My sister-in-law Kim told me about cauliflower crust pizza awhile ago, but I just hadn't gotten around to trying it. I did look it up on the internet, and I noticed that a number of examples shown in photos had quite crispy edges. I must confess that I've had one too many gluten-free pizza crusts that were a bit burned around the outside, and I don't particularly like the carbonara flavor. I decided to try something crazy and make little tartlets in a muffin tin using foil liners so that they could be a bit better contained and maybe reduce the likelihood of becoming too crispy. I'm also in the middle of reading Joel Fuhrman's book Super Immunity, in which seeds get lifted up as a must-have in any super-high nutrient diet. I had picked up some roasted pepitas earlier in the day, and I decided that grinding them and adding them to the crust would provide some healthy fat and let me reduce the amount of cheese in the crust. Success! These little babies are delicious! I could even have used less cheese, and they would have been fine. The crust was a little puffy and nicely crustly, with no burnt edges. I had several for dinner, but these would be pretty fun as a party food too. You can't really tell from the picture because of the cheese, but two of them have mushrooms, one of them has mushrooms and tomatoes, and two are just plain cheese. I liked every combination. Ingredients: 1 cup grated cauliflower (I used a cheese grater, and it went pretty fast) 1 egg 2 tablespoons roasted salted pepitas, ground (I ground them in my coffee grinder. If you don't have this around, double the cheese in the crust to 1/2 cup) 1/4 cup cheese for crust, plus ~1/4 more for topping 1/2 teaspoon Herbs de Provence (I used this because we were out of dried basil and the oregano was at the back of the cabinet, but you should use whatever pizza seasoning you like) ~1/4 cup pizza sauce (I used jarred sauce from the pantry) Pizza toppings (I had fresh mushrooms and some grape tomatoes on hand, and Joel Fuhrman likes them too) Directions: Preheat oven to 450. Line a muffin tin with 6 foil muffin cups and spray them with non-stick cooking spray. Grate enough cauliflower to have a cup of it (around half a head). Put it in a microwave-safe bowl and microwave it for 4 minutes. (Almost everyone else on the interwebs says to nuke it for 8, but that's WAY TOO LONG in our microwave. I also saw a recipe that didn't microwave the cauliflower at all, so I split the difference and went with 4 minutes.) Let it cool for a couple of minutes so that when you add the cheese and egg it doesn't get weird. Stir in the ground pepitas, cheese, herbs, and egg and combine thoroughly. Divide evenly among the 6 muffin cups until it's evenly divided. Bake for 10 minutes, until the crusts are a little puffy and starting to brown on the edges (but not too brown!). Remove from the oven, turn the oven up to broil, and while it's heating, top your crusts with a spoonful of sauce, toppings and cheese. Put under the broiler until the cheese is bubbly. Remove. Let cool for a couple minutes to let the cheese set up, then pop the tarts out of the foil cups. Enjoy! [Sign up for the mailing list to get my Quickstart Guide to Living Happy, Healthy and Gluten-Free, plus the monthly newsletter and other updates, offerings, tips and more! (I never sell or share my mailing list.)]
Always on the quest for tasty and in the realm of healthy, my friend Wendy gave me the inspiration for these muffins. We had a good time thinking up possible crazy names for these babies, including something that roughly translated to Sock Bombs, but in the end I decided that Sock Bombs would never show up on an internet search for healthy-ish gluten-free muffins. :-) Ingredients:
Directions: Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Combine the dry ingredients. Place milk, eggs, butter, cranberries and banana in a blender and mix until combined. Pour the wet ingredients over the dry ingredients and stir just until blended. Line a muffin tin with cupcake liners and spray with non-stick cooking spray. Fill the muffin cups evenly with the batter. Slide a Xocai Power Square vertically in the muffin batter. Bake for 25 minutes. Eat and enjoy! First, a TMI warning: One cannot talk about a woman's weight-loss journey and chocolate consumption without also talking about hormones, cramps, periods and the like. Does anyone else want to yell at the screen when women contestants have a bad week at the ranch on Biggest Loser? Why is everyone baffled that every four weeks or so the women contestants under 50 show some inexplicably puny weight loss, or heaven forbid, a weight gain? Maybe they will have me on as a guest expert to slowly and patiently explain that our bodies simply turn on us at regular intervals to make us retain, bloat, ache, crave and crabify. Yes, crabify. With that preamble, perhaps I DON'T need to explain that I'm not surprised that I didn't lose any weight this week. I DID continue to enjoy an increase in my energy level and general level of optimism, dispite the afore-not-mentioned circumstances. Since I've only lived in my own body, I don't know if my experience is the same as other women's, but the week before my period starts is usually not that uncomfortable (no cramps yet), but the hardest to get motivated to exercise. This week on dark chocolate, by contrast, I've worked out four times since Sunday and felt good doing it. Usually a few days after my period ends I notice a remarkable reversal of period-related bloating, etc. I look forward to getting on the scale in a week and having some good news to report. [As an aside, my heavy periods coupled with years of undiagnosed celiac disease are the current working theory as to why I continue to have anemia issues. My period really does take a lot out of me.] In the meantime, I created a new recipe that is not too bad for me and totally fitting for this time of the month. I call it... Gluten-free Mocha Banana Oat Squares I had originally planned to just modify my peanut butter banana oat squares, but by the time I was done I had changed it enough to warrant its own thing. I forgot the peanut butter, added coffee, used an egg instead of flaxseed... you see what I mean. It came out really tasty and fit for breakfast. 1½ cups gluten-free 15-minutes-to-cook oats (I use Trader Joe's) 1 egg, beaten ¼ cup coffee 1 banana, mashed 1/8 cup chocolate protein powder (I'm using Xocai) 1/8 teaspoon (or less) salt 30 grams of dark chocolate broken up in chunks (I used 3 xobiotic squares, but you could use 1/8 cup(ish) of chocolate chips) Preheat the oven to 350. Combine the egg, coffee and mashed banana. Mix in the rest of the ingredients until everything is moist. Line a 6"x9" baking pan (or some other pan that's on the small size - 8"X8" would probably work) with parchment paper or lightly grease the pan with non-stick cooking spray. Pour the oat mixture into the pan and bake for 20-25 minutes, until lightly brown on the edges. Lift the food out of the pan by its parchment paper and let it cool on a wire rack. Cut into bars and enjoy! Makes 12 squares. I've just completed my first week with a dark chocolate protein shake breakfast, replacing my former non-chocolate protein shake. I've also eaten 2 little squares of dark chocolate a day, one around 3:00 pm and the other after dinner. It's too early to be sure if this will be a long-term sustainable strategy, but the first week's results are encouraging. I'm down two pounds and my pants are a little roomier. It could be solely because of my increased attention to diet in general - sort of a placebo effect. Still, it's nice to see movement in the right direction.
The other encouraging indicator is my energy level. With the exception of last Tuesday (following a Monday dinner that included a couple of slices of bread), I've been feeling really amazing. This is notable because I generally just feel pretty good. It was almost like a light switch being thrown. Again, I can't be completely certain it's the chocolate, but that's the main thing I'm doing differently. Given these early successes, the research will continue! Healthy Choco-PB Dip I created this single-serving dessert which is totally guilt-free. It combines healthy dark chocolate with powdered peanut butter, inspired by my friend Robin's "dip strawberries in dark chocolate" idea and my friend Lisa's recent enthusiasm for powdered peanut butter, which has only 22 calories per tablespoon and 85% less fat than regular peanut butter. This choco-PB dipping sauce has only 55 calories, plus the caloric value of the fruit you are dipping into it. Nice. Ingredients 1 6-gram square of dark chocolate (I used a Xocai Power Square) 1 teaspoon of powdered peanut butter (I used Just Great Stuff Organic) 1 1/2 teaspoons hot water Directions Put the chocolate in a microwave safe dish and heat it until soft but not hot. Boil some water for tea. (You'll want a hot drink to go with dessert, right?) Add the peanut butter powder to the chocolate and pour the hot water over the top of both. Stir until combined. It will be the consistency of brownie batter (less water for thicker, more water for thinner.) Dip your cut up fruit chunks -- banana, apples, pineapple, berries -- in the choco-PB sauce and eat up! Lick the dish when you think no one is looking. Show restraint and don't go make a second one. Console yourself with the knowledge that you will be able to do this again tomorrow. I was in the mood for something sweet but healthy. I had some bananas reaching their golden years. I was still in my pajamas and wanted to make whatever it would be from ingredients on hand. And I thought I'd go for a vegan option. Voila! Peanut Butter Banana Oat Bars!
Ingredients 2 ripe bananas, mashed 1 1/2 cup gluten-free oats (the kind that take 10-20 minutes to cook. I use Trader Joe's Rolled Oats) 1 tablespoon ground flaxseed 4 tablespoons warm water 1/4 cup smooth peanut butter Preheat the oven to 350. Combine the water and the flaxseed in a small dish and let sit for a few minutes (If you don't want to do vegan, beat an egg instead.) Combine all ingredients in a medium-sized bowl and stir until well mixed. Line a 6"x9" baking pan (or some other pan that's on the small size - 8"X8" would probably work) with parchment paper (we've become big fans of the parchment paper lately -- no stick, less oil) or lightly grease the pan with non-stick cooking spray. Pour the oat mixture into the pan and bake for 20-25 minutes, untill lightly brown on the edges. Lift the food out of the pan by its parchment paper and let it cool on a wire rack. Cut into bars and enjoy! Makes 12 squares. Alterations that might be fun: Substitue in a different kind of nut or seed butter, or use chunky peanut butter, or add ground nuts Add in a half a cup of chocolate, butterscotch or vanilla chips. Not as healthy, but really tasty, I bet! |
Archives
January 2024
|