Signs of Spring

My 3' x 5' strawberry bed. It was overflowing with
plants last year, but I have high hopes for their recovery.

    Our local weather has definitely been the topic of many conversations this last month. After the many inches of snow in January, we had an unseasonable warm spell last week. For about five days, we had gorgeous sun and mid - high 50s here. I saw many people working in their yards and it definitely put a bounce in everyone's step. I decided to go out and work on clearing out my strawberry patch. Last summer, the deer came and ate every green leaf out of the patch and I was sure I would have to start over from scratch this year. I started clearing, in one small patch and soon realized that buried under the weeds was a strawberry plant. I then changed tactics and used a little more care with what I was pulling out. Happily as I cleared more and more, I saw that my strawberries did survive that seemingly decimating blow last year. They are definitely a bit worse for the wear and not nearly as plentiful as they were at the beginning of spring last year, but giving them a nice year of tender - loving - care this year and keeping the deer away will hopefully be enough for them to fully recover.
 
    As the sun brought out lighter spirits, it also ignited my desire to get back into the kitchen. I recently have joined Pinterest and am delighted by the wide variety of items that appear on my page throughout the day. On Pinterest, I saw this recipe for Peanut Butter Bars and I made them one evening for dessert. I didn't really like how they weren't very 'solid' at room temperature and the amount of sugar also made me cringe a bit, so I decided to revamp them to be a bit more of a healthy dessert. I also made them more bite-sized by molding them in my mini-muffin tin, which also made the application of the chocolate a lot simpler. Without telling my kids they were a healthier version, I sent them to school in their lunchboxes for dessert. Rave reviews at the end of the day, they never would have guessed I had even changed the recipe. Here is the revised recipe, which (depending on your ingredients) is gluten-free and refined sugar free and packed with protein and vitamins. Below the recipe are suggestions for dairy-free or ingredient substitutes.


Hidden Health Peanut Butter Bites
[Printable Recipe]


1 c (179 g) creamy peanut butter
3 Tbsp (55 g) agave nectar
1/2 c (42 g) dry milk powder
2 Tbsp (12 g) ground flax seed
1/4 c (23 g) quinoa flakes
1 c (31 g) rice crispies


4 - 8 oz semisweet chocolate chips, separated


In a medium sized bowl, mix the first five ingredients, until well combined. Add rice crispies and mix with your hands until the rice crispies are fully incorporated and you have a crumbly mix that will just hold together when squeezed in your hand. Form 24 small balls of dough, approximately 1/2 Tbsp each. Flatten each to the size of a silver dollar.

       

Muffin tin with chocolate in bottom of
each cup and 24 balls of mixture

Flattened Peanut Butter Balls,
approximately silver dollar sized.

    In a microwave safe bowl, melt 4 oz of chocolate chips in the microwave on 30 second bursts, stirring in between, until fully melted; about 1 1/2 minutes. In a silicone mini-muffin tin or using waxed cupcake liners (or waxed paper cut to fit), spread approximately 1/2 tsp of chocolate in the bottom of each cup. Press each flattened peanut butter ball into the chocolate. You can refrigerate at this point or you can melt the remaining 4 oz of chocolate chips and put a thin layer of chocolate on top each cup, creating a sandwich of chocolate, peanut butter and chocolate. Refrigerate for 30 minutes or until firm. Remove from muffin tin and wrap in waxed paper. Store in the refrigerator.


    These work really well in lunch boxes, but I would not put them in with a warm lunch or in a bag where the chocolate would melt. They are solid at room temperature, but I recommend storing in the refrigerator until you are ready to serve them or pack them in your bag for a quick snack during the day.


Yield: 24 mini muffin bites


NOTE: To make dairy-free, try replacing the milk powder with equal amounts of dry milk powder, rice flour or garbanzo flour. If you can't find the quinoa flakes you can substitute gluten-free quick oats, though you may have to decrease the amount or add a bit of melted coconut oil to help bind the ingredients.

Colder Weather

Oh my, I can't believe it's been so long since I last did a post. So much for me trying to get something up here every week. We had a lovely Thanksgiving holiday and I perfected gluten-free cornbread and therefore enjoyed a wonderful cornbread dressing with our smoked turkey.

I haven't been knitting all that much new lately. I am working on a few Christmas presents and therefore can't share those quite yet and have finished the square of the month for December, but knitting and baking have not been high on my list of things to do lately. The weather has turned colder of course and so I'm slowly working up to Christmas celebrations and figuring out what the kids can give to classmates while they work diligently to finish up their assignments before they start winter break this Friday. 

I recently spotted a flea on our white cat, who I believe is actually allergic to flea bites, by the bald patches that are appearing on her as a result of her over grooming. I've bought a flea collar for her and even tried a hydrocortisone shampoo bath (which almost killed her, so to speak). I gave her the bath and within about 3 hours she was vomiting violently and was lethargic and uninterested in food for about 24 hours. I'm still not 100% sure what caused this reaction, but I'm not inclined to bathe her again very soon. Her favorite spot right now is, as you can see, curled up to the heater. We find it quite amusing to see how much of herself she manages to fit under the 1" clearance space underneath.

Last evening was the holiday party at my local knitting guild, Snohomish Knitters Guild. There was the gift exchange and a lot of food. With my new food guidelines, I've learned to either eat before I go or take whatever I want to eat all evening, so I don't cheat and eat things that will have consequences later. I found a wonderful recipe for Carrot Fritters that I was able to adapt to be gluten-free and egg & dairy free as well. They seemed to be the hit of the ball and everyone requested the recipe. I didn't take a picture of them, but if you go to the link above, you can get an idea of what they are supposed to look like. I quadrupled the original recipe and had about 40 2" fritters and I guess that was a good quantity, because there were only 2 left on the plate when I packed up to come home. Here is the recipe with my adjustments. I'll formalize it later with an actual picture, but it will get you started.


Carrot Fritters
Adapted from Food.com

7 large carrots (about 8 cups grated)
2 small yellow onions
8 Tbsp Brown Rice Flour
6 Tbsp Tapioca Starch
6 Tbsp Millet Flour
4 Tbsp ground Chia seed
8 Tbsp warm water
4 tsp dried dill weed
1 tsp sugar
2 tsp salt
1 tsp ground black pepper
1/2 tsp baking powder

Grate the carrot and onion together. Stir in brown rice flour, tapioca starch, and millet flour. Mix ground chia seed with water, mix well and pour into carrot mixture. Add remaining seasonings and mix well until all ingredients are well distributed. Shape into small 2" fritters and place on wax paper on a cookie sheet. Chill for minimum of 1 hour, maximum 12 hours. Heat a large fry pan with a shallow amount of oil on medium-high heat. Fry the fritters, in batches, in the oil about 5 - 8 minutes per side or until brown. Drain on paper towels and serve while hot.

Pre-Halloween with soup

I have been busy at work, the last week and a half, creating a Halloween costume for Little Bigfoot. She loves stretching my creative powers to the maximum every year and this year was no different. In the creation of her costume, I developed a new knitted hat pattern that I am working to finalize and write up for sale. I can't share her costume yet, but promise to post pictures and Halloween excitement next week.

Her school had a Bingo Night on Friday and costumes were encouraged, so I dug around the house to come up with something. In the past I haven't been one for dressing up, a lot of that has to do with the fact that I felt horrible in general and the extra effort of finding a costume and putting up with being uncomfortable in it all evening wasn't something I relished. However, over the last year, I've regained more of my health and have felt better than I've felt in 10 years, so I decided to give it a whirl on Friday and see what I could come up with. Many years ago, I created this hat for The Redneck, as he was fighting the great opossum battle at the time, between them and our garbage cans. We've had many a laugh about it over the years, so I decided to put it to good use this year. I found an old pair of holey jeans, a ratty t-shirt and flannel and wore The Redneck's winter boots. I think I made a passable female redneck for the evening. The suspenders were dyed strips of fabric that just worked to highlight the whole thing. Bingo Night was a success, we had a lot of fun and won some fun prizes as well. Little Bigfoot wasn't quite sure what to make of my costume, but decided it was alright to be seen with me and it was even better when she started winning some at bingo.

On another note, the garden harvest is coming to a close, and we have a lot of Delicata Squash to use up. Since most winter squash are okay for me to eat, I'm trying to think of different ways to eat it, so that I don't get overly tired of the same flavor all of the time. I decided to try to create a creamy soup that would be dairy-free and hearty. Here is what I ended up with:

Creamy Delicata Soup
[Printable Recipe]

2 medium Delicata Squash, cut in half, cleaned and roasted until tender
1 can (14 oz) Great Northern Beans, drained & rinsed
1 can (14 oz) black beans, drained & rinsed
1/2 lb chicken sausage
4 mini bell peppers (orange, yellow and/or red), rough chopped
1/2 medium onion, chopped
4 cups chicken broth or water

Scoop cooled squash out of the skins and process with the northern beans in food processor until smooth, adding chicken stock/water as needed to aid in achieving a smooth consistent puree. Continue in batches, until all of the squash and northern beans have been pureed.

In a medium saucepan or large deep skillet, cook the sausage and onion until done, add the peppers and saute for 5 minutes. Add the black beans and squash puree, adding more chicken broth/water until a thick soup consistency is achieved. Simmer on very low heat until soup is warmed through. Add salt and pepper to taste. Serve hot.


Yield 4 medium servings or 2 large servings


Note: Squash can be cooked and stored in the fridge several days in advance, either in the skins, scooped out, or already pureed with the beans.

Candy and Knitting

As my blog name suggests, I do knit, usually more than a bit, but there hasn't been much proof of that on here so far. I've been working hard on my daughter's new school bag, but it is a bit monotonous. So while it is progressing very slowly, but I don't really feel like I should work on much of anything else, since I promised her I'd get it done 'quickly'. Luckily I have one other obligation that always takes precedence, to break up the monotony, since it is a time-sensitive project.

I belong to the Snohomish Knitters Guild and last year I designed a square a month for the members (pattern available on Ravelry.com here), which ended as a complete afghan. Even though I have switched roles in the guild, I got the okay to go ahead with another pattern series for the new guild year (October - September). To build on the knit & purl squares that we did last year, I choose to do textured squares using increases and decreases. Sort of building on your skills type of thing. Since the guild meeting is tonight, I had to finish the square, write the pattern and photograph it before tonight. Just finished everything this morning, though it was a possibly close call, since we were without power here until almost 8 am (wasn't sure why or when it would be back on). Here is this month's square, the pattern is available free to guild members or you can also join the knit-a-long on Ravelry for $5.00 (receiving a pattern update every month).

I also tried a new fudge recipe that my knitting friend and guild president shared with me last week. It is an extremely simple recipe with the potential to be dairy-free, egg-free & gluten-free, depending on the ingredients you use. I love to collect shaped silicon ice-cube trays and used them to mold the fudge into pumpkin shapes since it is Halloween this month (though the fudge had no chance of lasting that long). I also made a half batch which perfectly filled two ice-cube trays (another great reason to have a scale in your kitchen). Here is the recipe, such as it is.

Two Ingredient Fudge
related to me by Barb Simonds
[Printable Recipe]

1 - 12 oz package of semi-sweet (or other flavored) chocolate chips
1 - 16 oz can of prepared frosting
butter or vegetable shortening

Butter the molds or a 9" x 9" square pan. Melt chocolate chips in a medium sized bowl in the microwave, using 30 second bursts on medium power, stirring in between each heating cycle. Stir in the frosting, making sure to scrape the sides and bottom to thoroughly incorporate both ingredients. Microwave for 30 seconds on medium power once more (to make fudge pourable). Pour/spoon into molds or pan & smooth out. Place in refrigerator for 30 minutes or until firm. Unmold or cut into squares. Store in refrigerator.

The wonderful thing about this recipe is that you can choose any flavors to mix together, you could also make your frosting with your favorite recipe and use that instead of the store bought brands.

Chocolate Chip Cookies

My youngest loves Chocolate Chip cookies, and so I use this basic recipe with a few alterations. Over the last year or so, I've discovered that I love cooking by weight measurements. It is so simple to put the bowl onto the scale and just start dumping and pouring directly into it. It feels very freeing, though you can't tell by the results. It also cuts down dramatically on dishes, since you are no longer using multiple measuring cups to do the measuring for you. Cooking by weight also gives me an accurate standard to work with, when I wish to change the recipe slightly to improve this or that. With this cookie recipe, I adapted it to try to decrease the amount of spread on the cookie. So I decreased the amount of shortening and replaced the egg with the baking soda substitute. I also added a bit of graham flour to it to add another flavor dimension and a bit of healthiness to them.


I learned to cook by measurements, last year, when my family and I started working with food allergies and adapting recipes to our particular needs. Now it is second nature to pull out the scale when I'm making biscuits, cookies or anything else requiring more than a tsp or Tbsp of the necessary ingredient. I compiled a list of common baking ingredients by weight and have it taped to the inside of the cupboard near where I do my mixing. This makes it incredibly easy to adapt recipes as I go and ensures that I'll get the same results every time.


While I am the only member of my family that needs to eat gluten-free foods, I find that I still enjoy baking the 'glutened' goods for the kids. It really helps me to not cheat on my 'diet' when I know that sneaking a bit of the cookie or cake will have more drastic consequences than just to my waist line.

Chocolate Chip Cookies
adapted from The Pillsbury Cookbook
[Printable Recipe]

¾ c (165 g) packed brown sugar

½ c (100 g) sugar

½ c butter

¼ c (52 g) shortening (Spectrum)

1 ½ tsp vanilla

1 tsp baking powder

1 ½ Tbsp vegetable oil

1 ½ Tbsp water

½ c (50 g) whole wheat graham flour

1 ¼ c (168 g) all purpose white flour

1 tsp baking soda

 ½ tsp salt

1 c (6 oz) chocolate chips

Heat oven to 375°. In a large bowl, beat brown sugar, sugar, butter and shortening until light and fluffy. Add vanilla, baking powder, oil and water and beat 30 – 60 seconds longer. Mix in graham flour, white flour, baking soda and salt. Gently mix in chocolate chips.

Drop by ½ Tbsps onto parchment lined cookie sheet (dark works best). Bake in pre-heated oven for 8 – 10 minutes (9 minutes) or until light golden brown. Let cool 1-2 minutes and remove to cooling rack to finish cooling. Repeat with remaining batter.

Yield: 2 dozen + cookies