He Hawai'i au.

How the leaves came packaged.

In case you missed it, I'm Hawaiian. :-) Yes not fully but it's what I identify with the strongest. I was born and raised in Hawai'i on the island of O'ahu. It is and will always be my home, no matter where my husband's job takes us. When we first moved to Texas almost 15 years ago, I had near zero access to anything food like from home. I could order things online from Zippys (a local restaurant in Hawai'i kind of like Dennys but with local style food) but it was expensive. I made do with what I had. I found a little Filipino store that sold frozen poi and was THRILLED.

Cutting the stems.

Fast forward to Seattle and it was a whole new world. There was a FABULOUS store called Uwajimaya. They had everything from Zippys chili to laulau, kalua pig and poi. Then we moved home. Oh so much easier to buy things there. Well we're in California now. It's like Seattle in that it's easier to find what I'm looking for. What was I looking for? First, Purple Okinawan sweet potatoes. They are wonderful in so many ways. First, they are purple. How cool is that? Second, they are by far the best sweet potato EVER. They are creamy and not fibrous and so yummy. Second, I needed more Poi as my stash in the freezer was down to one. Finally I have been craving lu'au leaves which are the leaves of the kalo or taro plant. The bottom of the plant is what poi is made from. There's a dish called Stew lu'au that I wanted. There's also a dish served at parties that's called squid lu'au but since I'm not fond of seafood and was looking to up my vegi intake, I wanted to make my leaf plain and top it with the sweet potatoes.

Washing the leaves

In the pot. :-) I know it's overflowing. Just wait.

So we spent the week in downtown Oakland for a stay-cation as my husband had to teach a class on the Coast Guard Base in Alameda. One day the girlies and I took a trip to Berkeley to find the Tokyo Fish Market because after researching it, found out this was the closest store to our house with poi.

It was a great little store and my girlies were SO happy as they had the candies and cookies from Hawai'i there too. We bought a few other things including some Aloha Shoyu, some Hawaiian Sun guava juice for the big girlie,  the little girlie's favorite "milky candy". They had my LOVERLY sweet potatoes and bought a HUGE bag of it. The only thing they didn't have was my lu'au leaves. Ok, no problem we have one more Asian market to check out on our way home.

See just like other greens it's shrinks when cooked.

On our way back home we stopped at 99 Ranch. Oh that was so much fun. They did have my lu'au leaves. They also have my sweet potatoes. The girls went bonkers in there with oos and aaahhhs over the ice creams, the live sea food and their ready made food. I grabbed two bags of leaves and a few other things and we got out of there quickly as I wanted to buy a lot more things and had to stick to my budget.

Adding in the coconut milk. Yups those are all the leaves.

So the next day, I set to figuring out what to do. While I've eaten lu'au before and we've prepped it for parties and what not, I've never made it by myself and it's been years since I've touched an unprepped leaf. In Hawai'i you can buy already prepared leaves in the frozen section at some grocery stores. So I looked online and found a few places and just winged it. I cut off the stalk and some of the veins as it cuts down on the itchiness. (Taro has calcium oaxalate crystals in it which make it inedible when raw, but when cooked causes no problems.) Then you have to wash it. I remember washing the leaves before, by filling up the sink and washing it in there so I did that. I washed them three times and only got moderately itchy. I put the leaves in a pot with some water and boiled it for at least an hour. I'd like to give you the total time and I estimate it as being an hour and a half but we left in the middle of cooking so it sat in the hot pot (stove off) while we were gone. When I got home I turned it back on. Meanwhile I boiled the sweet potatoes. After the leaves were cooked, I drained them in a colindar and squeezed some of the water out. I placed it back in the pot and added some Hawaiian salt and a can of coconut milk. I turned the stove back on and cooked them together till they were heated through.

Yummy purple potatoes.

Everything was ready. I dished out my poi. (You NEVER EVER EVER put anything in your poi EVER! Seriously don't do it. If you want to mix something in your poi put it in your mouth and put the thing you want to mix it with in your mouth and do it there. ALWAYS keep your poi clean of food also when you're eating it. Yes, you can add poi to things when cooking it like stew, muffins, pancakes, etc. but when eating it plain, you have to keep it clean or mama will NOT let you eat from the big bowl. It's just sad to not be able to eat from the big bowl with everyone else.) I put a bit of chicken breast I had in the fridge in a different bowl, covered it with my lu'au and put my sweet potatoes on top. Here's where I tell you I had to force my girls to try it. While they ate poi, sweet potatoes and lu'au as babies, I didn't have it around as much as they got older. And here is where I tell you my heart swelled with pride with my girls both said it as good and my little girlie stole one of my sweet potatoes and proceeded to eat half of my dinner, eating her poi in the proper two finger method.

:-) So when you've got that craving that will either cost you $2000 to satisfy or you can spend some time researching and making your own, I opt for getting to know your surrounding area and making your own. Save your trip home for when the tickets are on sale.

DINNER!!!!

Mac-a-"quinoa" and cheese.

Mushrooms, cauliflower stems and brussels sprouts.

"Mama can we have macaroni and cheese?" Sure, easy enough but what do I eat and I'd like something cheesy and creamy too. Well I have recently discovered I can eat quinoa again. LOVE quinoa. I have some in the ice box. Ok, I can build on that. What else is in there? Well I'm roasting cauliflower and brussels sprouts. Since I'm only using the florets of the cauliflower I can chop up the stems and use that and no one will miss a few brussels sprouts. What else? Hey I have mushrooms and mushrooms are fantastic, meaty and flavorful.

Cooking away all flavored up.

Ok so start sauteing in the pan with a touch of olive oil. HHmm spices and herbs would be great. I've been trying to eat a bit more warming spices as I am reading up on Ayurvedic medicine (Hindu traditional medicine). So let's see, I have turmeric which is great for inflammation. (In Hawaiian it's called olena) I added some red chili flakes, garlic powder, dried onion flakes and a touch of oregano.

When the little girlie asked for mac and cheese, she wanted it like she had it at a restaurant they have in Hawai'i. It comes with peas and ham. I had some ham steaks but no peas. Sub in broccoli which is her favorite and we're good. So I cut the ham in chunks and sauteed that up with broccoli in another pan. Boiled up water in another pan for their macaroni.

Added in broth

Adding buttermilk

Then there's the quinoa. It's not a difficult grain to cook. You can cook it on the stove but I really like making it in the rice cooker. :-) My cooker has a variety of settings so I just put it on for white rice, wash it, and put it with water (1 to 2, so one cup of quinoa to 2 cups of water), turn it on and there's no fuss no muss, no watching it on the stove.

Mmmm Tillamook cheddar cheese

Ok so what else do I need. Something liquid. I have some left over homemade chicken broth and I need something creamy. I have buttermilk. That will do, but you can so use anything else you have in your ice box from almond milk to cream. I also love using cashew cream but didn't feel like pulling out the blender. You can find cashew cream in a previous blog entry if you want to try it. AND there is the need for cheese. So I cooked down the liquid a bit then added in the buttermilk. Last to go in was the cheese; stirred until melted.

Cooked quinoa from the rice cooker

Time to plate everything up. In my saimin bowl (You may know Saimin by the name Ramen) I scooped out some quinoa, put on my creamy, cheesy vegis and then added the ham and broccoli on last. The taste was perfect. It was a bit salty, a touch of spice, nice and creamy and cheesy giving the flavors I was looking for.

Even if you can have wheat or rice, you can still cook up your own vegis and make them nice and creamy with some broth, milk and cheese and make your own, healthier version of mac and cheese. If you want to thicken it you can use wheat or a starch like corn or potato starch. I didn't thicken mine. If your kids think they don't like vegis a nice thing to try is cutting the vegis up small, or cooking them and whizzing them up in the food processor. All the fiber and vitamins and no one is the wiser. :-) Give it a whirl.

Ready for my cheesy dinner.

Biscuits

Ready for chopping.

:-) I tried to figure out an eloquent title for this but, the title says it all. I was making soup and since couldn't have dumplings, I figured I'd check out biscuits. I have a couple of recipes I can choose from and went for the non cheesy ones as I'm trying to make sure I keep my dairy intake to a minimum. I'm frequently amazed by what you can make with alternative flours. This recipe uses almond meal. I'm not quite at the point where I can mix and match and mess with things when it comes to these types of flours, but I'll get there quickly.

I got the recipe from here: almond flour biscuits

Whizzed up nicely

So what did I change? You know me so well. :-) I didn't put in the agave as I didn't want it sweet. I also don't have margarine so I used olive oil. I also didn't use bleached almond meal. In fact, I had to grind my own because I used up what was in my ice box already. I promise you, making your own flour from almonds, cashews, oats or what ever is not hard at all. I wouldn't try making actual wheat flour, but you can so use other things in your food processor.

Adding in the wet ingredients.

I took handfuls of almonds and whizzed them up in the food processor. I would like to eventually get a larger food processor but for now, my baby one will do. I whizzed up about 2 cups worth of almond meal. Because it still had the skins on it, it's a darker flour then if they were naked little almonds, which would make a white flour. I mixed the dry ingredients and then mixed the wet and then combined them together. The dough was very thick, like cookie dough. I am much too lazy to roll things out and just made this drop biscuits. I also don't have parchment so I put a bit of oil on the baking sheet and dropped the biscuits on the sheet for the toaster oven.

Mixed and ready to drop.

I cooked them for the specified amount of time and then took them out and took them off the pan right away so they wouldn't stick. I wasn't impressed with their density. When they came out of the oven they were very almondy smelling too and this bothered me a bit too. Girlie number 2 wanted one so I split it open and buttered it for her. I took a taste of one. HHmm really not bad at all. They had a flavor reminiscent of soda crackers you get in Hawai'i. I had one with butter and broke another up to float it in the soup. :-) I made 10 biscuits. They only lasted 3 days as the girls kept eating them. I really wasn't sure about them when I took them out of the oven but after tasting them and seeing the girls enjoy them, they'll stay in my repertoire.

:-) So even if you're not sure about it, it doesn't hurt to give them a whirl. You never know what your family will enjoy.

Hot and buttery

Faux dumplings and oh so yummy.

Cake or death?

The ingredients and my homemade vanilla extract.

:-) Ok let me tell you I was having a hard night. I was getting depressed about how hard it has been to have a restricted diet that is something I'm going to keep for life. WAY less starch and virtually no sugar and holy cow I've been craving sweets. So I was checking things out online again and came across a coconut flour cake. On the same website I found the recipe for a coconut flour bread. HHmm well I didn't want to make the cake because it called for a dozen eggs and I just didn't feel like using that many eggs. The bread, called for 6 eggs and since I wanted a cake that was more like a pound cake this would SO work. These are the recipes I found on blog called Nourished Kitchen (Coconut flour bread and Coconut flour cake). So I used these recipes as inspiration. So this is what I did:

The batter after mixing. Thick and ready to spoon out.

Coconut flour almost pound cake
3/4 c. coconut flour
1/4 coconut oil, melted
1/4 butter, melted
6 eggs, beaten
1 TBSP powdered stevia
3 tsp. vanilla extract
1/4 tsp. salt

Melt butter and coconut oil. Beat eggs. Add in vanilla extract to the eggs. Measure out coconut flour. Add in stevia and butter and mix. Pour in butter and oil and mix well. The batter will be very loose. Pour in eggs. The batter will firm up from being very liquid to the consistency of wet sand. I chose to use small loaf pans that I have but you could use a regular bread pan. I tapped the pans onto the counter to make sure all the air was out of the batter. Then I cooked it at 350º for 30 minutes and checked it with a toothpick. I let it cool.

Buttered mini loaf pan filled 1/2 way up.

When I ate it, I took a handful of melted chocolate chips with a handful of walnuts and macadamia nuts and a tsp. of butter. You could top it with what ever you want. I wasn't sure how it would taste. My daughter said it looked like a big macaroon and well, I don't really enjoy macaroons. I tell you though, when I cut it, it was nice and moist, like a pound cake. When I tasted it, it was just slightly coconuty and just totally delicious. So if one day you're wanting something sugar free, this was just FANTASTIC and I can't wait to think of other uses for this pound cake.

Covered in chocolate and nuts and oh so yummily satisfying.

Fauxtatoes

The players ready for the game.

So when having to do no starches for a meal there are times you'd like a starch. Tonight I wanted a side dish like potatoes as the girlies and the Daddy would be having french fries. I had pinned a few things made of cauliflower from mashed, riced to fritters and tots.

Well I can't use Panko and have never really worked with cauliflower as an ingredient in anything other then creamy cauliflower for Thanksgiving. (Which by the way is SOOOO yummy, covered in a cream sauce and cheese.) So I looked at a few of the recipes I had and decided to wing it.

Pre chop

Post chop

They either called for Panko or for cheese, both of which I'm not eating right now. I had steamed 2 heads of cauliflower last night. I took some, cut it up and whizzed it up in my mini food chopper. I think mama needs a new toy in the way of a bigger whizzer. :-) I'll check window shop for that later. So I worked in small batches. I wish I could give you measurements for everything but I really have no solid idea. This is where, if you don't know how to play with food, you're going to have to jump in with both feet and try. What's the worst that could happen? It's inedible and you give it to the dog. The best is it works fabulously and it's yummy. :-) Mine was an in between.

Mixed with the herbs, eggs and almond meal

I didn't squeeze out the water, which I should have. Who knew cauliflower had so much water. LOL I do now. So added in 2 eggs, about 1/2 cup of almond meal (you could use other meal or starch or flour or matzoh meal or what ever you want), a liberal amount of dried onion flake, a liberal amount of garlic powder, paprika for color, and salt to my tastes. That's what to taste means. It means if you don't like that much salt then you put a little bit. If you want to be licking the bottom of the sea, put more. Just remember you can always add more but you can't take away. If you have to add salt to it after you cook it, then it's WAY better then putting too much while cooking.

After being smashed and baked golden brown

I put some olive oil on the bottom of a cookie sheet and put little balls of the cauliflower mix onto the sheet. I put it in a 400º oven. When I went to flip them at 10 minutes they fell apart a bit. So I flattened them with a spatula and made mini cakes with them. I also upped the temperature to 450º because I wanted more crispy cakes. After about 10 minutes I looked again and they looked great. Always remember temperature and cooking times can and do change for your oven and where you live. So you want to watch your food as it gets to the time. If you want it darker, leave it in for 5 minutes and check it again and so on.

So I let them sit for a bit and cool. Most of them fell apart but HOLY TASTE BUDS Batman they were  ONO (Hawaiian for delicious). I can use the same ingredients to make faux hash browns, for making corned beef hash, for anything I would like a potato caked type thing for. Next time I'll remember to squeeze the water out and see how it goes. Oooo I bet I could mix it with some whizzed up chickpeas and make my falafel latkes without quinoa. (I'm laying off the quinoa as well. It's a wonderful food, but still a grain and I'm giving myself some time for my body to heal a bit before I try and test any grains out again.) Next time you're wanting to try something new and sneak in some vegis on your kids play with your food and see what you can get.  Happy cooking. :-)

Golden brown and oh so ONO!

Those pesky vegetables.

The players. That's garlic by the onion.

You should eat more of them, but what do you do with those pesky vegetables? Do you have vegis in your fridge you just don't know what to do with? Not inspired, don't feel like mixing something elaborate or just need something mess free, I have a great idea for you.

I was inspired by a link I saw on Pintrest for what it said was the best broccoli ever. It was roasted broccoli. Hhmm I can do that. I had a fridge full of vegis and the little miss wanted broccoli and well that had been sitting in there a couple of days. I just bought some mushrooms from Costco, we had some asparagus and some onions. I can roast all of that. The longest part is washing and cutting things.

Cut the stalk off and used it in soup. Only roasted the florets.

Roasting in the oven.

I washed, trimmed and then cut everything up, placed a bit of olive oil on the pan, put the vegis on the pan, sprinkled on more olive oil, added spices and salt then popped it in the oven on 450º F. for about 30 minutes. The broccoli was a bit crispy which was nice. Once it goes in the ice box it won't be as crisp but it tastes loverly still. If you want your vegis more crispy you can leave it in for longer. I had so many vegis I had to use two pans.

Roasted.

They were great on their own but the wonderful part is they're ready to go in any other dish you might want, like your quiche for brunch. Which by the way, tasted AWESOME.

So next time you have vegis just sitting there about to go bad or you just don't know what to do with them, cut them up and toss them in the oven. It's quick and you don't even have to do much but put them in the oven and take them out when they're done.

Roasted, hot, crispy (at least some pieces) and delicious.

Brunch quiche with the roasted vegis. 

Like bread from heaven.

Meal, butter and egg. 

Yes, YES, YES!!!!! I figured that anything with flour was going to be out for me, for the rest of my life. I had steel cut oatmeal today that made my blood sugar go higher then I'd seen it (though to be fair I've only been testing my blood for a few days and this is one of the few carby types of food I've tried.), even higher then ice cream.

Then today, a friend sent me a link to my Facebook to this one minute bread thingy. I thought it looked good but I put off doing anything with it for the day figuring the girls and I would try it later as a science experiment. Then I tried it and I had to leave a message for the wonderful lady who had this recipe on her blog. It was from here: 1 minute muffin. The lady's name is Jodi Furman and her blog is livefabuLESS.com

Mixing the egg into dry ingredients.

Well since she said you can customize the muffins we did. Each person got one mug and got to put in what ever they wanted. I made mine with just onion flakes and garlic powder. The big girlie made hers with onion flakes, garlic powder, paprika and basil. The small girlie had mango and honey. The daddy was given blueberries, agave, and cinnamon. Mine was in a glass cup so we could watch it as it rose. They all slid out of the mugs just fine, though with the daddy's, we figured out, had too many blueberries put in. It took 2 minutes to cook and was very short.

L- after, R-before

Mine after cooking

What did they think? The daddy said it was good, the little girlie ate hers without even getting up from the table once, the big girlie and I just loved ours. It feels like bread, with the same texture and similar mouth feel. I used almond meal instead of the flax because I don't have flax. I also used butter instead of the coconut oil. (The girlies don't care for the strong flavor of the coconut oil) The texture was nice and moist and it didn't fall. LOL I love that mine looked like an egg, due to the shape of the cup I used. The big girlie and I were contemplating all of the different additions we could make to these muffins, like some rye for hers to be topped with schmear, lox and capers. I thought peanut butter and cocoa would be loverly.

Front-sweet, Back-savory.

Seriously, even if you don't have any food issues, you have to try these with your kids, or even for yourself. The amount of time it took was longer in the prep then anything else and that was super fast. This is just the fastest most satisfying thing I've ever made and it got me to use the microwave, an appliance I could actually live without. If it can get me to like that I have a microwave, it has to be divinely inspired. :-)

SOOOOOO YUMMY!!!!!!!!