Tag Archives: grain-free

The Julian Christmas cookies are my favorite.

Christmas, food and cooking, , , , ,

Many of us have completed the Twelve Days of Christmas, but I haven’t finished telling about all my activities connected to the Nativity Feast. My fellow Orthodox Christians who are on the traditional Julian calendar have just begun to count the days, however, so if we keep them in mind it won’t seem strange to muse a while longer on Christmas cookies. Plus, they are only Christmas cookies because I bake them at Christmas; you could enjoy them at any season of the year.

These are my favorite because of their chewy texture, the flavors of citrus and almond, and because my friends and family who are gluten-intolerant can fully enjoy them.

Last year I made two batches of this invention, but I wasn’t completely settled on the amounts of a couple of the ingredients. This time I made only one batch (so far), but after my latest tweaks I’m confident that if you try them, you are likely to be happy with the result. There are no grain flours in the recipe, so they are gluten-free.

Dried (sweetened) mandarin oranges

MANDARIN ALMOND COOKIES

7 oz. almond paste, in pieces
4 oz. cold butter, salted or not
1/3 cup sugar
1/3 cup powdered sugar
scant 1/4 teaspoon salt

Combine the above ingredients in a food processor until evenly mixed. Add and process:

4 large egg whites, one at a time.

Remove from processor to a bowl and add:

2 3/4 cups finely ground almond flour
6 oz. package of dried mandarin oranges (found at Trader Joe’s), finely chopped

Put the dough in the refrigerator for an hour.

Put 1/2 cup granulated sugar in one bowl, and
1/2 cup powdered sugar in another bowl.

Drop heaping tablespoonsful of dough into the sugar; gently coat and shape into 1 1/2″ balls. Repeat in powdered sugar.

Set 1 inch apart on parchment-lined baking sheets. Bake until golden or golden brown, at 325 degrees, 22-25 minutes. Remove to racks to cool. Cookies will be crumbly until thoroughly cool. They keep well in the refrigerator or freezer.

The amount of sugar here is a reduction from my original experiment, and I might try cutting back a little more next time, hoping that the chewiness of the cookie won’t be affected too much. The recipe that inspired me was an Italian Orange Fig Cookie that my son had made in 2022. I tried that last year with disappointing results, and created this one instead because I had the mandarin oranges on hand. I hope Trader Joe’s continues to carry that item!

Brownies prompt a question.

food and cooking, , , , , , , , ,

I was searching for a different recipe when I ran across this one for brownies, which I decided to take to a potluck last week. In reading the comments on the recipe, on the New York Times cooking site, I came upon the question of whether one could use “regular” cocoa powder instead of cacao in this recipe. Because the spelling is so similar, I hadn’t even noticed that the recipe called for cacao. Cocoa is what I always keep in my cupboard, so I needed to know.

The question wasn’t answered definitively enough for me, and I soon found a long discussion of cocoa vs. cacao on a different site, comments long ago closed. Most of the chefs and cooks on that site said there was no real difference besides the spelling, though a few insisted otherwise. My take is that at least some brands of “natural cacao powder” likely retain more nutrients than cocoa. Everyone did agree that you don’t want “Dutch process” cocoa because that is used to make poor quality cacao beans saleable.

When I went to the pantry for my cocoa powder, I saw that it was cacao powder after all, a big bag I’d bought at Costco without wondering why they were using that spelling. So I didn’t have to substitute that ingredient. If I’d had both cacao and cocoa on hand, I’d have baked one pan with each ingredient, for taste-testing purposes. Maybe next time.

I loved these brownies. They seemed very rich in spite of having no butter or eggs. I ate one and a half, and felt buzzed by them, they were so chocolatey. But I slept well that night anyway.

MEXICAN BROWNIES

Vegan and gluten/grain-free; adapted from the NYT recipe which was adapted from Julie Piatt.

3 Tablespoons/14 grams ground flaxseed
6 tablespoons water
Coconut oil, for greasing pan
¾ cup chickpea flour (besan)
½ cup cacao powder
½ cup tapioca flour
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon mild chili powder
¾ teaspoon xanthan gum
½ teaspoon salt
¼ teaspoon baking soda
1 cup almond meal
1 1/3 cups sugar
8 oz. Earth Balance vegan butter, softened
½ cup unsweetened almond milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
5 oz. dark chocolate chips
1 ½ oz unsweetened chocolate
3 tablespoons olive oil

1) In a small bowl, whisk together the flaxseed and water until mixture has an egg-like consistency. Set aside.

2) Heat oven to 350 degrees. Lightly oil the bottom and sides of a 9-inch square pan, and line the bottom of the pan with parchment paper. Set aside.

3) In a large bowl, sift together the chickpea flour, cacao powder, tapioca flour, cinnamon, chili powder, xanthan gum, salt and baking soda. Add almond meal and stir until fully incorporated.

4) In a double boiler or in the microwave melt the unsweetened chocolate and stir until smooth. Set aside to cool.

5) Whisk the flaxseed “egg” again, then put in the bowl of a stand mixer along with the sugar, vegan butter, almond milk and vanilla. Stir on low. Gradually increase speed to medium-high and continue beating until mixture is fully combined and mostly smooth, 5-7 minutes. Add the melted chocolate and olive oil and beat for 15 seconds.

6) Add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients and fold with a rubber spatula until fully combined and streak-free. The batter should be thick and gooey. Add additional almond milk if it seems too dry. Fold about half of the chocolate chips into the batter, then spread it in the prepared pan. Sprinkle the top with the remaining chocolate chips.

7) Bake until a toothpick inserted in the center of the brownies comes out mostly clean, 50-60 minutes.

The NYT recipe had more chocolate bar and chocolate chips. I added the olive oil to make up for the missing fat. I used unsweetened chocolate instead of a dark chocolate bar so I increased the sugar a tiny bit.

I doubled the recipe and baked it in a 9×13 Pyrex pan, which made for tall brownies and probably necessitated the full hour of baking.

For those interested generally in vegan cakes and brownies, this recipe, Chocolate Carrot Cake, is vegan, and has been accidentally, and then later intentionally, made into brownies. The brownie-eaters could not believe they were vegan. They are easier to make than the Mexican Brownies here in this post, but I like better the texture and complex flavors of the more involved recipe, the chili and cinnamon, almond and vanilla. Let me know if you try one or the other.

The Accidental Carrot Cake Brownie

Prunia Walnut Bread

food and cooking, , , , ,

gl P1030442My primary motivation for creating this loaf was to use a big bag of prunes that was taking up space in the fridge. Plus I wanted to make some kind of bread I could keep eating when (Orthodox) Lent arrives, which is soon. When I saw a recipe for a prune bread using buckwheat flour, I saw another opportunity, to incorporate some of the many kinds of flours and grains I have stored up and haven’t been using.

I took ideas from that recipe I saw online and made my own version. The name Prunia comes from joining prune with chia (seeds), another item I had on hand and that figures prominently in the bread, as do walnuts. I love walnuts, especially when they have been toasted, and their flavor may be the most dominant one here.

The picture of honey at the top puts the brightest ingredient forward, color-wise. We have many jars of honey around here lately, the most wonderful being the quart of golden sweetness from Kit’s own bees, whom she had to leave in Oregon on The Farm, when she came here. I often buy honey from the nearby monastery, or receive it as gifts from friends… it all adds up to our being a household rich in honey.

Unfortunately, the other ingredients that the beautiful honey gets mixed into are very drab. Buckwheat flour is gray, gray, gray, and chia seeds and prunes are pretty much black. Walnuts are brown… When I look at a loaf like this:

gl P1030445

…it makes me remember a Garrison Keillor spoof on health food in which the high-fiber cereal being put forward as so essential for regularity was called “Raw Bits.” My loaf does look rough on the outside. It is fairly high-fiber, too, as well as being gluten-free and vegan — with what I consider just the right amount of sweetness.

Prunia Nut Bread    gl P1030440

 1 ½ cups buckwheat flour
½ cup coconut flour
3 cups walnuts, divided
¼ teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon allspice
1 teaspoon nutmeg
½ teaspoon cardamom
1/3 cup chia seeds soaked in 1 cup water
30 large pitted prunes, divided
¼ cup coconut oil
½ cup honey
2 teaspoons vanilla
1 ½ cups plant-based milk

First toast the walnuts, 300° for 40 minutes, stirring once.

While they are toasting, put 10 prunes in a small bowl and pour on boiling water to cover.

Mix the chia seeds with the water in a small bowl.

Chop the remaining 20 prunes, sprinkling a little of the flour over them as you do, to keep them from clumping up again.

Into a medium-large bowl sift the flours, salt, baking powder and spices together.gl P1030441

When the walnuts are toasted and cooled, chop 2 cups coarsely and set aside.

Grind  the remaining 1 cup of walnuts in a food processor. Add these to the dry ingredients – but don’t wash the processor bowl yet.

Put the prunes and water in the bowl of the processor and purée.

In a medium bowl melt the coconut oil with the honey, then add the milk, the chia seeds and the prune purée.

gl P1030515

Combine the wet and dry ingredients, mixing in the chopped prunes and walnuts.

Put into oiled medium-sized loaf pans – or one very large – and bake for 50-60 minutes at about 350°. Cool on racks.

The bread comes out very moist and dense. I’ve made it three times in order to perfect my recipe, but each version was well worth the eating, which tells you that this recipe is still pretty tweakable. You might leave out the bit of coconut oil and I bet it wouldn’t be missed; or you could increase the amount of spice if you like more intensity. As it is it is a mellow loaf.

If I wanted to spend more time on the project, it would be to figure out how to use fewer cups and bowls in the mixing of the batter, and to do without the food processor altogether. For one thing, that little bit of prune purée is probably dispensable. But for now, for this Lent, I think I have plenty stashed in the freezer; the kitchen has been cleaned up, and I have a little more room in the fridge.

If anyone tries the recipe, let me know if you made any changes and how it worked.

Bon appétit!

gl P1030518

Banana Bread – traditional and favorite

food and cooking, ,

paleo banana bread 7-14What could be more traditional than banana bread? Every thrifty cook has her special recipe that makes very good use of the ripe fruit. My old favorite was the Laurel’s Kitchen recipe, because it used the most bananas, and it includes both toasted walnuts and dried apricots – yum!

Nowadays  I rarely bake this kind of cake, for several reasons, but I still acquire bananas that I am loath to toss. Last month I cut a few into chunks and froze them, with hopes that someone someday will want to throw them into a smoothie.

But then my Coconut Flour Project loomed. It all started with a humongous bag of coconut flour I bought at Costco, because I love everything coconut and am always trying to cut back on grains. Beyond the flour itself I hadn’t anything to show for my time spent thinking about what to do with what I thought was a great resource.

That’s not exactly true: I saw a recipe for coconut flour bread in Pippin’s files, and she warned me that for her it turned out “kind of dry,” but I eventually tried it. It might as well have been made with sawdust. Lesson learned: don’t use the stuff alone.

I had given up surfing and searching for coconut flour recipes and instead bought an old fridge to use in my garage, in which to keep my bag of coconut flour and other currently neglected semi-perishables, against some misty future when I would suddenly bake a lot again.

THEN Nikkipolani made some banana bread and mentioned it briefly on her blog, and because she said it was grain-free I followed the link to SlimPalate and found a recipe for which I had all the ingredients right here in one refrigerator or another. I even had the cacao nibs, but I didn’t add them, and it doesn’t seem P1100814that nikkipolani did either.

The crumb of this bread is so moist and tender – nothing dry about it. The banana flavor melts into the subtle almond and coconut, with honey and vanilla. I’d like to try it with the cacao nibs next time. I’m not sure this loaf will have enough opportunity to become the New Traditional, but it is now my favorite banana bread.

Update: I bought some bananas for the purpose of making this bread again, which I have now done. I had extra mashed banana so I made a 50% bigger loaf by increasing all the ingredients that much. I used large instead of extra-large eggs this time, so the batter was thicker, but the end result is not much different from the first time, and just as delicious.