Molly's post about mega-muffins got me to thinking - maybe my sugar-loving son who likes to get up and get himself a breakfast of a bowl of cereal (before his egg and oatmeal) would be happy to get himself a muffin instead, and in the process have a healthier breakfast. So I searched for recipes and ended up combining several. This is a first run through, and I'll follow with comments about what I would change next time. Here's what we made:
1 1/2 c white flour
3/4 c flaxseed meal
1/2 c oatmeal
1/4 c wheat bran (but most recipes call for wheat germ. I just couldn't find any)
2 t baking powder
1 t baking soda
3/4 t salt
>2 t cinnamon
1/4 c butter
3/4 c applesauce
1/2 c white sugar
1/4 c honey
2 eggs
1 1/2 c shredded carrots
1 1/2 c shredded apples
1/2 c craisans
3/4 c chopped mixed nuts
a small bag of frozen blueberries
Mix the dry ingredients. Cream the butter with sugar and honey, beat in the applesauce, then add eggs one at a time. Stir in remaining ingredients. Spoon into a muffin cups with liners. Bake at 350 for ~25 min. Recipe made 21 small-medium muffins (nice for a 4 year old's pre-breakfast or a snack), some of which are now frozen in our freezer.
These muffins are pretty good, not too dense, moist. Next time I would:
1) Use less sugar/honey. These are too sweet for me, so I would use 1/3 - 1/2 c sugar total, and maybe add more carrots in place of some of the apples. Other variations I saw also called for shredded zucchini, or for chopping the apples instead of shredding them.
2) These didn't have enough "crunch" for me. I would replace more of the flour with oatmeal or flaxseed meal, and use more nuts.
3) I might also look for wheat germ instead of wheat bran to try to increase the flavor.
4) These were actually almost too moist for me. I would be inclined to leave out the blueberries, though I think it might be harder to convince Will to eat them then.
5) I would use more salt, probably 1 t. But then again, I'm a salt-aholic, so I probably wouldn't use more just to cut down on my salt intake.
All in all, a good starting place I think. I would be interested in decreasing the sugar and increasing the protein content, and I'd be happy to hear any ideas along those lines.
-Maggie
Tuesday, January 29, 2013
Monday, January 28, 2013
Butternut Squash and Kale Soup
Tonight I tried a recipe for butternut squash and kale soup. Truthfully I didn't think it was going to be very good, but it looked to be healthy. I decided to give it a shot to force us to eat more veggies. However, I was pleasantly surprised. This is a pretty quick weeknight soup that makes ya feel good. Also it's fun to mispronounce butternut squash as "squtternut bash."
Ingredients:
1 tablespoon olive oil
1/2 medium onion,
chopped
3/4 cup peeled and
chopped carrot (about 2 large)
3/4 cup chopped celery
(about 3 large)
2 tablespoons chopped
scallions
some garlic, chopped
6 cups chicken or vegetable broth
2 cups water
3 to 4 cups 1-inch
chopped butternut squash
2 cups torn/chopped
kale leaves
2 to 3 sprigs fresh
rosemary and thyme
One (15.5-ounce) can
white beans, rinsed and drained
Kosher salt and freshly
ground black pepper, to taste
optional: grated
Parmesan cheese, for serving
Directions:
1. Heat the olive oil in
a large soup pot, then add the onion, carrot, celery, scallions and garlic. Cook and stir 5 to 6 minutes, or until vegetables begin to soften.
2. Add the broth, water
and butternut squash. Bring to a boil, then reduce the heat to low and simmer
for 15 minutes. Add the kale and herbs and simmer an additional 10 minutes.
Stir in the beans and heat through. Remove the fresh herb sprigs and discard.
Season to taste with salt and pepper, and serve. Sprinkle individual servings
with Parmesan cheese, if desired.
I did not serve it with parm and used plenty of rosemary and thyme (I am my father's daughter). It was quite simple but paired well with the sourdough bread I had picked up. Give it a shot!
P.S. Sorry about the poor quality of the photo, I took it with my phone.
Molly
Wednesday, January 23, 2013
Fish Curry
Kanga expressed an interest in simmer sauces and, in particular, in fish cooked in simmer sauce as a high protein, flavorful, easily swallowed food for Grandpa. Simmer sauce is pre-made, store bought, Indian curry or spice sauce which can be used to cook meat or vegetable to make a quick and easy curry. Our local Giant supermarket features both a fish counter and a relatively (for a suburban supermarket) extensive exotic or foreign food section. I was able to buy a small piece of cod and a selection of three different simmer sauces and as an added bonus, a jar of ginger chutney to try.
I was very disappointed. The simmer sauces were all spicy, but none of them was particularly tasty nor did they taste like Indian dishes I have had in Indian restaurants. The chutney was oily and tasted atrocious, in my opinion - a big surprise as the ingredient list started out with ginger and dates and went on to list all of the things you would expect in a chutney.
I felt I owed the products a full trial, so I heated up a package of Passage to India brand Tikka Masala Simmer Sauce and added half a can of mackerel. It got better after heating. I ate it for lunch with some rice and raita. Not too bad, but I didn't really care for it compared to our homemade curries and would not waste $4.50 buying this product again.
So back to square one. I perused Fish Curry recipes via Google. These seemed to be predominantly based on tomato and coconut milk. I picked one that sounded pretty good as a starting point:
http://steamykitchen.com/14700-indian-fish-coconut-curry.html
I pretty much followed the recipe except I used a whole can of Delmonte Petite cut Tomatoes with Green Chilies for the tomatoes and used the juice from the tomatoes in place of the 1/4 c. of water. When I was adding the coconut milk, I was inclined to stop after adding about 1/2 c based on taste of the sauce but then went ahead and followed the recipe since it was the first time through. Since this was an experiment, I did not want to commit the fresh fish, so I added a can of Jack Mackerel and cooked it up.
I took half of this over to K&G to see if they like it. I ate the other half this morning for mid-morning breakfast/lunch with rice, a sliced apple, and a small lentil-sprout salad. The sauce is basically spicy tomato and coconut milk with fresh ginger and garam masala. Chili powder gives it some heat and the fresh ginger adds a delightful high note. The coconut milk tends towards sweet, but not too very much. It is not really like anything I have ever tasted before since coconut milk has never really been a staple ingredient in our house, at least not until now. I thought it was good but it took a little time to grow on me. Using the Jack Mackerel, the flavor of the fish came through (it might not with a truly bland white fish). The breakfast reminded me of the fish, rice and salad buffet set up for the Japanese style breakfast each morning at the hotel in Aizu. The whole combination of flavors is very non-Western.
I think to play with this in the future I will try cutting back on the coconut milk (I tend to not like so much sweet and I expect the coconut flavor will still be there with only half as much), increase the amount of fresh ginger (purely person preference; I just love ginger) and maybe play around with the spice mix, try reducing the garam masala and adding in some other spice flavors. And if K&G like it, I will try making it with fresh fish instead of canned.
January 25, 2013 Update
Today, I took another crack at this using the fresh cod fish I bought the other day. Here is where I landed:1 T oil
1 small to medium onion (66 g) diced fairly fine
2 large cloves of garlic (8 g) minced
Pieces of fresh ginger (23 g) minced, not grated
1/2 t Garam Masala
1/2 t Curry Powder
1/2 t Turmeric
1/8 t Chili Powder
1/2 t salt
1 can Delmonte Petite cut Tomatoes with Green Chilies
Ground black pepper to taste
1/2 cup Chicken Broth
1/2 cup Coconut Milk
~ 1/2 lb fresh cod cut into chunks
Heat the oil in a pan, add the onion and saute until translucent, then add the ginger and garlic. Cook for ~ 2 minutes, then add spices stirring to make a spice paste. Use the juice/water from the can of tomatoes to thin as you stir. Then add the tomatoes and continue to cook maybe 5 minutes or so. This is the masala. To this add the chicken broth and coconut milk to make the sauce. Bring to boil. Add the chunks of fish and cook until the fish is done.
Serve with rice and raita.
So far, I like Take 2 better than Take 1- not so overpowered by the garam masala flavor, not so sweet from the coconut milk, and not so hot for those who don't like it too hot. Also, I have to admit, fresh cod is better than canned mackerel.
Tuesday, January 22, 2013
Sarma
I think I posted recently that I was trying to make sauerkraut with whole heads of cabbage. As a reminder and then follow up:
I recently had several heads of cabbage sitting in my fridge, but no time to shred and pound it to make sauerkraut. I also have some Serbian friends who love sauerkraut but were a bit disappointed by my "German sauerkraut" at Thanksgiving. They did like my sausage and rice balls in sauerkraut at New Year's however, pronouncing in an approving manner that it is actually a lot like sarma. Sarma is basically leaves wrapped around filling, and variations are found throughout eastern and southern Europe. Dolmas, seasoned rice wrapped in grape leaves, even count. Each region has it's own variation, and in Serbia sarma means fermented cabbage leaves wrapped around a meat and rice filling. Finally, I have a father-in-law whose mother used to make sarma to please his Serbian father and who was due for a visit in a few weeks.
So, I decided to try to kill a bunch of birds with one stone - mainly by fermenting whole heads of cabbage to make sarma.
My cabbage turned out amazing! When I first opened my crock three weeks after closing it up I was a little nervous, because it had a bit of a sharp smell on top of the sauerkraut smell. Then I realized that sharp smell was garlic, and I dug in. Mmmm, mmmm, mmmm! Must include lots of garlic in all future batches of sauerkraut. I couldn't stop eating the stuff - I just kept eating the leaves as I pulled them apart to separate the big ones that I could use for rolling sarma from the smaller ones.
George got his mother's recipe for sarma which basically boils down to a ton of meat with a hint of rice and some tomatoes wrapped cabbage leaves.
-3 pounds ground beef
-2 pounds ground pork
-1 pound ground smoked pork (except I don't know where to find something like that, and I had a pound of lamb in the freezer, so I used that instead. It was pronounced an acceptable and delicious alterative)
-3/4 c raw rice
-some tomato sauce (I got a can of whole tomatoes in juice, pureed the tomatoes without the juice, and then added about 1 - 1 1/2 c of the tomato puree to the meat. Enough to make it moist and add flavor, but not enough to make it goopy.
-salt and pepper to taste
-I also added a bunch of chopped onion. I think this is part of the original recipe and very traditional. I think it just was lost in the translation from Grandma Stanic to Aunt Kathy, to George's notes version 1 to George's notes version 2.
Mix all the ingredients together. Roll in cabbage leaves, burrito style. Layer on top of some chopped cabbage leaves in the bottom of a pan. Add some smoked pork (I used some pieces from a smoked ham hock) to the chopped cabbage leaves for flavor. Cover with a mixture of some of the cabbage brine, the juice from the tomatoes, and some water, then bake at 375-400 for 1 1/2 - 2 hours. (Sorry I don't have more exact measurements for the sauce - I was just throwing it together to get it in the oven at that point. But, use judgement and I'm sure it will be good.)
Apparently a roast pig is the traditional accompaniment, but I served ours with a salad of roasted red peppers, some red onion strips, and a light dressing of rice wine vinegar, red wine vinegar, tarragon (thanks for that tip Dad, I've been really getting into using tarragon lately), olive oil, and salt.
As you can imagine there is a lot of regional variation in sarma recipes. Our Serbian friend Irena said her family always makes it without egg or tomato, but with lots of smoked paprika, and is more dry. Her husband Dusan's family, which is actually Slovakian, makes a "more German" version with egg and tomato, and it's more wet. And, as I described above, Aleks's grandmother makes it with tomato, but no egg. I made Grandma Stanic's version and attempted Irena's version, and I preferred the version with tomato.
But, most importantly, I learned that you can ferment whole heads of cabbage. This takes a LOT less work than the shredding and pounding for traditional German sauerkraut, and as far as I can tell, it ferments just as quickly. Also, use garlic.
I recently had several heads of cabbage sitting in my fridge, but no time to shred and pound it to make sauerkraut. I also have some Serbian friends who love sauerkraut but were a bit disappointed by my "German sauerkraut" at Thanksgiving. They did like my sausage and rice balls in sauerkraut at New Year's however, pronouncing in an approving manner that it is actually a lot like sarma. Sarma is basically leaves wrapped around filling, and variations are found throughout eastern and southern Europe. Dolmas, seasoned rice wrapped in grape leaves, even count. Each region has it's own variation, and in Serbia sarma means fermented cabbage leaves wrapped around a meat and rice filling. Finally, I have a father-in-law whose mother used to make sarma to please his Serbian father and who was due for a visit in a few weeks.
So, I decided to try to kill a bunch of birds with one stone - mainly by fermenting whole heads of cabbage to make sarma.
My cabbage turned out amazing! When I first opened my crock three weeks after closing it up I was a little nervous, because it had a bit of a sharp smell on top of the sauerkraut smell. Then I realized that sharp smell was garlic, and I dug in. Mmmm, mmmm, mmmm! Must include lots of garlic in all future batches of sauerkraut. I couldn't stop eating the stuff - I just kept eating the leaves as I pulled them apart to separate the big ones that I could use for rolling sarma from the smaller ones.
George got his mother's recipe for sarma which basically boils down to a ton of meat with a hint of rice and some tomatoes wrapped cabbage leaves.
-3 pounds ground beef
-2 pounds ground pork
-1 pound ground smoked pork (except I don't know where to find something like that, and I had a pound of lamb in the freezer, so I used that instead. It was pronounced an acceptable and delicious alterative)
-3/4 c raw rice
-some tomato sauce (I got a can of whole tomatoes in juice, pureed the tomatoes without the juice, and then added about 1 - 1 1/2 c of the tomato puree to the meat. Enough to make it moist and add flavor, but not enough to make it goopy.
-salt and pepper to taste
-I also added a bunch of chopped onion. I think this is part of the original recipe and very traditional. I think it just was lost in the translation from Grandma Stanic to Aunt Kathy, to George's notes version 1 to George's notes version 2.
Mix all the ingredients together. Roll in cabbage leaves, burrito style. Layer on top of some chopped cabbage leaves in the bottom of a pan. Add some smoked pork (I used some pieces from a smoked ham hock) to the chopped cabbage leaves for flavor. Cover with a mixture of some of the cabbage brine, the juice from the tomatoes, and some water, then bake at 375-400 for 1 1/2 - 2 hours. (Sorry I don't have more exact measurements for the sauce - I was just throwing it together to get it in the oven at that point. But, use judgement and I'm sure it will be good.)
Apparently a roast pig is the traditional accompaniment, but I served ours with a salad of roasted red peppers, some red onion strips, and a light dressing of rice wine vinegar, red wine vinegar, tarragon (thanks for that tip Dad, I've been really getting into using tarragon lately), olive oil, and salt.
As you can imagine there is a lot of regional variation in sarma recipes. Our Serbian friend Irena said her family always makes it without egg or tomato, but with lots of smoked paprika, and is more dry. Her husband Dusan's family, which is actually Slovakian, makes a "more German" version with egg and tomato, and it's more wet. And, as I described above, Aleks's grandmother makes it with tomato, but no egg. I made Grandma Stanic's version and attempted Irena's version, and I preferred the version with tomato.
But, most importantly, I learned that you can ferment whole heads of cabbage. This takes a LOT less work than the shredding and pounding for traditional German sauerkraut, and as far as I can tell, it ferments just as quickly. Also, use garlic.
Wednesday, January 16, 2013
Mega-Muffin
Hey Fam,
I had a student leave me a very sweet note on my keyboard this morning along with a muffin. According to her note, the muffin was sugar free. I realized that it was a total "Mom muffin." It definitely had oatmeal, applesauce, dried fruit, and nuts in it. It was really packing a punch. This girl is the youngest of five, so I feel like her Mom tried to make a mega-muffin for breakfast. I was happy she shared one with me. It totally reminded me of those crazy "cookies" that Mom used to make with the sunflower seeds and what not.
Moral of the story, does anyone have a great recipe that they use for things like this? Any kind of super cookie or muffin type deal?
I haven't been cooking anything new lately - just trying to remember to eat. Also I haven't had hot water in my house since December 7, so it's difficult to cook. That should be getting fixed today (though admittedly they've been saying that for awhile).
Hope all is well!
Molly
I had a student leave me a very sweet note on my keyboard this morning along with a muffin. According to her note, the muffin was sugar free. I realized that it was a total "Mom muffin." It definitely had oatmeal, applesauce, dried fruit, and nuts in it. It was really packing a punch. This girl is the youngest of five, so I feel like her Mom tried to make a mega-muffin for breakfast. I was happy she shared one with me. It totally reminded me of those crazy "cookies" that Mom used to make with the sunflower seeds and what not.
Moral of the story, does anyone have a great recipe that they use for things like this? Any kind of super cookie or muffin type deal?
I haven't been cooking anything new lately - just trying to remember to eat. Also I haven't had hot water in my house since December 7, so it's difficult to cook. That should be getting fixed today (though admittedly they've been saying that for awhile).
Hope all is well!
Molly
Thursday, January 3, 2013
Sauerkraut!
Happy New Year!
We rang in the new year with, what else? sausage and sauerkraut served with mashed potatoes, followed by peppermint stick ice cream served with flourless chocolate cake. I had 3 pounds of sauerkraut left, but we invited Dusan and Irena over for dinner, so I changed the proportions, using a full recipe's worth of meat (2 pounds) and rice and a half-recipe worth of sauerkraut (3 pounds). Honestly, I think it could have used more sauerkraut, but whatever. It was good, good, good! Dusan and Irena are great friends to invite for this dish, because they actually really like sauerkraut. We still had plenty left over, and if I can make it last past tomorrow night, I'm going to freeze it just so that I can enjoy coming home to it some time later this month.
Our version of sausage and sauerkraut is one variation of a dish that is traditional throughout the region. In Serbia the variation is called sarma, and it's sausage, seasonings, and rice wrapped in fermented cabbage leaves. (Irena and Dusan approvingly said that my sausage and sauerkraut was really a lot like sarma.) Aleks and his father have fond memories of Grandma Stanic's sarma. I had several heads of CSA cabbage sitting in the bottom of my fridge waiting to be turned into sauerkraut, so I decided to try fermenting the cabbage heads whole. I just cored the cabbages, added a few heads of garlic, then poured some brine (3.5% kosher salt) over top. I also added some yogurt whey to spike the mixture with the good stuff. This method has the distinct advantage of being much quicker than shredding and pounding the cabbage. We'll see how it turns out. I'm a little worried that I messed things up by adding the brine while it was hot, instead of waiting for it to cool. I know that's traditional for pickling things, but I'm worried I "cooked" the cabbage a bit. Hopefully it didn't kill all the good bacteria in the cabbages. At least I had the forethought to wait until the brine cooled before adding my yogurt whey. I'll let you know how it turns out.
How did everyone else's sauerkraut turn out? Was it good for New Years?
-Maggie
We rang in the new year with, what else? sausage and sauerkraut served with mashed potatoes, followed by peppermint stick ice cream served with flourless chocolate cake. I had 3 pounds of sauerkraut left, but we invited Dusan and Irena over for dinner, so I changed the proportions, using a full recipe's worth of meat (2 pounds) and rice and a half-recipe worth of sauerkraut (3 pounds). Honestly, I think it could have used more sauerkraut, but whatever. It was good, good, good! Dusan and Irena are great friends to invite for this dish, because they actually really like sauerkraut. We still had plenty left over, and if I can make it last past tomorrow night, I'm going to freeze it just so that I can enjoy coming home to it some time later this month.
Our version of sausage and sauerkraut is one variation of a dish that is traditional throughout the region. In Serbia the variation is called sarma, and it's sausage, seasonings, and rice wrapped in fermented cabbage leaves. (Irena and Dusan approvingly said that my sausage and sauerkraut was really a lot like sarma.) Aleks and his father have fond memories of Grandma Stanic's sarma. I had several heads of CSA cabbage sitting in the bottom of my fridge waiting to be turned into sauerkraut, so I decided to try fermenting the cabbage heads whole. I just cored the cabbages, added a few heads of garlic, then poured some brine (3.5% kosher salt) over top. I also added some yogurt whey to spike the mixture with the good stuff. This method has the distinct advantage of being much quicker than shredding and pounding the cabbage. We'll see how it turns out. I'm a little worried that I messed things up by adding the brine while it was hot, instead of waiting for it to cool. I know that's traditional for pickling things, but I'm worried I "cooked" the cabbage a bit. Hopefully it didn't kill all the good bacteria in the cabbages. At least I had the forethought to wait until the brine cooled before adding my yogurt whey. I'll let you know how it turns out.
How did everyone else's sauerkraut turn out? Was it good for New Years?
-Maggie
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