Tag: snacks

Chocolate Avocado Mousse

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Chocolate avocado mousse

I’d been hearing about this as a paleo recipe and realized that it would be a great allergen friendly recipe to try with Miss 2 (who thought it was yum!). It’s a seasonal dish that’s wonderful to make when avocados are cheap. It’s creamy, chocolatey, and doesn’t taste like avocado at all.

Note: This recipe is best made with a food processor (or possibly an electric beater). I tried using a smoothie blender but the mixture was too thick and I ended up beating it with a fork (which is why it ended up a little lumpy).

Ingredients

  • 240g flesh of ripe avocados
  • 40g cocoa powder
  • 1/4 – 1/2c coconut milk
  • 1 tsp vanilla extract
  • pinch salt
  • 3-6T brown sugar.

Directions

  1. Blend until smooth.
  2. Serve immediately or chill.

How to make home made cinnamon buns (using a bread maker)

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Home made cinnamon buns – so yummy!!

So I’m really happy with how my home-made Linseed Bread is turning out each time and it occurred to me that maybe I should take the plunge and try to make something sweet. We can’t buy anything from bakeries because of my daughter’s soy allergy so I need to make everything myself.

I went looking for a Cinnamon Bun recipe that would allow the bread-maker to hopefully do some of the heavy lifting when it came to kneading. I found a recipe that looked promising and checked that it had been well reviewed (since the ingredient order seemed a little counter-intuitive). I decided to give it a shot and tweaked it a bit since there’s only two of us and I didn’t want a massive batch.  They were really delicious and really easy to tweak as well in terms of filling and glaze.

Ingredients

  • 1 1/2 tsp baker’s yeast
  • 2c flour
  • 1 1/2T sugar
  • 1/2 tsp salt
  • 3T rice bran oil (or 1/4c melted butter)
  • 1 egg
  • 1/2c milk (or almond milk)
  • 2T water

Filling

  • 1/2c soft brown sugar
  • 2 tsp ground cinnamon
  • 2T softened rice bran spread (or butter, or margarine)
  • Optional: sultanas or crushed walnuts.

Glaze

  • 1/4c icing sugar
  • 1/2c brown sugar
  • Couple drops vanilla essence
  • 2 tsps milk

There are lots of different options for glazes! This is a simple one but you could also do a cream cheese frosting, or a pink raspberry icing, or a maple glaze. The glaze will add a lot of flavour and sweetness so for a party you could easily make a big batch of these and then vary them by using a couple of glazes.

Allergies: soy free, dairy free*, peanut free, tree nut free.

Directions

  1. Dry ingredients first: put yeast in the bottom of the bread machine; then flour, sugar and salt.
  2. Mix neutral oil/melted butter, beaten egg, milk and water. Pour onto dry ingredients in the bread machine and then turn on the dough setting.
  3. When dough is done, put it onto a lightly floured surface. Knead in enough flour to make it easy to handle.
  4. Use floured rolling pin to roll out dough into a rectangular shape.
  5. Make up the filling and spread over entire surface of dough with a spoon or pastry brush (this is a good opportunity to let little hands help!). You can sprinkle on optional extras like sultanas or crushed walnuts if desired.
  6. Roll up the dough into a thick snake.
  7. Cut the dough (like making large sausage rolls) and place them in a lined baking tray.
  8. Cover with a tea towel and leave in a warm place until double in size. Depending on your weather this could take anywhere from 25 mins to 2 hours!
  9. Bake in a 180°C oven for about 25 minutes until light brown on top.
    • My oven was already heated to 220’C from baking bread and these went in straight afterwards and cooked in 15 mins so do keep an eye on them!
  10. When done, make glaze and swirl over buns.

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How to make quick & easy fried gnocchi (a.k.a. rapid roastini)

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Pan fried quick & easy gnocchi – so much yum!

So I was trying to make gnocchi for the first time this afternoon and decided to make a mini batch that excluded egg. I could tell (from the many blogs / tips & tricks / recipes that I’d read prior) that this batch would not make good gnocchi. It was much denser then the first batch that I’d made. On the other hand, being a frugal mumma means experimenting in the kitchen so I proceeded to roll it out and make little gnocchi. I was pretty sure that they were just the right texture to pan fry and they turned out as a delicious gluten-free snack that Miss 2 thought was delicious!

Ingredients

  • 1/2c potato flakes
  • 1 tsp parmesan powder
  • 1/4-1/2 tsp smoked garlic salt
  • 1/4 – 1/2 tsp onion powder
  • 1/4c boiling water
  • 1/4c plain flour

Note: This makes a snack for one adult (to share between adult & toddler) just multiple the ingredients by the number of serves you want to make.

Allergies: gluten free, soy free, egg free, peanut free, tree nut free. Can be made dairy free.

Directions

  1. Put the potato flakes, parmesan, garlic salt, and onion powder in a bowl. Add approx. 1/4c boiling water and stir.
  2. Add flour and stir / knead to combine into a thick dough. The mixture should be smooth, thick, and not sticky. Don’t over knead.
  3. Roll mixture into 2 balls (or more depending on if you’ve doubled / tripled the recipe etc.).
  4. Using a floured bench, roll each ball out into thumb width ‘wriggly worms’ (as Miss 2 deems them).
  5. Chop them into 1/2″ – 3/4″ pieces.
  6. If you have a gnocchi board then you can use that to do the ridges. I don’t and used the alternative method which is to press and roll them off a fork and indent the back with your thumb.
  7. Heat a frying pan and cover the bottom in a thin layer of oil (I use rice bran). Once the oil is hot drop in the gnocchi.
  8. It only takes 1-2 mins to fry them on each side (you can turn using silicon tongs or a spatula).
  9. Place them on a paper towel and lightly pat off the oil.
  10. Serve with chili mayo or your choice of dips.

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Making your own gourmet nut butter – it’s easy!

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Home-made Tree nut butter

Ingredients

  • Raw unsalted nuts.
    • I used a 150g blend that was cashew nuts (51%), almonds (26%), brazil nuts (11%), hazel nuts (6%), macadamia nuts (6%).
  • Oil (I use Rice Bran oil).
  • Salt

Allergies: soy free, dairy free, gluten free, egg free, peanut free.

I posted recently about how easy it is to make peanut butter and wanted to try my hand with tree nuts.

Making your own nut butter can be great if you have a food allergy in your family. It’s handy because you can customize it and experiment with different nuts. It can also be a cost effective way of making nut butter. Often tree nut butters are really expensive but if you’re able to pick up the nuts cheaply then it’s quick to make your own!

Directions

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  1. Roasting gives the nut butter more flavour. You can choose whether you want to buy roasted nuts or roast them yourself (if purchasing pre-roasted, check the type of oil that has been used if you have a soy allergy). Roasting gives the peanut butter more flavour and helps to loosen the oils inside the nuts to blend into a smoother butter.
    • Heat the oven to 180’C / 350’F and toast the nuts till they are golden and glossy with oil. This will take about 10 mins.
  2. Put nuts, a pinch of salt, and a teaspoon of oil into a food processor.
  3. Blend on 10-20 second bursts and scrape down the sides with a plastic spatula as needed. You’ll find it starts off looking a bit like crumbly breadcrumbs – this is normal!
    • I found the tree nuts were a lot tougher than the peanuts and took longer to blend. You don’t want to overheat the motor on your food processor so be kind to it and aim for short bursts on/off!
  4. Continue blending  until shiny and smooth.
    • Add a teaspoon of oil at a time if you’re finding it dry.
  5. Add salt to taste.

How to make chocolate peanut butter

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Oops – too thick to get smooth in the little pulser. It needs the food processor!

Ingredients

  • 2c (300g) shelled peanuts
    • I used 1/2c for my mini-batch; you probably want to do 2 cups at a time if you’re using it regularly.
  • 1/2 tsp salt
  • 2T oil
    • You may want to use peanut oil. I used rice bran oil.
  • 1/2c (45g) cocoa powder
  • 1 1/2c (170g) powdered sugar

Allergies: soy free, dairy free, gluten free, tree nut free, contains peanuts.

For smooth peanut butter, click here.

My first attempt to make chocolate peanut butter ran into a power problem. I was trying to make a mini-batch in the pulser and the addition of cocoa + honey made it to thick for the motor. I was able to make something warm and delicious for dessert (that tasted like a Snickers bar) but it needed a full size batch in the actual food processor to make it smooth. I have therefore borrow quantities from InspiredTaste.

Directions

  1. Roasting gives the peanut butter more flavour. You can choose whether you want to buy roasted peanuts or roast them yourself (if purchasing pre-roasted, check the type of oil that has been used if you have a soy allergy). Roasting gives the peanut butter more flavour and helps to loosen the oils inside the peanuts to blend into a smoother butter.
    • Heat the oven to 180’C / 350’F and toast the peanuts on a baking sheet till they are golden and glossy with oil. This will take about 10 mins.
  2. Put peanuts, a pinch of salt, and a teaspoon of oil into a food processor.
    • Note: I used a little pulser/grinder but that will only cope with 1/2c peanuts.
  3. Blend for about a minute and then scrape down the sides with a plastic spatula. You’ll find it starts off looking a bit like crumbly breadcrumbs – this is normal!
  4. Blend again until shiny and smooth.
    • Add a teaspoon of oil at a time if you’re finding it dry.
  5. Add salt to taste (and sweetness if you prefer).

The whole process is really quick and will make smooth peanut butter.If you prefer crunchy peanut butter that’s easy too. Put only 1/3c of the peanuts into the blender to start and pulse until they’re chopped into tiny pieces; pull them out and reserve for later. Use the rest of the peanuts to make smooth peanut butter and then stir your crunchy bits back in.

Making your own peanut butter (turns out it’s easy!)

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Home-made peanut butter & linseed bread

Ingredients

  • Shelled peanuts
    • I used 1/2c for my mini-batch; you probably want to do 2 cups at a time if you’re using it regularly.
    • Salt
    • Oil
    • Optional: sugar, maple syrup, or honey if you prefer it sweet.

Allergies: soy free, dairy free, gluten free, tree nut free, contains peanuts.

Commercial peanut butters often contain vegetable oil blends so check carefully if you have a soy allergy or make your own 🙂 We discovered this the hard way!

Directions

  1. Roasting gives the peanut butter more flavour. You can choose whether you want to buy roasted peanuts or roast them yourself (if purchasing pre-roasted, check the type of oil that has been used if you have a soy allergy). Roasting gives the peanut butter more flavour and helps to loosen the oils inside the peanuts to blend into a smoother butter.
    • Heat the oven to 180’C / 350’F and toast the peanuts on a baking sheet till they are golden and glossy with oil. This will take about 10 mins.
  2. Put peanuts, a pinch of salt, and a teaspoon of oil into a food processor.
    • Note: I used a little pulser/grinder but that will only cope with 1/2c peanuts.
  3. Blend for about a minute and then scrape down the sides with a plastic spatula. You’ll find it starts off looking a bit like crumbly breadcrumbs – this is normal!
  4. Blend again until shiny and smooth.
    • Add a teaspoon of oil at a time if you’re finding it dry.
  5. Add salt to taste (and sweetness if you prefer).

The whole process is really quick and will make smooth peanut butter.If you prefer crunchy peanut butter that’s easy too. Put only 1/3c of the peanuts into the blender to start and pulse until they’re chopped into tiny pieces; pull them out and reserve for later. Use the rest of the peanuts to make smooth peanut butter and then stir your crunchy bits back in.

Linseed Bread and Home made peanut butter

Smashed avocado (easy avocado dip)

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This is an easy dip to make that is great to eat outside in the garden paired with home made crackers.

Ingredients

  • 1 large avocado
  • 1T olive oil
  • 1T lemon juice
  • Salt to taste

Note: This is an easy recipe to scale to the number of people you’re serving. If you’re using a small avocado then change the olive oil & lemon juice from a Tablespoon (15ml) to a dessert spoon (10ml).

Allergies: soy free, gluten free, dairy free, egg free, nut free.

Directions

  1. Scoop out the avocado with a spoon.
  2. Smash up with a fork.
  3. Mix in olive oil, lemon juice, and salt.

 

Allergies: soy free, dairy free, egg free, peanut free.

Home made crackers

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This is a super simple recipe for making your own crackers at home and easy enough to have your toddler help in the kitchen! They’re great for snacks or to use with dip (I love this easy smashed avocado dip!). You can also customise the flavouring and the shapes which makes it a handy recipe to keep in mind for parties. Why not make dinosaur crackers with “molten magma” salsa, or bunny crackers with spiced carrot dip etc. You can also use this recipe to make home made pizza.

Ingredients

  • 1 1/4c flour
  • 1 1/2 tsp sea salt
  • 60ml olive oil
  • 100 ml water

Flavourings

  • 1 tsp dried mixed herbs
  • dash of cracked black pepper

Note: The original recipe called for 1tsp cracked black pepper and no herbs but I changed it for my toddler. It’s an easy recipe to try different flavourings with. You could try herbs and dried garlic, dried onion & grated cheese, dried herbs & marigold petals (they are edible and provide beautiful colouring), chilli & a dash of lime juice etc.

Directions

  1. Combine and mix all the ingredients.
  2. Turn dough onto a floured surface and knead for one minute until smooth.
  3. Cover plastic wrap and refridgerate for 30 mins.
  4. Roll out to 3/4cm thick and cut with a sharp knife. (A toddler friendly wooden bamboo knife also works!).
  5. Use a palette knife (fingers and the bamboo knife also work!) to lift onto oven tray. Prick with a fork to prevent puffing (they really do puff up otherwise!).
  6. Bake at 160’C for 10-12 mins.
    • My ancient oven isn’t very reliable so I turned the tray around after 10 minutes and had them in there for about another 6 mins. They do go crunchier as they cool and dry as well.
  7. Cool on wire rack.

Note: These can be stored for up to a month in an air-tight container. Uncooked dough can be frozen.

Allergies: soy free, dairy free, egg free, peanut free.

FOLLOW UP:

I’ve made these crackers a couple more times experimenting with flavouring ingredients. So far I’ve found them best to eat in the first couple of days. I suspect that I need to cook them for longer at a lower temperature to get them to keep in a  container and be dry and crispy.

Cheese & garlic: 1 1/2 tsp smoked garlic salt, 1 tsp garlic granules, 1/2c grated cheese, dash of cumin seeds. I loved these, my toddler not so much. I suspect that’s because I like cumin and she doesn’t; they do have a distinct flavour so only add a pinch (or omit) if you’re not sure you like them. Alternatively, you could swap the cumin out for a 1/2 tsp mustard powder.

dav

Tomato & Onion: 1T dried onion, 2 tsp tomato paste, pinch sumac, dash paprika, 1/2tsp mixed herbs.

My toddler really liked these; I think I’d prefer this flavour mix when using this recipe to make a pizza base. Would be interesting to try it with finely chopped sundried tomato & fresh basil although it might need to be eaten same day (it might not keep as well with the added wet ingredients).

dav

Mum’s Spiced Fruit Loaf

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This is a fabulous recipe and a firm family favourite. It’s also very versatile and can be used to make child sized cakes (in silicon cupcake cases) or miniature christmas cakes (in muffin trays). It also freezes well.

Ingredients

Group 1

  • 1/2c sugar
  • 50g butter or 60ml rice bran oil
  • 1c sultanas
  • 1c chopped dates
  • 1T golden syrup or maple syrup
  • 1 1/4c water

Group 2

  • 1 1/2 tsp  ground ginger
  • 1 tsp cinnamon
  • pinch nutmeg
  • 1/4 tsp ground coriander
  • 1/2c chopped walnuts (optional)
  • 1/2 tsp vanilla
  • 1/4 tsp salt

Group 3

  • 2c flour (or gluten free baking mix)
  • 1 tsp Baking Soda
  • 1 tsp Baking Powder

Allergies: dairy free, soy free, egg free, gluten free*, nut free*.

Directions

  1. Place Group 1 in pot. Boil; then simmer for 5 minutes. Remove from heat and allow to cool.
  2. Stir in Group 2.
  3. Ideally allow to cool to room temperature (this takes several hours) as this allows the dried fruit time to soak.
  4. Grease and line loaf tin. Preheat oven to 180’C.
  5. Stir in Group 3.
  6. Bake for 1 hour or until skewer comes out smooth.
  7. Cool in tin for 15 minutes before turning out onto wire rack.

Notes

I use a greased silicon loaf tin and often cook a smaller portion in silicon cupcake cases at the same time (for my toddler); the cupcake-sized cakes only take about 15 mins to cook.

This is a versatile recipe. Sometimes I have my toddler help me assemble all of Group 1 and 2 in the pot before I put it on to heat; sometimes I only give the fruit mix 5-10 mins to cool before adding the dry ingredients and cooking it. Sometimes I’ll do the fruit mix after my toddler’s midday nap, let it cool all afternoon, and then put it in to cook after dinner (when the oven is already warm); I’ve also allowed the fruit to soak all night and then cooked it in the morning.

I’ve made this a number of times and varied ingredients (while essentially keeping to the base recipe); i.e. using 1/2c sultanas and 1/2c cranberries; having no walnuts; using coconut thread instead of walnuts; using 1c mixed nuts (smashed) + coconut + melted chocolate + extra water (this is the one pictured).

Walnuts are a soft nut that are easy to smash and chew. I’ve made this using a nut mix (predominantly walnuts & almonds with some hazelnuts and brazil nuts) because it was on special – the other nuts just take a bit more effort to smash. If you have a young baby or toddler then you may want to leave the nuts out until they’ve grown all their molars and are comfortable chewing nuts.  I’ve found the ideal way for us to smash nuts is to put them in a plastic bag and have my toddler enthusiastically whack them with her toy hammer!

Allergies: Soy free, peanut free, egg free, dairy free (replace butter with oil).