Chocolate Pudding

A day off from teaching is a day that I get to spend doing a couple of my most favorite me-time things: cooking and lifting!  With the latter done early today, I had lots of time to make a mess in the kitchen (no joke here!) and ended up coming up with a paleo-worthy sweet treat.

The recipe is ridiculously easy and so damn good!  I'm not sure how much self control I'll have later on! 

Recipe makes 3ish cups

Ingredients:

•2 cups of water

•1/2 cup raw cashews, almonds, walnuts, pecans, or hazelnuts

•1/4 cup raw cacao powder

•1/3 cup chia seeds

•10 Medjool dates pitted

•2 teaspoons Himalayan salt or Kalahari desert salt (sea salt is fine if you don't have the others but I prefer them because they have a stronger salt flavor)

•Cacao nibs, raw coconut flakes, coconut creme, date creme, fresh fruit, or whatever the hell else you want to throw on top. 

Put everything in a high-powered blender and let that fucker blend on high for 2-5 minutes. Yeah that may seem like a big gap in time but whatever kind of blender you have will determine how long this will take. If it seems really thick, add a little more water, maybe 1/8 of a cup at a time. Don't worry if it seems a little too watery because the Chia seeds will thicken it up. 

If you have a shit blender, you should put things in little at a time and you should probably chop the dates, otherwise they may get stuck. If you have a vitamix or similar, your pudding will warm up a bit but hey, that's ok!

When everything is blended and smooth, you can either put your pudding into 1/2 size glass bowls, dump it all into one larger glass bowl, or just put your face it it! 

Don't store this in metal because it will react and change the flavor. If it's a choice between plastic and metal, use the plastic and go get yourself some glass food containers!

Raw Vegan Fruit Tart

I made this yummy treat for a family gathering and I was surprised at how well it went over.  I come from a very Italian family and everything is fried and cooked to death.  And heaven forbid it if you don't have meat and pasta on the table.  I made this tart look so pretty that everyone wanted to try it.

CRUST
12-15 medjol dates pitted and diced
2 &1/2 - 3 cups of raw sliced almonds

Place dates and almonds in the food processor and process until well combined.  Press into a 9" glass pie plate.

FILLING
3 ripe mangoes peeled and pitted

Place mangoes in the blender with the kelp or moss and blend well.  Pour onto crust.

TOPPING
Kiwi, various berries, pineapple, peaches, nectarines, or any other fruit that you desire.

Slice and arrange fruit on top of filling.  Chill for about an hour before serving.

Flax Milk Is Here!

So wandering the Nature's Market in my local grocery store (Wegmans) I stumbled upon flax milk.  Of course I had to try it.  If you like almomd milk even a little bit, you'll love this!  It's a lot milder than almond milk and not as heavy.  It works well in smoothies, coffee (no separating!), cereal, pancakes & waffles, any recipe that calls for milk, and just in a glass by itself.  It has calcium, omegas, vitamins A, D, & B12.  There is NO cholesterol, NO saturated fat, NO trans fats, and flax is NOT GMO! 

The brand I tried is Good Karma.  I like the brand because, as you can see below, the company supports Sustainable Agriculture.  Listed are a few other tasty things about Good Karma's flax milk.  I'm sure there are other brands, but this is the one my grocer carries.

Ingredients:All Natural Flaxmilk (Filtered Water, Cold Pressed Flax Oil, Evaporated Cane Juice, Tricalcium Phosphate, Vanilla Extract, Canola Lecithin, Sea Salt, Guar Gum, Xanthan Gum, Carrageenan, Natural Flavor, Vitamin A Palmitate, Vitamin D2, Vitamin B12.

Benefits:Natural, Lactose Free, Gluten Free, Non Dairy, Trans Fat Free, Soy Free, Allergen Free, Vegan, Supports Green Farming, Omega-3s

Fun Facts:Good Karma Products Promote a Healthy Lifestyle while supporting Sustainable Agriculture.

Here's the link to Good Karma if youwant to read more about their flax milk and more about the company.  http://www.goodkarmafoods.com/flax-milk-original

CREAMY 7 LILY Soup

I made this recipe spur of the moment to satisfy an onion craving.

2 boxes of organic veggie broth or
1 large head of garlic
2 bunches of chives
2 bunches of scallions
4 leeks
3 large shallots
1 large red onion
1 large sweet onion (mayan, spanish, vidallia)
6 chipolini onions
1 small celery, including heart and all the leaves

SLOWLY bring the broth to a boil.  While it's coming to a boil:

Peel and halve the garlic clove by clove and add it to the broth.
Cut the chives and add them in.
Cut the scallions and leeks, including the green part, and add them in.
Peel and quarter the chipolinis, shallots, red onion, and sweet onion and add them in.
Large chop the celery heart, including leaves, and add that in.

Gently boil veggies for about 15 minutes or until veggies are soft. (no more than 15 minutes!)

Strain out the veg from the soup and put them in the blender.
Blend 2-3 cups at a time until smooth, adding back into the soup after each time.
Repeat until you have blended up all the veg.
Salt and pepper to taste.

You can also find this recipe along with many others on Allergy Free Alaska

Moooooooove Over Milk

So, you've decided to lay off the dairy. Or maybe you want to see what else is out there. What do you do? There are a lot of non-dairy alternatives to choose from. Just make sure that what you buy says rennet-free, lactose-free, whey-free, casein-free as these are all derived from milk. Also make sure that if the cheese has lactic acid in it, it specifically says "non-dairy lactic acid". Many cheeses made from soy, rice, and almond will say lactose-free but still contain casein and lactic acid derived from milk.

Lactose is milk sugar, rennet is a complex enzyme (a group of digestive enzymes) that is used to make cheese, and whey & casein are milk protiens. It is produced in mammilian stomachs. Lactic acid is milk acid and it is used in cheeses and sour cream, butter milk, and yogurt.

The products below are things that I have used in the past or use on a regular basis. Really, it's all about trial and error. Should you try and decide it's not for you and you want to continue to use dairy, I strongly reccommend switching to organic dairy as much as possible. The safety standards are held higher and there are no chemicals given to the animals and there are no pesticides in their feed.

CHEESE: Unfortunately, the vegan cheese alternatives aren't the greatest. There are 2 main brands that I have found.

The first brand, which is a mozzerella alternative, is called Veganrella. I do have to warn that it has gluten in it so if you are gluten-free you may not want to eat this. It's not so great plain but I used it on a pizza and it was OK melted. It does melt pretty good but it's gooey so youdon't need a lot.

The second brand of vegan cheese is called The Vegan Gourmet. They have 3 flavors, cheddar, monteray jack, and jalepeno. The texture of all 3 is very similar to tofu. The package says it melts. It does, but not that good. Quite honestly, I did not like the cheddar. The flavor was not cheddar-like in any way. The other 2 are ok. The jalepeno is really good melted for nachos.

MILK: There are a lot of milk options out there. You can choose from soy, rice, almond, hemp and combos of some of these. There are many brands of each. They come sweetened, unsweetened, vanilla flavored, and chocolate flavored. They all can be used in place of regular milk in cooking and baking.

My personal favorite is hemp milk. I get a lot of odd looks and comments when I mention that I drink hemp milk and eat hemp seeds. Yes, it is in the same family as marajuanna but it is a different plant. It's missing the THC which is what produces the "high" you get from smoking or eating marajuanna. I use the brand called Living Harvest. It is the less-grassiest tasting. Hemp milk is probably the healthiest of the lot of milk alternatives. It is chock full of Omegas which are very good for your heart.

YOGURT: The main non-dairy yogurt is soy yogurt. Turtle Hill makes one called Soy Delicious. There are several different flavors and they contain yogurt bacterias. Turtle Hill also makes a coconut milk yogurt called So Delicious that is really good.

SOUR CREAM & CREAM CHEESE: Both of these have a vegan alternative. Tofutti makes them. They aren't too bad. I've made dips, beef stroganoff and many other things with the sour cream and no one has been able to tell the difference. The cream cheese is an aquired taste. I chop up onions, celery, and red bell peppers and mix them in and it makes it taste a lot better. There is also another brand of vegan sour cream called Follow Your Heart which is pretty good.

ICE CREAM: Ice cream is a favorite treat for many. There are a lot of different vegan ice creams. My current fav is the So Delicious coconut milk ice cream made by Turtle Hill. Turtle Hill also makes other vegan ice creams that are not coconut milk based that are delish! There are several flavors and they are all pretty tastey. Temptation makes a fabulous vegan ice cream and they have a mix that you can make at home.

I think I've covered all the main milk products. Should you choose to try any of them, I hope you enjoy!