Tag: wellness

Candied Salted Caramel Pumpkin Seeds

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Candied Salted Caramel Pumpkin Seeds

Candied Salted Caramel Pumpkin Seeds

I love this recipe! It’s a fantastic candied treat that’s great for parties and for holidays. If you have food allergies in the family, it’s also a great recipe to pass to grandparents who want to spoil the kids! It’s also ideal to take to kindergarten parties and pot lucks as it’s free of all major allergens!

Don’t be put off by the idea of pumpkin seeds – these are nothing like the raw ones that you get in salads. These are as different as corn is after it’s popped and are sweet, salty, and crunchy like M&Ms. They are dangerously addictive and are great eaten straight, sprinkled on fruit crumble, or on top of ice cream.

Ingredients

In the oven:

  • 2c pumpkin seeds
  • 2 1/2T sugar
  • 1/4 tsp cinnamon
  • 1/2 tsp ground ginger
  • Pinch nutmeg
  • 3T water
  • Oil for roasting dish

Caramel sauce

  • 1 1/2T allergy-free spread (i.e. Nuttelex) / butter
  • 2 1/2T brown sugar
  • 1 1/2 tsp salt

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

Note: If nut allergies are not a concern,this recipe will also work well with peanuts, cashews, and almonds.

Directions

  1. Pre-heat oven to 180’C and lightly oil a baking dish (I used a silicon flan / pie dish).
  2. Mix all of the oven ingredients together and pour into the baking dish. Note: the water is important because it helps the spices to stick to the pumpkin seeds (and the seeds will absorb the water a little as they puff up during cooking).
  3. Bake the pumpkin seeds for 20-25 mins until golden and crunchy.
  4. Once the pumpkin seeds are cooked, mix the caramel sauce ingredients together in a pot. Cook for 1-2 minutes until the ingredients have melted and turned a deep golden brown.
  5. Mix the caramel sauce and pumpkin seeds together until well coated. Spread on a tray and allow to  cool.

Blood Orange Icing (a.k.a. how to make pretty pink icing without using artificial colours)

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Gluten Free Cupcakes with all natural pink icing

Gluten Free Cupcakes with all natural pink icing

My daughter is sensitive to red food colouring – as are many kids! For some reason New Zealand still allows artificial food colouring agents to be sold here that are banned in many parts of Europe. I’ve been doing more research (as you might have noticed from the post on why to be cautious about annatto as a colouring agent) and am experimenting with natural food colours.

One way to make pink icing is to use beetroot juice but I’m not a big fan of beetroot so instead decided to make a Blood Orange icing that has a beautifully delicate berry flavour and uses fruit tea!

The secret ingredient to this icing mix is Blood Orange fruit tea which uses a mix of

  • Hibiscus
  • Apple
  • Rosehips
  • Natural Flavouring
  • Stevia
  • Orange Peel

Not only do you get to make icing but you can also make yourself a cuppa in the process. Incidentally, this tea is also lovely cold, with sparkling water, or in fruit punch. You could also experiment with other fruit teas (like Blueberry & Blackcurrant) to make other colours.

Ingredients

  • 50g Butter or allergy free spread (i.e. Nuttelex)
  • 1c icing sugar
  • Blood Orange tea bag
  • Hot water

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

Directions

  1. In a mug steep the Blood Orange tea bag in a small amount of boiling water (i.e. about 50 ml). Allow it to cool and it should have a concentrated deep red colour.
  2. Cream the butter and icing sugar.
  3. Slowly add the (cooled) blood-orange-water to the mix until you have the colour and consistency that you desire. (Add more icing sugar if needed).
  4. Ice your cupcakes (like these Gluten Free cupcakes!)

Note: You can also make this with just icing sugar and the Blood Orange mix to make a darker colour.

 

Gluten Free Cupcakes

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Gluten Free Cupcakes with all natural pink icing

Gluten Free Cupcakes with all natural pink icing

I love experimenting with gluten free baking! As well as this vanilla cupcake recipe, I also have different recipes for chocolate cupcakes and berry muffins.

Ingredients

Cupcakes

  • 1c superfine white rice flour
  • 1T glutinous rice flour (also marketed as ‘sweet rice flour’)
  • 1/2 fine cornmeal (polenta) – use finely milled.
  • 1/2c sugar
  • 1 tsp guar gum
  • 2 tsp Baking Powder
  • 1/2 tsp Baking Soda
  • Pinch salt
  • 1/3c neutral oil (i.e. Rice Bran Oil)
  • 1 egg (or egg replacer)
  • Vanilla
  • 2/3c water

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

Makes 8-10 cupcakes.

Directions

  1. Mix all the dry ingredients together.
  2. Whisk the egg (or egg replacer) until fluffy and pour in.
  3. Add the oil and vanilla. Mix.
  4. Slowly pour the water in while mixing.
  5. Spoon into cupcake cases and bake at 180’C for approx. 25 mins until golden.
  6. Allow to cool and ice. I used a Blood Orange icing with no artificial colours!

 

Tip: My current preferred method for cooking cupcakes is to fill a large cake tin with silicon cupcake cases (so that they are touching). This helps them to keep their shape and is super easy to get in and out of the oven.

 

Icing 

The icings that I use don’t have any artificial colours, glycerin, additives etc.

Sweet cornbread muffins

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Cornbread muffin

Note: I only wanted to make a small batch so this makes 5-6 muffins, double the recipe to make more.

Ingredients (Dairy or Dairy Free)

  • 1/2c yellow cornmeal
  • 1/2c plain flour
  • 1/2T Baking Powder
  • 1/2 tsp salt
  • 2T Brown sugar
  • 2T liquid honey
  • 1 egg
  • 1/3c milk*
    • I used coconut milk.
  • 1/4c butter*
    • I used rice bran oil.

These turned out beautifully; they were quite sweet with 2T brown sugar & 2T liquid honey. I wouldn’t have known they were dairy free. They were light, fluffy, and delicious warm & cold. Made 5 muffins.

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

Ingredients (Dairy Free & Egg Free)

  • 3/4c yellow cornmeal
  • 3/4c plain flour
  • 1/2T Baking Powder
  • 1/2 tsp salt
  • 2T liquid honey
  • 1T ground linseed soaked in 3T warm water
  • 1/2c – 3/4c coconut milk.
  • 1/4c rice bran oil.

With this batch I was aiming to increase the size of the mix, replace the egg and reduce the sugar. I find, in general, that linseed works well as an egg replacer but you may need a little more liquid. These still turned out well although not quite as fluffy as the first batch. Makes 6 muffins.

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

Directions

  1. Mix the dry ingredients together.
  2. Mix the wet ingredients together.
  3. Pour the wet ingredients onto the dry and mix till combined. Do not over mix.
  4. Put mixture into muffin trays. Bake at 180’C for 15-20 mins until golden brown.

Feijoa Cake

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Feijoa Cake

Ingredients

  • 125g butter
  • 3/4c sugar
  • 2 eggs
  • 1 1/2 – 2c feijoa pulp (scoop it out and squeeze out the excess liquid).
  • 1 tsp Baking Soda
  • 2T warm milk
  • 2c plain flour
  • 1 tsp Baking Powder

Allergy: soy free, peanut free, tree nut free.

For other yummy things to do with feijoas check out the Feijoa Cheesecake!

Directions

  1. Cream butter and sugar until fluffy.
  2. Add in eggs and feijoas. Mix.
  3. Stir baking soda into warm milk; add to mixture.
  4. Add flour and baking powder.
  5. Bake at 180’C for 50 mins or until cake is cooked through.
  6. Serve dusted with icing sugar or with whipped cream.

 

Feijoa Cheesecake

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Feijoa cheesecake

Malt biscuit base for the feijoa cheesecake
Feijoa Cheesecake

Ingredients

Base

  • 250g biscuits
    • Gingernuts pair well with feijoa but aren’t necessarily allergy friendly. I used malt biscuits that were soy free so feel free to sub in something that works for you; i.e. you could use gluten free cookies.
  • 100g melted butter
    • Do melt it; I put butter in straight from the fridge and the crumbs stayed too dry so I had to dash in some rice bran oil.
  • Optional: generous pinches of cinnamon and ginger.

Filling

  • 400g scooped feijoas (after squeezing out excess liquid)
  • 1 – 2T lemon juice
  • 250g cream cheese (at room temperature)
  • 1c greek yoghurt
  • 2T mild liquid honey
  • 1 tsp vanilla essence
  • 3tsp powdered gelatin
  • 2T boiling water

Allergies: Soy free, gluten free*, egg free, peanut free, tree nut free.

Directions

  1. Lightly butter the sides and base of a 20cm springform cake pan. Line the base with baking paper.
  2. Crush the biscuits very finely. Combine with the butter.
    • (I used a food processor.)
  3. Press biscuit mix onto the base of the pan. Chill.
  4. Blend the feijoa flesh and lemon juice in a food processor, until smooth. Add the cream cheese, yoghurt, honey, vanilla essence and blend until smooth. Dissolve the gelatine in the boiling water and add to the filling. Mix well.
  5. Pour onto the biscuit base. Cover and chill for 3 hours or overnight.

 

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 Multi-seed bread (Toddler friendly)

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Multi-seed bread on first rising
Multi-seed bread fresh from the oven
Multi-seed bread

Often Multi-grain bread recipes will include things like whole linseed, sunflowers, pumpkin seeds, and these can be a bit rough on a young toddler’s gut. This is especially apparent when they get old enough to inform you ‘Poo! Seeds!’; they can obviously feel it. So, the seeds I’ve used for this bake are gentler and smaller passing through; the wonderful thing about home-made bread is that you can adapt it to suit. I also really like making Ancient Grains bread which is very light and fluffy!

Ingredients

  • 325ml water
  • 2T + 2 tsp oil (I use rice bran)
  • 1 1/2 tsp salt
  • 2 1/2T sugar
  • 3c 2T flour
  • 2T milk powder
    • Baby formula also works.
  • 9-12T seeds (I used 3T ground linseed, 3T poppy, 3T sesame).

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

Directions

  1. Put everything into the breadmaker in order listed. Select Dough only.
  2. When it finishes, select Dough only again so that it goes through another knockdown/rising cycle.
  3. Take out dough, knead for a couple of minutes, and place in bread tin. Let it rise while oven heats
  4. Heat oven to 220’C.
  5. Bake at 220’C for 10 minutes, then at 180’C for 30 minutes.
  6. Bread should sound ‘hollow’ if you take it out of the tin and knock on the bottom.

How to make Milk Bread

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Milk bread

To make a 750g loaf. This was a sweeter denser bread that toasted well. It was delicious with butter & jam, and also with vegemite & avocado.

Ingredients

  • 310ml milk (full cream or standard not trim)
  • 3 tsp oil (I use rice bran oil)
  • 1 1/2 tsp salt
  • 2T sugar
  • 3c bread flour
  • 3 tsp bread improver yeast

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

Directions

  1. Put everything into the breadmaker in order listed. Select Dough only.
  2. When it finishes, select Dough only again so that it goes through another knockdown/rising cycle.
  3. Take out dough, knead for a couple of minutes, and place in bread tin. Let it rise while oven heats
  4. Heat oven to 220’C.
  5. Bake at 220’C for 10 minutes, then at 180’C for 30 minutes.
  6. Bread should sound ‘hollow’ if you take it out of the tin and knock on the bottom.

Chocolate Irish Potato Cake (Vegan & Allergy Friendly)

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CHOCOLATE IRISH POTATO CAKE (VEGAN & ALLERGY FRIENDLY)
CHOCOLATE IRISH POTATO CAKE (VEGAN & ALLERGY FRIENDLY)

 

Ingredients

  • 4T ground linseed/flaxseed + 6T hot water
    • OR use 4 eggs.
  • 1c hot unseasoned mashed potato (instant is fine)
    • 1c of potato flakes + approx. 3/4c boiling water makes 1c mashed potato.
  • 1c hot water
  • 3/4c rice bran oil
    • OR 3/4c softened butter
  • 1 1/2c sugar
  • 1 tsp vanilla
  • 2c flour (or gluten free baking mix)
  • 2 1/4 tsp Baking Powder
  • 1/2 tsp Baking Soda
  • 1/4 tsp salt
  • 1 1/4c cocoa
  • Optional: 1 tsp cinnamon

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

Note: I’ve included ingredient options so that you can choose whether to use butter & eggs; I made mine without. It’s worth having a recipe like this even if you don’t have allergies. It’s great if you’ve run out of other ingredients (or would rather use the eggs for breakfast!), it’s cost effective, it’s allergy friendly to share with others, and you’re getting extra nutrients + fibre from the linseed. The other fabulous thing about linseed as an egg replacement is that it makes cakes and breads beautifully moist.

My inspiration for this recipe came from finding potato flakes in a bulk foods store and wondering what I could do with them. I gather from the internet that in some countries (like the USA) it’s reasonably common to find potato flakes or instant mashed potato at the supermarket; elsewhere, have a hunt in bulk food and health food stores.

Directions

Note: This is a thick batter and you’ll get the smoothest batter by using a food processor. You can also use a big mixing bowl and electric hand mixer but in that case you’ll want to go a bit slower (i.e. egg, beat, egg, beat, etc. and alternate the potato & dry ingredients) to blend & aerate it.

  1. Pre-heat oven to 180’C.
  2. Prepare your egg replacement. Use a bowl or mug, put in 4T ground linseed and 6T hot water. Mix and then leave it, for 5-10 mins, until needed (this gives the seeds time to absorb the water) it turns into a stretchy liquid that’s a bit thicker than egg.
  3. Mix up your mashed potato. You can use a bowl, put in 1c of potato flakes, and then slowly add 3/4 – 1 cup of boiling water while stirring until smooth. It turns into mashed potato very quickly.
  4. Slowly add 1c of hot water to the mashed potato stirring carefully to create a smooth liquid.
  5. In the food processor, blend the oil, sugar, and vanilla until smooth.
  6. Add the linseed (egg-replacement) and blend.
  7. Add the liquidy potato.
  8. Add the flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, cocoa, cinnamon and blend till smooth.
  9. Pour into a silicon cake tin.
  10. Cook for 25 min and check (a knife is likely to come out sticky); cook for another 15 mins and check (a knife is now likely to come out clean). Turn the oven off and leave the cake inside for another 10 minutes. Pull cake out and place on bench to cool.
  11. Dust with icing sugar.

This comes out as a beautifully moist, rich, chocolatey cake.

Alternatives:

  • If anyone successfully plays around with coconut flour/sugar, let me know. I wonder if it would turn out like a gluten-free Bounty Bar cake.
  • If you like coffee consider adding 2T dark roasted instant coffee when adding the dry ingredients.
  • For birthdays or special occasions, try splitting the batter between two cake tins. Layer the cakes with cherry, plum, or raspberry jam in between and a thick chocolate frosting on top.
  • For another allergy friendly chocolate cake, check out this Depression-Era Chocolate cake.