Still Cookin'

I'm still cooking my food due to tummy-issues. This is quite weird for me - gluten free plus dairy free is one thing, but I really start feeling deprived when I can't have a big, daily dose of fresh fruit and vegetables. Well, so be it.

It doesn't mean no treats, though! So here are two new "tried" things to eat if you're grain, soy and dairy free.

First off, I've tried Apple Muffins, which I found at this website that has a lot of recipes that are excellent if you really need to restrict the intake of...I was going to say everything, but it's obviously not. They are mainly apple sauce, apple pieces, two eggs, oil and a bit of honey. I was prepared for muffin disaster when I baked them, especially afraid they where going to be "egg-y", but they really are just sweet, freshly apple-tasting and perfect!

At first I thought there was no way I was going to get 16(!) muffins out of the amount of batter and sure enough it got me only 8 normal-sized ones, but I ended up cutting them in half afterwards, they are really - I wouldn't say filling, just satisfying. I didn't tweak the recipe except I only used two small tbsp honey, and it's sweet enough for me - next time I might see if I can bring down the amount of oil a bit too, as they are fairly oily. I froze them immediately and since my freezer is not that cold, I can eat them straight from the freezer, good for the summer heat!

Secondly I tried Cashew Butter Muffins, which can be found in this recipe section. The recipe calls for

1 cup cashew butter
2 small bananas
2 eggs
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp apple cider vinegar

Again, for me that's a really quirky recipe for muffins. I cringe at using that much cashew butter in just one batch of muffins because that stuff is bloody expensive, but I had some old-ish almond butter so I used about half a cup almond butter and a quarter cup of tahini (no salt in either). I blended bananas and nut butters, added the eggs and blended, added the baking soda and blended, and finally mixed in the vinegar and about 4 tbsp almond pulp and a handful of soaked, chopped almonds to make up for my penny-pinching ways with the nut butters.

I love it how the original recipe says, "These muffins even had little air pockets in them like regular ones." Yep, it's the small things that count. Mine came out fragrant, light, and fluffy - watch out with the oven though, they really were done in a cinch. I reckon they would be sweeter with the cashew butter - my almond-tahini subbed ones are quite earthy, and very subtly banana-tasting. I never bother calculating statistics on my food, but I'm wagering these are pretty high in protein because of the eggs and the nuts - nice.

It has been warm here for two days now, way up in the range of stupid warm, wanna-shower-three-times-a-day-but-cannot-get-cold-water-from-the-faucet-anymore kinda warm. So about the last thing I've been wanting to do is crank up the oven to make muffins, or heat up the stove to simmer the life out veggies for veggie stock or turn crisp apples into mush for a batch of apple sauce. Good thing is, once it's done, and things have cooled of on the counter and spent the night in the fridge, there's cold apple sauce and chilled veggie broth for breakfast. Works wonders for a sore tummy!