Yams Gourmet Babylon Style

Thanksgiving Yams with Orange Cranberry Relish

What are your yam or sweet potato recipes for the holidays? Here is what I made. It was inspired by someone on Gourmet Babylon, a FB group a friend invited me to about a month ago. They have given me so many great ideas that I have neglected to blog. So I'm making up for it today with 2 entries. We will definitely be making this again.



Rinse 3 softball sized yams, poke with fork, and cook the yams in a microwave for 10 minutes. If you prefer you can bake them in the oven till mostly done. Then peel, slice, and layer in a baking dish with cranberry relish and walnuts. 
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Orange Cranberry Relish

Orange Cranberry Relish:
1 cup of fresh cranberries rinsed, strained, and placed in food processor with 1 sectioned orange, process briefly till pieces are the size you enjoy in your relish. Save the juice and peels. Place into an airtight container but do not cover yet, add 1/4 cup of coconut palm sugar or 1/8 cup of brown sugar, any extra juice from the orange you sectioned, and 1/2 teaspoon of salt. You can double this recipe easily. Extras save well in the fridge and can be frozen. Chill for 2 hours before serving

Walnuts:
Chop and soak the walnuts for 2 hours before then strain, rinse and set aside to dry. I soaked the walnuts while our orange cranberry relish was chilling in the fridge. this lets the chemicals in the walnut that make it bitter release, hence the need to rinse them, and it makes them softer and need less cooking time as well, in fact you can just eat them raw at that point and your body could process the proteins.

First Layer of Yam Dish

Layer yams, rellish, walnuts, and then Sprinkle a small amount of red pepper flakes on each layer. Squeeze a full orange worth of juice over the entire thing. Place baking dish in the oven at 350 for 10 minutes. We then turned the oven off and left them sitting in there with the stuffing until we were ready to serve. SO GOOD! You could use 1/8th of a cup of brown sugar for the same level of sweetness if you do not have coconut palm sugar, but I decided to use up the last of mine for this. It is said to be low on the glycemic index, and I've found that cooking low glycemic foods keeps my blood sugar more regulated. Before eating dinner my BG was 104, and after eating my thanksgiving meal this year my blood glucose was only 126 a full two hours later! Woohoo! (2 hours later is when they tell me to check, supposedly it's the highest your blood sugar will get after eating)

If you use either of these recipes, please let me know how you liked them, and if you have your own favorite you'd like to share, please do! You can also join in the recipe sharing in the Healthy Recipe Sharing Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/HealthyRecipeSharing/

Lemony Crusted Polenta

Many know my love for polenta. I was overjoyed when I found polenta recipes in a recently purchased cook book. But I noticed they were all a bit similar. One of the things I love about polenta is that there are so many different ways to serve it. I love making it from scratch, but recently patch brought home a tube of premade plain polenta, and I must admit, it is much simpler to just slice off a few pieces and has lead to me getting creative in how I heat it. So far I've tried heating it in the microwave, the toaster oven, the oven, and of course on the stove top.

Since I've recently begun tracking my food on spark people, I have been trying to limit artery clogging fats but incorporate those fats which can help heart health. Often the suggested meal plans include olive oil. Since I was cooking up some polenta anyway, I thought I'd use the Meyer Lemon Olive Oil I bought which comes from right here in Arizona. (Olives do grow well in our climate) I know it's been a while since I shared a recipe or posted anything here, but hopefully this one is worth it.

Lemony Crusted Polenta:
Premade Tube of Plain Polenta (makes 5 servings, 2 to 3 slices per serving)
1/4 cup Almond Milk
1/4 cup Progresso Italian Flavored Bread Crumbs
1/8 cup Hard Italian Cheese of your choice grated fine (I used Parmesian and Romano mixed)
2 - 3 tablespoons Meyer Lemon Olive Oil
large frying pan

Slice polenta into 5 sections then slice each section into 2 or 3 rounds depending on your prefered thickness. I like them rather thin, but they can tend to fall apart more that way so use a sharp knife and slice carefully.
Pour almond milk into a bowl and dip polenta rounds into almond milk
Mix Bread Crumbs and finely grated cheese in small bowl then coat each round in bread crumbs

Heat large frying pan on high, then turn down a bit and coat bottom of pan with lemon flavored olive oil. Carefully lay polenta rounds on pan with 1/8 to 1/4 inch between them. They will sizzle and pop if the pan is hot enough, so be careful. After 15-20 seconds flip and if they're not browned enough cook a bit longer then flip again. Cook till nicely browned n each side then remove from heat and serve!

It's delicous! Sometimes I eat these for lunch with a serving of deli sliced turkey sprinkled with a small amount of grated italian cheese for a little lean protein.

There are some great gluten free alternatives to making bread crumbs that I'd be happy to share if anyone's interested, but this morning I was going for quick and easy since no one eating was gluten intolerant. And if you're vegan just leave off the cheese or substitute it for some potent vegan pseudo cheese

Do you really cook all that food?

No! Sometimes Carlie does, sometimes Patch, other times I do (tho usually with one of their help to stir something or chop some ingredients) and sometimes I find a yummy treat somewhere like today at Whole Foods Market in Chandler, AZ.

Today I had gluten-free black bean soup and a mix of vegetables seasoned with sage. I'm going to try making a warm version of the vegetable mix myself. Maybe some day I'll make some black bean soup as well... I'm very curious to try making bean soup, and I really love black beans. If I put rice in it, it would have that perfect protein mix going for it as well. Although rice in soup has always struck me as odd.

The mixed vegetables had sage, salt, pepper, and olive oil on butternut squash, zucchini and a couple other kinds of squash. It may also have had some citrus.  I think it would be great with some cheese gnochi or some kind of ravioli. It was tasty cold, but I really wished I had some way to heat it up since the day was so cloudy and the soup was so nice and warm. Somehow eating cold vegetables and hot soup was an odd combo. It was a good thing to eat before heading next door to Bodhi Body tho. I felt better able to sit and get my first I.V. treatment than if I'd gone in there hungry.  Tomorrow I go in for my food allergy tests. Let's hope they agree to do my celiac tests so I can finally stop eating gluten 100% and see if it helps. I'm already feeling better bit by bit these days... not sure which parts of the treatments are working, but the supplements and I.V. definitely have had the most obvious immediate results.

Home Cooked Italian YUM

I LOVE Italian food and Carlie makes some mouth watering pasta dishes. She has lived with Patch and I for the last 8 years and our stomachs are forever grateful. She comes from a family that is half Irish, and half Italian but she is one of those that looks 100% Italian, and from the way she cooks, you would believe it. After I read some of the recipes and comments in the "Gluten-free Italian" cookbook to her, she mentioned that if we could get the hang of cooking with gluten-free pastas we could make just about any of the meals she usually makes because there is no gluten in tomato, cauliflower, nor meat. 


True, although I have noticed the occasional use of wheat-flour in some strangely unexpected places, so we'll keep our eyes open for ways it might try to sneak into our diet. It will depend on how intolerant of gluten I am, but I have read that as little as a tablespoon a day can cause flare ups in some people and we may therefor have to be super vigilant about the ways gluten sneaks into our foods. I believe our new grocery store mantra will be, "When in doubt, leave it out!"


Other than being vigilant by reading the ingredients on pre made and packaged foods, she's right! Preparing Italian food should be pretty much the same as before. 


I found premade gluten-free lasagna noodles at Whole Foods and picked a box up. We are likely to end up making our own pasta some time soon, because frankly, home made is almost always better than pre-packaged, but it's a lot more work to make your own, and we don't have a pasta machine so we will be using prepackaged most of the time. Thankfully the Gluten-free Italian cookbook I bought on amazon does have a pasta recipe that looks like it will make great ravioli. Mmmmmm I can't wait to make interesting fillings for ravioli.

Tonight we made brown rice risotto with chicken. We LOVED IT! And want to make it again. Makes enough for 6-8 people depending on if you serve it as an entire meal as we did, or a hearty side dish.

Ingredients:
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
4 tablespoons unsalted butter
1 small yellow onion
1 small red onion
1 tsp garlic powder (0r 2 cloves of chopped garlic if you ahve them)
10 - 12 ounces skinless, boneless chicken breast cubed (1 inch cubes)
1/2 teaspoon oregano
1 teaspoon rosemary
4 tablespoons diced bacon (or prosciutto if you have it)
2 cups brown rice
2/3 cup cooking sherry
3 cups gluten-free chicken broth, heated (I use swansons 100% natural)
3 cups hot water
6 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley
4 tablespoons grated parmigiano-reggiano
fine sea salt
black pepper 

in large skillet, on medium heat cook chicken with 1/2 herbs till no longer pink in 1 tablespoon olive oil
in large saucepan, on medium heat, warm 1 tablespoon olive oil and 2 tablespoons butter. Cook chopped onions and garlic until soft, but before browned. (about 5 minutes) add the rest of the herbs and the bacon or procsciutto. Season lightly with salt and pepper.

Add the rice and stir until well coated with oil. All the grains will appear shiny. Stir in the cooking sherry and bring to a boil. Stir and bring down to a strong simmer cooking until all the sherry is either soaked into the rice or evaporated, then stir in 2 cups of the hot broth. Simmer and stir often until the liquid is almost absorbed. Repeat with remaining broth a cup at a time. Repeat with 1/2 the hot water, and cook until rice is tender to the bite (about 35 minutes) adding the rest of the hot water as necessary until the rice is tender and the risotto is creamy with a slightly soupy consistancy. It should not be dry or sticky.

Turn off the stove, stir in the parsley and 2 tablespoons butter. Taste, and adjust seasoning as necessary. I added more pepper and garlic powder, but not more salt to mine. Seperate into bowls and sprinkle a tablespoon of the parmigiano-reggiano on top of each. Buy a good cheese, it makes all the difference in the world.

We put the leftovers in a sealed container into the fridge so we wouldn't eat it all up in one sitting. It was tempting, but portion control is part of losing weight while still being able to enjoy delicious food. When split into 6 servings, this ended up being 9 points on weight watchers.

Rustic Lime Potatoes and Gardening Thoughts

I've been looking at a lot of recipes which include butternut squash so that I could use up the rest of the squash leftover after the making of corn chowder. I hate tossing out produce even tho we do have a compost bin to put them in, and knew the squash would go bad if I didn't use it this morning.

All left over produce in our home be it rinds or uncooked unused fruit and veggies eventually end up in our garden. We use home made compost to help add nutrients to the dry, desert soil. Last year we only managed to grow a few tiny mutant carrots and a lot of pumpkin that the dogs ate before we could harvest it. This year we are hopeful for more success since there is now more healthy nutrients in the soil from a year of composting. Even the hybrid plum/nectarine fruit tree which we planted last year is starting to blossom and sprout it's leaves! Perhaps we will taste home grown plums and nectarines this year.

Growing our own fruits and vegetables will really cut down on the cost of eating whole, organic foods not to being the most locally grown you can get. Gives me a chuckle to think of all the gas saved and elbow grease spent..  It also allows us to choose NOT to put harmful chemicals on our food. Knowing where my food is coming from has become more important to me as I realized that I had eaten a lifetime of pesticides etc. And although part of me felt like tossing my hands up and saying it's too late now, I've seen enough people regain their health after improving their way of eating that I just have to give it a try.

This morning, I was wanting to use up the leftover squash tho, so all the compost bin got were the rinds and some seeds. Maybe some of the seeds will take sprout in the compost and I can transfer them into the garden. It's happened before, so who knows.

But enough of that! In looking at the various squash recipes in the gluten-free vegan, I found myself inspired. One recipe called for orange juice. We are out of oranges, but we do have lime juice on hand because I love the flavor of limes. I hear there is a lime flavored olive oil that would probably be great in this recipe...I'll have to keep my eyes open. I wasn't sure how much lime to put into this meal because I didn't want to overwhelm the sage and thyme, but it came out great. The following is the delicious meal I had for breakfast. I'd say this would make a great side dish for a main meal.

Rustic Lime Potatoes:
(serves 4-6)
4 medium red potatoes
1/4 cup lime juice
1/2 medium butternut squash
macademia nuts
2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
1/2 teaspoon thyme
1 teaspoon sage
1/4 teaspoon sea salt

Clean and cut red potatoes into large chunks. I cut each potato in half, each half into fourths and then halved the larger cubes. Seed, peal and cut butternut squash into chunks of a size similar to the potatoes.

Preheat oven to 350. Mix olive oil and herbs in medium mixing bowl. Add potato and squash chunks and stir until herbs and oil coat thuroughly. Add 1/4 cup lime juice and mix well.

Pour entire mixture onto a baking sheet and bake at 350 for 30 minutes or until soft. Stir periodically making sure all sides stay well coated. I stirred after 5 minutes, and then about every 10 minutes. Poke largest chunks with a fork to test for firmness. I felt it was done properly when the texture was soft but not squishy as this is how I like my potatoes.

Serve with macedamia nuts sprinkled on top for a nice little crunch, their delicious flavor, and of course the added protein. I use them sparingly; these little babies do have quite a bit of fat in them. They'd be eve better. chopped up and sprinkled on top

Carlie has been avoiding my gluten free meals almost as if she's afraid they're going to be tasteless or somehow "too healthy" tasting, but we spoke about it today as we read a gluten-free Italian cookbook, and she decided to give my breakfast a try. She went back for seconds, so it must have been good!

Corn Chowder for a Rainy Day

Despite the aches and pains I get, I love the rain. More accurately, I love staying in on a rainy day and eating comfort foods like corn chowder. However corn chowder, as much as I love it, does not love me back. Until today that is.

Today we pulled out the Gluten-free Vegan Cookbook by Susan O'Brian and made her corn chowder recipe. YUM! It was pretty labor intensive what with chopping up potatoes, butternut squash, leeks, onions, garlic and more, but Lauren filled me in on the tips and tricks to which produce can be bought at Trader Joe's already chopped up and ready to just toss in the pot. Next time I may do that, because WOW, if Lauren hadn't helped me chop veggies I would not have been able to make this meal. Patch or Carlie could, but for me just walking around the kitchen  was pretty much enough to wipe me out even with rests sitting on the island chairs. Luckily for me, by the time I ran out of energy the food was ready to kick back and enjoy.

It was tasty, warm, slightly salty, slightly sweet goodness. Still, we both agreed it was missing something. For one thing, protein, plus we wanted just a bit more green and a bit more bite. We would add lentils and green onion stalks to the recipe. I think it would really make it perfect. I'll try it out in the near future before it gets too hot for a good chowder and let you know.

Still, I could see using this recipe as the base for many a good meal to come. Later this morning I am making buttermilk pancakes with fruit for my friends, and some baked red potatoes and butternut squash on the side. I think they'll be pleasantly surprised at the vegan, gluten-free faire. 

Side note, I have had an itchy red rash on my face for DAYS and it's really annoying. I'm going to try a cold compress with some baking soda on it see if it calms down a bit. Hopefully it will be less bothersome in the next few days, but perk back up in time for my appointment with the doctor so she can actually see it in action. this is one of those weird symptoms I get that doctors rarely see the damn rash or hives or whatever it is. Much like a car no longer making that weird noise when you take it to the mechanic, it likes to fade away in time for doctor appointments. I'm hoping the changes of diet I'm starting to implement will eventually take care of this annoying symptom.

Tuberous Treats

Recently a friend of ours took us up on the offer to come over for a visit. She happens to be a vegan who is gluten intolerant with latex allergies. For those who don't know, latex allergies coexist with a slew of food allergies including peanuts, bananas, melon, mango, and more. I have never been able to cook a meal for her, because there are so many things she can't eat that she usually finds it safer to bring her own food with her. 

Still, I know there are many things she can eat, and I have felt deprived of being able to feed a loved one. So when she said she might be coming over, I became excited. Maybe this could be an opportunity to play with recipes from The Gluten-Free Vegan by Susan O'Brian. I ran off a list of ingredients in some meals i'd been thinking of trying, found out which things on the list were out, and adjusted the menu. I'm not vegan myself but several of my friends are so I've been doing research. Here's an article from Weight Watchers and getting proper nutrients as a vegetarian. If you're wanting a bit more protein tofu or seitan could easily be mixed in to Patch's Amazing Tubers.

I decided to make various Tuberous Treats* including Patch's Amazing Tubers, Corn Chowder, and maybe Stuffed Butternut Squash. Just sounds like a hearty, warm, meal of comfort food doesn't it? 

* Tubers are various types of modified plant structures that are enlarged to store nutrients. They are used by plants to survive the winter or dry months and provide energy and nutrients for regrowth during the next growing season and they are a means of asexual reproduction.^[1] Two different groups of tubers are: stem tubers, and root tubers. http://www.foodsubs.com/Tubers.html

Amazing Tuber  Recipe:
Ingredients:

olive oil

2 cloves garlic

sea salt 

pepper 

sage 

savory

6 carrots

2 red potatoes

2 purple potatoes

2 sweet potatoes or yams

1 parsnip

1 leek

1 white onion

1 red onion

1 zuchini

1 small butternut squash

1 sunchoke

1 celery root

Cut tubers and roots (except the onions and potatoes) into chunks, boil in lightly salted water for 5-10 minutes, until slightly soft and flavors have partially combined. 

Slice onions, mince garlic and caramelize with leek in 1 tablespoon olive oil 

In large mixing bowl, combine olive oil, sea salt, pepper and sage to taste. peal and cut potatoes and add to bowl. Strain tubers and add to large mixing bowl. Add 1/2 garlic onion and leek mixture, and stir all together till all is well coated with sage mixture. 


Spread the coated "Tuberous Treats" in a baking pan and bake at 425 for 35 minutes stirring 2 or 3 times to keep mixture coated. When all tubers are tender, mix in remaining garlic onions and serve warm. This is a great way to use up those locally grown CSA vegetables because you can put in whatever produce comes in  that week's share!


*note: Seitan, while delicious in vegetarian meals, is not gluten-free. Thanks Lynn for pointing that out :)