Browsing articles in "Recipe"
Recipe, Sweets, Vegetarian
Feb 14, 2012
sabrinamodel
4 Comments

Champagne & Roses Caramel = Ooey Gooey Sticky Romance = Happy Valentine’s Day!

I may have mentioned before here and here that I love Valentine’s Day. It also happens to be  my halfiversary- sort of. When I was a kid, I figured that if August 4th was my birthday, February 2nd must be my half birthday.  Pretty fancy division skills, right?

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Joshua and I met on August 28th, and were married on the same date 6 years later. We’ve always celebrated our halfiversary using my awesome kid-math- so… February 14th it is.

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This year, a last minute change of plans, means we’re staying in, and I know exactly what we’re having for dessert. Champagne (pink champagne at that!) and roses turn this caramel sauce into pure romance. While I have been eating this off of a spoon, tonight, we’ll have ice cream parfaits layered with blood orange pound cake, champagne-soaked strawberries, and vanilla bean whipped cream topped with some rose petals nicked from my neighbor’s organic garden—with his permission of course!

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Happy Valentine’s Day!

  • INGREDIENTS
  • ½ cup of rosé champagne
  • 1 cup organic sugar
  • heavy pinch of sea salt
  • ½ cup heavy cream
  • 1 tablespoon rose water
  • ½  teaspoon whole ground vanilla (like Love Street Living Foods) or a whole vanilla bean
  • 4 tablespoons butter cut into small pieces

 

  • INSTRUCTIONS
  • In a heavy bottom sauce pan, reduce champagne over medium high heat until it’s volume is reduced by half.
  • Add sugar and salt and bring to a boil while swirling the pan gently. Turn down heat to medium and continue to swirl the pan to incorporate the sugars. Wipe down the sides of the pot with a wet pastry brush, to incorporate.
  • Watch your caramel very carefully, as it starts to change color, it will go from perfect to burnt, very quickly. Since we’re using a colored liquid, you’ll want to be extra careful. Smell and viscosity will also play a large part in making this sauce. The caramel should drip very very slowly off the back of a wooden spoon- think thick like maple syrup.
  • In a separate small saucepan, warm heavy cream, rosewater, and vanilla until just warm to the touch.
  • When sugar mixture is golden amber in color, completely smooth, and thick like syrup, remove the sugar mixture from the heat source, and slowly whisk in the cream in a steady stream.
  • Place pot back on low heat, and whisk in the butter one piece at a time- only adding the next piece once the last one is fully incorporated.
  • Cook on low for a minute or two, whisking constantly to achieve a nice thickness, remove from heat and cool before tasting. Serve over vanilla ice cream, or pound cake, or strawberries macerated in champagne… or make a sundae with all three!

 

Breakfast, Recipe, Sweets, Vegan, Vegetarian
Feb 9, 2012
sabrinamodel
9 Comments

Strawberry Cashew Milk Shake For Valentine’s Day & Every Day

As Valentine’s Day nears, it seems that everything is tinged with sweetness. I love the movement towards DIY Valentines, and old-fashioned handmade candies make me squeal.

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Who cares if Hallmark popularized the day, take it back! Celebrate this time by treating yourself , your friends, your family, and your sweetie (if you have one) with love and kindness and special treats.

Of course, I can’t go around eating cake balls, and truffles, and lollipops for the entirety of the Valentine’s Day season, but does that mean I should miss out on pretty pink things and polka dot paper straws? It most certainly does not.

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This raw and vegan cashew milk is thick and creamy and so luxurious. It almost doesn’t seem fair that cashews are lower in fat that almost all other nuts, and the fat they do contain is mostly unsaturated fatty acid. To be specific, it’s the same fatty acid found in olive oil! Love that.  To that, we’re adding freeze dried strawberries which are full of antioxidants, dietary fiber, and crazy deliciousness (scientific term).

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All of the health stuff, cannot begin to describe how good this little shake tastes and feels.  I got a text yesterday from Joshua “Strawberry cashew milk, seriously, the best thing ever. I want to have it every day”. I guess that says it all. A little Valentine to my sweetheart, pretty, and pink, and sweet, each morning. I can do that.

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A quick shout-out to my friend Tracy at Shutterbean whose amazing Raw Chocolate Milk recipe reminded me who much I adore Cashew Milk. I still haven’t tried her recipe, but it’s next on my list.

Also, thank you to Michael Procopio of Food For the Thoughtless who asked about sources for both raw cashews and freeze dried strawberries. If you life near a Trader Joe’s, I highly recommend their freeze dried fruits and their nuts. They are both low cost and good.

Otherwise, check here for raw cashewsspacer and here for freeze dried strawberries

  • INGREDIENTS
  • 2 cups raw cashews soaked in water to cover for 2 hours
  • 1.4 ounces freeze dried strawberries
  • ½ cup coconut palm sugar
  • 1 tablespoons vanilla extract
  • 2+ cups water for blending

 

  • INSTRUCTIONS
  • In a spice grinder, pulverize strawberries until they are a very fine powder
  • Drain cashews
  • Add 1 ½ cups of water to a blender, pour in sugar, dried strawberry powder, and cashews and blend for at least 5 minutes. Check consistency of the shake. Add more water if needed and continue blending. There should be no grit. Add more water if you’d like it thinner.
  • Cool it in the fridge and serve- with two straws if you’re sharing.
Main Course, Recipe
Feb 5, 2012
sabrinamodel
26 Comments

Lamb Meatloaf Baked in Mini Pumpkins A Vintage Recipe Remake

Participating in the Burwell General Store Vintage Recipe Swap is one of the highlights of my month. In addition to working with a fantastic community of bloggers, I also get to push my creativity. If you’re not familiar with our swap, I’ll explain. Each month, Christianna chooses a recipe from a vintage recipe book, and we, the bloggers, re-imagine it.

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Simple. Right?

The re-imagining is my favorite part. I have gone from Potato Donuts to Donut Vodka- from Hot Slaw to Bacon and Escarole Custard and from Maple Cake to Savory Maple & Sausage Pies. This month’s vintage recipe is Wild Rice Dressing. It was meant to be stuffed into a turkey.

Three things about the recipe stood out:

  • 1. stuffing
  • 2. turkey
  • 3. curry powder

As I began to brainstorm about this one- I thought turkey, stuffing, thanksgiving, pumpkins… The first thought was to do a turkey sausage and lentil curry in little pumpkins, perhaps with some hand-harvested wild rice.  Fate intervened at my butcher shop, when some ground lamb called my name.

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Right then and there, I thought of one of my favorite dishes, Kaddo Bourani. It is an Afghani specialty of sweet pumpkin, covered in meat sauce, then topped in yogurt sauce.  So, that’s how these little guys came to be. I’ve used potimarron squash (also known as red kuri squash) because the skin is thin and edible. The flesh is dark orange red and tastes rather mapley and of chestnuts which is beautifully offset by the spices in the lamb. Baking the meatloaf right inside the pumpkin imparts an amazing flavor into the flavor of the squash as well.

My husband actually called it delightful. Just to clarify, he’s not generally the kind of guy who uses the word, “delightful. So while this recipe remake traveled a long way from it’s origins, I hope you’ll enjoy it. We certainly have.

  •  INGREDIENTS LAMB MEATLOAF

  • 1 red onion, coarsely chopped
  • 1 tablespoon olive oil
  • 2 lbs ground lamb
  • 5 tablespoons tomato paste
  • 4 eggs
  • 2 tablespoons coarsely chopped fresh cilantro
  • 3/4 tablespoon fresh ground coriander
  • 2 teaspoons tumeric
  • 1 tablespoon smoked paprika
  • 2 teaspoons black pepper
  • 1 ½ teaspoons sea salt
  • 6 finely chopped cloves of garlic
  • 1 ½ cups fresh breadcrumbs  (I used the ends of some toasted ciabatta and challah bread)

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  • INGREDIENTS PUMPKINS*

  • 8 small potimarron squash-each roughly 4-5 inches across
  • ¼ cup dark brown sugar

 

  • INGREDIENTS BREADCRUMB TOPPING

  • 1 cup fresh breadcrumbs
  • 3 tablespoons dark brown sugar
  • 1 teaspoon sea salt
  • 1 teaspoon black pepper
  • 2 teaspoons smoked paprika
  • handful of fresh cilantro
  • 2 tablespoons olive oil

 

  • INGREDIENTS YOGURT SAUCE

  • (ever so barely adapted from The Helmand’s Restaurant recipe published in SF Gate)
  • 2 cups of plain full fat organic yogurt
  • 1 teaspoon dried mint leaves (very finely chopped)
  • 4 cloves garlic, very finely chopped
  • ½ teaspoon sea salt

 

  • INSTRUCTIONS LAMB MEATLOAF

  • Preheat the oven to 400º and line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
  • Cook onions in olive oil in a large skillet over medium low heat- for about 15 minutes, turning from time to time to avoid scorching. You are looking to get caramelization, but no black or dark brown colors.
  • While onions are cooking, determine the top and bottom of your squash. Cut a very small amount off the bottom, just so it can stand up without wobbling. Be careful not to cut too deeply into the flesh. We want to keep the juice of the meatloaf all nice and sealed in. Next, flip it over, and cut off the top third of your squash.  Using a spoon, remove all of the seeds and the stringy matter from the inside.  Repeat with the rest of the squashes.
  • Rub the inside and cut tops of each squash with a little bit of brown sugar.
  • Toss breadcrumbs with dark brown sugar, sea salt, black pepper, smoked paprika, and cilantro until very well-combined. Drizzle in olive oil and toss to coat
  •  In a large bowl, combine sautéed onions with lamb, tomato paste, eggs, cilantro, coriander, tumeric, paprika, black pepper, sea salt, garlic, and breadcrumbs. Mix well, but gently, being careful not to overwork the meat.
  •  Gently stuff the meatloaf into the squashes so that it’s overfilled with a nice little mound on top. Finish each one with a generous sprinkling of breadcrumb topping.
  • Bake for 30 minutes then check squashes for doneness- you’ll know they’re done when you can insert a knife in the side of one with ease. Mine took about 45 minutes in the end.

 

  • For Yogurt Sauce & Finishing Touches

  • While meatloaf is baking, make yogurt sauce. Mix yogurt, mint, garlic, and salt. Cover and refrigerate until ready to use.
  • When squashes are done, cool for at least 10 minutes before eating, then top with yogurt and some fresh cilantro and enjoy

 

*Should you wish to skip the pumpkins, you can bake these in 8oz mason jars without the lids. Leave 1 inch of headspace. They will freeze well and travel well too! You’ll only need to bake these for about 25 minutes.

Main Course, Recipe, Vegan, Vegetarian
Feb 1, 2012
sabrinamodel
11 Comments

Spicy Japanese Farro Salad

My closest people would say that I rarely repeat a dish twice, and in a way it’s true. Once I’ve poked and prodded and looked at a recipe from the inside out, I’m ready to let it go.


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But there is another type of dish, the dish that is not really a recipe, the one that comes naturally- without thought. These are the dishes Joshua and I eat throughout the week. Packed off to work in Mason jars, shared with friends who stop by unexpectedly. Never precious, never fancy, always satisfying… these are the meals that warrant lunchtime texts of “Mmmm… thanks for lunch. Soo good. Do we have leftovers?”
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Breakfast, Recipe, Sweets, Vegan, Vegetarian
Jan 25, 2012
sabrinamodel
10 Comments

Vegan Rice Pudding Or Staving Off A Case of The Winter Blues

I was born with what people call a “sunny disposition”. Maybe it’s because I’m an August baby, ushered into the world at the height of summer. Or maybe I’m just wired that way.  Though, like anyone, sometimes I get the blues.

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With so many inspiring opportunities on the horizon, 2012 promised to  start off with a bang and… a sniffle. Yes, a New Year’s Eve cold- one that lingered a bit too long- and two weeks later it was tonsillitis, a sinus infection, and a fever of over 100º. Rest and fluids seemed to do the trick, or so I thought, until last weekend left me with a stomach bug.

I guess my body might be telling me to take a break, be gentle, maybe get away from The City for a weekend and just sit in a hot tub while looking at the redwoods. But until then, there is always jasmine tea, a good book, an extra kiss, an extra blanket, cranking the heater up to 63º, and some homemade vegan rice pudding.

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I love this rice pudding for a several reasons.

  1. 1. I can’t tell if it’s dessert of breakfast; therefore, it is perfectly acceptable to eat it whenever I please
  2. 2. It is completely culturally confused, part Thai with its sweet sticky rice and coconut milk, part Indian with its cardamom and pistachios, and part European grandmother because all European grandmothers make rice pudding
  3. 3. It is relatively healthy even though it tastes decadent and totally naughty.
  4. 4. Even though it’s called glutinous rice, it’s totally gluten free!
  5. 5. You make it in your rice cooker, only one dish to wash!
  6. 6. It makes my husband wildly happy

I actually feel better just having written about the rice pudding. Magic!

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  • Ingredients Vegan Rice Pudding

  • 1 15 oz can of organic full fat coconut milk (well-shaken)
  • 16 oz (2 c)  vanilla flavored whole grain rice milk
  • ¼ cup coconut palm sugar
  • ½ tablespoon ground cardamom
  • ¼ cup dried cherries
  • ¼ cup pistachios
  • 1 teaspoon sea salt
  • 1 ¾ cup sweet glutinous rice (white or brown)
  • extra coconut sugar, cardamom, and chopped pistachios, for sprinkling on your rice pudding (optional)

 

  • Instructions

  • Add coconut milk, rice milk, palm sugar, cardamom, cherries, pistachios, and sea salt to your rice cooker and whisk to combine
  • Add rice and stir again to combine
  • Turn on your rice cooker and….
  • Voila, vegan sticky rice pudding!
Salad, Vegetarian
Jan 10, 2012
sabrinamodel
1 Comment

Green Salad with Purple Potatoes & Radishes

Today, is a lovely day in California. The sun is shining and it is unseasonably warm. It is also a special day because I am

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