5 year old approved Corn Soup

While on my Unprocessed journey, I discovered that gluten inflames my psoriasis (skin condition) and so that makes me a soy/eggplant/pine nut/gluten free mostly vegan (always vegetarian). This means I have been eating a lot of the same dishes over and over again (Stir fried quinoa, butternut squash soup, and the paella (kinda) recipes have been on repeat for about a year. My goal for 2017 is to try new recipes though, the first of which is a recipe that my 5 year old and I put together recently. We call it corn stew.

10 Brussels sprouts
1 red bell pepper
1 green bell pepper
4 red potatoes
1 can organic black beans
1/2 box of veggie broth
1 small can corn
green onions to taste (I use about 1/2 a bunch)
to taste - oregano, basil, thyme, and rosemary (I am very liberal with the spices)

My 5 year old loved it so much she at it for lunch AND dinner all week!

Craving Cookies during Passover? I've got you covered

Vegan Peanut Butter Cookies....

1 cup of peanut butter (I use the just peanuts and salt ones, no sugar. You can "make" your own at Whole Foods or Safeway, or buy Trader Joe's or some other brands) 

1/3 cup of raw agave nectar dark
1 tablespoon flax seed mill (I just used the scoop that comes with my flax seed protein powder).

Mix all ingredients together until there is no flax seed mill powder lumps and it all looks like wet peanut butter. Use a tablespoon measuring aid to scoop out 1 tablespoon cookies (should make about a dozen) onto a cookie sheet (I use olive oil to make them not stick), and then flatten the cookies with a fork and bake on 300 for about 10 minutes (check them at 8, as these burn very easily so keep an eye on them). Let them cool for about 20 minutes and you should be able to scoop them off and eat them like a regular cookie without them falling apart.

Almost Raw Salad

This week on the unprocessed journey is a recipe for a summer salad. My co-op box came with red cabbage, corn, and cherry tomatoes so I mixed them all together for a light and tasty dish.

1 pint of cherry tomatoes
1 piece of corn
1 cup of black beans
1 cup of diced red cabbage
balsamic vinegar, pepper,and olive oil to taste
squeeze 1/2 a lemon

This is a light and delicious salad. Some hot peppers, green onions, and/or cilantro would also be great additions (none ready in my garden at the moment unfortunately).

I ate pretty much the entire dish in one sitting!

Apple Plum Bread- Unprocessed

Last weeks muffins were loved by all of the adults in the house but still did not impress the 4 year old, so this week I thought I would attempt something a little less dense. 

3 cups Bob's organic 10 grain flour

1 cup diced carrots 

1 cup diced plums (I used dried plums) 

4 packets of Organic applesauce (a only apples applesauce will due) - probably about 1 1/2 cups

2 tspn cinnamon

1 tspn salt 

1/2 cup vegetable oil 

1/2 cup almond milk 

1/2 cup agave

1 large spoonful of honey 

1 egg 

1 tspn baking powder

I scooped it into muffins so that it would cook faster and be travel friendly, but this definitely tastes more like a bread than a muffin. They came out incredibly fluffy, not dense at all (at least fresh out of the oven). 

Lentil Soup

This is a recipe I have been making for years, but honestly I am not sure if I have posted on this blog before. I havent made it in at least a year, but thought this unprocessed challenge was the perfect time to resurrect it.

Saute 1 large potato and 3 green onions with olive oil for about 10 minutes.
Add in 1 box of veggie broth
Add 1 cup of red lentils (uncooked)
Add in herbs - I use basil, oregano, thyme, and rosemary from my garden - dont be shy with them.
Add in assorted veggies (I used zucchini, heirloom tomatoes, stewed tomatoes, kale, cauliflower, carrots, and bell peppers).
If you use a leafy green (collard greens, kale, spinach, etc.) add those in the last 5 min rotation.

Stir every 5 minutes for 20 minutes and saw YUM!

I've outdone myself with these Unprocesed muffins!

2 1/2 cups of Bob's Red mill 10 grain stone ground flours (100% wheat, rye, soy, flaxseed, millet, triticale, oat, corn, barley, and brown rice)

1/2 cup agave nectar (I like the fair trade organic type)
1 large dollup of honey (I love the Trader Joe's organic raw honey)
1 tspn baking soda
1 tspn baking powder
2 teaspoons cinnamon
1/2 tspn salt
3/4 cup almond milk
1 cup shredded carrot
1 cup raisins (O organic has great ones)
2 eggs

All items were organic or non-gmo (except for the baking soda and baking powder not sure about those)

Mix all ingredients together, bake at 350 degrees for about 15-20 minutes.

So for those new to 100% whole grains, they still may feel the bite that grains have, but for those of us that eat pretty pure already - these will definitely surpass all expectations!

Unprocessed challenge

There is a book by Megan Kimble, called Unprocessed. She deems that she can eat anything with ingredients that she could feasibly (even if time consuming) make herself at home. That means that she considers whole grains that are milled, cooked veggies, etc all to be unprocessed because with the right amount of time, she could make these items. Other items like white flour or processed sugar she could not make at home, she would need to make in a lab. (White flour strips out the nutrients and then adds them back in and even bleaches the flour by adding chlorine!). 100% Honey or agave nectar can be used in the place of sugar.

Only on Chapter 3 of the book, I am attempting the challenge. I am pulling out the handy juice maker, bread maker, steamer, and rice cooker (for quinoa and brown rice) and will be baking /making new dishes weekly that fit these requirements.

The hardest part is that you have to check the ingredients very closely. My go-to corn tortillas (Mission thin tortillas because thinner = less calories and carbs) have more than corn, water, and acid. Apparently they also have benzoic acid and amylase, both suspect ingredients not only for someone eating unprocessed, but for all people who don't like odd food additives. Benzoic acid is "harmless" in small quantities but poisonous if overexposed. Supposedly humans would need a lot of it to be poisoned, but even in lower doses it is known to cause rashes and asthma. 

So off to the store I go to get whole food ingredients and start making recipes. This week I will be trying out a few bread recipes.