Sweet Potato Whole Grain Waffles

Fake seems to have become a real fact of life these days. Think about it. No one is who they purport to be on facebook or twitter. In fact, on the internet, not being your real self can be a major selling point (ruth bourdain anyone?). And, as food goes, sure there are all the artificial flavors and colors. But, even with the new “real food” movement, think about the pictures. Many of those pictures have been styled, artificially lit, and preened to within an inch of their existence. For years, there have been accusations from psychologists that the plethora of airbrushed, surgically enhanced models in magazines and in video games would make young men unable to appreciate the normal female body. I am starting to think the power of food photography is affecting how I see regular food.




These waffles spring forth from their iron looking a little like a patio tile. Not the pretty Italian-made ones, mind you. More like the ones at the edge of the patio that have crumbled after putting up with one too many cold winters. And, if you aren’t used to whole grains, their bespeckled nature might concern you. And, then there is the sort of unfortunate orange of the dough. The marketer in me might call it terracotta. In other words, these are not the prom queen of waffles; instead, they make the wallflowers of waffles look like Miss America. And, then here is where my brain thinks societal conspiracy. I actually thought they are so ugly I wonder if they taste good. What? Why? My brain somehow placed visual data ahead of smell when it came to food. Who the heck cares what it looks like? I guess some food stylist/ lizard part of my brain. Luckily my husband, who abstains from all types of food porn on principle, is immune from such stupidity. He dug in and quickly attested to their deliciousness.

Recipe:
Whole Grain Sweet potato Waffles
In a blender combine:
250 grams cooked sweet potato
1 buttermilk
2 eggs
2 heaping T oil

Cook 100 grams bob's red mill hot cereal plus 3 T chia seeds with 1 cup almond milk. Cool and add to the wet. Mix.

In a large bowl combine:
145 g whole wheat flour
40 g chestnut flour
15 g flax seeds
10 g oat bran
60 g corn meal
1 T yeast
1 t baking soda
1 t salt
2 T brown sugar
2 T white sugar

Add the wet to the cold. Mix heartily. Let rest in covered in the refrigerator overnight. Bring to room temperature. Add 1/2-1 cup more buttermilk (or almond milk if you wish) to create a batter like consistency. Cook in a waffle iron at medium for about 5-7 minutes. These take longer to cook than other waffles we have made. Ours dings when it thinks they are done. So, we went through three of the regular cycles.

I am submitting this recipe to yeastspotting run by the lovely Wild Yeast.

Shevai with Balsamic Tomato Sauce (Indian and Italian Fusion)

As a fairly small child, sitting in the vestibule outside temple biding time until lunch, I asked my mother about the caste system. To which she answered, “You know, it used to be that if you left India across the ocean, you were out of it all together.” There I was not even in middle school yet, and my mother was basically explaining that my soul was lost. We have a wacky dark streak in our family that stretches back generations.

As unreligious as I was, excommunication from faith was not what struck me. It was the vastness of the ocean. The fact that these people were walking onto boats and later onto TWA planes, hopes in their hearts and scraps of their material lives in their hands. And, for their trouble, they were given basically given a ‘see you later’.

I can only imagine it was eternally freeing—frightening and freeing. In that moment the verboten became delicious. We often joke that it must have been a moment verging on the spiritual awakening when my bad-Hindu father tasted his first bacon double cheeseburger.

My girls, Maybelle and Lily, are heirs to a rich heritage of those who quit faraway homes, picking and choosing what food tastes to keep and what to chuck. An accent-lilting Indian grandmother often makes them home food for dinner but then takes them out for grass-fed burgers. On their father’s side, they are descendents of the hard-scramble mountainous spine of Italy. Their great-grandfather’s whole town left Italia because they had apparently lost their taste for rock farming.

But, here is the where the math starts just muddy. If it were only some Lamarkian genetic food memory that exercised its powers on the taste-buds, my children would want Indian food ½ the time. Anyone who has fed children knows that they are capricious little beasts, who demand food that is at moments banally monotonous and at others perplexingly new. My first came out loving beans, and my second seems to think cauliflower is the bee’s knees. I like both, but the fist-pumping strength of their desires to eat these foods every night of the week seems amazing. Where did these loves come from?


In my short parenting history, I have learned just a smidge about feeding little ones:

*Fuel, engage in, and cultivate their healthy food desires (We grew eight kinds of beans from seed this year.)

*Introduce foods that you love—and then don’t be broken hearted when they don’t share your tastes.

*Let them help you cook. Have them help you cook. (These two are different.)

*If you blog, have them help with picking the menu, plates, etc. Talk about your pictures. Let them take pictures. (Even at three and a half, Belle helps with this.

*Make some foods over and over. Kids like routine.

*Play lots of dance music while you are cooking. (This is the equivalent of a Julia’s glass of wine while you cook with the toddler set.)

*And, the last bit of advice, mix it up. Don’t assume they won’t eat something because it is new.

One day a few months ago, my mother got it in her head that she would make shevai (sounds like if you say Chevy said with a cross between a southern twang and a French nasal). She served those noodles up without even worry if the girls wouldn’t like them.

Shevai are rice noodles from south India eaten by many ethnicities including my own Konkani people. The process is fairly simple. Soak rice until the grains are sopping and translucent (overnight), grind with water or coconut milk, steam into a gelatinous mass, and then extrude through a press.


The difficulty rating on this dish, for me, occurs because of the extruding. Think of it as the equivalent of pushing drying cement through a tea strainer. Making shevai always conjures images in my mind of my aunts and grandmother finishing making shevai, arms flexed in the air a la Rosie the Riveter. For your labor, you are not only the owner of gorgeous guns but also pillowy soft, toothy threads of noodle. These turned out to be a fan favorite at home, though the name was quickly changed by Belle to be called shimmy. As the cheeky mother than I am, I have also taught her the accompanying dance. Traditionally, they can be eaten with Indian pickle or with a sweet jaggery and coconut sauce.

But, traditional is a word I have always only understood ever so tenuously. We serve our shevai with an Italian inspired tomato sauce so delicious you will want to lick the pan. This sauce was inspired by one that my Belle makes with her dad from the Silver Spoon for Children. The secret is a little bit of brown sugar. And isn’t shevai just a gluten free Asian angel hair pasta? And what’s better than spaghetti and sauce for breakfast even if it took a wide detour through India? (Or maybe because of that detour.)

In the end, who we are, and by extension, what we love to eat, is the result of such perplexing alchemical processes, it’s probably not be worth doing the calculations. It does have something to do with the magic of being born into a family who nurtures you. So, if someday my girls venture off on their own across a wide ocean, if they leave me and my cooking behind, what of our kitchen will they take comfort in? Let’s not do the math.

My first entry for the Project Food Blog should exemplify my blog: good writing, global food, and family.

I am also sending this onto the Hearth and Soul Blog Hop hosted by A Moderate Life,
girlichef, Hunger and Thirst, and Frugality and Crunchiness with Christy



Recipes:
Shevai
Balsamic Curry Leaf Tomato Sauces
Bell Pepper Quick Indian Pickle (Achaar)
Spicy Orange Achaar

Vegan Waffles

I want to like pancakes, I do. When I was pregnant with Belle, my husband would make plans for Saturday morning pancake mornings. In his world, we would all work together to make pancakes, music playing gently in the background. Dad would flip. Belle and I would sit at the table anticipation in our voices. Then, we would all saddle to up large stacks of pancakes, drenched in maple syrup, Belle cuddling on her father’s lap. With pancakes described to you in this way, who wouldn’t want to like them.

If you have no offspring, you really think you can make plans; that you can predict who they will be. You can’t. Belle came out disliking pancakes intensely.
J—thought that maybe it was a case of tasting pancakes at least 10 times. Then he thought it might be need 15 times. Let’s just say, it’s a couple years in and neither mother or daughter have come to love the pancakes.

Though the girls in our family must be incredibly susceptible to marketing. Take that flour and milk mixture, and put it in a waffle iron, and well, we are sold. Sold, I say. If I decide to dissect this thing, I think it’s because waffles are fluffy pancake-iness encased in crunchy, browned happiness. It’s the crunchy, plain and simple.


Recipe:
Vegan Yeasted Whole Wheat Oat Waffles

This recipe is the best vegan waffles we have ever made.

I am passing this recipe onto yeastspotting from Wild Yeast.

Bacon and Cheddar Puff Pastry Squares

To say that the whole house filled with smoke would be incorrect. To be honest, it was just the kitchen, the dining room and the family room. Nevermind that at the time these rooms were filled with various in-laws. Nevermind that they were all starving. Nevermind that they are people who love their breakfast meats.

About ten minutes before this scene, I was saying to my husband, “I make bacon in the oven all the time. It should be fine.” I have a lifelong belief that hubris only offers returns in bad luck, so I should have known better.



But, when I paint a picture of scene, you can see how this all came to be. My nephews were over and I just wanted to please. Bacon is near the top of their list of pleasurables. So this how that morning played out. The family wakes up early so we are under the gun to make breakfast. Our Belle, who was a little over one year old, had been up in the night. So I was underslept. That morning, we were too ambitious--making waffles, fruit syrup, feeding our Belle yogurt, frying breakfast sausage…then there was the bacon. I had Belle on my hip. I took out the baking sheet. I opened the package with my free hand. Then with that same ONE hand, I placed the bacon on the sheet. At the same time, I bobbed and weaved so that Belle wouldn’t reach out and touch the raw meat. I popped the bacon in the oven with the help of my brother-in-law. Then I cleaned up the counter and went to set the table.

Did you notice what I missed? I forgot to put the bacon on a rack about the rack. That small step meant that for weeks we were cleaning bacon grease out of the oven (not to mention airing out our house and clothes.)



Since then, I had avoiding serving bacon for guests. It’s been more than a year and I knew I would eventually have to face my fears. Donna Hay turned out to me my therapist on this one. She had a simple recipe where ham and cheese are baked on puff pastry—I subbed in bacon. I took out the fig paste and use a little mango chutney. The recipe was a breeze and was seriously addictive.

Pesto Ricotta Asparagus Egg Pie

Anticipation is become an endangered emotion.

The immediateness of society has numbed us and made us believe that waiting is an unnecessary part of life. Thankfully biology has kept us in touch with the reality of anticipation. There was a time when you waited until spring for strawberries, when you ate tomatoes in summer, when winter squash came in the winter. Eating seasonal is so fashionable any discussion of the behavior is a bit banal.

Pregnancy is great reminder about the power of anticipation. Forty weeks of waiting. And for most of human experience, women waited and waited in the hope that their wombs were holding a son (hopefully some were happy with a girl.) Science has helped us with the gender thing. But, we still have to wait the long wait.

But modern life bucks this trend. Instead of prizing anticipation and enjoying the time we wait, we think of time as a commodity. Most magazines are advertising ways to help you save time. But, what are we doing that is worthwhile with that time? Here is where anticipation and waiting come in. If you save up all that time only to be busy doing more things, what’s the point? Enjoying the moment is quite another thing altogether.

The momentary has often been lost on me. But, with Belle, I am learning. Learning to appreciate the wait is a skill that I am trying to teach my Belle. When your whole life is half a Presidential term, it is hard to appreciate long stretches of time. But, in trying to help her realize why waiting is worthy, say like waiting for the cupcakes to bake, I am learning to appreciate the time we wait together. For that reason, when we had J—‘s family over for brunch, I made some easy, fast recipes. But, then I didn’t take too many food pictures, I didn’t write a post right away, I did care about keeping the moment for the future. I just lived the moment. And, now I anticipate another such morning. With the hecticness of life, another such morning won’t happen for a long time no doubt. But, we can enjoy the wait.

The Menu:
Baked French Toast
Pesto Ricotta Asparagus Egg Pie
Strawberry Ricotta Pie
Bacon Squares

Recipe:
Ricotta Egg Pie
(based on a recipe from Country Living)

Grate potatoes, toss with salt, pepper and olive oil and then pack into the bottom and on the sides of a deep dish pie pan. The potatoes will shrink so over fill it.

Bake at 375 until brown. Place in the freezer over night.

The next morning, whip 2 egg whites.

In a large bowl mix,
1/4 cup half and half
1 cup ricotta
3 eggs
1 egg yolk
1/2 cup grated parmesan
3 tablespoon pesto
¼ cup diced steamed asparagus.

Fold in the egg whites.

Pour into frozen crust. Top with a few spears of steamed asparagus.

Bake at 375 for 45 minutes.

This is also my entry for One Local Summer. The Half and Half was Snowville Creamery, the eggs, asparagus came from the Chagrin Falls Farmers market. The potatoes were frozen grated potatoes from last year’s CSA. The pesto from our own basil. (In fact the whole menu was fairly local. The bread from a local Jewish bakery, the bacon from Cherry Valley, the maple syrup from Snake Hill Farm, the strawberries from Woolf, the ricotta from Micellis… Really where I continue to lack is with wheat products—the filo and the puff pastry were store bought and who knows from where they hailed. And, with the baked egg dish, the parmesan was Italian and the pinenuts not local.)

Raspberry Clafoutis

Prior to having children, morning was about sleeping, stretching, reflecting. There were quiet mornings of sipping spiced tea and reading the newspaper.

Belle’s idea of morning is action and reaction. By 10:00, we have read many books, eaten breakfast, walked the dog, run to the market, done laundry, taken a shower, cleaned our room… Most mornings we have accomplished what needs to be done.

This morning the rain soothed the whole family into sleeping longer and sounder. Instead of roaring out of our beds and into our chores, we milled in bed. We spoke quietly and giggled. Rather than running out to a quick breakfast dive, we sat around the table and made breakfast.



Yesterday was one of those chore-filled days; we made it to the market early enough to get raspberries. My husband suggested with raspberry sauce. Pancakes are not my favorite. To me, they are messy and labor-intensive at a time when my synapses are at their slowest.

So, this morning it was raspberry clafoutis with Ohio maple syrup for breakfast following the perfectly scaled recipe at Eric Ripert. In keeping with our relaxing morning, the labor of making clafoutis is thankfully incommensurate with delicious decadence of the results.

It is also our entry for One Local Summer with farmer’s market raspberries (didn't get the farm's name because Belle was trying to steal the strawberries from the table), Snowville Creamery half and half, Snake Hill Farm maple syrup, and Maple Valley Sugarbush eggs.

Baked Challah French Toast

Never say never

Tall icy lemonade is my greatest pregnancy craving. From her first surreptitious taste, Belle was hooked. I frown on her drinking juice and consuming sugar, but “do as I say and not as I do” is not exactly my style. So, over the months of pregnancy, many evenings I let Belle share my icy lemonade. I sit on the couch head sagging and she stands leaning on the side table stirring the ice with a spoon. In these quiet moments, she spends her time inquiring. Why does the ice spin in the glass? Where is the ice going? What is ice? Her life is all inquiry and desire.

Recently, I was told by a teenager that I really don’t value my Iphone because I am not nearly as tech-savvy as he. Somewhere between age two and age 16 you get to the point that you know everything. The world has become clear, your path is known, your life solved. In that sweet spot of life, I often uttered the phrase—“I would never…” I am thankful that it was a time before cell phone video cameras and social networking so that the arrogance of youth is not captured forever. But, my mind’s eye remembers the tone and the stupid self-assurance. The black and white nature of teenhood seems to fade into grey eventually, either through maturity or complexity of life’s situations.

Strata was a word that I abhorred. Baked egg concoctions seemed like a marker of someone who had given up, of someone who felt the easy way was the right way, of someone without discerning taste. They were the sort of wives who couldn’t be bothered. Casseroles were all laziness and lack of flavor. Any time-saving baked concoction was high on my list of I would nevers.

And, then we had the baby. We still wanted to continue to entertain; we still wanted to join friends together around food. With a child who was basically nocturnal for 5 months, I was fairly confident any cooking that involved dexterity and concentration was out. And, unembarrassed, I started to look again at my pyrex baking dishes. Empathy is a difficult skill to learn; for me it was learned through experience. We haven’t gone all casserole all the time, but in a pinch a baked make ahead meal for guest is not a cop out. Actually, it is an earnest act of entertaining—instead of focusing on the food, the service or the décor, you are focusing on the fact that spending time with the guests is the supreme element in entertaining. And, it turns out many of these baked dishes are quite tasty.

Recipe
Baked Challah French Toast
(reading the recipe at balance made me think about making baked french toast again.)

Toast 1 sliced loaf of challah

In a bowl combine:
8 oz cream cheese
2-3 T brown sugar
2-3 T maple sugar

Spread the cream mixture on the challah and overlap into a pan

In a large bowl mix:
6 eggs
2 yolks
2 cups half-and-half
2 tablespoons granulated sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
pinch of salt

Pour the eggy mixutre over eggs and then weigh french toast down with another pan. Refrigerate over night.

The next morning, bake with a water bath for 60 minutes at 375 degress.

Serve with strawberries and maple syrup.

Gluten Free Pancakes

Families wax and wane. This natural cycle is almost imperceptible in your youth. Sometime in mid-age it dawns on you that the number of funerals that you are attending outweigh the weddings.

In my childhood, my parents saved their vacation time and pennies for trips to India. In these short trips, they returned to their parents, tasted their childhood favorites, and shared stories with siblings and cousins. My friends went on vacation, and I went to India; here imagine my 11-year old eyes rolling. Now, as my aunt is planning her trip to India, I realize how envious I am of a trip to the family. But now, my parents are the grandparents. And, my husband and I save our vacation time to make sure my children spend time with their grandparents and aunts. Now we sit around the table, eat our childhood favorites and share memories with siblings.

The tables are increased with children and in-laws. And, each person complicates the food offerings. Allergies, dislikes and sensitivities are part of our family; probably part of every family. I can’t remember the last time I saw a peanut. Each new food situation changes the offerings.

Recently, when my cousin and his gluten-free girlfriend came from brunch. We tried to think what would be a good thing to serve. At first, we thought fritatta. As a reformed egg detractor, I always think eggs are can be an acquired taste. We thought about skipping breakfast and steaming towards lunch. There are plenty of savory items that are easy and gluten-free. But, then other questions came up. Red meat, okay or not? Dairy-free or not? There is always the fear that a menu might turn off a guest. And, since we see my family so rarely, we wanted to make sure brunch was welcoming and enjoyable.

My husband is a major proponent of pancakes. The smell, the warm syrup, the sugar rush all scream happy times and restful weekend to him. As the food has the word cake in its name, perhaps not the first thought when serving a gluten-free guest. But then again, with the right recipe…

Recipe
Gluten-free Pancakes

Separate 2 large eggs.

Beat the whites until fluffy but not stiff.

Combine the yolks with and whip with a fork:
1 1/2 c milk
2 t vanilla extract
3 T melted ghee (cooled)

In another bowl, sift together:
1 1/3 c. GF flour (I bought storebought)
3/4 tsp. salt
2 tsp and a pinch baking powder
3 Tbsp. sugar

Add the egg mixture to the dry ingredients. Mix quickly. Fold in the egg whites.

Let batter rest for 10 minutes and then cook on a hot griddle. Serve warm.

Blueberry syrup:
In a saucepan combine and simmer:
2 cups Water
2 T Orange-blossom honey
1 cup Frozen blueberries
Orange zest
Lime zest
2 inches of ginger (peeled)
2 T brown sugar
3 T sugar
2 cardamom pods

Masala Coffee Donuts

Hibernation must be in my body’s future. It has been craving thigh-fattening fare for a couple weeks and I can only acquiesce. As I hear my yogi friends say listen to your body and give it what it craves. Sure their svelte, healthy body’s yearn for green leafy vegetables and seaweed, but mine is yelling, screaming for deep fried sweets. In my defense of my body, it has very rarely asked for sweets in its long life. When the whispering about donuts began in my psyche or soul or wherever, I was sincerely surprised.

This deep-seated interest in donuts that has manifested itself in my soul became evident as I sat in the dentist’s chair. I was sitting in that turny seat full of remorse about the ungodly volume of tea that I consume daily and its mark on my teeth. Guilt gave way to obsession as I started to focus on the donut shop across the way. When I left the parking lot, clean teeth and all, will-power reined supreme as I passed Amy Joy by. But, then another donut shop appeared in my view. What was I to do? Fine as they were, those donuts did not satiate me.

And then this weekend, I decided to make Masala Coffee Donuts. We were having friends over for Indian food and I wanted to create a fantastic dessert. Basically, I have an over-inflated sense of my cooking ability and often make new recipes for company. The results can be hit or miss—particularly with dessert. That evening’s round of donuts was so unsuccessful that I went to sleep focusing on how to improve the recipe. The next morning I attempted again. Yes, I made donuts two days in a row. And, yes, my husband did joke, “time to make the doughnuts?” The second time around I added buttermilk to the dough; I am a huge proponent of buttermilk. I believe they made the difference.

The resulting doughnuts are not the average chocolate frosted, and so I suggest if you serve them you warn your guests. The dough has cracked pepper and honey, and the frosting has coffee, cardamom, pepper, honey and jaggery. Doughnuts “gone native” perhaps.

Recipes:
Masala Coffee Donuts with Espresso Cardamom Cream Filling
(Adapted from Epicurious)
makes more than 24 doughnuts

In the bowl of a stand mixer, allow to sit for ten minutes the following:
2 1/4 teaspoons dry yeast
1/4 teaspoon plus 1/4 cup sugar
1/2 cup warm whole milk (105°F to 115°F)
1/2 cup plus 2 T buttermilk at room temperature

Add to stand mixer and beat with the hook attachment:
2 eggs slightly beaten
10 tablespoons (1 1/4 sticks) unsalted butter, melted, cooled to lukewarm
1 T honey

In a separate bowl combine:
4 cups all purpose flour
1 t ground cardamon
1 t freshly crushed black pepper
1/2 t almond extract
1/2 t salt

Add dry mixture to the stand mixer in small batches until it comes together in a sticky dough.

Let rise for 4 hours.

Pat out the dough into a large rectangle. Cut out rounds using cookie cutters(and then cut the whole in the middle with a smaller cookie cutters.) Let rise for 1 hour on a baking sheet.

Fry at 350 until brown.

When the doughnuts are rising make your filling.

When doughnuts are cooling, make glaze.

Cardamom Espresso Pastry Cream

Soak 1 handfull of crushed espresso beans in 2 cups whole milk for 1/2 hour.

In a sauce pan on medium whisk:
1/2 cup sugar
6 tablespoons all purpose flour
2 cups coffee steeped whole milk
5 large egg yolks
Pinch of salt

Add:
2 tablespoons (1/4 stick) unsalted butter
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 tsp almond extract
2 tsp cardamom
1/2 tsp crushed pepper (optional)

Whisk until thickened. Chill for 4 hrs with tin foil to cover. (They say plastic wrap but it is not easy to recycle or to reuse.)

Coffee, Honey, Blackpepper Glaze

Steep 8 blackpeppercorns and 2 cardamom pods in 1/4 cup coffee for 20 minutes.

Add:
1 1/2 cups confectioners sugar
2 tablespoon honey
1/4 teaspoon salt

Whip until smooth and then simmer.

Vegan Muffins Again with the Family

I posted some vegan carrot muffins last week. They were so good I thought I would make them again. Sadly, this time the recipe turned out terrible. In fact so bad, that I took down the post. My guess is that I miswrote something. There is always a fear with posting a recipe that it will turn out terribly. After all, we bloggers put these things up and someone might think we know something. This authority is awesome and horrible, no?

Anyway, my failure made me retry the recipe from scratch. Though, we did it as a family. The joy of vegan baking is that there is no fear of salmonella with eating the batter, so it was fun to make with Belle, who spent half the time licking her fingers. Baking with toddlers? Let me pass on some tips. Have everything measured out and placed in unbreakable containers. We decided to put all the wet together in one big bowl while she looked on. Her job was to dump in the wet. (Lick the peach pulp from the bowl too!) With dad's help, the batter got stirred. Then, mom filled the muffin tins.

Recipe
Peach Carrot Vegan Wheat Bran Muffins
(adapted from the Veganomicon Banana Muffins)

Combine:
1/3 cup sugar
1 tsp vanilla
1.75 whole wheat flour
1/2 cup wheat germ
2 t cinnamon
2 t ground ginger
2 t baking powder
1/2 t baking soda
1/2 t salt

In a separate bowl, combine
1 cup soy milk
1 t vinegar

In a third bowl, combine
1/2 cup peach
1/3 cup carrots
1/3 cup canola oil

Mix wet into dry. Fold in 1/2 cup blackberries.

Bake at 350 for 20 minutes.

Vegan Carrot Raspberry Blackberry Muffins

I have been reading a lot of muffin recipes lately (at Modern Beet, Mango Power Girl etc.) So, when I had too many carrots around, I thought I would try my hand at making up some vegan ones. My goal was fluffy but hearty.

I have been noticing how hungry I am in the morning by the time I get to work. That might be because I haven't time for breakfast. Yes, I know, breakfast most important meal; I am sure you eat a balanced one every day etc. But, when I wake up, I generally feel too groggy to even figure out how to put cereal in a bowl, let alone eat breakfast. I have made resolutions to eat breakfast before, but then come morning, it doesn't happen. Let's see if these will make me change my ways.

I ended up remaking this recipe a week later and didn't get the same results. However the updated recipe is at here.

RFJ: Almond Fried Chicken and Raspberry Sweet Potato Waffles

When I was living in Berkeley, I found myself spending too much on groceries. There were so many amazing items in the stores, and I would just go crazy. They say you should only shop on a full stomach, so I hatched a plan. I would eat a very filling meal. Roscoe's is a California tradition and its signature meal is Fried Chicken and Waffles. I haven't been to Oakland in years, but back then, you didn't need to ask directions to Roscoe's. You need only spot the line around the corner.

This combo has gotten some good press in the last few years, but if you are thinking "WHAT??!!??" I can only explain it this far...there are many who claim to have originated the pairing. It seems to have been a naturally occuring result of late night dining. Apparently at 2 O'clock in the morning, short-order restuarants would serve both dinner and breakfast. Many diners chose to partake in both and glory in the joy that is sweet and savory.

Recently, I was reading the Royal Foodie Joust ingredients to my husband. Two days later, just after I turned off the bedside light, I heard, "Fried Chicken and Waffles...Almond Fried Chicken and Raspberry Waffles." And, so it was born. Fruity, fried, crispy, crunchy, moist, sweet, savory, healthy (almonds and raspberries) and unhealthy.

And the lime you say? The lime linked the two components. There was lime juice in the chicken marinade, lime zest in the waffles, and lime juice in the coulis.

Did this work? If you accept the premise that there is culinary promise in the sweet/savory counterpoints, then yes. We had planned to make this for brunch during the holiday weekend, but we came to realize why everyone was standing in line at Roscoes--this is a lot of work to accomplish in the morning.

Recipes:
Almond Fried Chicken
The night before, soak 8 pieces of chicken (we used dark meat) in:
2 cups of buttermilk
1/2 cup almond milk
3 T lime juice

Drain the chicken, pat dry, and rest for 10 minutes.Dredge the chicken in 1.5 cup flour that has been seaoned with
2 T of salt
2 T paprika
2 t cayenne pepper
1/4 cup almond flour

Let the chicken rest 10-15 minutes.

Dredge the chicken in fresh buttermilk and then dredge in flour and sliced almonds

Fry in vegetable shortening (oh yes, shortening.) Or, if you go that way, lard....

Raspberry, Sweet Potato, Lime Waffles

(using a recipe modified from Spice Island Vegan and, well, bastardized, made non-vegan and served with meat. Sorry, Spice Island Vegan.)
Combine in a bowl:
2 1/4 milk
2 large sweet potatoes (about 15 oz), cooked and riced
1/4 cup oil
1/4 cup brown sugar
1 egg
2 teaspoon vanilla extract

Once the wet ingredients are combined, add the dry:
2 1/4 cup all purpose flour
1/4 cup almond flour
2 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
2 t lime zest

These rise! Do not overfill the waffle iron. Fill the waffle iron only halfway up.

Once they are in the iron sprinkle in the raspberries. We found whole raspberries messed things up so we used tiny chunks of raspberry--about 1 berry per waffle. In total for the whole batch we used about 1/3 cup frozen raspberries

Serve with Warm Rapberry Lime Coulis (use the juice and the rind), Maple Syrup, and Hot Sauce.

Warm Mango Raspberry Oatmeal Smoothie

Motherhood contains with it a certain amount of grossness. The newest “eew” to me is hand, foot and mouth disease which should really be called “erupting sores all over disease.” Lost your appetite yet? Well, let me tell you, as there were some nasty suckers in her mouth, Belle sure did. And, frankly, thinking about those sores also made me loose mine. We have both been housebound for the last couple days, because I do not want to go down in history as the mother of Typhoid Maybelle.

I have been cooking soft food and pacing. I had dreams that my culinary results would be both enticing and curative. Of course, as she hasn’t eat anything I have made since Wednesday, excluding white rice and some mango oatmeal smoothie. It does indicate the power of the slightly warm oatmeal smoothie.

This smoothie is becoming a common blue plate (mug?) breakfast special here. It is full of good things (calcium, whole grains, fruit, fiber); it takes less than 10 minutes to make; and it is adorable when being slurped by a sickly toddler. And, it is of course good for me, too.

I have been fairly quiet about my identity, but I lets just say I am over thirty, Asian, and thin—the trifecta when it comes to osteoporosis. My cousin, freshly certifiable and a doctor, claims thirty years of milk consumption are not enough to counteract these risk factors, years of physical inactivity, and high caffeine consumption. In other words, I am about to hobble down a very painful road if I don’t take care of myself. My weight bearing exercise right now is the daily activity of lugging around 21 pounds of lovin’, but that is more than I did two years ago.

The food as medicine portion, including consuming calcium and whole grains, is much easier, tastier and enjoyable. And, this oatmeal smoothie is one great medicine. Heck, even a sore-ridden toddler agrees to that.

I have included this in the osteoporosis event by Food Blogga. Since I saw it listed, I knew that I should make a good faith effort to not only be part of the event but also read all the entries--for my health and belle's.


Recipe/Plan
Oatmeal Smoothie
Make one serving of oatmeal (not instant and not steel cut) according to the package directions

In a blender, whizz until crushed
1/3 cup frozen fruit (I used raspberries and mangoes)

Once the fruit is crushed add:
1/3 cup plain Greek-style yogurt (I used fat-free)

Whizz. Add soymilk to get the smoothie to the right consistency.

Pour 1/2 the oatmeal, when slightly cooled, into a tall mug, and spoon fruit over the oatmeal.

Makes two adult portions