Sweet Potato Sage Bread (Low Gluten or GF!)

I've been in sweet potatoes lately, thanks to my awesome, certified organic (and local!) CSA.

CSA Week #23 (11/1/12): 

A few tiny head lettuces, huge bunch of carrots, eight sweet potatoes (yes!), a head of Romanesco (cool!), a bag of arugula and a bag of "spicy" mix (spring mix).

 Romanesco is a cruciferous veg (related to broccoli & cauliflower). 

You prepare it the same way.  It's supposedly more mild and creamy than either of its cousins.  

 This week's haul of sweets!

Monster carrots (they were SO good).  I glazed them just like that first week of Hakurei Turnips.  

And the week prior, sweets galore as well!

CSA Week #22 (10/24/12):  

Kohlrabi, parsley, carrots, sweet potatoes, beets (yes!), arugula, kale (double yes!!), spinach (yeah!), and lettuce (OK, it was gorgeous).

Here were the sweets:

These were the sweets I had prior to Hurricane Sandy.  Two HUGE ones, one medium, and three smalls.

They made my Hurricane Sweet Potato Pie!

 Roast them taters real good! I do them for at least an hour at 400 degrees until they are oozing and the skin is crispy in some places and they are VERY soft.  

 This color blows me away every time.  

 I used this recipe by The Witchy Kitchen but I had to double the volume of the filling.

If you make it, double the filling recipe or it will not even fill half your pie crust!  I don't think this recipe was ever tested.  But, it was tasty once I made enough of it!

Thirst quenching hurricane provisions in the background: 

TJ's instant coffee, diet iced tea, hot cocoa, ginger ale.

With this week's sweets, I made a Sweet Potato Sage Bread!

Sweet Potato Sage Bread*

*Can be gluten free* Is also soy-free and nut-free (unless you want to add nuts!)

Inspired by Sweet Potato Rosemary Bread in Flying Apron's Gluten-Free & Vegan Baking Book.

Yield: One loaf

2 cups Brown Rice Flour 

1.5 cups White Whole Wheat Flour*

*or 1.5 cups more BRF for a Gluten-Free bread

1 Cup Garbanzo Bean Flour (Chickpea Flour)

1/4 cup Ground Flax Seeds

1 tsp Sea Salt or Kosher Salt

3/4 tsp Xanthan Gum

2 tsps Home Dried Sage, chopped finely

1/4 tsp dried rosemary

1 tsp cinnamon*

*it adds depth and not so much a "cinnamony" flavor

1/2 cup raisins or chopped dried fruit (apricots would be good)

1/2 cup chopped nuts (optional)

(I would have loved to add walnuts but my son is a "no nuts" kinda guy)

1/4 cup EVOO (Extra Virgin Olive Oil :-)

1/4 cup maple syrup (organic if poss)

1 cup lukewarm water 

(just warm to your finger when dipped!)

1/2 tablespoon cake yeast 

(in the refrigerated section of your store)

1 cup pureed sweet potato or yam

Preheat your oven to 300 degrees F.  I use a double-burner cast iron griddle to bake bread and pizza on and I also preheat that inside the oven.  Spray it or lightly coat with olive oil before preheating.

Combine dry ingredients (flours through nuts) in a bowl and mix well to incorporate.

Dry ingredients (not yet mixed well, haha).

Heat one cup of water in the microwave until just warm to the touch.  45 seconds on 80 percent power for my little microwave is perfect.  If you have a powerful microwave, this would be way too long.  Add the cake yeast and stir until it is dissolved.  You can mash it about, too.  Then, add your warm yeast water to the maple syrup and olive oil in a large mixing bowl:

Cake yeast.  Ain't she purdy?

 Wet ingredients with yeast added.  Let sit about five minutes for yeast to "activate." Will look creamy/cloudy and bubbles will form.

Add dry ingredients a little at a time, alternating with some sweet potato until a lovely dough forms.  Do not over mix.  Strangely, I had a full half cup of dry ingredients left over when I did mine.  Not sure why, but maybe my sweet potato was lowish in moisture.  Anyway, use your judgement about when to stop adding the dry ingredients.  You want the dough to be moist and pliable, but not too dry.  

Take your preheated cast iron griddle (or baking pan or pizza stone) out of the oven and put it on your (heat proof) counter.   Get ready to add your loaf!

On a floured work surface (I use a RoulPat mat dusted with a little flour) knead your loaf gently only a few times just to incorporate everything.  Shape into a loaf and lift gently (I slid the whole loaf onto my forearm) and place on your griddle/sheet/stone.  Slash a few times gently with a floured knife.  I sprayed my loaf with olive oil to give it some extra moisture in the oven.  If you don't have a Misto, just brush some oil on to lightly coat your loaf.  Bake at 300 degrees for about one hour and five minutes.  Done when a toothpick comes out clean and it has started to brown on the bottom. Do not overbake this bread.

 Raw loaf ready for the oven!

 Baked loaf! Not sure why it cracked so much, probably still a little too dry, but it was delish!

 The loaf had just the right flavor: herby (but not too strong, my husband said he wanted more herbs in it, actually), sweet from the potato and raisins and with a touch of warmth from the cinnamon.  It has a moist crumb, and is quite satisfying, dense and chewy and has a lovely golden color from the sweet potatoes.  Yum!

Would be great for a sandwich, toast, french toast (!), bread pudding or even cubed and toasted as a stuffing for your Thanksgiving Seitan Roast (I'd mix it with veg sausage and nuts, definitely) or as a dressing baked on the side of your Thanksgiving main dish (I'd still add veg sausage and nuts and dried cranberries!).

Hope everyone is well.

Enjoy!

Toasted Boots Sauce: Roasted Tomato, Artichoke & Chickpea Pasta

This ain't no spaghetti western! Enough gallavantin' around town, it's time to get cookin'!

Toasted Boots Sauce (Italy=the boot, get it?): Roasted Tomato, Artichoke & Chickpea Sauce.  

There were still more tomatoes to be had in this last week's CSA:

 CSA Week #21 (10/17/12):

Fingerling Potatoes, Cauliflower, Sage, Arugula, Parsley, Carrots, Mini B'nuts, Daikon Radish, Beets, Spring Mix, Radicchio, and Heirloom & Cherry Tomatoes:

Aren't they prettier than a speckled pup?

 I thought about makin' em into paste, but that was too much work and I didn't have that many.

OK, let's get down to it:

Line a rimmed baking sheet with foil, oil the foil generously.  Add sliced tomatoes and top with home made (ideally) breadcrumbs seasoned with oregano, thyme, salt, pepper, etc. and top with capers and a bit of the brine from the caper jar.  Spray or brush with olive oil on top.  Bake at 425 until soft and starting to brown, this is around 20-25 minutes.  Check them periodically to make sure you don't burn 'em!

You can also roast some plain slices with just olive oil and salt if you like. I did.

 Meanwhile, get your big pot of water on and get it ready to boil some pasta.  I used perciatelli for this, I also love the long fusili, the ones as long as perciatelli, but I couldn't find any at the store, they're persnickety!

While your 'maters are a roastin' and your water's a boilin', saute up some whistleberries, uh, I mean, chickpeas (one tin can, drained and rinsed) and marinated artichoke hearts (one jar, drained, but save some of the oil to saute everything in!).

I use the oil from the marinated artichokes to saute the chickpeas & hearts.  I also added the fresh juice of one organic lemon, some Kosher salt, and a few sprinkles of garlic powder (you should use 2-3 cloves of chopped garlic, but I was fresh outta real garlic!).  Saute on medium-high heat until chickpeas and artichoke hearts are starting to brown.  

Once your tomaters are done roastin, add them to the chickpeas & artichoke hearts:

Mix it up good!

Add as many tomatoes as you like until you get the consistency of a nice sauce.  I actually added two trays worth of roasted tomato slices to this sauce.

Your pasta should be done cooking at this point, but before you drain it, dip a coffee cup in there and retrieve yourself about 1 cup of pasta water (to thin the sauce if needed).  Now drain your pasta, and add the pasta to your sauce in the pan on the stove.  Saute for about two minutes to help the drained pasta absorb the sauce and fully incorporate.

Put your Toasted Boots on!

Now, I'll be! Don't it look like a little creature got to makin' his business on top of that tomato? Well, don't you worry.  It's just some roasted capers!

Vai, vai! Sprigati!

Next up, freezin' stuff, fermentin' stuff, or takin' a trip to the next town over!

Homesteadin' it October 1st through October 31st, 2012

Cashew Ricotta In Action!

So, now you have made a nice container of Cashew Ricotta from my last post, but what to do with it now?

Here are some ideas.  Instead of posting formal recipes, I just bolded the ingredients and typed away.  Please let me know what you think of this style, is it as usable as the "listing" style with ingredients separated? Curious.

I made some some roasted fennel and asparagus that I happened to have in my fridge.  I roasted them in the oven w/ olive oil, salt & pepper (oven at about 400 or a little hotter for about 20-25 minutes).  You could also do carrots, parsnips, potatoes or whatever else you like.  Stir/turn them once about half-way through the baking time. Here are the fennel & asparagus:

Roasted asparagus & fennel.  So easy, guys.

Now, you could just cut up the veggies and put a tablespoon or more of the ricotta on them, stir it up, letting the ricotta "melt" into the warm veggies and snack away,

Or, you could boil up some pasta, any shape or size, and just mix some of the ricotta into it while it is still warm (or even use cold leftover pasta from the fridge and microwave it with some of the ricotta and a little olive oil and just mix it).   I made my son some using the microwaving leftover pasta method, and he ate THREE bowls. Ratio was about 1 cup of cooked pasta to about 1 tablespoon of the ricotta. I put the roasted fennel & asparagus in mine:

Then, with the SAME batch of ricotta (I still had tons) I made eggplant & zucchini "Parmesan." Peel one eggplant, cut on a bias (or just into rounds) and put it in a colander covered with Kosher salt for 30-60 minutes to suck out some of the bitterness.  In the meantime, peel 3 small zucchinis and slice them up.  Oil a 9x13 Pyrex pan or aluminum baking dish.  Rinse the eggplant slices in cold water once they are done (you will see that the eggplant looks wet/moist because the salt draws out the water from the eggplant) and pat dry. Now, just layer the eggplant with the cashew ricotta (smoosh some ricotta onto a piece of eggplant with a spoon) and stick the zucchini on top of the ricotta.  Here are pics:

You have a lot of zucchini left, right?  Now you "glue" them on top of the other zucchinis/eggplant.  I was using the rest of the zucchini as little chips and "scooping" up a bit of ricotta from the container and then "gluing" them onto the eggplant and the other zucchinis.  A little like an arts & crafts project, fun! Like this:

You can make a recipe of my quick marinara sauce as follows: In a large, stainless saucepan, I just sauteed two chopped carrots (for fun) in some oil, added about 1 1/2 tsp of dried oregano and salt & pepper, sauteed about 7 minutes total.  Then add two chopped cloves of garlic and saute one to two minutes more (don't burn it!).  Go ahead and add one 28 ounce can of organic, chopped tomatoes. a tablespoon (or more if you like it) of nutritional yeast in it to add body and 2-3 tablespoons of the ricotta in it to add flavor and "cheesiness."   Simmer about 20-30 minutes.  Guess what?  If you only cook it for five minutes it will still be great!  You could also (gasp!) just use a jarred sauce as well, just make sure it is a good, organic brand.  Add the nutritional yeast and the ricotta to the jarred sauce and I'm sure it will be pretty good.  Pour the sauce over the eggplant and zucchini like so:

I put some breadcrumbs on top, too.  Now, if you like, add some Daiya cheese (mozzarella kind):

Now, bake at 375 degrees for about 30-40 minutes, until cheese is melted and it is hot & bubbling.  Stick a fork in it to test the eggplant/zucchini for doneness.  It will be soft, fork will pierce right through.

                                                                          Yummers! Serve over linguine, like so:

I think I'll get me some right now, I'm starving!  Guys, have fun using your Cashew Ricotta, I know I did!

BTW, I got me a new cookbook, The 30 Minute Vegan and made the coconut-lime banana bread to bring to a friend's house today.  It is AMAZING (but, um, took like an hour and not 30 minutes, but that is what I expected for a recipe like this).  Here is a picture of it:

The glaze didn't dry yet, so it looks goopy in the center, but it was great!  The authors of that book live in Hawaii, so a lot of the recipes seem to have coconut oil and macadamia nuts in them :-) no nuts in this one, just coconut (oil & shredded).  Get out the paddles of the defibber, it's worth it! Thank goodness for my friends who served a yummy vegan tofu scramble and vegan bran muffins for brunch today, we needed the detox after this guy!

Questions, comments, etc. are all welcome!  As usual, my FB friends, I'll answer anything you'd like there as well.

Have a great weekend! Dawn