The Mother of Invention

This blog's title, The Mother of Invention, was inspired by my crazy diet, which is a mother of a grind to follow. But, by necessity, it has inspired me to create a mother of a repertoire in the kitchen. I seriously should be on the FoodNetwork show "Chopped". If anyone can take a basket of unrelated ingredients, such as burdock root, clams and coconut and turn it into an appetizer, it's me. So here's the rundown of my four day food rotation.

Day 1 I can have bison, lentils, yogurt, the soft cheeses, onion, garlic, winter squash, kale, blackberries, olive oil, bay leaf, and flax seeds.
Day 2 allows me chicken, anchovies, chick peas, goat cheese, avocado, lettuce, olives, swiss chard, hearts of palm, lemon, cherries, sesame, sunflower oil, turmeric, ginger, cardamom, and common (mint family) herbs.
Day 3 I get to have lamb or pork, yogurt, milk, cocoa, cauliflower, cabbage, asparagus, leeks, brussel sprouts, bok choy, blueberries, cranberries, coconut, olive oil, bay leaf, vanilla, wintergreen, and rosemary.
Day 4 includes turkey, beans, peppers, spinach, artichoke, burdock root, tomatoes, celery tomatillo, ground cherries, currants, gooseberries, canola oil, cumin, caraway, saffron and parsley.

I love chili, so I love day 4.

Exciting challenge, isn't it? Since I never back down from a challenge, and, as I mentioned before, have always seen recipes as mild suggestions, and I really, really wanted a peanut butter and jelly sandwich the other day, I invented the ever-popular PBJ. Without peanut butter. Without jelly. Without bread. Now this may sound like a stretch, but my brother can tell you I once re-invented the air conditioner with a cold shower and a standup fan. So friends, I bring you the...

Deconstructed PBJ

Make the lovely Chick Pea Flour Tortilla as directed in my previous post, using sunflower oil.
Coat it with a few tablespoons of unsweetened sunflower butter.
Roll it up like a jelly roll and slice it into rounds.
Fill a bowl with frozen organic sweet cherries.

Now, make the "perfect bite"... one round of tortilla with one cherry on your fork. Voila!

Grilled Salad

You know you want to know what the hell a grilled salad is. First, I'll tell you what it's not. No zucchini, no asparagus, no grilled eggplant. You can add these things if you want to, but essentially it is made of lettuce. Grillable lettuce? Yes, grillable lettuce.
So when your mother calls you and asks "Have you eaten your greens today?" You can proudly say "Yes, mom, I at my greens. " Even if its 20 degrees with a wind chill of 8, you can have salad.

Grilled Salad

2 head of endive
1 small head of radicchio
1 head of hearty lettuce, like romaine
Olive oil
Sea Salt
Freshly grated or sliced Parmesan cheese
Crunchy garnish. Might I suggest sesame seeds, unsweetened dried raspberries, or hemp hearts?

Slice the heads of endive, radicchio and lettuce lengthwise in quarters and do not core them. So you end up with four long pieces attached at the base for each head of greens. I know they aren't all green. I'm calling all of them "greens" for the purposes of this recipe.

Heat a good dollop of oil in a non-stick pan and sprinkle in some sea salt. Place the greens cut side down in the hot pan and saute for about 3 minutes per cut side.

Take all the greens out with tongs and immediately cut them crosswise into strips. Toss in a bowl with the pan drippings and healthy grating of parmesan cheese. You can add dressing, but if you oiled and salted the pan nicely, you won't need it. I sometimes drizzle a little more oil on top. Add your garnish now if you'd like. Serve warm or at room temperature as a lunch, a side dish, or under grilled chicken for dinner.

If you have leftovers, you can add them to any soup or stir-fry. They are especially good stirred into hot lentil soup at the last minute.

See? Now you can say, "Yes, mom, I ate my greens. "

Flax Seed, Schmax Seed

Aaaahh. Flax seed. The word connotes everything that is the opposite of comfort food. Doesn't fill the mouth with sultry smoothness. Doesn't leave hints of sweetness on the back of the tongue. Doesn't soothe the palate with a round, pleasing, fullness like mac-and-cheese or vanilla pudding or chocolate cake or shepherd's pie. No. Flax seed is wooden, and tasteless, and boardy and hard to chew. And I am falling in love with it.

The most unlikely-to-succeed-combination, based on the qualities lacking in flaxseed would be one in which the result does leave hints of sweetness and soothes the palate in a smooth disguise of comfort food. This combination is Hot Pumpkin "Cereal".

Hot Pumpkin Cereal with Ricotta and Flax Seed

1/2 cup ricotta
1/2 cup water
1/4 cup pumpkin puree (from a can is fine)
pinch salt
2 Tbsp flax seed
Few dashes of cinnamon
sweetener to taste (I recommend 2 to 3 drops of orange flavored stevia extract or raw honey)

This hot cereal substitute takes about 5 minutes to make and would be worth taking longer, but it doesn't.
Whisk ricotta and water in a small saucepan til smooth. Whisk in pumpkin. Heat over medium heat til just steaming warm. Stir in pinch of salt, flax seed, cinnamon and whatever sweetener you choose--brown sugar, stevia, maple syrup, honey are all good.
Spoon it into a bowl. Sit down and watch the snow fall while you eat it.


This next recipe for flax seed crackers is all about the flax--woody, stiff, hard to chew, but if you want crackers and can't eat traditional grains or if you are on a low carb regime, the flavor is really good, if you can get past the texture.

Garlic and Parmesan Flax Seed Crackers

1 c. flax seed meal
1/3 c. grated parmesan
1 tsp garlic powder
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 c. water

Preheat the oven to 400. Mix all the dry ingredients to distribute them evenly. Then add the water to make what looks like dry mud with vegetation in it. Yum. Cut a piece of parchment to fit a flat cookie sheet. Spoon the mixture onto the parchment and cover it with waxed paper. Then roll it out with a rolling pin REALLY thin. Thinner than pie crust, and as even as possible. Score it with a pizza cutter to make a grid, so that after it bakes you can break it into crackers.
Pop it in the oven for 18 to 20 minutes. Let it cool completely and break the crackers apart. If the middle isn't quite crisp, you can pop them back in the oven to warm and dry them at 300 degrees.

Chick Pea Flour Contined (by way of Coconut Flour)

I have flour coming out of my ears. Okay, maybe not out of my ears, but off my Uggs and the cuffs of my jeans. And it has to be kept in the refrigerator. As if I don't already have enough unrecognizable containers of old leftovers in there. Now, I have to keep track of flour? Chick pea flour, black bean flour, flax seed meal, coconut flour... Oh, right, coconut flour.

Apparently coconut flour doesn't exactly "bind" like wheat flour or other flours you typically think of when cooking. My daughter is allergic to eggs, and I have made regular old pancakes for her a thousand times without using a single egg. Some wheat flour (yes, the regular white, bleached, enriched wheat flour), a little baking powder, salt, a little milk, melted butter, and a hot pan become pancakes. Stacks and stacks of them, in fact. So, why not do the same with coconut flour, right?

Since I can not eat eggs now, I decide to whip up some coconut flour pancakes. A little flour, a little baking powder, salt, a little milk...sounding familiar yet? I whisk, let it sit for a few minutes, get my pan lubed and nice and hot, and pour in the batter. Can't wait for the result. Now children, this is a life lesson for you, so listen up: Coconut flour pancakes aren't. This is the equivalent of pouring bechamel sauce into a hot pan and trying to flip it. These "pancakes" aren't browning; they aren't even cakes. They are reducing into some strange bubbling concoction of coconut. So I begin to stir, and stir, and Eureka! (I love Eureka moments). I realize that I am making Coconut Polenta!

So I stir until it is the consistency of cream of wheat. Slap it in a bowl and stir in some wild blueberries. This is better than pancakes folks. And a happy accident for breakfast keeps your belly full all morning.

Coconut Polenta

1/4 cup coconut flour
1 cup water
pinch of salt
1/2 cup wild blueberries
sweetener to taste (honey, stevia, whatever you like)

Whisk in 1/4 cup of the water to make a fine paste. When smooth, add the rest of the water and salt and continue whisking. The mixture will be very thin. Pour it into an oiled or buttered saucepan (nonstick preferably), and stir continuously over medium high heat until it reduces to the consistency of cream of wheat. Remove from the heat and stir in the sweetener and berries.
Eat!

Chick Peas Galore!

So, I met with an actual dietitian this morning who is AMAZING. I have been on a very not-so-exciting doctor order diet (not diet as in weight loss--diet as in something is wrong with you that needs to be fixed). And for the last two years, it has been NO FUN! No bread, no pepper, no sugar, agave, maple syrup. And recently they've banned all the best root vegetables, for example potatoes, carrot, parsnips, beets, celeriac. I'm pretty much left with kohlrabi root. Oh joy! There's only so much bok choy and swiss chard one can eat, know what I mean? And I can't even drink to pass the time.

As a matter of fact, I'd say almost half of my friends have weird things they can't eat, or gut issues, or IBS, or hives, or whatever crazy ailments. You know who you are. Wouldn't it be great if just food could make it better? I know: I'm dreaming.

But enough about that, let's get to the good news....Chick Pea Flour and Coconut Flour! Let me tell you that I am absotively thrilled! I can't wait to start experimenting with chick pea tortillas, chick pea pizza, chick pea everything. 'Cause life without pizza pretty much bites.

Then we have coconut flour...You got your coconut flour biscuits, coconut flour muffins, coconut flour dutch babies, and so on. I am bloody well psyched to try these!

And because I am the sharing type of person I am, here are some untested recipes from me:

Chick Pea Flour Tortillas (Skillet Bread) from Bob's Red Mill

1 Tbsp Olive Oil
1/2 cup Chick Pea (Garbanzo Bean) flour
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
2/3 c. water

Whisk the flour, salt and water together to make a thin batter. Heat the pan and coat with olive oil. Pour the batter into the pan and roll it around to coat like a giant pancake. Cover and cook on medium high heat for about 2 minutes. Uncover and cook 5 minutes, then turn the skillet bread. Coook another 5 minutes on the other side.


Chick Pea Flour Pizza

2/3 cup chickpea flour
1/3 tsp. salt
1 cup water
1/2 tsp. finely chopped rosemary
3 T Olive Oil
1/2 chopped tomato
1 T chopped onion
3 T grated Parmesan cheese

Preheat the broiler. Add the salt to the chickpea flour to disperse evenly. Add 1/4 cup of the water and whisk to remove lumps and then mix until smooth. Whisk in the remaining water and let the batter stand for a half hour or so, then stir in the rosemary (or whatever herb you prefer--marjoram is good too).
Heat 1 T of the olive oil in a nonstick ovenproof pan. Stir the batter once, pour it into the skillet and drizzle the remaining 2 Tbls. of olive oil on top. Cook the pizza over moderately high heat until the bottom crisps and the top is almost set, about 2 minutes. If any big air bubbles show up, just pop them with a knife.
Sprinkle the tomato, onion, and cheese over the top, then place the skillet under the broiler and cook until the pizza is golden crisp, about 5 minutes. Take it out and eat!


Now repeat after me (in the style of a congo line). "I can't wait to eat this! I can't wait to eat this!"

Stay tuned for coconut flour muffins. I'll test these and my no-recipe meringues before I pass them along. Too much can go wrong with them.