Makes enough for 2 good-sized servings. Feel free to double or triple as needed.

Schmaltz, rendered bacon fat, OR pastured butter or ghee such as Kerrygold or Purity Farms
4 leeks, cleaned* and chopped
2 medium yellow or white onions, chopped (if you want a really sweet dish, choose a large sweet onion)
8 to 10 cloves garlic, chopped
2 servings whole-grain pasta of your choice (be sure to use gluten-free pasta if you want a gluten-free dish)

Place a dollop of schmaltz in a large nonstick skillet and melt over medium heat. Add the leeks and onions and cook, stirring occasionally, for 10 minutes. Add the garlic, reduce heat by a notch or two, and continue to cook for another 10 minutes, adding more schmaltz if the pan starts to get too dry and the veggies start to stick to it.

While the alliums are sautéeing, prepare the pasta according to package directions. I usually simmer my pasta for 8 minutes, so I like to start the pasta during the second phase of the allium cooking so that everything is done at the same time. If your pasta takes more than 10 minutes to cook, you might want to start off the recipe by cooking the pasta.

Drain pasta well and toss with the sautéed alliums. Feel free to serve this dish with a full-flavored aged cheese like Parmesan or even a blue like Stilton. Perhaps you might want to go the sweet route and pair your alliums with bell peppers or tomatoes. Maybe you’d even like to do both. Alliums are so versatile — especially when cooked — that you really can’t go wrong with them.

Enjoy!

* To clean a leek, peel off and discard the outermost layer. Cut off the tough dark green lower portion of the leek and discard. Hold up the leek by the root end and use a large sharp knife to poke through the leek about an inch away from the root end. Pull the knife straight down, cutting the leek in half but keeping it connected at the root end. Turn 90 degrees and repeat. You should have a quartered (but still held together) leek. Fan out under running cool water and hand-scrub the layers gently to wash away any dirt that might be trapped between the layers. Shake dry and chop, discarding the root end.

Shrimp-Crab Cakes with Avocado, Lemon & Dill

Just about everyone agrees that crab cakes are sublime. Just about everyone likes shrimp, too. So why not make shrimp-crab cakes? The tiny and amazingly cute wild rock shrimp that come in cans are ideal for making cakes since they’re already so small, plus they can hang out in your pantry right next to the canned crab until you want to whip up a quick seafood dinner. I like the wild-caught tiny shrimp from Trader Joe’s, but you can use whatever kind of shrimp you’d like. If you have some normal-sized shrimp on hand, you can simply measure out about 3 ounces of freshly cooked shrimp and mince it to approximate the size and texture of the tiny shrimp.

I’ve used almond flour in these crab cakes since 1. the mild nut flavor pairs well with seafood (creates a much richer flavor than standard breadcrumbs), 2. it’s gluten-free, and 3. sliced almonds are a pantry staple shoo-in (they’re a snap to grind into flour with a spice/coffee grinder). If you’d prefer to use whole-grain breadcrumbs, that works, too.

Shrimp-Crab Cakes with Avocado, Lemon & Dill
Makes 6 cakes (figure on 2 cakes for a lunch serving and 3 for a heartier meal). Recipe can easily be doubled or tripled.

6 oz. canned crab
4 oz. canned tiny wild shrimp OR 3 oz. chopped fresh-cooked shrimp of any size
1 egg, preferably from pastured hens
1 T. prepared mustard (my favorites are stone-ground Dijon or German-style mustard)
1 tsp. dried dill
Freshly cracked black pepper
1/4 cup to 1/2 cup almond flour OR whole-grain breadcrumbs (I like to grind sliced almonds in a coffee/spice grinder for about 10 seconds to make fresh flour)
Lemon wedges for garnish
Chopped avocado for garnish

Squeeze the liquid out of the crab and shrimp, then place the meat in a medium bowl. Discard the liquid. Whisk the egg, mustard, dill, and pepper into the crab and shrimp. Stir in enough almond flour to make the mixture dry enough to handle and shape but not so dry that it falls apart. (Hence starting with 1/4 cup and working your way up.) Divide the mixture into 6 portions and shape each one into a patty about the size of a small hamburger.

Heat a drizzle of extra-virgin olive oil or a pat of pastured butter in a large nonstick skillet over medium heat for 1 minute. Add 3 cakes and cook for 3 minutes undisturbed or until the bottoms are golden brown. Carefully flip over and keep cooking for another 2 minutes or until both sides are golden brown. Remove to a plate and cook the remaining 3 patties, adding more oil/butter if the pan is dry.

Serve patties with a spritz of fresh lemon juice, some chopped avocado, and a dash or two of additional dill sprinkled over the top.

Enjoy!

Broccoli, Avocado & Sausage Pasta

Want to get more efficient in the kitchen? Make multiple-pot meals. Heck, you’ve got four burners, so why not have them all in motion? If you simmer two ingredients while you sautée a third (and chop a fourth), your prep time will be only as long as the longest-cooking item of the bunch. For this meal, the pasta takes 8 minutes while the broccoli and sausage take 5 each, so we’re talking 10 minutes to make dinner. (That’s including the 2 minutes it’ll take for the water to come to a boil.)

I like my pasta a tad chewy and toothsome rather than mushy, so I tend to cook my pasta (and all whole grains) for less time than the package indicates. It’s easy enough to check the texture periodically and keep on cooking it if it’s still too chewy. Another plus of going with the “slightly undercooked” technique is that it takes more effort to digest chewy pasta/grain, which means less of a spike in blood sugar levels…which in turn is a good idea for everybody. It’s also nice to shave a few minutes off the prep time.

Broccoli, Avocado & Sausage Pasta
Serves 2 and can easily be doubled or tripled.

Cook the pasta according to package directions. While that’s burbling away, simmer the broccoli for 5 minutes. Drain pasta and broccoli separately or together. Sautée the sausage over medium heat for 5 minutes while the pasta and broccoli are simmering; prep the avocado while all three are going.

Toss the pasta and broccoli with the sausage and the pan drippings from the sausage. Add avocado, toss very gently once or twice, and serve immediately. How’s that for a ten-minute meal plan? The dish sans avocado can be refrigerated for up to 4 days.

Enjoy!

* Be sure to get gluten-free pasta if you want a gluten-free meal!

Ricotta Poppyseed Muffin

Ricotta cheese is like a reversible coat: it has two distinct sides and both are equally appealing. Ricotta salata (or “salted ricotta”) is a hard, aged cheese that is lovely for grating and garnishing; it reminds me a lot of Parmesan. Fresh ricotta, on the other hand, is creamy and sweet and tastes like summer. Its texture reminds me a little bit of whipped cream cheese, except that ricotta made with fresh milk is incredibly lush and has none of the vaguely plastic flavor/texture of commercial cream cheese.

Seeing as fresh ricotta manages to be delightfully dense-textured and airy at the same time, I figured a heaping dollop of it would make baked goods more moist and fluffy. (Not to mention more nutritious and tasty.) I’m happy to report that my hunch was right — these muffins had a nice golden crust on the outside but were tongue-pleasingly delicate on the inside. The poppyseeds added a nice contrasting crunch.

Should you happen to get your hands on a nice tub of fresh ricotta and already have baked goods on hand, you can use the ricotta as a spread, too, just as you would butter or cream cheese. You could even slather a knifeful of ricotta onto a savory sandwich to add a whole new kind of creaminess.

Ricotta Poppyseed Muffins
Makes a baker’s dozen.

1 cup sorghum flour*
1 cup millet OR brown rice flour*
1 T. baking powder
Pinch sea salt
1/4 to 1/2 cup poppyseeds (OR chia seeds OR chopped nuts OR chopped sunflower/pumpkin seeds; the idea here is to include a crunchy accent)
1 cup fresh ricotta cheese (if you can’t find this, use full-fat cottage cheese that you’ve run through a processor/blender)
4 eggs, preferably from pastured hens
1/2 cup honey
1/4 cup almond oil OR extra-virgin olive oil
2 tsp. vanilla

Preheat oven to 375F and line a muffin tray with paper cups. I find that the parchment-style cups made by If You Care work BY FAR the best.

In a large bowl, whisk together the flours, baking powder, seeds, and salt. In a medium bowl, whisk together the ricotta, eggs, honey, oil, and vanilla. Scoop the liquid ingredients into the dry ones and whisk well to combine. If you’re using wheat flour, stir with a spoon until barely blended.

Pour into the waiting tins and bake for 18 minutes or until an inserted toothpick comes out clean. Top baked muffins with additional ricotta and honey if you’d like.

Enjoy!

* These are gluten-free flours. If you’d prefer to make wheat-based muffins, use a total of 2 cups of spelt, kamut, and/or whole-wheat flour.

Pumpkin-Chestnut Waffles

I don’t often post recipes that involve special equipment, but these pumpkin waffles were far too delicious not to share with fellow waffle iron owners. If you don’t already have an iron, perhaps knowing that there’s a lovely (and whole-grain!) Belgian waffle recipe out there will spur you into picking up that still-in-the-box, never-used waffle maker when you’re hitting garage sales this spring.

The trick of making fluffy waffles that don’t tear apart when you open the waffle maker is to pour a full cup of batter into the maker before you close the two halves and let the waffle cook into its signature crannies and crenellations. That’s just as important as the more obvious precaution of thoroughly greasing the waffle maker before you pour in the batter. (Both of these elements are exponentially more important if you’re making gluten-free waffles since they’re much more likely to tear apart when you open the waffle maker.)

If your waffle iron is the kind that rotates 180 degrees, that’s even better — then you can make sure that both halves of the maker are well-greased before pouring in the batter. If your maker isn’t flippable, use a heat-safe barbecue brush to “paint” both halves with melted butter or coconut oil.

Pumpkin-Chestnut Waffles
Because these are true Belgian-style, only-raised-with-yeast waffles, they need to sit overnight for the yeast to have a chance to flavor and puff the batter. Simply whisk together the batter the night before rather than in the morning. I prefer to make waffles this way, anyway, because this approach means a lot less work in the morning when you want to make your breakfast with a minimum of effort.

3/4 cup mashed pumpkin, either canned or freshly baked and then mashed
1 cup whole milk, preferably from grass-fed cows
1/4 cup melted butter (1/2 stick), preferably from grass-fed cows
4 eggs, preferably from pastured hens
1 cup brown rice flour*
3/4 cup chestnut flour*
3/4 cup sorghum OR millet flour*
1 T. yeast
1/2 tsp. sea salt

Whisk together pumpkin, milk, butter, and eggs until well-blended, then whisk in remaining ingredients. Cover and refrigerate overnight. The next morning, heat your Belgian waffle maker until the “ready” light is on (or whatever happens when your waffle maker has reached the desired heat). While the iron is heating, whisk your batter briefly; it will have puffed up overnight due to the presence of the yeast.

Place a little scoop of coconut oil or a dab of butter in the center of each of the four quarters of the bottom half of the maker. Close and flip over to grease the other half. If your iron doesn’t rotate, use a heat-proof brush to brush both halves with the oil or butter. The idea is to have a well-greased waffle iron.

Pour 1 full cup of batter into the waffle maker, flip over if you can, and cook for as long as the manufacturer’s instructions indicate for your desired setting. (For mine, it takes about 5 minutes to cook to a lovely golden brown.) You might wish to flip it back over halfway through the cook time. Carefully use a heat-proof spatula and a fork to lift the cooked waffle out of the maker and onto a waiting plate. Add more oil or butter to the iron before making the next waffle. Recipe makes about 4 waffles.

I like to top my waffles with maple syrup and either pecan or walnut oil — the pumpkin is particularly nice with nuts. Or sprinkle toasted nuts on top of your waffle with perhaps some fresh fruit or freshly whipped cream.

Enjoy!

* These are gluten-free flours. If you would prefer to make wheat-based waffles, use a total of 2 1/2 cups of spelt, kamut, or whole-wheat flour.

Pumpkin Walnut Bread

What’s in your freezer pantry? The space adjoining your fridge is just as useful and important as your cupboard shelves. Stashing away frozen fruits and veggies is a great way to make sure you always have a good stock of otherwise-perishable ingredients on hand, plus it’s far more tasty and economical to freeze your own leftover dinners rather than buying prefabricated frozen meals. (And just think: if you only scrawl the date and not the contents onto your leftovers, you can give yourself a happy culinary surprise at a later date. You’re guaranteed to like what you’re getting because you already enjoyed it the first time around — it’s like going to your favorite restaurant and telling the waiter “Surprise me!”)

One of the best ingredients to keep in the freezer is nuts. While chestnuts and almonds have a relatively low fat content and are therefore less perishable than other nuts, richer nuts like walnuts and pecans and pine nuts can turn rancid in just a month or two when stored at room temp.  The fact that walnuts and pecans are often sold in pieces or halves — i.e., their protective outer skins have been breached — makes them even more prone to rancidity. If you store the more delicate varieties of nuts in the freezer, though, they’ll easily last a year. (Side note: always store nut butters in the fridge! Cool temps will keep them fresher, and they’ll still be spreadable straight out of the fridge.)

This hearty breakfast quick bread takes advantage of the natural affinity pumpkin has for walnuts. If you’d like even more walnut flavor, feel free to dry-toast the walnuts in a pan over medium-low heat for about 4 minutes or until the they’re fragrant and browning before adding them to the batter.

I like to amp up the walnut aspect by drizzling some unrefined walnut oil onto my slices when I enjoy the baked bread. (Since walnut oil is primarily an polyunsaturated fat, it should NOT be heated and is therefore NOT suitable for baking. It is, however, fabulous when whisked into dressings and/or drizzled over finished dishes. It’s also a good source of omega-3 fats.)

Pumpkin Walnut Bread

3/4 cup brown rice flour*
3/4 cup sorghum OR millet flour*
1 tsp. baking soda
1/4 tsp. baking powder
1 1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1 tsp. allspice
1/4 tsp. cloves
1/2 tsp. coriander (optional, but a nice background flavor)
1/2 cup chopped walnuts (toasted if you like)
1/2 cup whole milk, preferably from grass-fed cows
3 eggs, preferably from pastured hens
1 tsp. vanilla
1/2 cup maple syrup
1 cup puréed pumpkin (either homemade or canned)

Preheat oven to 350F. Grease a 9×5 glass loaf pan by either rubbing its sides with butter or extra-virgin olive oil.

In a large bowl, whisk together the flours, baking soda and powder, spices, and walnuts. In another bowl, whisk together the remaining ingredients. Pour the liquid mixture into the flour mixture and whisk well to combine.

Pour the batter into the greased loaf pan and bake for 1 hour or until an inserted toothpick comes out clean. I usually flip on the oven light to peek at the loaf at the 55-minute mark just to do a quick visual check. If the center still looks soggy and un-set, let it go another 10 minutes before doing a toothpick test. If it’s set and slightly domed, do the toothpick test right away.

Let bread cool on a wire rack for at least 15 minutes before cutting into it. Bread will keep for several days at room temp in the cool winter months, but if it’s summertime or you keep your house toasty warm in the winter, you might want to pop the bread into the fridge to prolong its life. I prefer to leave mine out since the fridge has a tendency to suck the moisture out of baked goods and make them a bit dry. (And I am too thrifty to heat the house past 68F in the winter.)

Enjoy!

* These are gluten-free flours. If you’d prefer to make a wheat-based version, use a total of 1 1/2 cups spelt, kamut, and/or whole-wheat flour.

Crustless Pecan Pie

What do chestnuts, pecans, beech nuts, and hickory nuts all have in common? They’re all native to North America. While beech nuts and hickory nuts are hard to find since they’re usually foraged rather than farmed, chestnuts and pecans are relatively plentiful. Roasted chestnuts are especially findable around the holidays. (Although this Flourless Chocolate Chestnut Cake is delicious any time of the year.) Pecans, on the other hand, are findable year-round.

Where chestnuts are starchy and dry in nature — which makes them excellent in baked goods when dried and ground into flour — pecans are rich and buttery. That satisfying flavor and the high protein/fat content of pecans makes them an ideal ingredient for breakfasts that’ll stick with you all the way to lunch. (As opposed to sugary, refined cereals that will leave you feeling hungry and irritable by mid-morning and will have you reaching for more sugary junk to make it to lunch time. Break the cycle deliciously!)

Soaking the pecans, draining them, and then roasting them overnight will make them insanely buttery-tasting and isn’t very much work seeing as all of those steps are pretty passive: once you have the nuts situated, they can simply do their thing. But you can pan-toast the pecans at the last minute, too, if you want to skip the overnight soak. I think it’s much easier to do hands-off activities like soaking and roasting rather than pay-attention activities like toasting in a pan. (The more oily and buttery the nut, the more likely it is to over-toast and wind up burnt.) How you deal with your nuts is up to you.

Crustless Pecan Pie

8 oz. raw pecan halves (6 oz. or even 4 oz. would also work; I happen to be a nut about pecans and wanted to make a very pecan-y pecan pie)
1 T. sea salt (which sounds like a lot, but you’ll wind up rinsing most of it away)
6 dates, pitted and chopped
1/4 cup maple syrup
4 T. butter (half a stick), preferably from grass-fed cows
3 eggs, preferably from pastured hens
2 tsp. vanilla

The night before, place the pecans and salt in a small bowl and add enough cold water to cover the nuts. Leave them sit out on the counter overnight. The following day, rinse well and let drain for at least 5 minutes. Preheat oven to 200F. Spread the drained pecans out on a rimmed baking sheet and bake for 15 minutes or until the pecans are dry and brittle and break apart easily. (When they start to smell magnificently of roasting nuts, start checking them. This is the most enchanting scent ever — not even baking bread can beat it!) When the pecans are done, increase the heat to 350F.

Get out a 9″ glass pie pan. Place the dates, maple syrup, and butter in a small saucepan and heat over medium-low until the butter is melted. Raise the heat up a notch or two until the mixture is gently bubbling. Let simmer for 3 minutes, then remove from heat and whisk in eggs and vanilla. Whisk in the pecans. You can hand-break them into smaller bits or you can leave them as whole halves. I like the texture and look of the halves, so I do my best to keep them intact.

Pour the batter into the ungreased pie pan and bake for 30 minutes at 350F. Let baked pie cool at least 15 minutes before cutting into it. Leftover pie can be refrigerated for up to 5 days.

Talk about the most lush breakfast imaginable! Especially when you consider that if you serve it in 4 generous portions (one-quarter of the pie makes a lasts-well-until-lunch breakfast), each portion only has 1 T. of maple syrup and 1 T. of butter. It doesn’t take much to play up pecans!

Enjoy!

Spiced Sorghum & Yogurt Cake

What’s a grain, a flour, and a sweetener? Hint: it used to be a popular foodstuff in the U.S. back in the pioneer days, and it’s still popular in African and Indian dishes. You can make beer out of it, too. It has more fiber (and iron) than and nearly as much protein as soy and wheat. And it’s gluten-free!

I’m talking about sorghum. It’s my #1 go-to flour — I like it even better than brown rice flour — and I often include whole sorghum grains in my main dishes. Sorghum syrup tastes a lot like blackstrap molasses and is fun to bake with; sorghum-based beers are tasty, too. The U.S. still grows plenty of sorghum, but most of it is used as animal fodder rather than as food for humans. What a shame! It’s nutty and chewy and is lovely tossed with a simple drizzle of extra-virgin olive oil and a shake or two of sea salt. It’s true that it takes a good 50 minutes to cook — sorghum is a hardy grain — but you can cook a big potful of it and keep it in the fridge for up to a week, dipping into it whenever you want cereal or a hearty grain-based meal.

This recipe makes use of both sorghum flour and sorghum syrup. The former is getting easier and easier to find in grocery stores (health food stores, ethnic stores catering to African and Indian clientele, and well-stocked stores like Whole Foods almost always offer sorghum flour), but sorghum syrup is  a bit trickier to find…although it is quite popular in the southern states. If you can’t find the syrup, feel free to substitute blackstrap molasses.

Spiced Sorghum & Yogurt Cake
This recipe makes a cake big enough to serve ten people. Since it isn’t overly sweet and also packs a ton of whole grains and whole-milk dairy products, I like to have it for breakfast.

3/4 cup sorghum flour*
3/4 cup brown rice flour*
1/2 cup teff flour*
1 tsp. baking soda
1 1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1 tsp. allspice
1/2 tsp. nutmeg
1/4 tsp. sea salt
1 stick (8 T.) butter, preferably from grass-fed cows (Kerrygold and Organic Valley are great choices), softened
1/2 cup sucanat
2 eggs, preferably from pastured hens
1/2 cup whole-milk Greek yogurt
1/2 cup sorghum syrup OR blackstrap molasses
3/4 cup buttermilk, preferably from grass-fed cows (you can make your own last-minute buttermilk by filling the 3/4 cup just shy with whole milk and then squeezing in enough fresh lemon juice to finish filling the measuring cup; let stand for 10 minutes before using)
Raspberries for garnish (optional)

Preheat oven to 325F. Grease the bottom and sides of a 10″ springform pan. In a medium bowl, whisk together the flours, baking soda, spices, and salt. In a large bowl, beat the butter for at least 2 minutes. Beat in sucanat, mixing for another full minute. (The creamier and more aerated the butter is, the fluffier the final cake will be.) Beat in eggs until well-blended, then beat in yogurt and sorghum syrup.

Add half of the flour and mix well, then add half of the buttermilk and mix well. Repeat with remaining halves. If you’re making a gluten-free cake, you can beat these in with your mixers; if you’re making a wheat-based cake, stir them in with a spoon. (If there’s gluten involved, you don’t want to overdevelop it and make your cake tough. No need to worry about that with gluten-free baking.)

Pour into the springform pan and bake for 40 minutes or until an inserted toothpick comes out clean. (This may take 50 minutes, but you want to check it at 40 so that you don’t risk overbaking it and drying it out.) Garnish with raspberries — or any kind of berries — if you like. You could top it with a dollop of yogurt, too.

Enjoy!

* These are gluten-free flours. If you’d rather make a wheat-based version, use a total of 2 cups of spelt, kamut, and/or whole-wheat flours.

Buckwheat Crepes with Chocolate Yogurt

One of the many beauties of crepes is that you can fill them with whatever you like, whether that’s sweet or savory or something in between. And by varying the kind of flour you use to make the crepes themselves, you can tweak their base flavor to suit your mood. Want a nutty, rich-tasting crepe? Use teff, buckwheat, or chestnut flour. How about a mild crepe that would work with any filling? Try brown rice, sorghum, millet, or corn flour. For a decidedly savory crepe, go with chickpea or potato flour. In a chocolate kind of mood? Use unsweetened cocoa powder as one of your flours…and maybe throw in some coconut, too. Mesquite flour lends crepes a caramel flair; plantain has a hint of the tropics. Your options are endless.

Although I often make savory crepes intended for lunch wraps and chutney roll-ups, I made these for breakfast and filled them with chocolate yogurt and some blackberry jam. The whole-grain-ness of the crepe + the protein-rich whole-milk yogurt makes for a deliciously satisfying breakfast…and you can make both elements ahead of time and simply roll them at the last minute. Quick breakfasts can be classy and easy!

Buckwheat Crepes with Chocolate Yogurt
This crepe recipe makes about 12 crepes; the yogurt is enough for 2 servings. Feel free to downsize the crepe portions or upsize the yogurt portions as desired. I like to make a full batch of the crepes so that I have some leftovers to enjoy however I like.

For the crepes:
1/2 cup brown rice flour*
1/2 cup buckwheat flour*
1 1/2 cups whole milk, preferably from grass-fed cows
2 eggs, preferably from pastured hens
Dash of sea salt
Butter or ghee for cooking the crepes, preferably from grass-fed cows

For the chocolate yogurt:
1/2 cup whole-milk plain Greek yogurt (Fage is my favorite)
2 T. unsweetened cocoa powder
1 T. maple syrup

To make the crepes, whisk all of the ingredients together in a large mixing bowl. Get out a (or two or three) 7″ nonstick crepe pan and place a dab of butter in the pan. Heat over medium heat — I go with mark 4 out of 10 on my electric burners — until butter has melted and is sizzling. Pour in 1/4 cup of the crepe batter and cook for 2-3 minutes or until crepe is set on top and browned on the bottom. Use a heatproof spatula to flip over the crepe and cook the second side for another minute or two or until equally browned. If you’re adventurous, by all means go ahead and flip that sucker up into the air to turn it over. Just don’t do that directly over the burner! It’s much easier to rescue a misdirected crepe from a cool element than a hot burner.

Place the cooked crepe on a wire rack. (If you put it on a plate, it’ll collect condensation and get soggy.) Make a second crepe in the same pan using the same technique. I find that I have to put a fresh dab of butter into my crepe pan every other crepe to keep them from sticking. Leftover crepes can be stacked in a sealed container and refrigerated for a week.

To make the yogurt, use a fork to thoroughly mix the ingredients in a bowl. Leftover yogurt can be kept up until the “expires by” date on the original package.

When you’re ready to assemble your chocolate-filled crepe, just spoon some yogurt onto the center of the crepe, roll up, and enjoy!

* These are gluten-free flours. If you’d prefer to make wheat-based crepes, substitute 1 total cup of spelt, kamut, and/or whole-wheat flours for the brown rice and buckwheat.