I have a real treat for your today if you like hummus, bean dips, and pizza.
A hummus recipe that is–well, pizza hummus. Or pizza dip. Or just a great tangy, spicy hummus recipe.
Or just plain yum.
Super Bowl Menu – 2013
January 29, 2013 By 13 Comments
If you’re planning a Superbowl get together and would like some healthy fixins for your crowd, here is a great list of healthy snacks and such.
I am typically not such a big football fan, but we love getting together with friends and hope to do it again this year.
On the Road with Special Diets ~ and Focaccia Flax Bread (gluten-free with vegan option) {Balanced Platter}
June 28, 2012 By 5 Comments
Are you or a loved one on a special diet?
If so, you know how hard it can be to travel.
Stopping at fast food places, eating at restaurants, and the like can be very difficult.
Whether or not you are on or know someone on a special diet, join me today over at The Balanced Platter where I’m sharing some of my favorite foods to take on the road (not that we get there very often 
).
If special diets are a part of your life, this post will hopefully make traveling easier for you.
And if they’re not a part of what you deal with, I think your next trip will be a little more wholesome.
Enjoy …..to continue reading, click here.
Nut Butter Fruit Dip | Dessert Sauce (with allergy and sugar free options)
February 3, 2012 By 47 Comments
I love dips. Veggie dips. Fruit dips. Hummus. Bean Dips.
My son doesn’t really like dip, but he will eat my dips on rice, plain, or spread them on breads and such.
As I mentioned on my Facebook page a few days ago, I was working on an Almond Butter Dip.
Anyhow, the was a complete success. In fact, I couldn’t really keep out of it yesterday.
I always have to find the balance between making things that are good enough to share with all of you and yet not so good that I end up eating all of it.
(Well, I didn’t eat all of it, but….)
I typically don’t rush around to get a post out (gotta take it a little slow due to adrenal fatigue), but I thought you all might want to add this to your Healthy Superbowl Menu Galore.
I used to love those caramel apple dips, but they are loaded with all kinds of things that I don’t want to or can’t eat anymore:
- high fructose corn syrup
- partially hydrogenated oils
- disodium phosphate
- mono and diglycerides
- potassium sorbate
- white sugar
Ick.
This dip, while not caramel, is really tasty. And is made of only healthful ingredients.
And it’s super fast to make! My kind of recipe.
Healthy Superbowl Food Galore!
February 2, 2012 By 47 Comments
So the Superbowl is this weekend and you are scrambling to have some healthy options to munch on or serve to your guests.
The truth is, we may or may not be watching the Superbowl this year. We are really an ice hockey family and we get our fair share (or actually, much more than that) of sports each year (especially in the winter season) without football being added to it.
But if we can incorporate spending time with others and the football, then maybe we too will be watching the Big Bowl.
Just yesterday my son said, “You know, Mom, you really should write a post about Superbowl Foods. I see a lot of people writing posts on it!”
I hesitated, thinking that I ‘d just written Healthy Snacks to Nourish You on the Go, but decided to go ahead with this post for two reasons:
- There are things that wouldn’t classify as a snack that would be great for the Superbowl
- To celebrate my son’s great idea. Most of you know that he has autism (Asperger’s Syndrome). One of the reasons that I keep plugging along with this blog is that he helps me with a few “behind the scenes” things. Like:
- Helping with linking my site to blog hops
- Emailing the Free Soaked Grains E-book to subscribers
- Proofreading my posts (sometimes)
- Updating my Recipes page with new recipes
I am just thrilled with how his autism has been healing and that, despite the fact that sometimes he messes something up and I wonder why oh why I am working on this with him, sometimes he really surprises me with a great idea. So – in honor of my son, here is a list of things that we think would be great additions to your Sunday celebration, with or without the Superbowl.
(Actually, I am wondering if he suggested this to make it more likely that we’ll say “yes” to letting him watch the Superbowl ! I probably will.)
So – on to the Healthy Superbowl Food Ideas!
Kale Chips – Veggies Your Kids Will Love
September 8, 2011 By 71 Comments
Looking for a healthy snack or a way to use up extra greens from your garden? How about a healthy substitute for potato chips?
You new healthy snack solution to the rescue is — Kale Chips. (We have even taken to eating them as a side dish when I need a fast veggie !)
Kale Chips, you say? Why make Kale Chips?
- They taste great. Really. Just ask my kids and everyone else whom I’ve shared them with
- They are really healthy.
- Save tons of money! They cost $69/lb on one site and $43/lb on another. Ugh!
- Kale is super easy to grow. You can even still grow it now in a lot of areas of the country.
If you remember from my post on Considering a CSA? – Information You Must Know, an over-abundance of greens (especially kale) was one of the hardest things about participating in a CSA.
This year, though we are quite happy with our CSA experience, we still have a bit too much kale and chard, especially considering that our kale is one of the crops that really decided to do well in our garden (we still need to figure our why our zucchini seems to be the only zucchini resistant to growing .
In past years, we have made Oven-Baked Kale, which was quite a hit, and I will be sure to share the recipe with you soon.
However, the kale is really coming in fast and furious and I needed another solution (though it’s great, there are only so many nights that my family will eat baked kale .)
Well, here it is. Tasty, crisp, salty and delicious and good for you – and a great way to get veggies into your family’s diet!
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How to Make The Best Garden Fresh Salsa – Recipe
August 26, 2011 By 59 Comments
Looking for a great salsa recipe?
Remember my post about our weekend of processing and storing tomatoes?
This year, being the vegetable freaks that we have become, planted a large garden and also bought into a local CSA as a “back up.” Well, our CSA farmer offered us a TON about 120 pounds of tomatoes (see the beautiful mix of reds, yellows and oranges in the bowl?) this past weekend, and me, being the glutton for bulk kitchen anything accepted his offer.
Tuscan Bean Dip
June 13, 2011 By 1 Comment
As I shared in my post on Chat Masala (the spice mix that now graces our table at literally every meal), sometimes “mistakes” turn out to be a great thing after all.
Now, sometimes they don’t — like the time when I baked a cake with my elementary school friend and it ended up being used as a frisbee. No kidding.
Almond Feta
February 17, 2011 By 27 Comments
Here is a recipe for almond feta cheese that makes it easy to get the great flavor of feta without the dairy.
Now, I am not opposed to dairy, per se, but my son has a life-threatening allergy to cow’s milk, so it is not an option for him. This is one of his favorite things that I make with our raw almonds and boy, was he thrilled when I made it again today!
This recipe is a slight modification from one found on Diet, Dessert and Dogs, a sugar-free and gluten-free blog. I admit that I am quite envious at times of the great detail that she can go into in sculpting beautiful desserts. That went out the window for me once about a year ago when I had to rethink my limitations. Well, in truth I do that daily, right?
Anyhow, I still get goat and sheep feta for myself at Costco sometimes as I seem to be tolerating it well, though they do not always have it. For my son, this version will have to do. And it’s quite good whether baked or not. In fact, until today, we never baked it. We just ate it as is. Again–limitations! And when it gets gobbled up without going through all the extra effort, then I typically don’t go to the extra effort!
Here is a photo of the finished product (nicely shaped and baked this time :
Now quickly, before you go on to the recipe, I need to explain my main alternation to the recipe. First of all, clearly the color of my “cheese” is more pink than white. That is because the original recipe called for blanched almonds. Now, I could certainly have done that to enhance the color of the finished product, to make it look more like feta, but in order to blanch almonds, you need to boil them, which causes them not to be raw anymore. And yes, I know that almost all almonds in the U.S. are not raw, but I coordinate a large purchase of raw almonds in the early winter months every year so mine (and other lucky almond buyers’) are truly raw. Even if your almonds are labeled “raw”, they almost certainly are not. (By the way, if you live in West Michigan, you are welcome to join us this year and there may be some left this year yet if you are quick!)
In any case, to keep the enzymes intact in my soaked and dried almonds, boiling them is not a great option, and since the recipe tastes great without blanching, I am all for saving the time and effort. I am sure that there is a slight variation in the taste, but I think the nutrition boost and time savings counteract any gain there.
So–here is the recipe:
Almond Feta
Ingredients:
2 cups whole raw almonds
1/2 cup lemon juice
6 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil
1 clove garlic
2 1/2 tsp fine salt
6 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil
dried or fresh parsley, or other herb to taste
Directions:
Soak almonds overnight or up to 24 hours. Drain and rinse.
In a high-powered blender, blend the almonds, lemon juice, 6 Tbsp of olive oil, garlic, and salt until very smooth.
Preheat oven to 200F. Line baking pan with parchment paper. Spoon the cheese onto the parchment and shape into a disk approximately 3/4-inch thick. Bake for approximately 40 minutes or until the top is stiff and dry. Cool and chill if you would like to serve it cold, or for a warm cheese dish, immediately top with the remaining olive oil and sprinkle with herbs.
This would be great spread on Focaccia Flax Bread, plain or served as a sandwich with grated carrots on it or served with fresh vegetables. Yum!
Linked to Monday Mania and April in the Raw.
Savory Hummus
December 26, 2010 By 70 Comments
I am always on the hunt for quick, easy, frugal, healthy (and did I miss tasty?) meals and snack ideas.
Well, this one really fits the bill.
This recipe is our version based on one that we found in a Cooking Light magazine years ago. And I mean years.
My path to health started (though now I know that it was not in a good direction) back in my teenage days when my grandfather passed away from a sudden heart attack while driving. He had already had heart surgery (a triple bypass) in previous years and his mother had died from atherosclerosis (hardening of the arteries). I thought that low fat and especially low animal protein must be the way to go and so I did. Hard core. Armed with one subscription of Cooking Light magazine I was off and running to the healthy kitchen races.
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