Bright Beginnings: Gf/Sf Blueberry Muffins

Yum a dum dum. The sun is shining, the birds are singing, and these blueberry muffins are a grainfree, easy-peasey way to feed a crowd. Thanks to Guilty Kitchen!

Sometimes gf/sf cooking can be an exercise in abstraction, as baked goods can easily become an interpretation of the intended treat rather than a version of it. These muffins, however, are the real deal and  I was impressed by how very recognizably blueberry muffiny they tasted.  I admit that coconut flour is a huge moisture suck, but the resulting teensy lack of moisture was not enough to stop me from eating three...a day.

When I was in seventh grade, I spent a few weeks learning html so I could build an awesome website on Geocities. I'm dusting off the ol' coding cap to upgrade Cooking Up Kefi--so bear with me as I figure out how to tweak the new template.

Gf/Sf Blueberry Muffins

Ingredients

• 3/4 c coconut flour
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1/4 tsp + pinch baking soda
• 1/4 tsp cinnamon
• dash nutmeg
• 6 eggs
• 1/3 c maple syrup
• 1/3 c Greek yogurt (FIBYDY)
• 1 TBSP vanilla extract
• 1/3 c + 3 TBSP coconut oil, melted
• 12 oz frozen blueberries (I used 10 oz and think the extra berries would have helped the moisture issue)

Assembly

1. Preheat oven to 350. Line muffin tins with paper or lightly grease each muffin hole.

2. Combine dry ingredients.

3. Add wet ingredients to dry mixture and stir until lumps are out--it won't be perfectly smooth, but it'll do.

4. Spoon into muffin tins until each is nearly full, as these guys don't rise too too much. Bake 25-30 minutes, or until you can stick a fork in them and it comes out clean.

5. Let cool completely before gobbling up.

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Sweet 'n' Salty Almond Butter Cups

In the words of my dear friend GingerKef, "Wowowowowowowowowowow!" 

I've been eyeing all the iterations of homemade Reese's cups out there on the interwebs, but none have been exactly sugar-free--the recipes I've seen have called for some kind sugar for either the nut butter or the chocolate shell. That ends now.

I played around with these puppies last night, and was amazed to find how easy they really are.  BF Kef was HUGE fan and promptly enjoyed two of these fancy little treats. They're a little sweet, a little salty, and a delicious replacement for any Reese's lover.

You'll have lots of almond butter left over--keep it in a container at room temp and enjoy it on apples, bananas, toast, and everything else on which almond butter is awesome.


Ingredients

• 2 c slivered almonds
• 2 c unsweetened shredded coconut
• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
• 1/4-1/2 tsp salt
• 10oz bag of unsweetened carob chip (or dark chocolate over 50% if you prefer)

Assembly
1. Preheat oven to 350. Put an ungreased cupcake tin in the freezer.
2. Spread almonds out on a rimmed baking pan. Roast in oven for 10 minutes, until lightly browned.
3. While almonds roast, put coconut and in a food processor. Blend until buttery, which will take about 10 minutes. About half way through, add the vanilla extract to keep the mixer moving.
4. Once roasted, let almonds cool for 2-3 minutes, then add the nuts, 1/4 c of the carob chips and salt to the coconut/vanilla mix in food processor. Blend until the mixture resembles a loose nut butter. Check for taste, and add another 1/4 c of carob chips if you feel so inclined. Set aside.
5. Heat a deep pot of water to a low boil. Remove cupcake tin from freeze. Place remaining carob chips in a handheld pot small enough to hold over the boiling water.  Stirring very frequently, place the small pot over the hot water (but try to keep bottom from touching water) and allow carob to melt. This will take 3-5 minutes. 
6. Using a spatula, divide the carob between each cupcake hole--each one should get enough to cover the bottom completely. Move quickly so the carob does not re-harden (if it starts to get firm again, put back over the boiling water for a few seconds and stir). It will not be pretty. Then, use the back of a metal spoon to smooth out the melted carob and push some up the sides of the tin. Again--it will not be pretty, just do what you can.
7. Add about 1 TBS of almond butter to each cupcake holder and smooth. We liked these without a top layer of carob--but if you have any left over, go ahead and pour it over the almond butter to make a final layer of "chocolate." Put cupcake tin back in freezer for 15-30 minutes. Once frozen, remove from cupcake forms and let come to room temperature before enjoying.

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Spanakopita, Deconstructed

I've made no secret about it: spanakopita, practically the national dish of Greece, is no favorite of mine.  This indifference is, in large part, owed to the strong contrarian spirit that dominates at least two-thirds of my opinions ("Oh, you think puppies are cute? Let me tell you why I find that to be misguided...")-- but mostly it's just because I'd rather be eating my Aunt Lena's eggplant pie.  Why eat a spinach/lemon/feta concoction when you could be sinking your teeth into an amazing amalgamation of eggplant, tomato, and onion? I rest my case.

But, alas. Winter is coming and the days of eggplant for $0.99/lb (thank you New Jersey, third-largest eggplant producer in the world) are over. Way over. Seems the only things under $2.49/lb these days are greens. Mustard greens, spinach greens, beet greens. Spinach. Arugula. Kale. It's a slow boat ride back to berry season-- but at least we'll be full of iron.

So what's a good Greek girl to do? Break down and deal with the hand nature deals the Northeast or spend $86/week on groceries? With my hand forced, I turned to spinach.

I came up with this take on creamed spinach--a cornucopia of uber-Greekness. Olive oil, spinach, dill, creamy yogurt... it's almost enough to make me forget about that eggplant pie.

Almost.

Deconstructed Spanakopita, or: "Creamed" Spinach

Pay no attention to the pre-made salmon patty on the left.

Ingredients

•  9 oz spinach, rinsed and dried
• 1 medium-large bunch of kale, rinsed, dried, and shredded from the thick center vein
• 1 bunch dill, bottoms cut off and chopped into thirds
• 1 large onion, chopped roughly
• 4 garlic cloves, chopped roughly
• 2 tsp oregano
• 2 TBS olive oil 
• 7 oz Greek yogurt (Fage is best, but you do you)

Assembly  
**I made this with my food processor--if you don't have one, just finely mince the onions/garlic and skip the shredding of the greens. It won't have the same texture but the option's there.**

 1. Puree the onion and garlic together in food processor. Set aside.

2. Throw the kale in a big, deep pot. If you have room, throw the spinach in there too--otherwise, cook separately.  To cook, add a splash of water and cover the pot, heating over med-high heat.  After 2-3 minutes, open the pot and stir thoroughly to distribute the heat. Cook for another 1-2 minutes, until the greens are wilted (note: the kale will take longer so, if cooking together, make sure it is on the bottom first so it gets most of the heat).

3. Place the greens in a colander to strain the excess water. Use a spatula to press out any additional water.

4. Heat the olive oil and oregano in a saute pan over medium heat until fragrant, about 2 minutes. Pour the onion/garlic puree into the pan and mix with the oil.  Allow to heat over medium until fragrant and slightly carmelized,  6-8 minutes.

5. While the onion mixture cooks, run the spinach, kale, and dill through the food processor until it is a pulp. Set aside.

6. Once fragrant, take about 1/3 of the onion puree (does not have to be exact) and set aside to cool.  Add the pulped greens to the remainder and mix well to combine.  Cook all together for another 3-4 minutes, until spinach is heated as well.

7. While spinach heats, combine cooled onion puree with yogurt and mix well.

8. Once spinach is heated, combine  spinach and yogurt mixture. Enjoy!

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Eggplant "Keftedes"

Hello to my loyal readers (loyal enough to remember me, since yesterday was my first post in 11 months)-

My apologies for my absence, but I have been busy with some other things.  Notably, things like this traditional Greek-abandoned-train dance I'm demonstrating below.

In case you have been reading this blog and thinking, "Gosh, they keep posting these damn recipes I can make myself and ALL I WANT ARE SOME REVIEWS OF GREEK RESTAURANTS IN PARIS," I bring good news: L'Olivier, which I mentioned last year, has completely redone the interior and also has received a Michelin star.  Boo-ya-ka-sha.  

I have also found new exciting and not-too-stuffy Parisian places that we'll have to talk about another time, although those who know me will be stunned to learn that they're all rive droite (horror!).  But they're all reaaaaly fun and realllly good:

• Jaja 
• le taxi jaune--specialist in horse meat, which sadly my soon-to-be-30 diet prevented me from having (because who doesn't say "I'm going to be 30 in a year and therefore I will abstain from eating Mr. Ed?), but the fish and ratatouille were also awesome
• Autour d'un verre, which is really Brooklyn, except for (1) the menu that is only on the chalkboard (ChefKefi, RN editor note--please excuse my brother who has lived out of the country for a decade and does not realize that this is what EVERY restaurant in Brooklyn did four years ago/still does), (2) no one's speaking English, and (3)  THE WINE.  Amazing wines, all chosen by the waiters when you describe what you want.  And all the wines are 'new' French
• And, finally, Au Coin Bio, which is perfect for a Sunday brunch if you're walking through the Marais and want to eat at makeshift tables in an outdoor market

(ChefKefi, RN editor note: THANK THE LORD that now when people google "gluten-free pumpkin recipes with Parisian restaurant reviews, my blog will come up first!)

Ok, so onto the food. Keftedes are great Greek meatballs.  If you're Greek-American and a bit health conscious, however, you make them vegetarian. And if you're Greek-American, health-conscious and a bit creative, you bake them as a casserole rather than frying them. And then they look like this:

The 2nd full dish from the left.

They are a little labor intensive but so worth it. Best if made the night before so the flavor comes together.

JetSet Kef's Keftedes

 

Ingredients:

• 2 large eggplants
• 2.5 tomatoes
• 1 Red pepper
• 1 Green pepper
• 2 cloves garlic
• 2 tbsp fresh basil or spearmint, finely chopped
• 2 sweet onions
• 2 tbsp white vinegar
• 1 egg
• 2 tbsp parsley, finely chopped
• 150(ish)g good feta cheese
• 1c flour
• 1 tsp baking powder
• Salt and pepper
• Olive oil

Assembly

1a (do in parallel with steps 1b and 1c). Peel the eggplant and soak in salted water for 30 mins. Grate or dice very finely.  Then you need to get all the water out of the eggplant.  This part is fundamentally not fun.  The best thing to do is put a few tablespoons of eggplant into a potato ricer at a time and squeeze all the water out.  (You can only do a few tablespoons at a time, though -- don't go crazy otherwise you won't get the water out.  And getting the water out of the eggplants and the tomatoes is one of the tricks here.)  By the way, if you don't have a potato ricer, get one.  Game changer.  Also if you don't have a potato ricer, you can squeeze the water out bit by bit with your hands (if you have 4 hours).

1b. Peel the tomatoes.  Then cut into quarters and squeeze them like lemons to get rid of the seeds and a lot of the water.  Then dice them. Now put a paper towel into into a sieve and put the tomatoes on top of them.  Add some salt to the tomatoes and let them sit for a least an hour while you're getting other things ready.  When it's done, the tomatoes should be much drier and should peel away from the paper towel pretty easily.

1c. Dice the peppers, onions, garlic and herbs. Everything should be nice and small otherwise you will be eating baked wannabe-ratatouille

2. Place the eggplant and the tomatoes into a large bowl and all the peppers, herbs, garlic, egg, vinegar, baking powder and salt and pepper. (NB: you only need red peppers to add some color to the final product ... otherwise it comes out a not-so-appetizing brown-ish grey.  If you really hate red peppers and you like brown food, feel free to skip them).  Stir gently; add the cheese and the flour.  Add the flour slowly -- you don't want these to get too floury.  As you add it, you can test the consistency by putting a bunch onto a teaspoon; if it slides off, it's too watery, and if it sticks, it's too dry.  You want it to be like thick honey:

Even JetSet Kef gets a sous chef sometimes--meet Khalid Kef!

3. Put all of this into an olive oiled baking pan and cook for 30+ minutes on 350.  Let it cool and serve.  You'll know it's done when there's not water cooking up on the sides anymore (another reason why you really need to get the water out of the tomato and the eggplant before you start cooking).  The cheese should have melted and it should be nicely warm all the way through.  It often takes a good 45+ minutes for me -- so just make sure to start monitoring it after 30 mins.

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Homemade Fruit Roll Ups So Simple a 5-Year Old Can Do It

Hi, I'm Chef Kef and I'm berry-aholic. 

The whole world seems to conspire against my work to contain my berry habit--global climate change has created a nearly 6-month berry "season," that beautiful wall of red, blue, and black is ALWAYS the first display in a grocery store, and pints of those cancer-fighting rock stars seem to be on "buy-one-get-one-free" sales just about every other week.  So I buy one (and get one) and try my damnest to eat them before they turn into a refrigerator science project.  As it turns out, strawberry curry does NOT make for a delicious dinner and I can't eat berry-topped yogurt with every meal, and so they get a little mushy and moldy before I can finish them all.  Then it's time to grocery shop for the next week and guess what? It's deja vu all over again.


Lucky for me, the tender angels I babysit all happen to be adventurous eaters who also like a project or two.  So last week one of the KiddyKefs and I took on the task of homemade fruit roll ups to get rid of my extra strawberries before they went bad.  What resulted were good enough that KiddyKef 1 and 2 ate nearly the whole batch (which is admittedly not that big--but the point remains), and as KiddyKef 2 astutely realized-- "Everything in these is healthy!" 

 Ingredients
--half a pound of strawberries*, stemmed and chopped, don't worry about uniformity
--one green apple*, peeled, cored, and chopped
--juice of one lemon
--1/4c water
-- 1 TBS agave

** you can use any fruit in any amount you'd like- you really can't mess this up (but more fruit means add a bit more water). The margin for error is in the sweetening--remember that sweetness and flavor will increase after they get dried out, so I wouldn't add much more than another TBS of sweetener unless you are using WAY more fruit than shown above, especially if you're using naturally-sweeter fruits.


 Assembly
1. Throw chopped fruit, lemon juice, and water in a sauce pan over medium heat.  Bring to a boil, cover and let simmer for about 7 minutes. Stir occasionally. They will get stewy. At about the 5 minute mark, add the agave and stir around.
2. Remove from heat. Let fruit cool off. Preheat your oven to "Low" or 180F.
3. Puree your fruit--food processor is best, but since they're all stewy, you can mash the big pieces by hand if you want.
4. Spread the puree thinly and evenly on a lined baking sheet. I used a silicon mat, but I am told that the temp is so low that microwave-safe plastic wrap works as well- do you.
5. Cook in the oven until you get the texture you like--we cooked them at 190 for 5 hours and our batch came out closer to fruit leather than rollup-- so I think 180 for 5.5-6 hours would do the trick.

6. Cut with a pizza roller and enjoy.

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Orange-Chocolate Pudding that Will Change Your Life (or at least your day)

No matter how healthily I eat during the day, I always (and I do mean ALWAYS) want something sweet after dinner.  Most nights, I can trick myself into thinking an apple and almond butter is dessert enough- other nights, I trick myself into thinking a full pint of ice cream is a good source of calcium.  

Today I bring you something that will really blow your hair back: a vegan, low-fat, low-sugar, gluten- free, easy-to-make, inexpensive chocolate dessert that tastes INCREDIBLE.  If all THAT isn't good enough for you, factor in that dark chocolate is actually chock full of antioxidants (polyphenols and flavonols) and...wow. Truly, a superfood.

I also whipped up a honey cream  but was too impatient to wait for the cream to get room temp, so it looks a little bizarre- but it was delicious. 

Yep, this is really all you need!

Ingredients 

• zest of 1 orange
• 100 g very dark chocolate (I like Lindt's 85% because it is on the cheap side and has the lowest sugar at 5 g per serving)
• 2 c almond milk
• 2 TBS sugar
• 2 TBS corn starch
  Non-Vegan Whipped Cream (optional)
• 1 c whipping cream this should be at room temp for optimal whippage
• 2 TBS honey

Assembly

1. Separate 1/2c of almond milk and set aside.  Then combine remaining 1.5 c of the almond milk with orange zest, chocolate, sugar, and corn starch in a heavy bottomed pan.  

2. Over medium heat, whisk together orange/milk/sugar/chocolate/starch mixture, being sure to not to let the chocolate burn at the bottom or the starch clump together.

3. Once the chocolate has melted, pour in remaining 1/2c of milk.  KEEP THAT WHISK STIRRING!

4. Let the mixture come to a boil (stirring all the while).  You can raise the heat to medium-high if you'd like.  The mixture will come together and get thick all at once, just before it boils.  Once it is boiling, cook for 2 more minutes, stirring constantly.

5. Remove from heat and pour into your serving bowl.  Know that if you want a nice, smooth finish, you need to smooth the top out IMMEDIATELY with a flat spatula.  Allow it to cool to room temperature, then put it in the fridge to chill until serving.

Optional Not Vegan Whipped Cream: Combine cream and honey.  Whip at high speed in metal bowl with electric mixer until you have whipped cream.

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