$20 Richer

This morning on the dog walk I found a soaking, wet, twenty dollar bill. My head was looking down and there it was. Whoopee! I'm not going to use it for anything special. I just put it in my purse and will use it for food or gas. Yes I know it is not very exciting, but I'm not a big spender.

Here is the recipe for the Carrot Cookies, Autum Cookies, "Pumpkin Cookies", or Spice Cookies. I haven't picked a title just yet. I'm still crituquing this recipe, but they are still pretty good. If you decide to make the cookies thick they will be soft and moist. If you make them thin they will be hard and chewy; I like both.


Cookies
4c carrot pulp
2/3c almonds
1/2c soaked buckwheat
1/4c honey
3/4t salt
1t cinnamon
1/4t nutmeg
1/8t cloves (optional)
1/4t ginger
Put all the ingredients into the food processor and blend until smooth (or chunky it you like that). Roll the mixture into balls and flaten onto a teflex sheet 1/4'' thick and dehydrate for 6 hours, flip, another 4 hours. Enjoy!

Yikes!

Well, that did not work! So much for that pumpkin pie! I have been trying to chip this stuff off the sides of the dish for a while now. I will just eat it as cereal. At least it still tastes good. I don't know how I will prevent this in the future, maybe add flax to help it hold together. What are your thoughts?

Zucchini Pasta and More

Today I have been doing some cleaning and I made carrot cookies, cinnamon crackers, juiced carrots, almond milk, pie crust, sprouted and dehydrated nuts, sprouted and dehydrated buckwheat and zucchini pasta for lunch. I have a lot to do today, I still need to study and do some paperwork.

I love zucchini pasta, even before I was raw. It is great with just olive oil and salt, but with nutritional yeast and garlic is even better! Today I put it in the dehydrator before consuming so it would not be so crunchy. The spiralizer I have cuts it kind of thick so it is a must to put it in the dehydrator.

The pie crust was a mix of almond pulp, walnuts, cinnamon and honey. I can see right now that it is cracking so next time I will add ground flax to see if that helps. The crust is for my "pumpkin pie".

I have been eating the cinnamon crackers with almond butter and raisins, yum, it is good.
I will post the recipe for the carrot cookies sometime soon. It is a mix of carrot pulp, buckwheat, nuts and seeds, honey and cinnamon. I have also been eating the cookies all week as a snack and dessert.

Ok, I got to get back to work and need to stop watching youtube videos! Try zucchini pasta! If you don't have a spiralizer check grauge sales, thrift stores (that is where my mom just got me one for like $6) or buy online. Later everyone.

Hard Week and "Pumpkin" Pudding

Whew! Work is tough, stuff this week! Dog barked all night, didn't get much sleep. I worked 10 hours nonstop yesterday, I know that isn't much, but I'm tired.

I have such good parents. Every weekend they go to garage sales while I'm at work and buy me things they think I would like! Very nice, this week they got me a turn table and a never been used ice cream maker for $15.

With the Pumpkin Pudding I made this week I didn't use a recipe, I just threw in cashews, carrot juice, honey, cinnamon, salt, nutmeg, coconut oil and water. I will give you the recipe, but it might need some adjusting.
1 1/2c soaked cashews
1c carrot juice
1 1/2t cinnamon
1/8t nutmeg
1/4t salt
1/3c coconut oil, melt after measuring
1/3-1/2c water
3T honey (add more if you like it really sweet)
Blend in vitamix until smooth and creamy. Pour into dish (bowl, ramikins, etc.). I find that all these puddings, cheesecakes are much firmer if you let them set in the freezer. I threw the pudding in the freezer until solid and let rest in the fridge overnight after that. This stuff is very good, I am going to put it in a pie crust next!
THIS PICTURE DOESN'T DO IT JUSTICE! THE CAMERA WAS UNABLE TO CAPTURE THE PRETTY ORANGE COLOR AND SPECKS OF CINNAMON AND NUTMEG.

Has anyone ever tried a raw pumpkin pie with real pumpkin? I haven't had much success with it, but I am willing to give it another shot.

Wish everyone WARM wishes, Fall is here.

Sweet and Savory Crackers with Cashew Cheese

Hi, so far all the food I have made these past two days has been good! I have had plenty of time to prepare foods because of my three day weekend. Not my choosing, I need money, ha, I was considering having no days off! Anyway, on to the food!

I made the apple crisp from Sarma's book Living Raw Food. Its delicious, I couldn't stop eating the crisp topping, it would make great cereal. It is amazing how it tastes baked.

I followed the recipe exactly, but used walnuts instead of pecans. The filling was chopped up apples mixed up with agave (I used honey and cinnamon) and dehydrated for 4 hours. After the apples are done you put them in the processor until the consistency of chunky applesauce. The topping is almond flour processed with pecans, salt, and maple syrup (again I used honey). Crumble the mixture onto Teflex sheets and dehydrate until crispy. Yum, that stuff is SO good. I suggest that you keep the filling and the topping sepparate until the moment you are ready to take a bite or else the topping will not be very crunchy.
(This picture isn't very good because everything is brown, you can't tell where the crumble meets the filling)

The next thing I made was cashew cheese. I saw the newest post over at my favorite blog http://beautifullivingfood.blogspot.com/ and new I had to try making that cheese! I have always wanted to make cheese, but I was too lazy to mess around with the rejuvalac, so I was excited to see that I could use probiotics.

First I soaked 2c cashews overnight. Then I blended the cashews with 2 probiotic capsules with 1/3-1/2c water. I then left this mixture wrapped in my cheesecloth in a strainer on the counter for 24hrs. Now Joyce from beautiful living food said that her cheese smelled like sour cream and mine didn't have ANY smell. Its like I did something wrong, but I don't know what.

Once the 24 hours were up I spread some on a cracker with a sprinkle of salt (cheese means salty in my opinion) and it was good. To me this cheese tastes like the soy cheese you can buy from the store if you have tried that. I will try making a savory and sweet spread with this.



Here are the savory crackers with a scoop of cheese. Its not good without that salt sprinkle in my opinion. I'm not going to tell you what I think it tastes like without the salt, I will leave that up to your imagination. I will deffinately make this cheese again though.


When I made the cheese I new I had to make crackers to put it on. I couldn't remember the recipe I used before so I just winged it. I threw in about a 1c soaked buckwheat, 1 1/4c gr flax, 3/4t salt, 1/2c sunflower seeds and enough water to be spreadable and pourable into the processor. I then seppataed the mix into two bowls . Then I mixed into one bowl savory seasonings like oregono, parsley, onion pw, garlic pw, and basil. In the other bowl I put honey, stevia, cinnamon (a lot), and vanilla. Then dehydrated until crispy. The cinnamon crackers are SO good! I wasn't expecting that actually! I mean really, really good! To me that means no weird flax or buckwheat flavors. The savory crackers are good to, but not as good as the other.
Here is a picture of the cinnamon crackers.

You can see I put a lot of water in the mixture because they are so thin and delicate. They are good with almond butter.

Well that's enough for now.

Not a Good Week for Me

Carrot Cake/Cheesecake
This happens to me every once in a while where everything I make in the kitchen turns out BAD.
I made a carrot cake/cheesecake, chocolate pudding, salad, almond milk and its all YUCK. Too bad, I don't like throwing food out, but I'm considering it.

School starts soon, I am going to be BUSY.
I wish I had more luck with my spring form pans. The little metal lip on the pans makes it so I can never get the bottom of whatever I'm serving onto a plate! I have tried everything! Next I will try putting wax paper over the disk (I have tried it before, it didn't work either). If anybody has some helpful tips I would love to hear them.

New Book, New Recipe

Yay! The book arrived yesterday (thank you amazon for the speedy delivery) and I made my first recipe this morning.
Avocado Soup with Orange and Mango Salsa


Avocado, cucumber, celery, salt, cumin, coriander, orange zest, lemon juice and shallots is in the soup. I didn't use shallots because raw onion doesn't sit well with me. The soup was refreshing, but it is missing something (probably those shallots). The salsa however was deliciously, addictive! It consisted of mango, red pepper, orange juice, salt and cilantro. I didn't have cilantro, so I skipped it.

Its nice to take a bite of the sweet mango and crunchy pepper in the soup. I will probably make this again, but modify it slightly.

The photography in the book is stunning and there is such a variety of recipes! The book also has a wealth of information on tools, techniques, ingredients (very useful and helpful info), and her story. The recipe sections are divided by Quick and Easy, and Off the Menu. Within the Quick and Easy part is Milks, Shakes and Juices, Family Meals, and Simple Sweets. Off the Menu has First Course, Second Course, Desserts, Cookies and Bars, and Cocktails.

I can't wait to dig in! The key lime pie shake, BBQ skewers, Thanksgiving dinner, apple crisp, milk-chocolate mousse layer cake, caramel bars are all calling my name!