gluten free Archives • Page 6 of 6 • Ant & Anise

Oven dried apples and pears

When we were talking on Saturday, you mentioned that meditating for only a few minutes a day can help increase grey matter in your brain. I know it’s a good practice, but I’ve found it challenging to sustain it daily. Your comment got me thinking again.

First, that I will try, again, to build meditation into my day. Every day. (I started on Sunday morning with 7 minutes and am up to 10 already. Yay! This TEDx video is adding to my motivation.)

It also made me think that small investments in time can often yield benefits that endure. I thought of getting together with good friends, or exercising for just half an hour. Both of those make me feel better and last well beyond the actual time spent.

Oven drying apples and pears is the same: A little effort goes a long way and gives a generous result. (Rather like the slow roasted tomatoes you introduced me to.)

The oven drying takes just under an hour, plus a few more hours to completely dry. Mostly it’s not active time, just a matter of being around so you can keep an eye on the fruit slices while they’re in the oven.

And what you get are compact slices of amped-up apple and pear, concentrated flavor in a sweet, chewy bite. Delish.

They can be used a number of ways. So far I’ve tossed them on top of green salads and stirred them into hot cereal. (The cereal was particularly good.) They would jazz up a cheese plate, particularly if a cambozola or roquefort were involved. And I bet they would be heavenly dipped in some dark chocolate. Oh yes, dried pear and chocolate. Now that’s a thought I can meditate on.

Recipe Tip: You’ll find a number of techniques for drying pears and apples – like soaking the fruit in water with lemon juice added, using a greased pan or oiled oven rack to place the fruit on. What I found worked best is an extremely simple approach, with no oil or lemon involved. Here are my suggestions:

Use firm fruit. It’s easier to get the slices thin and produced a better (drier) result. I used a Granny Smith apple and both Bartlett and Bosc pears.
If your slices are thin enough, you won’t need to brush them with lemon juice or soak in a water/lemon juice solution. (I brushed half of the pear slices with lemon juice but couldn’t see any difference with the plain ones once they were dried.)
Unless you’re particularly seed averse, don’t bother coring the fruit. Leaving the seeds in is easier, and they look quite pretty.
Use parchment-lined baking sheets, and place the slices directly on the parchment – no oil required.

Oven dried apples and pears

Ingredients

1 crisp apple and 1 firm pear

Instructions

Preheat oven to 200°F. Line a large baking sheet with parchment paper.
Slice the apple and pear crosswise into thin slices, about 1/8” thick. If you have a mandoline this is a good time to enlist it. If you don’t (or if it’s in storage like mine is) use a sharp chef’s knife.
Place the slices evenly on the parchment-lined baking sheet and place in the oven. Let the slices dry for about 45-60 minutes. It’s a good idea to check them at the 45-minute mark, as the thinner slices will start to get toasty brown then.
Remove the baking sheets from the oven and let them cool for 5-10 minutes. Carefully peel the slices from the parchment, and transfer to a cooling rack to finish drying. This may take a few hours. Store in an airtight container for up to a week.

Arugula salad with pomegranate, feta and walnuts

What a crazy couple of weeks in late December. Like you said, Eve, much of it was happy and festive. But having Mom in hospital for almost a week with pneumonia over the holidays shook me up, maybe more than it should have.

Sitting with her in the hospital around lunchtime on Christmas Day was the worst part. Not because her condition had deteriorated. The antibiotics had started to work and she was getting better, well enough to be leaving the hospital in a few days if her progress continued.

For me it was that although she’d dodge this pneumonia, she won’t ever be herself again. Nothing like she was before Alzheimer’s struck. This isn’t news, of course. She hasn’t been herself for years, to the point that I doubt she knows who any of us are anymore.

I thought back to Christmases when I was growing up, when Mom was such a force. The one who was busy for weeks with shopping, baking, staying up late wrapping presents. She pulled everything together to ensure that we enjoyed Christmas, whether we were ripping open the carefully wrapped presents under the tree or tucking in to a feast of well-loved dishes that we had only once a year.

This Christmas Day, when I sat with her listening to Elvis’ Christmas Album (she always loved Elvis) and trying to get her to eat, I felt extra sad about all we had lost over the past several years.

…

Parsnip hummus

Do you like parsnips?

Ummm…well, I don’t dislike them. But I don’t go out my way to find them either. I guess I appreciate them more than I used to. Does that count as a yes?

When I was growing up parsnips didn’t make their way into too many of our dinners. As in, almost never, at least on the Johnson side. (Eve, can you think of a time?)

No, we stuck to the basic root vegetables: carrots, sometimes rutabaga (which we called turnips, but were really yellow-fleshed rutabaga), and potatoes. Especially potatoes. A never-ending rotation of mashed, boiled, baked, and, for special occasions, scalloped. And then more mashed ones again.

On the Neely side of the family, parsnips turned up only once every few years, around Christmas. At my cousins’ place my aunt Glennys made candied parsnips, with heaps of brown sugar and butter to make them more appealing to everyone, especially the kids. I knew my sweets though, and the candied parsnips didn’t have me fooled. When the parsnips got passed around the table to me I remember taking a token one or two small pieces, just to be polite.

Enter the CSA. This was our second summer enjoying a weekly box of fresh vegetables from Cropthorne Farm in Ladner, and I love it. Well, mostly I do. It’s exciting to see the season unfold week by week and to try veggies I don’t normally buy.

But every season, there’s a few weeks where my culinary creativity sinks to a low ebb. Maybe it goes on summer holiday. At those times, when I open up the weekly box and see something I don’t regularly eat — like kohlrabi or parsnips — I’m apt to shove it to the back of the crisper, thinking what am I ever going to do with that?

That’s exactly how I felt when we got parsnips 3 weeks in a row in the CSA box. I secretly hoped that Bob would discover them in the fridge and roast them all up for a big Sunday night dinner à la Jamie Oliver.

No such luck.

So I took up a challenge for myself: Find some inspiration, somewhere, and make a respectable dish out of the parsnips. Not a boring side dish you’ve seen before (boiled or roasted parsnips), and not a slavishly strange creation you’ll never see again (Heston Blumenthal’s parsnip cereal). More like a simple, slightly offbeat dish that would appeal to almost everyone over 12 years old.

How about parsnip hummus?

Yes, parsnip hummus. An earthy, thick spread of cooked parsnips, tahini, garlic and spices. Some lemon juice and zest for brightness, and a little olive oil and melted butter for a velvety mouthfeel. The texture is like hummus but lighter, a little sweeter and spicier than one made with chickpeas. (And Eve, everyone happily enjoyed more than a token amount at your dinner party. I’ll take that as two thumbs up.)

Parsnip Hummus

This is a fantastic way to use parsnips in an unexpected way. It's a healthy, gluten- and grain-free appetizer that pairs well with raw veggies or crackers. Plus, you can make it a day ahead of time.

Ingredients

1 lb parsnips, peeled and cut into 2-inch thick pieces
2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
juice + zest of 1 lemon
1 tablespoon ground cumin, toasted (*see note)
1 teaspoon ground coriander, toasted (*see note)
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves, toasted (*see note)
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
salt and pepper to taste
olive oil for drizzling (optional)
fresh vegetables, crackers or bread for dipping

Instructions

Place the parsnip pieces in a medium saucepan and cover with water. Bring to a boil and simmer over medium-low heat until parsnips are tender, about 5 minutes. Drain and transfer to food processor.
Add lemon zest and juice, spices, and olive oil and blend together until smooth. Scrape down the sides of the processor, add the butter and blend together again. Add salt and pepper to taste. If the texture is thicker than you prefer, add a little more olive oil or lemon juice. If not using right away, cover and refrigerate.
To serve, spoon hummus into a ramekin or onto a plate, drizzle with some olive oil if desired, and surround with slices of fresh vegetables, crackers or bread. Makes about 1-1/2 cups.

Notes

Toasting and grinding your spices helps to boost their flavor: Heat spices in a dry sauté pan over medium-low heat, stirring occasionally with a wooden spoon, until fragrant. (Keep a very close eye on your pan, as the spices go from fragrant to burnt in no time!) Remove from heat, cool, then grind in a spice grinder. I use an inexpensive coffee grinder which I use exclusively for spices.

Pear ginger upside-down cake

I’m blaming it on the move. The lack of posts lately, that is. To say it’s been hectic around here the last month is an understatement.

Moving house is one of those well-known stressful life events. And ours wasn’t just a move but a downsizing. I’m not sure, but my guess is that this ups the stress score a few notches.

In addition to the long list of regular moving tasks, with a downsizing there’s a number of questions that need answers before moving day: What is essential to take with us? Will our huge, well-loved sofa fit in the door? What can we shed rather than move into storage? And one question I pondered a lot: If it’s going into storage, won’t we realize in a year that we can get along without it just fine? That’s the minimalist in me talking.

With all the long days of making moving-related decisions, it suddenly hit me: With my regular life temporarily turned upside-down, I really needed a few stable things to count on. Anchors to help keep me sane amidst all the changes swirling around us.

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Mini Chocolate Blackberry Cupcakes

It’s funny, the way we do family birthdays. The ones that fall outside of October, that is.

Between Christmas and August it seems impossible to get us all together to celebrate individual birthdays, one each in January, March and May and two in July. We’ve tried numerous times, but our schedules don’t mesh very well. And having Bob out of town on business so frequently these days doesn’t help either.

A late summer party to exchange gifts and belated birthday cards seems to work. There’s a small window of opportunity, around the third week of August, after you and Alan return from vacation and before Janet and Jenny head off in early September. By this time, there’s usually been enough warm weather and lazy summer days so we’re all relaxed, to some extent, along with more relaxed summer schedules.

After spending the day in the kitchen chopping, roasting and making vinaigrettes, I was happy to enlist some help to assemble the appetizers — Alana with the smoked salmon canapes and you with the melon pieces wrapped with prosciutto. We don’t hang out too often in the kitchen together, but it’s always interesting to compare how we’d tackle things.

Like the prosciutto wrapped melon. If it were you, you would have put the ingredients on a plate so your guests could assemble their own appetizers. The pieces of melon are so small, you want me to wrap each one?

Yes, Eve. (Tee hee hee.)

It’s true, making individual bites of prosciutto-wrapped melon is more labor intensive. But I like them that way. I think it’s partly because I like to be on the receiving end of perfect bite-sized canapés. It’s like you’re at a posh cocktail party, you know?

It could be my Dad’s side of the family coming out in me too. I can remember his mother taking a lot of care and attention to assemble a fruit platter for a party, fussing to make sure the watermelon slices were all evenly spaced in a fan shape and fretting a little when they would slide out of order.

To complement your rustic peach blackberry galette for dessert, I made chocolate blackberry cupcakes. Mini sized ones. (There’s that labor intensiveness again. But they’re so cute. And bite sized!) A blackberry in the bottom of each cup, rich chocolatey cake and a Swiss meringue buttercream, lightly flavored and colored with juice from fresh blackberries that I squished through a fine mesh strainer.

It was so good to get everyone together at last. We bundled up to eat outside, and I was thankful we had the outdoor heater going. When the light faded so quickly after dinner we ate dessert in the pitch black, except for the glow of the candles. The stories, laughs and bites of blackberry galette and cupcakes made me think this is just what a late summer barbecue should be like. Happy Birthday, Bob, Eve, Jenny, Alan and Dad. Thanks to Janet, Brittne, Alana and Mike for helping make the night a special one.

Mini Chocolate Blackberry Cupcakes with Blackberry Buttercream Frosting

Yield: 44 mini cupcakes

Adapted from Cake on the Brain's Best Ever Quinoa Cupcakes. These cupcakes are super moist, almost a bit too moist for my liking. (Hard to believe, I know.). The blackberry buttercream is adapted from a recipe from Sugar for the Brain.

Ingredients

Chocolate Blackberry Cupcakes:

2 cups cooked quinoa, cold (*see note)
1/2 cup milk
4 large eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
1-1/2 cups sugar
1 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1-1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
44 blackberries

Blackberry Buttercream

4 large egg whites
1 cup sugar
3/4 pound butter, softened
pinch salt
1/2 cup blackberries

Instructions

For the Chocolate Blackberry Cupcakes:

Preheat the oven to 350F. Line a mini muffin tin with paper liners. Drop 1 blackberry into each liner.
In a blender or food processor, combine milk, eggs and vanilla and blend until combined. Add 2 cups of cold cooked quinoa (see below) and the melted butter. Blend until smooth.
Add the sugar, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda and salt, and blend well to combine.
Pour (if you're using a blender) or spoon out (if you're using a food processor) the batter into the cupcake liners. Fill them about 3/4 full. Bake the cupcakes for about 20 minutes, or until a cake tester inserted into the middle of a cupcake comes out clean.
Let the cupcakes cool in the tin for 5 minutes, then remove them to a wire rack to cool completely. If desired, frost with blackberry buttercream.

For the Blackberry Buttercream:

Fill a medium saucepan 1/4 to 1/3 full with water and bring to a simmer.
In the bowl of a stand mixer, add the egg whites and sugar. Place the bowl on top of the saucepan and whisk constantly until the temperature reaches 160F. If you don't have a candy thermometer, whisk until the sugar has completely dissolved and the egg whites are hot.
Remove the egg white and sugar mixture from the heat and quickly move it to your stand mixer. With the whisk attachment, whip until the mixture is thick, glossy and cool, about 4-5 minutes. Scrape down the sides of the bowl and remove the whisk attachment.
Using the paddle attachment, beat the mixture on medium speed. While the mixture is beating, add the softened butter one piece at a time and mix until all the butter is incorporated. Add the salt.
Squish the blackberries in a fine mesh strainer over a bowl to extract the juice. Add to the buttercream and blend until smooth.

Notes

If you haven't got cooked quinoa on hand, make it first so it can cool before you add it to the cake batter: For 2 cups of cooked quinoa, rinse 2/3 cup raw quinoa. Place it in a heavy saucepan with 1 cup water and bring to a boil on medium-high heat. Cover, reduce heat to low and simmer for 15 minutes. Remove from heat and leave covered for another 10 minutes. Fluff with fork and allow the quinoa to cool completely. Quick Tip: If you're in a hurry, spread the cooked quinoa on a baking sheet and pop it into the fridge so it will cool faster.