A Little More

Food experiments have taken a bit of a spring slumber in my kitchen, but a lot of other interesting stuff has been shakin'. Given the name and spirit of the blog- also, whose going to stop me- I'm going to try rolling in what I've been up to outside of the kitchen. Not unlikely sushi.

The past week has provided a dare I say perfect opportunity to do this. Here in Austin, we're in the thick of the Fusebox Festival, a ten day party of boundary-pushing, interactive performance and visual art that gives the finger to genres and conventions (although at times, still writes them a 'do u like me' note folded into a seemingly impossible 7.5 pointed star). It's fun as hell, and I've had the pleasure of volunteering at several events.

... starting with Mozart Requiem Undead, an experiment, let's call it, spear-headed by the Golden Hornet Project. For this collaboration, ten composers from all over the map pounced upon Mozart's last work, the Requiem Mass, which he died before he could finish. Said composers filled in the blanks. For the performance, a string and brass section, several percussion set ups, a band, and keys joined a choir of 200 volunteer singers at the French Legation, a beautiful, sprawling outdoor venue in the downtown vicinity. People were climbing the walls to get in. I'm not exaggerating, I was standing guard- with selective efficacy- at the side gate.

To set the scene: the weather was perfect, the space was enchanting, and the performance knocked everyone's socks right off their tapping toes. I don't know how to talk about music in any technical or expert sense (is that a treble... clef?), the best I can come up with is this: The show was fucking awesome. The emotional swells that Mozart has such a mastery over came through, as did the fun that each composer clearly had with re-imagining their movement. The audience's anticipation of what surprises the next movement would bring seemed to consistently give way to delight. The effect of 200 voices- even untrained- singing all at once- shivers, y'all.

A lot of people have reviewed or commented on the show already, so I'll leave it at this: my boss was also there, a man old enough to be my dad, and certainly with different tastes and sensibilities than I. At work the next day, spills of laudatory adjectives burst forth as we rehashed our experiences, although making a coherent sentence seemed beyond our capabilities. We were geeking the fuck out about this shit. Golden Hornet Project, I have a cleverly folded note for you.

Coconut Cream Smoothie

It's been a while! Life has taken a turn for the busy, so I've had to put kitchen adventures on the back burner. But I threw something together last night that delighted me so, I couldn't keep it to myself.

Coconut Cream Smoothie (raw, vegan)
makes just over 2 cups, 1-2 servings depending on your appetite

1 large banana 

1/2 large apple (of the Gala, Fuji variety) 

8-10 cashews 

1 pitted date 

1/2 Cup unsweetened, shredded coconut 

1 cup (give or take) unsweetened almond milk 

optional- 1 Tbs flax seeds (I add this to every smoothie for the Omega 3s)

Put all ingredients into a high speed blender and blend to desired consistency. I've recently discovered the Smoothie Setting on my Vitamix; it's amazing! Perfect texture EVERY time!

And that is all you need for a decadent coconut flavor-trip! I almost always put a few frozen items into my smoothies so they're nice and cold, but the warm temperature of this recipe doesn't hurt the outcome one bit. It kinda feels pie-ish, which is never a bad thing.

Raw Bites

I'll see your poker chips and 

raise you a tasty snack.

Fruit and nut bar success! Unlike my last attempt at the raw food snack bar cookie thing, I ditched recipes and followed my instinct. Turns out, it's pretty sharp. Or, that making this kind of thing is so ridiculously easy, you'd really have to be over-thinking it to screw it up... 

I had a bunch of seedy, nutty odds and ends that needed using, so I combined their powers into the following recipe.

Make Room fer Raw Bites (raw, vegan)
makes 2 cups of paste, variable servings

1 Cup dried dates, pitted and soaked for about 30 minutes 

1/2 Cup almonds 

1/2 Cup rolled oats

1/4 Cup raw pumpkin seeds

1/4 Cup sunflower seeds

1/4 Cup sesame seeds

small handful macadamia nuts

1Tbsp coconut oil 

1-2 Tbsp vanilla

1. Put all ingredients in a high speed blender and blend on a low to mid setting. The tamp will only get you so far on this one, I had to stop that blender and scrape the sides several times.
   
   (I typically like my fruit-nut bites with a lot of texture, but if I was going for a smoother consistency, I'd grind the nuts and seeds into a meal or flour before blending. This would also be a good idea if you look around your kitchen and don't see a high speed blender.)


2. Once everything is mixed into a fairly homogeneous paste, form the paste into little bite sized pieces with your hands. I got 27. You could also make balls, bars, really any shape. Got a cookie cutter? Go crazy.


3. You can eat them right away, or chill in the fridge for a couple hours first. Store in fridge or freezer. I see a lot of recipes that recommend separating each bite or bar with plastic wrap or some such, but I never bother.

This recipe is one of dozens (hundreds? thousands?) that you could make: experiment with other dried fruits instead of the dates or use a nut butter; sub your own favorite nuts and seeds; add chocolate, shaved coconut, or other flavorings; make it savory rather than sweet. Here are some tasty looking recipes from Counter Culture Living. Here are some more from 100 Days of Real Food.

Take THAT, added salt and sugar, preservatives, and unnecessary soy!

Surprise, it's Granola!

I’ve made my own raw food bars/ snacks a couple times and really enjoy having them around. I found a neat, customizable recipe at choosingraw.com (really, I should just change the name of this blog to the choosing raw fan club). I misjudged the amount of time the ingredients needed to blend, though, so when I should’ve pulled a pan of gooey but sliceable fruit-nut-paste stuff out of the fridge, I got a bunch of crumbles. Crumbles! Fortunately, I found that the mix was still super filling and tasted amazing atop yogurt with blueberries or with almond milk as a kind of muesli cereal thing. Success!

Happy Accident Granola (raw, vegan-able)

makes about 4 cups

1 Cup almonds, raw 

1 1/4 Cup quick oats 

1/4 Cup chia seeds 

1/4 Cup raw sunflower seeds 

Pinch of sea salt 

2 tsps cinnamon 

1 Cup goji berries 

3 tbsp coconut oil 

1 Tbsp agave nectar 

3 Tbsp honey (for a truly vegan variation, just use agave nectar) 

2 Tbsp ground flax seed

Blend to desired consistency and refrigerate. This will also do fine in the freezer.

I’ll try fruit bars again (with more blender patience!), but I’ll also be returning to this easy, happy-accident granola very soon.

Hard Core Soft Serve

A couple of weeks ago, I discovered banana soft serve. My life is changing. I'd position this confection a little closer sherbet than soft serve, but who cares what's like; it deserves its own dessert category. Freezey flavor bombs? Raw fruit cream? Whatever you call it, it's so easy to make, so pretty-good for you, and so swear-inducingly tasty! Here are a few variations I’ve come up with since I stumbled across Gena Hamshaw (of choosingraw.com blastasticalness)’s Raw Blueberry Ginger Ice Cream recipe over the 4th of July.

Apple Pie Banana soft serve (raw, vegan)
Makes 3-4 servings

2 frozen bananas

2 small red delicious apples, chopped and frozen (I’d have prefered something closer to Fuji, but this is what I had on hand)

1 Tablespoon lemon juice

3 Tablespoons almond milk

1/4 teaspoon cloves

1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg

1/4 teaspoon allspice

1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1 teaspoon vanilla

2 oz crushed pecans

2 Tablespoons ground flax seeds

Blend everything together until texture is creamy, top with nuts or whatever you'd like, and devour. 

This one could have used some sort of crust, but I still enjoyed it mightily. Also, it didn’t do quite as well as a leftover as the Blueberry Ginger. Might just have to eat the whole thing next time.

Next up: I friggin love bananas. Their flavor, their nutritional content, how you can do next to anything with them... but my fella just can't abide this wonderfruit (also on that list: Elton John, Disney movies, and “The Final Countdown.” Somehow we're still together). I wanted to bring the magic of raw soft serve to him, though, so I put our differences aside and made the following variation, using mango instead of banana as a base.

Tropical Soft Serve Night (raw, vegan) (recommended listening)
Makes 3-4 servings

2 Cups (10 oz) frozen mango, chopped

1/2 Cup frozen pineapple, chopped

1/2 Cup frozen peaches, chopped

3-4 Tablespoons full-fat coconut milk

1/4 cup crushed macadamia nuts (I soaked them for about 30 minutes first)

1/2 Tablespoon lime juice

Blend to perfection for a flavor explosion. 

One thing to consider: this variation is super sweet. This wasn't a deal-breaker for me, but next time, I'll try subbing peaches for some or all of the pineapple to take the sugar factor down a notch. The texture for this one was on point, especially when covered with crushed macadamias. 

You'll just have to use your
imagination on this one.

Food52.com (via Hamshaw, of course!) has a ton of other variations to try, and here are some more ideas that have been floating around in my head with summer fruits in full swing:

Chocolate Cherry, with frozen cherries and cacao nibs

Melon, with cantaloupe, honeydew, and maybe some cucumber

Lemon Strawberry

Hyatt Riot Tomatillo Salsa

The Hyatts, my fella’s folks, brought us about a pound and a half of tomatillo peppers from their garden last week. I’d been meaning to make a foray into homemade salsa for ages, so this was a fabulous surprise. I turned to Mark "Food Matters" Bittman’s Tomatillo Salsa recipe, which I doubled, blend-ified, raw-ified, and tweaked for heat and flavor.

Hyatt Riot Tomatillo Salsa (raw-able, vegan)

Makes about 4 cups

4 cups husked, rinsed and quartered tomatillos. They’ll be a little sticky once peeled, the rinsing will take care of that.

2 large jalapenos, chopped

A couple cloves of garlic, chopped

1/2 cup chopped white onion

1 teaspoon salt

1/2 a lime’s worth of juice

1/2 cup tightly packed fresh parsley (Fresh parsley or carrot tops are my go to sub for cilantro, which I just can’t get down with.)

Optional: 1/4 C pickled jalapeno or pepperoncini juice, if the heat in the peppers isn’t gonna do it for ya. Note that if you’re going for raw, the vinegar used to make most commercial pickled items was likely boiled at some point. Raw pickled foods are available, though (also totally better for you for), and of course, adding some extra kick via more fresh peppers, chili powder, wasabi, whatever, is encouraged.

Put everything in a blender and blend to preferred consistency.

Hey salsa, you seasick?
Cuz you are GREEN.

Typically, I do a lot of tasting when I blend or cook up something new, adding a little of this (or of that) to get the recipe where I want it. With this one, though, it was perfect on the first try. For me, this means that the flavors of the vegetables really come through for a green, planty taste, there’s just enough tang from the lime juice, and whoa nelly, is it spicy!

The next time the Hyatts grace us with some tomatillos from their garden, I may add a small avocado, a cucumber, a tomato, or some cumin to this recipe and see what happens. Not that it’s lacking on its own!

2 Coconut Water Hydrators

Since my last post, I've relocated to a new house, and in fact, the move inspired the following two variations on coconut water-based hydrators. Because when you're moving, you sweat. And when you're moving in Texas in July, beer and pizza ain't cuttin it.

Blueberry Secret Weapon (vegan, raw) 

Makes a pint 

1 Cup Coconut water 

1 Cup filtered water (or, ya know, tap’s cool) 

Pinch of salt 

Drop or 2 agave nectar 

handful of frozen blueberries 

Put everything in a water bottle (mine’s about 16 oz) and shake shake shake. It’s ready! Added bonus to this hydrator: blueberry treat at the end.

I first tried this little number with my second attempt at yoga sculpt (yoga + weights, for the sadistically inclined). The last time I had taken this class, it killed. So for the second run, I brought my Blueberry Secret Weapon. It didn’t help me survive the class any better, but I did notice I felt a little more lively afterward. So we can say that it worked! I had another one of these fellers after running some errands, with a peach sliced into it and strained. Yurm.

Not a berry fan? Have a go at...

Summer in a Glass (vegan, raw)
Makes about 2 pints

1 Cup Coconut water

1 Cup filtered water (tap’s still cool) 

1 Cup fresh watermelon, chopped up a little 

1 Cup cucumber, chopped up a little 

Optional: Couple leaves of fresh spearmint 

What is that, a halo over the glass?

Blend all ingredients together. I strained the mixture, so it was more juice than smoothie, but there's no shame in keeping the pulp. Everything I used had been refrigerated, except for the mint. If more than one or two ingredients had been at room temp, I'd have added a couple ice cubes before blending.

My fella and I shared this concoction during some major unpacking (and... after a late night of frivolity). It hit the spot!

For more totally delicious coconut-water based hydrators, plus a little insight into the nutritional science behind them, head over to Thrive Forward's Sport section. Thrive Forward is like youtube + wikipedia + allrecipes for a plant-based clean living lifestyle. It overflows with info and goodness.