dairy-free Archives - A Byte of Life

One Pot Potato Leek Soup {Gluten-Free, Dairy-Free}

It’s officially soup weather. The sweaters, boots and umbrella have been pulled out and are here to stay. The rain is here and it’s cozy time. Browsing in the market on Saturday, I was drawn to the gorgeous leeks piled high in one of the bins at our local Whole Foods market. They were brilliantly colored, as big around as a hearty farm grown carrot and on sale. Check, check, check. There are two things I like to do with leeks; make a potato soup with them or sauté and eat them with olive oil and lemon for a snack. You can make soup with the stock sand sauté the leaves if you wish to have the best of both worlds. Sautéing leeks to eat as a snack would have NEVER crossed my mind, but I read it in a book I quite enjoy and have tried it a few times since. The book is something I picked up at a half-price book store a few years ago and find myself reading each year. It’s called “French Women Don’t Get Fat” by Mireille Guiliano. Now, let me pause here and say that I am not encouraging dieting behavior. The I love her healthy, holistic approach.

The focus of the book is teaching us how to eat for pleasure and nutrition versus eating, or not eating, as a diet choice. She discourages dieting and is a fabulous writer. I agree with her encouragement for people to view the relationships between food, weight and health within an over focus on a healthy happy lifestyle. Okay, back to sautéed leeks. I had the best intention of using two boxes of chicken stock that I received from an amazing food conference I just attended (IFBC!). We’re really aware of how much salt goes into our food and opt for low salt whatever we can (broth, soy-sauce, chips, mixed nuts, etc). I have to give the disclaimer that I’m a broth snob. I love broth and have been known to make up a pot of broth in the winters to supplement my massive tea intake. My mother makes amazing soups and has always set the bar high. I’ve never found a boxed or canned broth that I find remotely decent. I’ve always used the same stock my mum uses the brand Better Than Bouillon and I always make sure to get the reduced sodium base. You’ll always find the chicken and beef base in my fridge but they have ham, turkey, lobster, mushroom, the list goes on! One caveat, not all of their flavors come in reduced sodium but the chicken and beef ones do and Costco carries them so I’m a happy camper! So, I grabbed a few leeks, potatoes and onions and was off to make the first soup of the season.

As I mentioned before, we go low salt so at first when I tasted this soup it really felt like it was missing an ingredient. After calling my mother the soup master (Just missed her, she had already gone to bed!) and googling what flavor should hit the center of your tongue, which was right where the soup was missing some seasoning flavor, the mister and I decided that it was salt. Simple salt. I took out a few spoonfuls of the soup and cracked some fresh pink salt on top and low and behold…that soup was PERFECT!

The fun part about this soup is that you can completely change the flavor of the soup with a few very simple cooking variations! Throw in a few carrots, or add some turnips with the potatoes. Not big on thyme myself, but you could add a tablespoon or two of dried thyme or 1-2 Tbsp chopped fresh thyme and/or if you like dill, which I don’t, you can include ½ tsp dried dill, or 1 tsp chopped fresh dill. You can cook with truffle oil or use truffle salt, or any other amazingly flavored salt you have stumbled upon. You could cook bacon in the pan first and wipe half the oil out, and use the remaining half of bacon grease to cook up the veggies and potatoes.

How do you like your potato leek soup? Leave a comment!!

One Pot Potato Leek Soup {Gluten-Free, Dairy-Free}

1 Tbsp rice bran oil
1 medium yellow onion
3 large leeks, without the leaves, sliced into rounds
4 medium russet potatoes, washed and chopped and loosely diced
pinch grey or pink salt
fresh cracked black pepper, and more to taste
chopped fresh or dried parsley
2 bay leaves
2 tbsp Better than Bouillon Reduced Sodium Chicken base + 7 cups hot water

Pull out your stock pot. Heat the rice bran oil over medium heat. Chop your onions and add them to the pot, stirring occasionally. To prep your leeks, wash the stocks and cut off the leaves right where the light green turns dark green and the leaves start. Cut off the roots.

Set the leaves aside (unless you want to wash them and include them which you totally can). Slice the stock in half, and cut 1/2 inch half moons until the stocks are all chopped. I do this so it’s easier to separate the leeks when I drop them into the pot.

Stir whatever you have in the pot a few times with each ingredient addition. Add the leeks to the pot and cover.

Cut your potatoes and add them to the pot to sauté for about 5-7 minutes. I cut my potatoes like I would for a breakfast hash: cut the potato in half, then half again and loosely dice.

Once you’ve sautéed the leeks, onions and potatoes for a bit, add a pinch of salt, pepper, chopped fresh or dried parsley and 2 bay leaves. I always add bay leaves to my soup and broths because my mother does and she makes the most amazing soups! Just remember to pull both of them out before blending or serving!

While this is sautéing heat up your tea pot to mix the bouillon base. I always mix the broth in a glass pyrex because just when you think it’s all dissolved into the water and pour it into your soup pot, you’ll see the huge chunk of bouillon that was hiding at the bottom plop into the pot! Not amazing. Mix the bouillon in your pyrex, assuring it’s dissolved, then add it to the pot and bring to a boil.

Let the soup boil for a few minutes then reduce to low heat, cover and simmer for about 45 minutes. Check the soup to assure that the potatoes are cooked through and turn off the heat. Go fishing for your two bay leaves and pull those guys out. If you have a stainless steel immersion blender, which I don’t, puree of the soup in the pot until you reach the desired level of smoothness. If, like me you don’t own a fantastic immersion blender, pardon me while I add that to my amazon which list which is 90% cooking tools and cook books! I use my trusty vita mix and blend it in batches.

Taste the soup as you blend it because this is your chance to add more herbs and spices since you’re blending the heck out of it and the flavors will be sure to mix well.

Garnish with whatever your heart desires:
cracked pepper
fresh chopped parsley
pumpkin seeds (roasted pumpkin seeds recipe) and sub paprika for the salt
shaved marinated carrots
chopped green onions
sour cream
chopped bacon
fried onions
a drizzle of some truffle oil
… your options are endless!

Seasonal Kale Radicchio Salad w/ Poppyseed Dressing

I met this delicious seasonal dish at a baby shower a few weeks ago. Let’s set the stage here; I’m not usually super amazing thrilled baby showers attendee. But, one of my very good girlfriends recently had her first shower and there was a sacred promise that there would be no games, which is a huge plus for encouraging attendance. Little did I know that I would be greeted upon entry with a glass of La Marca Processco (which is my favorite) and ushered into a room of absolutely fantastic gals. With a glass of bubbly in my hand and a smile on my face I was shown to the food table. This, my fine friends, was both a visual and tasty delight! There were numerous quiche options, fresh shrimp with cocktail sauce, three types of homemade mini cupcakes and an absolutely amazing kale radicchio salad which I shamelessly had thirds of.

The bubbly was also flowing, but, that has no correlation to the ‘yum’ factor of this salad. Not only was it visually delightful, but it was so delicious that I had to remind myself I was in public and shoving salad into my mouth as quickly as I could was not socially appropriate. It was tangy, creamy, crunchy, herbaceous, earthy and downright amazing. Three bites in I was begging for the recipe. It was a simple and side dish that is easily transported for events and was SUPER tasty. Had I hit the side-dish mecca? Quite possibly my friends, quite possibly.

For halloween our office did a “Crocktober” and one look at the food sign up sheet had my insides yelling for something even remotely healthy! Someone’s got to make a non-crockpot dish to balance this whole situation out right!? So, when asked to sign up for a dish to share I decided that there needed to be a little balance to the baked goods, 3 types of mac n cheese (including one that boasted being ‘texas style’ which apparently meant extra cheese and cream), pork, meatballs, cookies, brownies and otherwise carbacious cheese covered feast that was about to ensue. This festive gathering needing kale, lots of kale. Good, wholesome tasty kale. There was no other thought in my mind than to debut the kale radicchio salad recipe. If we’re being completely honest, I made this salad for a few reasons; one of preservation so I knew there would be something I would eat there, and I also really needed some motivation to blog this recipe (that a few people have specifically asked for in the past week) and try my hand at homemade poppyseed dressing. Unless I had a deadline of hungry mouths tomorrow and feeling the moral obligation to balance out the cholesterol and sugar levels of the office party, this recipe could have been put off for months.

This recipe is so easy and tasty it’s almost ridiculous. It really highlights the fall and winter seasonal flavors that might not be combined in salad form but are absolutely ridiculously good when combined. This recipe calls for one of my favorite seasonal ingredients, pumpkin seeds. Now, if we want to be fancy we’d call them pepitas instead of pumpkin seeds which has a literal translation of “little seed of a squash”. It’s basically the spanish culinary term for a pumpkin seed. I gave the salad a little upgrade by roasting them with paprika before adding them to the recipe. You can find my recipe for roasted pumpkin seeds here and just sub out the salt for paprika. This is one salad where you can really personalize! Next time I might also roast some delicata squash and add it in, or even pumpkin or butternut squash!

This salad is really going to be a seasonal staple for us and will be ever evolved. It makes a great simple, quick meal or healthy and tasty potluck dish! It’s super simple to make the night before and combine when you’re ready to serve. It’s gluten-free, dairy free, nut-free, healthy and easy. Yes PLEASE!

Seasonal Kale Radicchio Salad w/ Poppyseed Dressing

For the Salad
1 head kale, washed, stemmed, massaged and torn into pieces
1 head radicchio, washed and cut and cut in chiffonade
pepitas/ pumpkin seeds
olive oil
paprika
dried cranberries
1 small thinly sliced shallot

Poppyseed Dressing
3 tbsp Katz late harvest sauvignon blanc vinegar
2 tbsp local honey
2 tsp dijon mustard
pinch grey salt
pinch fresh cracked pepper
2-3 tbsp grapeseed oil
1 tsp diced shallot

Pre-heat the oven to 350 degrees. Lay the pepitas out on non-stick foil and spray with olive oil or other high-heat oil. Dust with smoked paprika and toast for 10 minutes, keeping an eye and adjusting time according to how your oven heats. Once they’re done remove from the oven and let cool.

Meanwhile, thoroughly wash and de-stem the kale.

I wash the kale well, and use a large OXO SoftWorks Salad Spinner to dry kale and I absolutely love it! Add a tiny bit of grey salt and massage the kale in the bowl until it reduces in size and turns a darker color.

Grab the radicchio, peel the outer layer, slice in half and core the halves. Pull apart a few layers at a time, fold and chiffonade. The chiffonade technique is basically rolling the leaves and thinly slicing.

Place kale and radicchio in a bowl. Add the toasted pepitas and cranberries to taste.

Place all dressing ingredients in a mason jar and shake to combine.

When you’re ready to serve, add the dressing to the bowl and toss.

Variations
Substitute pepitas for walnuts and add goat cheese and parsley with plain oil dressing
Spiced pecans and dried cranberries with a warm bacon vinaigrette
Mandarine oranges with slivered almonds and a sesame vinaigrette
Roast up some delicata squash, butternut squash or pumpkin and throw it in

Pumpkin Seed Butter (Gluten-Free, Dairy Free)

Last summer I got hooked on pumpkin seed butter. Before that, I didn’t even know such a thing existed. I felt pretty nut-butter gourmet knowing that there was macadamia butter as well as cashew butter. I knew that you could grind your own; I’ve seen and even used the machines in my local Whole Foods to make fresh almond butter. But those machines were big, and scary, not to mention loud and quite menacing to look at. The though had NEVER dawned on me that it was something that could be made at home. Until a combination of a strong desire for a food processor, DIY itch and budgeting came together. Random components, but quite a story!

This recipe was adapted from the the kitchn’s Pumpkin Seed Butter recipe. I LOVE that they say it was inspired by a nut butter that they tasted at the Portland Farmers Market because I’m pretty sure it’s the same nut butter that hooked me on Pumpkin Seed Butter. Nut-Tritious Foods is a wonderful little company based out of Vancouver, Washington. They do a great job of educating customers why cold-pressed nut butters are better for you. I pulled the info below from their about page because it’s REALLY important to know!

“… we COLD-PROCESS and don’t use heat to get our nut butter into the tub. Heat will oxidize the healthy fats (poly- & mono-unsaturated) and make them more like a saturated fat! Most all jar nut butters have been heat processed – you can tell by the ‘nutcrete’ in the bottom of the glass jar.” An additional note, the heat processing method allows the nut butter to sit on the shelf in a jar until it’s purchased. Personally, I’d much rather have the fresh stuff that I know is perishable and know that I’m getting the most nutrition out of my consumption.

Check out my Almond butter recipe here.

Pumpkin Seed Butter

2 cup raw pumpkin seeds, without shells
1/2 cup ground sunflower seeds
1/4 cup flax meal*
1/4 cup grapeseed oil
1 spoon of honey (to taste)
pinch grey salt

*Flax Meal: You can easily make flax meal in a coffee

Combine pumpkin seeds, sunflower seeds , and flaxseed meal in your food processor. Blend until the ingredients are well chopped and blended. You’ll need to stop and scrape the sides down so all the ingredients get blended together.

Add the honey and blend until the nut butter starts to form. This can take up to ten full minutes so have patience! Once you see the play dough texture, where the seed butter starts to form a ball and move around the bowl you’re getting close! Add the oil and continue to blend 5-10 minutes more until the butter is consistently smooth. Your food processor might get warm but don’t worry too much, you can always let it cool a little bit and then blend away. I used the 1/4 cup of oil and it was just fine, but you may want to add more depending on how you like your nut butter.

Place in an airtight container (tupperware or glass jar) and store in refrigerator up to 2 weeks.

There are plenty of additions to this recipe, you can mix up the ratios. You can choose olive oil or coconut oil. You might want to add salt, or use salted pumpkin seeds. You can also pre-heat the oven to about 350 and roast the seeds on a parchment paper or foil wrapped cookie sheet for 10-15 minutes. If you oven roast them, stir the seeds once or twice during cooking and let them cool before adding to the food processor. There is also a delicious looking adaption for Maple Pumpkin Seed Butter and Chocolate Pumpkin butter.

Banana Bread {Paleo, Gluten-Free, Dairy-Free, Sugar-Free}

It feels like fall in the city. The weather had been grey and gloomy all week, which is quite a change from last weeks sunburn weather! Grey clouds always get me in a comfy cozy mood, and inspire me to drink tea and curl up with a good book and a blanket. But, what’s tea without a little tea treat, am right?

This amazing banana bread entered into my heart a few weeks ago when I had a day off and went to go visit my sister at work. She’s been on this “Paleo Kick” that I usually roll my eyes at, but I have to say this recipe immediate became a kitchen staple and has now replaced my tried and true Banana Bread recipe that is YEARS old! It’s THAT good kids!

Gluten-free cooking is nothing new to me. I LOVE baking with Bob’s Red Mill All-Purpose Gluten-Free Baking Flour and have made quite a few goodies with it. Most recently I made a Strawberry Basil Bread, Gingerbread cookies, Chocolate Chip Cookies, amazing Vanilla Cupcakes, and even tried my hand at Vegan Gluten-Free Donuts! To be clear, I am NOT a big believer in following every food fad that comes along, and most definitely did NOT jump on the Paleo band wagon when it came in vogue, nor am I on that bandwagon now. This bread is quite simply one of the most delicious healthy baked goods I’ve ever had. It’s mainly bananas and eggs, a little homemade almond butter, gluten-free flour, and some apple sauce to hold it all together. That’s it! No added sugars. No two stick of butter and 5 cups of refined white flour. Just simple, regular ingredients you can pronounce and happily eat.

There are many variations you can try with this recipe and I list a few at the end of this recipe. Next time I might throw in some blueberries, or try coconut flour to make a bit more of a dessert style bread. What variations would you, or are you, going to try?

Paleo Banana Bread
Adapted from Civilized Caveman Cooking Creations Recipe
Prep Time: 10 mins | Cook time: 30-45 minutes

Ingredients
2 1/2 cups yellow bananas, mashed (approx. 4 bananas)
4 eggs
1/2 cup homemade almond butter
4 tablespoons Apple sauce (original recipe called for melted grass-fed butter or coconut oil)
1/2 cup gluten-free flour
2 tsp cinnamon (original recipe called for 1 tbsp but that’s a little heavy for a summer bread)
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder (gluten-free or homemade)
1 teaspoon vanilla
pinch of sea salt

Instructions
1. Pre-heat your oven to 350 degrees fahrenheit
2. Combine your bananas, eggs, and nut butter, and apple sauce and mix well
3. Add in in the flour, cinnamon, baking soda, baking powder, vanilla, and sea salt and mix well
4. Grease a 9×5 glass (see notes) loaf pan with a fat of your choice (I use Rice Bran oil)
5. Pour in your batter and spread it evenly throughout
6. Place in your preheated oven and bake for 55-60 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean (If you use a metal pan it will probably bake in 35-40 minutes so start checking at 35 to ensure the middle stays moist)
7. Remove from oven and flip your bread out onto a cooling rack
8. Slice and serve

Variations
1. Alternate Nut Butter: You can use any almond butter you desire: coconut, sunflower seed, macadamia nut, etc
2. Alternate Flour: My sister uses coconut flour, but I bet that almond flour or macadamia nut meal could be delicious
3. Flavors: Cranberry Orange – Only use 3 tablespoons of butter. Add zest of one whole orange diced, juice of one whole orange, and 1 cup dried cranberries or fresh if you want
4. Flavors: Chocolate Blueberry – Add 1 cup of fresh blueberries and 1/2 cup of cocoa powder
5. Flavors: Pumpkin Pecan – Reduce the almond butter to 1/4 cup and add 1/2 cup of pumpkin puree and 1 cup of roughly chopped pecan pieces

If you want to make these into muffins, use the same recipe and for mini muffins bake approximately 25 mins and normal size muffins 30-35 minutes.

Butternut Squash Couscous (Vegetarian, Vegan, Meat Free, Dairy Free)

The way that I describe this dish, is a middle eastern version of fried rice. It’s a great meal the throw together and one that you can experiment with spices that you don’t likely use in your daily cooking. The original recipe calls for a steaming method of cooking, which is the traditional method. I neglected to read the directions before I started the recipe and didn’t think we even owned a steamer! Well, after I completely revamped the entire cooking method, I realized that we DO have a steamer so I guess I’ll try that next time!

Couscous is very low in fat, and has about the same in protein, fiber and carbs as quinoa. Quinoa beats couscous in the mineral content, but couscous packs an amazing 87% of your daily suggested intake. About 55mcg is suggested daily and couscous has 43mcg per once cup serving. Selenium has antioxidant properties, can help the body regulate the thyroid hormones, support a healthy immune system, and aid in metabolism. One of selenium’s most important roles is as an antioxidant helping to prevent cell damage due to free radicals. (Sources: WebMD and Eating Well)

One VERY important thing that I did not note, until I’d already washed and set aside four cups of couscous, is the water to couscous ratio in this recipe. Much like rice or quinoa, there is a two to one ratio for water to couscous. Now, this recipe called for 4 cups of dry couscous. Four cups of dry couscous is quite a large portion, borderline obscene actually. I only realized this fact at the very moment where I was pouring the 8 cups of water and 4 cups of couscous into my stove top pan and it was nearly brimming over. And, I hadn’t event started it boiling yet! My denial for the amount of couscous I was in the middle of making could no longer be indulged and I pulled out the large stock pot and transferred my absurd amount of couscous into the larger pot. While there was much more couscous than I would normally cook, about 9 servings worth, the ratio of the other ingredients worked perfectly. The only thing I would change is to maybe try cutting the couscous by half.

To serve, mix the roasted zucchini and butternut squash, chickpeas, raisins and sautéed onion together in a bowl and add a little more chopped parsley. (Typically, chickpeas from a can are already cooked but double-check.) Add in the couscous and stir well. The couscous will be a little gummy which is possibly due to my cooking method and not steaming it as directed. Garnish with more fresh parsley if you wish. You can also add grilled chicken or tofu to this if you want more protein like I usually do.

Squash Couscous
Yield: 9 cups of couscous + a good amount of veggies for 4 people
Recipe and method adapted from the recipe on Canadian Living
*Note: Due to preference and feeding two people versus 6, I suggest cutting the couscous, chicken stock and water in half. If you LOVE couscous or have a lot of people to feed, keep the recipe as is!

Ingredients
1 1/2 lb (one medium large) butternut squash, peeled and chopped in 2 inch cubed
2 large zucchini, sliced into 2 inch cubes
1 medium yellow onion, diced
1/2 cup raisins
2 cups ( 1 15 oz can) chickpeas, drained and rinsed
1/4 c chicken bullion paste for chicken stock
8 cups water
2 tbsp chopped fresh parsley
1 tsp ground ginger
1/2 tsp pepper
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp turmeric
4 cups Israeli couscous ( I only had 3 cups, so I added one cup of the golden small couscous
additional parsley to garnish

Directions
Wash and chop the zucchini and butternut squash. Don’t forget to de-seed the squash. Lay out on aluminum foil on a baking sheet and roast at 450 for 30-45 minutes. Turning every 10 -15 min. Wash the couscous and set aside.

Chop the onion and fry it on the stove with some olive oil in a large stock pot. Set aside in a large bowl which you’ll use to mix up the rest of the ingredients. Drain and rinse the chickpeas and add to the bowl, along with the raisins and some more parsley (to taste). Add the zucchini and butternut squash to this bowl once they’re browned on all sides.

Bring 8 cups of water to a boil in the large stock pot you used for the onions. Stir in the 1/4 cup of bullion, parsley, ginger, pepper, salt, and turmeric. Let boil together for a few minutes. Add the couscous and let it come back to a boil. Be sure to stir it all up every few minutes. Cook until the couscous soaks up the broth and get’s to a consistency you like.

Add the couscous to your large bowl with the onions, raisins and chickpeas, zucchini and butternut squash and stir. Garnish with additional parsley if you wish.

Tonight we’re eating this with some delicious bone in pork chops that are currently brining, but you can serve with grilled chicken, boiled eggs, firm tofu, or grilled steak. The options are endless!

Potato, Carrot Leek Soup (Dairy Free, Soy Free, Gluten-Free, Vegan)

It has officially gotten cold in Seattle. Not “girl” cold where it’s 50 degrees and my tosies get a little chilly. I’m talking Midwest, you can see your breath, chill hits to your bones cold. We’ve had low 30’s for about a week now and even my poor parsley I forgot on the patio was frozen to the bone! With cold like this, a big bowl of warm homemade soup is just the ticket to help you thaw out! After being used to cooking an ENTIRE Thanksgiving feast, four pies seemed like a walk in the park! I opted for the my go-to holiday hits and baked four fresh crusts from scratch for pumpkin pies and two pecan pies. Of course, I home-roasted the pumpkins using my recipe HERE.
we would up with all of the veggies that I had drug up my parents house with the best intentions of cooking up for my family. What do you do with bunches of leeks and a massive yellow onion?

Well, you buy potatoes and carrots and make soup of course! I wrote this recipe from looking at a few different ones, and deciding that I didn’t want dairy OR soy in my soup…and using this a little as a kitchen soup recipe to clean out the fridge. The recipe is sweet because it’s relatively low maintenance and you can make it in your VitaMix or if you have a food processor. Super simple, SUPER delicious, and super healthy! No diary, no soy, gluten-free, and can be made vegan if you substitute out the chicken bullion.

Potato, Carrot Leek Soup (Dairy Free, Soy Free, Gluten-Free, Vegan)
prep time: 10 min | cook time: 1 hr
5 leeks
2 ½ tsp minced garlic (or 5 fresh cloves)
5 stalks celery + the center lighter part with the leaves
dried Parsley (or fresh!)
5 medium russet potatoes
2-3 large carrots
½ large yellow onion
2 tbsp chicken bullion ( I swear by Better Than Bouillon Organic Chicken Base, Reduced Sodium)
8 cups water
1 tsp ground rosemary
1 tsp fresh thyme
2 bay leaves
fresh sea salt and pepper

Pre-heat oven to 400.

Wash, peel and chop all vegetables. To clean the leeks, cut just above the roots and just below where the dark green leaves start to branch off. Wash the body of the leek and peel the outside layer off. Cut into disks. For the dark leaves, cut the tips off and be sure you have washed them well. Then slice and set aside. For the potatoes, I usually cut the potato in half, then half again and cut into chunks.

Misto spray a cookie sheet then place carrots, potatoes and onion on cookie sheet. Dust with fresh cracked pepper and dried parsley (unless you have the fresh stuff- in that case add when you puree the soup). Cook 40 minutes or until potatoes are soft in the center. Turn veggies once or twice so that all surfaces get browned.

While those veggies are in the oven, get out a large pan and sauté the garlic. Add the leeks, separating the layers of the disks, and the celery. Then add a little fresh cracked pepper and some salt. Sauté until all the veggies are cooked. As I turn the leeks and celery in the pan, I’ll do a light olive oil Misto spray just so everything gets a little charred in the pan and I’ll also coat with pepper. Also, any of the leek that is still held together in the little disk, separate the different layers as you cook. I never measure pepper and I like the flavor so I usually just cook by sight and will add until I feel like it’s seasoned.

To make the broth, bring the water in a 10-cup stockpot then stir in the chicken bullion. Add the rosemary, thyme and bay leaves. Bring to a boil and simmer for 10-15 minutes.

Once all veggies are cooked and the broth has simmered, remove the bay leaf and get your vita mix ready. Place 1/3 of each of the ingredients in the blender and blend on medium until thoroughly puréed. Once puréed, place back in the stockpot and repeat until all of the ingredients are puréed. Simmer soup for 10-15 minutes and serve.

Can be frozen up to 4 months in a freezer Ziplocs bag or Tupperware. .

Wine Marinated Crispy Chickpeas (Vegan, Vegetarian, Meat-Free, Dairy-Free)

(Vegan, Vegetarian, Dairy-Free, Meat-free)
It’s “officially” fall in the Pacific Northwest. All of the normal indications are here: I need sunglasses, a jacket, a scarf, a tank top, gloves and an umbrella all in the course of about five minutes. The sun is setting earlier, waterproofing boots is on my to-do list, and my shorts get packed away.

Another indication that it’s fall is here is the lack of daylight. There is an impending sluggish feeling that starts to set in when we realize that we go to work when it’s dark and leave work it’s dark. Unless you’re one of the lucky few that has a window near your cubicle or in your office, it’s possible to only catch a glimpse of real “light” through ever distant windows on the run from the much needed afternoon coffee break to back to back afternoon meetings.

When the rain starts, the fall flavor craving starts. These cravings battle the ever sluggish feelings and makes us torn when it comes to dinner. Either it’s the event that keeps me going during the day and I can’t wait to rush home and cook something that I’ve pinned, liked, saved or stashed. Or, the last thing I want to do is be in the kitchen as a continuation of my daily servitude but am conflicted when I mentally explore the ease of ordering pizza.

Marinated Chickpeas

1 can chickpeas, drained
White Wine
Minced garlic
Dried Parsley, garlic, rosemary pepper
EVOO or cooking spray

Open the can of chickpeas, drain and rinse
Marinate the chickpeas in spices, white wine and a few dashes of balsamic in a bowl or tupperware
When you’re about 17 minutes away from the other dishes being ready, pre-heat a pan with some EVOO or cooking spray
Remove the chickpeas from the marinade, I use a slotted spoon to do so, and toast on medium-high until the exterior starts to brown (usually about 10-15 minutes)
Shake the pan every few minutes to move the chickpeas around so they brown evenly
Once they’re browned to your linking, remove from the heat and serve

I usually pair with baked butternut squash, sauteed garlic kale or kale chips and toasted quinoa.

Cooking Notes:

–The Wine: I NEVER cook with a wine I wouldn’t drink. So, choose whichever you’d like. Anything from a Chardonnay to Riesling works. I usually use a traditional table white wine or a dry Pinot Grigio

–Marination Time : Since this is a go-to meal I usually only marinate them for about an hour, but if you can remember in the morning to prepare them it will taste MUCH more delicious

Vegan Blueberry Lemon Poppy Seed Bread

It’s 3:15 am… a time of… well not really day OR night… it’s a time no person should ever experience let alone when they’re SO worn out and sleepy all they want to do is go back to sleep. I’ve you’ve been following A Byte of Life, you’ll have read the post on Spain (also found here) which was a MOST incredible trip! We were seriously debating how long we could just fall off the grid and NOT come home! But alas, common sense or something to that nature won and we got on the multiple planes home. Oh hey jet lag, how are you? Are YOU the reason I’m up at 3:15am!?

Turning to my tried and true comfort, I started googling for recipes. If I can’t sleep I may as well bake right!? My love for lemon poppy-seed is almost as strong as my love for a good bottle of red wine, and thankfully, the mister LOVES a good lemon poppy-seed ANYTHING! The request was made and I had a mission ahead of me: your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to create a delicious lemon poppy-seed baked good that’s not super sweet and melts in your mouth Well, now that’s a fun challenge!

Vegan Blueberry Lemon Poppy Seed Bread
—-
1/4C canola oil
1/4 C honey
1/4C applesauce
1/4 C soy milk
zest & juice of 1 lemon
—-
2 C Bob’s Red Mill Gluten-Free flour
3/4 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
2 tbs poppy seeds
1 C fresh blueberries (put in freezer for about 30 minutes before using)
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Pre-heat oven to 375
Combine the oil, applesauce, soy milk, honey , lemon juice and zest in a bowl
Sift together the flour, baking soda and salt. Add the poppy seeds and mix to combine.
Add to the wet ingredients and incorporate
Fold in frozen blueberries. Note that the batter will be thick
Place into a greased loaf pan, sprinkle raw sugar on top
Bake at 375 for 35 minutes(turning once half way through cooking)

Tasting notes:
It’s not your typical fluffy, white flour, white sugar lemon loaf you’d get at Starbucks. This is a more rustic bread and it was quite good! The gluten-free flour lends to a bit more of a mealy texture. Next time I’d add a bit more lemon juice. It’s not a sweet bread at all, so you’d need a lemoncello glaze, or blueberry jam/lemon curd/clotted cream to make it more pastry-ish.

All in all, it’s a good solid rustic breakfast bread…and…I better go taste another slice before posting this review 🙂

Simple Winter Soup- Butternut Squash, Yam, Carrot & Garlic

butternut-squash-soup-3 — Photo from: “inspiring the everyday” post on butternut squash soup

Somehow the winter season always ages my hobbies by about ten years; knitting, roasting whole pumpkins, baking, canning and the strong desire to bake and make breads and pastas, winter meals, soups, stews… wanting to make everything really. I will admit I recently pins a recipe for homemade Wheat thins! (Stay tuned to see how THAT one goes!)

While chatting last night with my impossibly adorable new hairstylist who is also a foodie, she shared with me a new recipe! Cue ridiculous joy and excitement! We proceed to chat the entire time about her recently discovered hobby of making homemade pasta from scratch (a checkbox on my cooking bucket list), reviewing all of our favorite local restaurants and expounding on 15 uses for sage (It truly is an under appreciated herb)!

Cooking doesn’t have to be hard, we both agreed, you just have to have the ingredients in your pantry and a couple of minutes to make it.

So, along with the recently added item “weather proof boots” on my winter weekend to do list, “roast” to appease the pumpkin on my counter, and “meal plan” to attempt an attack plan to actually COOK all of my recently pinned winter dishes, I shall also be making this soup!

I’ll post my own pictures once I cook it up but for now, enjoy a lovely picture from inspiring the everyday’s post on butternut squash soup.
So, stock up on winter goodness, snuggle into your favorite sweater, pour a glass of wine and and let the winter begin!!

What are your warming winter foods or your go to winter dishes?
Winter Warming Squash Soup

1 butternut squash
carrots, yams and fresh garlic (ratio to your preference)
1 large onion to caramelize
chicken stock/broth

Directions-

Pre-heat the oven to 400 or 450 (depends on how quickly you want the veggies and how your oven heats) and proceed with prepping the butternut squash as you prefer. Note: There are two methods for butternut squash you can either peel it and bake it or slice in half rub with olive oil and bake.
Slice the carrots and yams, and chop off the top of your garlic. (I just posted a recipe here on home-roasting your own garlic. You can roast and keep fresh for up to a week, frozen for a few months. It’s GREAT to have on hand for winter meals!)
Roast all veggies and garlic in pre-heated oven until golden brown.
In the meantime, sauté your onions.
Once the squash, veggies and garlic are roasted to your preferred “done-ness”, remove from the oven and blend/ puree in a food processer with some warmed chicken broth and serve warm.

Carrot Raisin Walnut Muffins (Dairy Free)

Well she’s at it again… the one who can’t rest when she’s sick! What can I say!? I was tasted up for a carrot raisin muffin and there were carrots in the fridge! Now, on a note to my future self, baby carrots are NOT the optimum for baking and I’m actually amazed that I didn’t grate my fingers in the process! But, as I previously stated, in my defense that’s all that was in the fridge and I was in no condition to be baking… let alone traipsing out to the store in the Seattle rain! So, I worked with what was in the pantry!

I cut the original recipe in half since my other half doesn’t enjoy vegetables in his baked goods and I can’t..er… shouldn’t eat a dozen by myself in a week. Although after tasting one fresh out of the oven just now, I’m pretty sure I could happily live off of these and soy foam americanos for at LEAST the next week. These are THE best muffins I think I’ve ever made! And let me tell you, I’ve made a LOT of muffins in my lifetime! They were perfectly moist yet dense and hearty enough that I wasn’t reaching for a second just to feel full. The balance between the walnut, carrot and raisin to “bread” ratio was superb!

When it comes to breakfast, I start with my “protein” and build around that. Garbanzo bean flour has twice the protein that other flours have and mixed with the other goodies in the muffin, it’s just a perfect delight to grab in the morning and doesn’t leaving me reaching for a loaf of bread by 10am or feeling bad about eating a muffin for breakfast! One of these guys with some yogurt or cottage cheese and a coffee and you’ve got a happy morning!

I was short on eggs and long on garbanzo bean flour so I figured I’d noodle around with the recipe a bit. After all, I strongly believe that recipes are simply “ratio guidelines” for us to play with! And I like raisins so I threw a few handfuls in there! When it comes to “wet” ingredients in baking recipes I cook a lot “to taste” making sure to keep the same ratio of wet to dry ingredients while making sure to keep an eye on the leavening agents. I learned that last one the hard way, you don’t want to omit those or you’ll have dense flat baked goods!

Carrot Raisin Walnut Muffins (Dairy Free)
Yield: 6 muffins
Recipe adapted from PCC’s Market recipe: Carrot-Walnut Muffins

Ingredients
1 1/2 c Garbanzo Bean Flour
1/2 c wheat bran
1/2 c brown sugar
1 tsp baking soda
1 tbsp baking powder
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp ground nutmeg
1/4 c + 2 tbsp apple sauce
2/3 cup vanilla soy yogurt
2 1/2 cups grated carrots
chopped walnuts & raisins to taste

Preparation
Preheat oven to 350° F. Combine the dry ingredients in a bowl. Add the remaining ingredients, one at a time, and stir to blend. Spoon into oiled muffin tins or paper muffin cups. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes.

Nutritional Value

	Calories	Fat(g)	Sat Fat(g)	Cholesterol(g)	Sodium(mg)	Potassium (mg)	Total Carbs (g)	Dietary Fiber (g)	Sugar(g)	Protein (g)
1 Dozen	175	2	0.75	3.75	346	226	31.5	6.6	16.8	8.6
Half Dozen	351	4.5	1.5	7.5	692	451	63	13	34	17

Variations:

Any flour can be used, but keep an eye on the baking time if you’re using whole wheat as it tends to burn quicker
1/4 c apple sauce replaced one egg
2 tbsp apple sauce replaced 2 tbsp oil
I added raisins to my recipe since I like them, but you can omit or add whatever other ingredients you wish (coconut, chocolate chips, other nuts, etc)