FoodFash

Adventure Begins in the Kitchen

PB Chocolate & Avo Mousse

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Anyone, especially a blogger, can get sucked in the related posts trap.  You click and click and, before you know it, hours have passed.  Unfortunately, this isn’t as fun of a game for me as it used to be.  A hacker wiped my site last November and I still have hundreds of photos missing.  Big.  Bummer.

But I will spin this back to a positive note by telling you I have found the silver lining.  Looking at pictureless post after pictureless post gives me a perfect excuse to recreate old recipes and create new photos with a better lens.  And I’ll embrace any excuse to use this lens!

FoodFash PB Chocolate Avo Mousse (yields 3 servings)

1 ripe avocado

4 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder

3 tablespoons maple syrup

2 tablespoons peanut butter

1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Blend all of the ingredients until the mousse is as smooth as possible (I blended a few more cycles after the picture above).  Refrigerate for about 30 minutes and enjoy!

It’s amazing how an avocado can mimic a mousse-y texture.  The peanut butter and cocoa powder give a rich flavor and almost completely mask any trace of avocado flavor.  And even though I can still taste a hint of veg, this is the perfect 3PM-I-need-chocolate treat.

Quinoa Stuffed Grape Leaves

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I’m not even going to proceed with caution when telling you that I think rice is a total waste.  Rice bores me to death.  Rice is the reason why it’s taken me so darn long to make dolmas (stuffed grape leaves) at home.  Making a dish that centers itself around a main ingredient of rice just seems painful.  

Quinoa, now quinoa isn’t boring at all.  It kicks rice’s butt when it comes to protein, fiber, and overall vitamin content.  And quinoa is so darn cute.  Perhaps the bird measuring cup is clouding my cuteness judgement, but for reals, if rice then why not quinoa?

I began scoping out dolmas recipes to get a general idea of process and ingredients, but ended up jotting down the list on the side of my favorite Whole Foods dolmas.  I winged it and it totally worked.

FoodFash Quinoa Dolmas

Stuffing:

2 tablespoons olive oil

2 cloves of garlic, minced

1 yellow onion, chopped

1/3 cup mint leaves, chopped

2 tablespoons dried dill

juice of 1 lemon

1 cup quinoa, uncooked

salt, black pepper, crushed red pepper to taste

Grape Leaves:

12 to 20 jarred grape leaves, thoroughly rinsed

2 tablespoons olive oil

juice of 1 lemon

2 cups of water

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.  Over medium heat, lightly brown garlic in olive oil.  Add onions and cook until translucent.  Add remaining stuffing ingredients and stir together until thoroughly mixed.

Layer the bottom of a dutch oven with leftover grape leaves.  Place the stuffed grape leaves in the dutch oven like tetris.  You’ll want them really close together so that they don’t move.  You can place a second layer of grape leaves on top of the first.  Pour water, lemon juice, and olive oil over the grape leaves and immediately cover the grape leaves with something oven-safe and heavy that will prevent them from floating to the top (I used 4 ramekins).  Cover and bake for 45 to 60 minutes.  Eat right away or refrigerate overnight for cool dolmas.

So… quinoa stuffed grape leaves should happen all time!  The amount of lemon tang that the grape leaves soak up is unreal and amazing.  And the stuffing was so good that it would be completely worth it to make on its own if you didn’t have time for the whole grape leaf shebang.      In that case, you would cook the quinoa first and add it to the rest of the stuffing towards the end.

After preparing this recipe, I feel as though I should be able to add another notch to my pseudo-chef belt – go me!

Spicy Black Bean Hummus

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I went to the market during my lunch break today and felt completely consumed with inspiration.  I wanted to make anything and everything, but what?  Aha!  My Little Celebration’s black bean hummus, that’s what!

Within this recipe, Dana offered ranges of ingredient quantities that you could adjust to your taste.  Two years ago I would have cringed at the idea, but today I was ready for it!

In addition to black beans, cilantro, cumin, and salt, I used 2 teaspoons of crushed garlic, 3 tablespoons of tahini, 2 tablespoons of olive oil, and mixed it up a bit by using the juice from 1-1/2 limes and 1/2 teaspoon of cayenne pepper.

The addition of lime was so tart and fresh.  And the kick from the cayenne was muy bueno.  This recipe quickly turned into a little Mexican fiesta hummus!  Is it Cinco de Mayo yet??

Berry Good Breakfast

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So Jenny, who will now be referred to as Jebby Swizz, and I baked some ridonkulous strawberry pancakes on Friday night after a marathon happy hour.  They were so good that I couldn’t wait to make them into freezable muffins for work-day breakfast.

FoodFash Strawberry Pancake Muffins (yields 8 muffins)

3/4 cup sprouted wheat pancake mix (or regular pancake mix)

1/2 cup water

2 eggs

1/2 teaspoon vanilla

1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

5 large strawberries, diced

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.  Mix the first five ingredients in a bowl and then fold the strawberries into the batter.  Scoop 1/4 cup of batter and pour into each muffin cup.  Bake for 15 to 20 minutes.

Our post happy hour cakes were slathered in butter, which brought them to a whole new level of deliciousness.  But sans butter, these pancake muffins are a perfectly guiltless weekday treat.  The strawberry adds moisture and a subtle sweetness to the hearty sprouted wheat base.  Yu-um!