Chia Pudding - Theme and Variation

Now that I'm at the "what on earth do I feed her" stage of Kate's development, compounded by complications of multiple allergens, I've been scouring the interwebs looking for dairy-, egg- and wheat-free food (preferably baking and desserts, I'm just that kinda gal).

Enter the idea of chia seed pudding: fits in with those of you raw and vegan (if you use a dairy-free option fot the liquid) foodies, fibre-full for those trying to "feel full", great source of calcium and omega-3s, plus endless opportunities to play with flavours.  Now, if you don't like gel-textured things (think: tapioca pudding), run, don't walk, away from this post.  You'll need to come up with some other way to eat your chia seeds.

photos source: blogilates

I started off with blogilates' chia seed pudding: 2 tbsp white chia seed plus 1 cup liquid (in my case, I tried it with rice milk first - this was before we were off rice...).  While it was tasty, it didn't gel at all like in her blog post.  Hmmm.  See how those are dark little bits floating around in the milk?  One of the staff at the Duncan Community Farm Market indicated there wasn't much difference between white and black chia, so I grabbed the least expensive available at the time, which was white.  I went back and picked up black, and it gels way better.

photo source: choosing raw

Next stop: leftover oven-roasted squash with smoked sea salt and rosemary.  That'd be neat, hey?  I used choosing raw's pumpkin chia pudding as a springboard, adding our own home-grown & pressed organic apple juice for the liquid.  Yum, yum.  Very nice use of leftover squash!

Now I have an opened jar of apple juice... let's add a banana, handful of frozen blueberries, and chia seed to the juice, plus a sprinkling of cardamom (a very under-utilized spice in my opinion), combine with stick-blender, and voila!  If you add a few more whole blueberries after the fact, it makes it even more appealing to blueberry-faced toddlers.

photo source: dinutrition

dinutrition decided to riff on this with her own take - I quite like the idea of adding some nut/seed butter to the mix; I will have to try tahini and almond milk next, I think, maybe with some vanilla and a little garam masala?  So many possibilities!

I also recently tried our own cranberry juice (read: extremely tart) with some of our apple juice for sweetness (about 3:1 cranberry to apple juice), some cardamom for spice, and it was really great.  Tangy, interesting, and the chia seemed to soak up the sour.  I wonder what pudding I'll try next...

Blood from an Orange

I love blood oranges. I don't think they taste remarkably different than their orange-fleshed brethren, other than being a bit more tart, but the just look so gorgeous. Unfortunately, this recipe doesn't highlight their glorious colour, but enjoy their blood as it runs into your juicer! Speaking of juicing, these are a particularly challenging citrus to juice: their flesh is pulpy and their skin, while thick, isn't particularly skookum, so they kind of crumble when using a traditional juicer like in the photo above. I discovered that if you gently work from the edges of the halved orange inwards and around on the juicer, it's better than if you do the typical whole-hearted push & squeeze of a lemon or lime. This recipe originally arises from a search on the internet which turned it up, but of course, I couldn't leave it alone! Naturally, you don't have to use blood oranges, but that's what I had in my fridge; so, for breakfast this morning:

Blood Orange Muffins

1 cup unbleached all-purpose flour
1 cup whole wheat flour
2/3 cup quick or rolled oats
1/2 cup brown sugar
2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp ground cardamom
3/4 tsp ground ginger
1 tbsp grated rind
2/3 orange juice, freshly squeezed (or "squozened" as we like to say)
1/4 cup olive oil
2 eggs, beaten
1/2 cup chopped sunflower seeds (hulled, of course!)

Mix flour, oats, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and spices. Combine juice, oil and beaten eggs with rind. Mix liquid into dry until just incorporated (don't over stir). Place into greased muffin tin (12 muffins), filling each cup to about 2/3 full. Bake at 350°F for 20-25 minutes.

Crunchy Banana Breakfast Muffins

"Bananas" posted by Crias on WetCanvas Image Library

I can't resist hot muffins for breakfast, so while I don't do it every day, I like to bake them fairly often. We have some bananas and I thought that'd be a good muffin base, so I checked my trusty Harrowsmith Cookbook for a recipe and came up with the following, which actually isn't the exact recipe: I forgot 1/2 cup brown sugar, 3 Tbsp oil, I don't use salt nor can I use nuts, plus I added a bit more banana and changed the 1 cup unbleached flour to a split between that and whole wheat flour! I think I might next time include the oil, but it turned out with the extra banana in my version to not be necessary. I might also add just a touch of cinnamon next time, but really, they were good as is.

Crunchy Banana Muffins

1/2 cup unbleached flour
1/2 cup whole wheat flour
2 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
3/4 cup rolled oats
1 egg, beaten
2 mashed bananas (approximately 3/4 to 1 cup)
1/2 cup milk
1/3 cup chopped sunflower seeds

Combine dry ingredients. Combine moist ingredients. Add moist to dry and mix until just moistened, and stir in sunflower seeds. Spoon batter into well-greased muffin tin to two-thirds full. Bake at 400°F for 18-20 minutes.