I was too lazy to put two recipes into one post, so here are those paleo cookies I was nerding out about in my last post.
Short and sweet, just some photos and a recipe!
Apple Cinnamon Cookies (Paleo-friendly)
Recipe from What Runs Lori, here! My yield was about 10ish cookies, ish. I’m a little behind, I’m not entirely sure since this batch is long gone. Ehhh, you get delicious cookies anyway, what do you care?! Moist HYDRATED, apple-y, and full of cinnamon. Yum yum yum. AND grain-free, vegan, refined sugar free, and full of healthy fats.
1 buhhnahhhnuhh
1/3 c grated apple, skin on
2 tbsp almond butter
1-2 tbsp milk bev (use almond or coconut to keep things vegan/paleo), if needed
2 tsp vanilla extract
pinch of salt
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp ground ginger
1/3 c coconut flour
1 tsp baking soda
2 tsp apple cider vinegar
Preheat the oven to 350, and line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
In a bowl, mash yo’ buhhhnahhnuhhh. Toss in everything else: grated apple, almond butter, vanilla, salt, cinnamon, ginger, coconut flour, baking soda, and vinegar. Stir together, and add in 1-2 tbsp milk bev if the batter looks too dry (I used 2 tbsp). Drop cookies by the heaping glob onto the prepared cookie sheet, and bake for 8-10 minutes (mine went for 8)—an appropriately short baking time (hellooo, instant gratification). Let cool on a rack… or maybe in your stomach.
I wear leg warmers… and birkenstocks. Sometimes together… possibly more often than I care to admit.
My traveling attire when I went to Oregon was truly something spectacular… the usual leg warmers… and my yoga mat! Wow. People in the airport were REAL jealous, let me tell you.
Not my fault I was raised on tofu and bananas and other sorts of natural-type foods like peanut butter that separates (that no stir stuff has always creeped me out). Born in Berkeley, what can I say. Admit it, it’s part of my charm.
And look… I made granolaaaa!!! Like, real granola. Not like my type of hippie crunchy granola. I figured it would be easy and more cost effective to make my own, not to mention healthier, as I know exactly what goes in it. Not that we eat really sketchy granola, as a rule: Nature’s Path is pretty non sketch and delicious. But still. I wanted to try my hand at making some anyway… and I’m pretty sure it was a success.
Besides, this granola is full o’ the good stuff… like healthy fats from the pepitas and the flaxseed (can you say omegaaaasss!), whole grains (oats), and blood sugar stabilization from cinnamon. Apples are pretty freaking awesome too, since they provide soluble fiber (mostly in the form of pectin) for happy digestion and lower cholesterol levels, AND antioxidants…not to mention vitamin C! I love me some anti-free radial activity. Soooo, basically apples are awesome. You know what they say, about apples and doctors? Yeah. Pretty much true. Or maybe you should just eat some granola instead, nudge nudge wink wink…!
Apple-Cinnamon Granola
The recipe is slightly modified from Sally’s Baking Addiction, here! It made three jars worth of granola (as some of you are aware, I ADORE jars and store nearly everything in them)… which probably amounts to about 3 cups, ish? The recipe comes together quickly, bakes in half an hour, and is great snacking/breakfast/yogurt topping option. Gotta love granola and it’s ridiculous versatility!
2.5 c rolled oats (not quick oats)
3/4 c ground flaxseed
2 tsp cinnamon
heaping 1/4 c raw pepitas
1 c dried apples*, diced
1/4 tsp salt
5 tbsp unsweetened applesauce
1/4 c maple syrup
*preferably use dried apples that are just that: apples that have been dried! None of those icky sulphites or sugars. Ew. None of that.
Preheat the oven to 300, and line a rimmed baking sheet with parchment paper.
In a largish bowl, mix together oats, flaxseed, cinnamon, pepitas, and diced apples. In a smaller bowl, whisk together salt, applesauce, and maple. Pour the wet over the dry and stir to combine, making sure that the wet ingredients are evenly distributed. Spread the mix onto the prepared baking sheet. Bake for 30 minutes, stirring slightly at the 15 minute mark. Let cool for at least a half an hour on the stove top (you wouldn’t want soggy granola, would you?!). Store in jars!!
Today, I ate an ice cream the size of my FACE. No. Really. It was. Don’t believe me?
you’re welcome.
Yep, now you do.
In all fairness, I did share with Vaccuum Vati. Thank heavens. It was enormous.
And then I took a nap. Seriously. I have never in all my life gone into that serious of a food coma… but I actually napped when I got home! With my kitty, love love love! And then… I did kitty yoga and went to the gym. A lovely day all around, I must say.
You see, I’ve been going to Fenton’s ever since I was a child, with my gram. So it brings back all kinds of nice memories, besides giving me the ability to stuff  my face with deliciousness. As a kid, I used to search the menu for the least painful, smallest lunch option possible, so I could go speedily onto dessert… and I realized today that I apparently still do that. Ice cream is infinitely superior to lunch. Duh. Everyone knows that.
phew. Healthy eye-relief.
Anyway. Getting back to the point of this blog, which is, after all, recipezzz… I made chickpea cakes! I’ve made them before and they’re fab… but was too lazy at the time to blog about them. Sooo you get them now! Do a happy dance, they’re amazing. They sort of taste like hummus in cake form. Winner winner, hummus dinner…
mmm, chickpeas!
Chickpea Cakes with Yogurt Drizzle
The recipe is ever so slightly adapted from Naturally Ella, here. These are delicious. Hummusyyy and with a nice texture. The yogurt drizzle gives them just the right amount of sauciness… and they’re particularly good with cucumber. I doubled the recipe to serve 3.
yum.
Chickpea Cakes
2 c cooked chickpeas (I used canned)
2 tbsp tahini
sprinkle of garlic powder (I was out of for reals garlic, if you have it, use about one clove)
a few spoonfuls of plain yogurt of choice (mine was lowfat, not greek)
drizzle of olive oil
salt, pepper to taste
perfect antidote to ridiculous amounts of ice cream.
Muscle your food processor out of it’s hiding place/lair in the cupboard. Set up the whole shebang. Toss in chickpeas, tahini, Braggs, garlic powder (or normal garlic), and parmesan, and pulse until the mixture comes together and is a bit crumbly. Add in flour and eggs, and salt and pepper, and pulse to combine. Add a teeny bit more flour if it seems a little too thin—it should be like sticky batter consistency.
Heat olive oil in a nonstickish pan over medium heat. Once pan is hot, drop large spoonfuls of the batter into the pan. Let cook until you can easily flip them and the bottoms are done, then flip and cook until both sides are nicely browned, about 5ish minutes.
To make yogurt sauce, vigorously stir all ingredients together in a small bowl. Seriously. It’s that easy.
I don’t have anything too interesting or anecdotal today, but these cookies were delicious, so I want to share.
timber!! oops.
They remind me of something I ate in my childhood, but I can’t put my finger on exactly what. I feel like they’re something out of Chocolat (exceptional movie, by the way), in that scene where Judi Dench takes a drink of the hot chocolate for the first time and says “it tastes like… I don’t know… ” and then giggles. These cookies are kind of like that for me too, except they’re unfortunately not filled with Mayan chocolate or infused with ancient magic. Oh well, they’re still a worthy substitute. AND not too bad for you, to boot. Almonds for manganese and Vit. E, as well as lowered LDL cholesterol levels… antioxidants from dark chocolate, and blood sugar stabilization from cinnamon… what’s not to love?
yum yum yum.
These are full of cinnamon flavor, which is great if you’re a cinnanut like me (I swear, I put it on literally EVERYTHING). They are soft and a little on the crumbly side, and best just out of the oven, when the chocolate is all melty and warm. Or you can just pop them in the microwave for 10-15 seconds (if they last long enough after the initial batch comes out of the oven… haha yeah right). Maybe they remind me of cinnamon grahams? Maybe. Except waaaay better. You’ll just have to see for yourself.
uh oh. one got away.
Chocolate Stuffed Almond Butter Cookies
The recipe is from The Vintage Mixer, and the only adaptation I made is less chocolate—I used a few squares from my TJ’s 72% fair trade bar (my fave). My recipe yielded 11 small-medium sized cookies, so you’ll just need enough chocolate of choice to stuff however many cookies you end up with.
1/2 c whole wheat pastry flour
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp cinnamon (love love love)
3/4 c almond butter
scant 1/2 c brown sugar
3 tbsp ground flaxseed mixed with 3 tbsp water
enough 1/2″ chocolate pieces to stuff into your cookies! Dark chocolate, preferably.
river o’ molten chocolate…
Preheat the oven to 350.
In a small bowl, mix together water and flaxseed. Set aside for about 5 minutes. Using an electric mixer, cream together almond butter and brown sugar. Add in flax and beat briefly to combine. In another small bowl, whisk together flour, baking soda, and cinnamon, and then add the dry ingredients into the brown sugar/almond butter bowl. Stir or use the mixer to fully combine. The dough will be on the thicker/stiffer side of things. Pinch off small balls (about 1″), push a piece of chocolate into the center of each, and roll/semi flatten into cookie shape before plopping them down onto your ungreased cookie sheet.
Bake for 10-12 minutes—mine went for about 11. Let cool on a cooling rack (or, better yet, place on a cooling rack and then eat them warm).
sorry this picture has weird lighting… molten center. omnomnom…
It’s been one of those weeks where you get up and think… do I really have to put clothes on today? Dis.Gust.Ing. Too hot to live, let alone bake. I really am a pacific northwesterner in this regard: hot weather makes me nutty. Today I sort of decided to stick it to the weather and go take a hot yoga class, since I’d been sweating all day anyway. Surprisingly, it was a great idea: maybe there is something to that ayurvedic  idea of eating hot foods on a hot day? Huh. Anyway. After said hot yoga class, all I wanted was a dunk in cold water and one of these.
yum.
Yes.
No bake, for the WIN.
The solution for when it’s too hot to do much of anything and turning on the oven (or really even the stove, let’s be real here) turns into a capital offense. I had grilled cheese for dinner last night (although I did go gourmet with some sauteed veggies, ha) since I was so unmotivated to do much of anything except watch other people (i.e. Olympians) be ridiculously fit. Whatever, I made up for it with my yoga today, so there. And with these bars. These are FAB. And healthy, which is a bonus considering most no-bake items seem to involve some form of strange food product like cool-whip. Let’s not go there, shall we? Back to these:
cooooconut
Mmmm. Banana coconut bars on a nutty date crust. Naturally sweet and so frostily delicious. Bonus points for being gluten free and vegan, as well as refined sugar free. You also get a healthy dose of magnesium from the cashews, calcium from the almond butter, healthy medium-chain fatty acids from the coconut, and potassium from the banana. See? It’s like a complete summer meal in a bar (welllll…sort of). Wheee! Squat and gobble to your heart’s content, I won’t tell… even if you do it in a sports bra and running shorts because, like I said, it’s too hot to live or bother to look decent. Or to blog… this is all I got today!
drippy. LOVE.
Vegan Banana-Coconut Bars
I slightly adapted these from the DAMY health blog, here! These are frosty and best when straight out of the freezer. Easy to make, they come together in a snap and set up decently quickly, satisfying all kinds of crazy summer cravings (Besides, they’re healthy to boot!)
Poke around and scrounge up the following:
For the crust:
1/2 c raw cashews
scant 1/2 c unsweetened shredded coconut
1 c pitted dates, chopped into smallish pieces
a tbsp or two of water, if the crust needs a little help to come together
For the topping:
1 ripe banana
scant 1/2 c unsweetened shredded coconut+ some for sprinkling
1 tbsp vanilla extract
1 tbsp maple syrup
1/2 c organic almond butter
1/4 c light coconut milk
look! another one materialized!
In the bowl of a food processor, pulse together cashews, coconut, and date pieces until the dough comes together, with pieces of nuts intact. Add a tablespoon or two of water if it needs a little help. Spread this mixture in the bottom of a lightly greased pan (mine was 9″ square, making thinnish bars), flattening it out as you go. In your food processor once again, blend the topping ingredients, scraping down the sides occasionally, until smooth. Pour the topping on top of your crust, and use a spatula to spread it out evenly. Top with some reserved coconut, and cover with plastic wrap or foil (bonus points for foil, it’s recyclable!). Let set for at least 2ish hours before slicing (it should be firm). Store in the freezer!
Love tasty food. Eat. Feel magically cooler… ohmmmm.
eeeeeatmeeeeeone of the nicer parts of warm weather: these are all from my back yard!
I know it’s slightly blurred, but I love this one!
I do apologize for the large gaps between posts (I know, I know, it’s my wittiness that you miss)…
I’ve been busy busy of late and have been eating lots of tasty, albeit fast and non-photogenic, food of late. Like tempeh, for instance. I recently discovered that I do, in fact, enjoy this fermented “textured protein”, in spite of a childhood derision for said food object. Like, refusing to ever eat it EVER again. I suppose I’m eating my words on this one… (but that being said, I seriously WILL NEVER EAT tofurky sausage. Like, EVER. Ranks up there with one of the most disgusting things I’ve ever brought near my face… so unless they radically change the formula, there will be no more  of that). So. Tempeh. Tasty, especially in peanut sauce… but definitely NOT conducive to appealing looking photos… at all. You can thank me later for sparing you the pictures.
cooookies!
SO.
Instead, you get COOKIES! Surprised? Yeah, I thought not. But whatever, these are good and a nice change up from my pb-chia-oat-coconut routine. Except that these do have pb and oats, but there is this crazy addition of this thing called COCOA POWDER! Woah. Really going out on a limb here, aren’t we? Besides, I really obviously have a thing for pb cookies… and I had a jar of that amazing coconut-pb spread begging to go into cookies… and it was less hot… and chocolate and pb are a match made in heaven… so there you go. Chocolate cookies. With pb. And oats. Good(ish) for your health, wonderful for your soul. Be happy. Indulge.
bowl ‘o cookies
These cookies are on the soft side (although they are supposed to be chewy… huh. I’m thinking the reduction in sugar is causing the lack of chewiness, so if you prefer a sweeter cookie, go with the amount in the original recipe), so if you like crunchy cookies (Miss Kira, I’m looking at you), leave these in quite a bit longer so they can harden into rusk-like hockey pucks (just kidding!!). They’re lightly sweet but nicely chocolatey. I used a chunky peanut butter which is kind of funny considering I HATE nuts in my baked goods… I kind of didn’t put two and two together that chunky nut butter = nuts in cookies… but for some reason these are acceptable and pass my nut test. Go figure…?
//
Chocolate-Peanut Butter Cookies
I made a full recipe and got 19 cookies… the original says you can get 36, but I question what kind of weirdo wants cookie that small… pshhh. Ever so slightly adapted from Eating Well. I didn’t have pb chips—if so, I would have used them.
Lezzzz DO IT! Scrounge and procure:
1 c chunky peanut butter (or coconut peanut butter if you’re cool like me)
1/4 c canola oil (I may try half applesauce at some point for kicks)
1/3 c brown sugar
1/3 c granulated sugar
2 eggs
1 tbsp vanilla extract
3 tbsp plain yogurt (mine was nonfat)
3/4 c whole wheat pastry flour
1/3 c unsweetened cocoa powder
1/4 c rolled oats (or quick oats)
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1/4ish cup of chocolate chippies
failed attempts at cookie henge…
Heat the oven to 350, and line two-ish baking sheets with parchment paper.
In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, cocoa powder, oats, baking soda, and salt. In a larger bowl, use an electric mixer to beat together peanut butter, oil, and sugars until blended. Beat in eggs, vanilla, and yogurt until just combined. Stir in dry ingredients (the dough is on the sticky side) and chocolate chips. Drop by respectable spoonfuls onto the prepared cookie sheets, flattening slightly with your hand or the bottom of a glass (turbinado sugar on the flattened tops is nice, but I was out). Bake for 8-10 minutes, being careful not to over bake. Mine went for about 10, but I was testing the convection settings on my oven, and mine probably could have gone a bit less. Let cool on the sheet for 5 minutes, then remove to a cooling rack to cool completely.
for some reason I really like this one… It makes the bowl look luminous!
Mortar board covered in red glitter and a puffy painted anchor? Check.
Honor cords acquired? Check.
Imminent familial arrival? Check.
Pre-graduation nerves and free time resulting in inventive baking and cooking? MEGA CHECK.
Last blog post before the merriment of commencement commences? Probably check.
thanks, Willamette!
It’s happeninggggg!!! This Sunday I graduate from Willamette University with a BA in Art History magna cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa, and with departmental honors. Yesssssss! I had to brag, just a little! I still can’t believe it’s happening. It probably won’t hit me until after it happens, at which point it likely won’t feel real either, ha! Jeez, I thought I had copious amounts of free time after I finished thesising?! I have sooo much now (at least until tomorrow when all the fun starts), I don’t know what to do with myself! Oh wait… yes I do. Cook and bake! Duh. I’ve made some super tasty yummies the last few days, but unfortunately they escaped into my stomach before being photographed. BUT. I’m fully intending on making most of them again, so maybe at some point they’ll make it on here.
coookies! But… can you tell me what the curry is doing lurking in the picture?
Anyway… today when I was sitting around post-running trying to figure out what to do with myself, I stumbled upon these cookies. And had one of those moments where I was suddenly fixated on them and determined to make them, despite already having made red wine chocolate cookies yesterday (but whatever, irrelevant, since they’re almost gone). These are pretty much the complete opposite end of the spectrum from the red wine ones… They have CURRY in them! What a novel and EXCELLENT idea! Curry + coconut + oats = yumyumyum. I’m so glad the inside of my car smells like a spice shop now, since now I have these. Win win win all around. And besides, now I’ll have something to sustain me through the (three hour?! Willamette is so NOT big enough to justify a 3+ hour commencement, pshh) graduation ceremony… I’ll have to hide them under my robe, for snackies! Can’t have the gremlins grumbling when I’m about to get my diploma, can we?!
yumyumyummyy
Curried Chocolate Chip-Oat Cookies with Coconut
Only slightly adapted from Cookie Madness, here! I made half of the recipe on account of already having some red wine-choc cookies left over, and got 7. I’ll include the full recipe here, with my modifications.
These cookies are unusual, but so good! I like them for a change from standard chocolate chip/oat cookies. The sugar and coconut add just the right sweetness to balance the curry powder—I reduced the sugar a bit already, but I probably wouldn’t take it down much further. These are easily made vegan!
1 tbsp curry powder (any kind is fine, just make sure there’s no garlic in it, that would be awkward)
1.5 c rolled oats
1/2 c shredded unsweetened coconut
1/2 c chocolate chippies
they look kind of like Horta-cookies! heheh.
Preheat the oven to 375.
In a large bowl, use an electric mixer to cream together butter, applesauce, and sugars. Add in egg, milk, and vanilla, and beat to combine. In a smaller bowl, whisk together flour, baking soda, and curry powder. Add this to the liquid bowl, and stir until just combined, and then toss in oats, coconut, and chocolate chippies. Drop by small (or huge, if you’re like me) blobs onto an ungreased cookie sheet. Bake for 10-12 minutes, depending on the size of your cookie blobs… mine were more like 12, since they were on the large side. Let cool for a minute or two on the sheet, and then transfer to a cooling rack for eating further cooling.
Okay, so I’m on a roll. Now that I’m not thesising, I have to come up with SOME way to entertain myself, right?! Heaven forbid I should be bored between now and graduation. Psssh..
Anyyywayyy. Like I mentioned in an earlier post, I’ve been in a dinner rut the size of the Grand Canyon. BUT. I’m slowly starting to scale the walls towards more variety! Huzzah! I mean, I do love my steamed veggie-protein-grain combo, but hey, let’s face it… that gets just a wee bit old after awhile. At least, I like to eat this combo in a variety of forms, say like a quinoa bowl, savory oats, or a quesadilla. All delicious, to be sure. But I was… bored. And still (until yesterday) thesising. Which meant that dinner kind of got the short end of the stick. I did, however, stumble upon a fast and tasty quesadilla alternative in my quest for variety… tortilla pizza! Genius idea, you’ll see. It’s like… insta pizza. Especially if you like the super thin crust variety.
That being said, today’s post isn’t really a recipe, per se, but is rather more of a suggestion. This recipe is great since it’s infinitely adaptable… all you really need is protein of some form, veggies, and whatever else you want… cheese is nice, of course. I plan to keep experimenting with topping variations, since this has become my new favorite quickie dinner!
/
Tortilla Pizza!
Dreamed up by my hungry thesis-brain. Serves one!
Tortilla of choice
veggie variety
protein? If you want it… chicken is good, and so is sausage.
grated cheese of some form, however much depending on personal preference.
up close and personal
Preheat the oven to 350, and lightly de-stickify a cookie sheet (I used a light smear of coconut oil). Place your tortilla of choice on the prepped cookie sheet, and bake for 10 minutes. While the oven is heating/tortilla is baking, prep your toppings. For mine, I tend to steam a variety of veggies: usually mushrooms, bell peppers, and spinach, and use some form of animal protein, either chicken or chicken sausage. Cheese is up to you—I’ve used both cheddar and toscano, and both have been delicious.Top the pre-baked tortilla with toppings of choice, and bake for another 2 minutes, ish, until the cheese is melty and delicious. Slice and eat immediately while it’s gooey and warm. Mmmm.
The pizza in the photos was a combo of steamed veggies, Trader Joe’s chicken-apple sausage, and Syrah-soaked Toscano cheese. It was unbelievably delicious, which is what prompted me to share this. Before eating, I tossed on some cucumber for extra crunch.
Another fabby combo was steamed mushrooms, bell peppers, and spinach, Tillamook sharp cheddar, and chicken tossed with cinnamon and curry powder. That one was uglier though, so it didn’t get to star in the pictures… I fully intend on making a black bean version of this at some point in the very near future.
Yum yum yum :) Easy and delicious. And quick. Added bonus!
I can’t even believe I’m going to type these words…
Wait for it…
I FINISHED MY THESIS! For realzies. 92 pages? Check. Bound and printed? Check. Coherent (and relatively humorous) presentation? Check. Wait. NAILED. (Despite feeling I was going to go into cardiac arrest for the first few sentences, ha). I feel a thousand pounds lighter! [and mildly exhausted… this may be on account of running on adrenaline for the last 24 hours] Or maybe that’s just the removal of the pile of books that is now off my living room floor and back to the library…? It’s like my child. I sort of want to frame it, and keep it up on the wall forever and ever.
So…
I love the way citrus looks.
Now what?! So much free time, what to do, what to do?! Oh wait. That’s right. Bake more! And alternatively get more creative with dinner. Because I’m stuck in a dinner rut the size of the Grand Canyon. Except not tonight. Because tonight is a fancy-schmancy department dinner! YAY! Celebration time. And time to do all the fun senior-type things at the end of the semester (which is rapidly approaching, sheesh. Sloooowww for the cone zone, please). Which means that I have an excuse to bake a ton… in order to mitigate the amount of food to be carted back down to California when Kira and I move out, of course. You have to admit, this a is a perfectly valid excuse. Not that I really ever need an excuse to bake.
Except today. I was celebrating :)
mmm.
Coconut-Banana Bread with Lime Glaze
Mega thanks to Christine for showing me this (and for several ingredient donations)! It’s adapted from Cooking Light. I made 1/2 the batch and ended up with 2 mini-loaves, though putting it all in one loaf pan would be fine as well (just increase the bake time). I reduced the sugar quite a bit, as sweetened coconut is already pretty sweet. This bread comes together quickly and is DELICIOUS. Just sweet enough, with a pronounced coconut flavor… mmm. It’s also decently not so bad for you, considering it comes from Cooking Light. Win all around :)
look at all that toasty coconut
Acquire:
1 c whole wheat pastry flour
very heaping 1/4 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
1/8 c Earth Balance (or butter)
1/4 c brown sugar
1 egg
3/4ish cup mashed ripe bananas (the riper the better, obvs) (about 1.5 bananas)
1/8 c plain, lowfat yogurt
2 tbsp rum (don’t leave this out, it’s YUMMY!)
1/4 tsp vanilla extract
heaping 1/4 c shredded sweetened coconut + 1 tbsp (mine was probably closer to 1/3 c… I loooove coconut)
optional: chocolate chipppies! (But really… why would you leave these out?!)
1/4 c powdered sugar
juice of one lime
/
Preheat the oven to 350, and lightly grease your loaf pans of choice. In a small bowl, whisk together flour, baking soda, and salt. In a larger bowl, combine Earth Balance and sugar with a hand mixer until fluffy. Beat in the egg until well combined. Add in banana, yogurt, rum, and vanilla, and beat to combine. With the mixer on low speed, add in flour until just combined. Stir in 1/3 c coconut and chocolate chippies, if using. Pour batter into the prepared pans, and top with remaining tbsp of coconut. Bake for about 30 minutes for the mini loaves, until a tester comes out clean. (Or about an hour for a larger loaf).
While the bread is cooling/baking, combine powdered sugar and lime juice, and whisk until smooth. When the bread is cool, drizzle the glaze over the top of individual slices, or poke holes in the bread and drizzle over the whole loaf… up to you!
So. I had taken a fab set of pictures for today’s post (with natural light, even! Thanks, Oregon, for cooperating) yesterday, and they were all nicely stored on my camera, ready to be uploaded. This morning, when I uploaded them, I swear I put them into my blog photos folder. I know I did. So…
Where are they?! Nowhere to be found, is the answer I’m looking for. Maybe in pot of gold at the end of a rainbow? I suspect leprechaun involvement in this (definitely not user error. DEFINITELY leprechauns). Probably because I didn’t make a leprechaun trap last night… those sneaky little buggers! I better rustle up some green to put on… currently I’m not wearing any (that’s visible, anyway! ha.). I’ve always loved St. Patrick’s day! And yes, I am for-reals Irish (not just 1/365th), which is probably why I’m being targeted by those feisty little green men.
Blurry, but I still like it...
Anyway, after much grumbling, I took another set of photos (sadly not as good as the last ones), so you can vicariously enjoy the soda bread scones Kira and I made to celebrate! They turned out beautifully—the shape almost reminds me of a four leafed clover. Scoring the top of soda bread lets the fairies out (and promotes even baking, but that’s less fun), so I kept to this tradition and scored my scones into triangles… we now have a sprite-free apartment! To me, these scones don’t taste like traditional soda bread, but they are definitely delicious. And not at all bad for you, since they’re made with soda and yogurt rather than eggs and butter. Mmm… and, I have to say, they’re excellent with lemon curd (what isn’t?!)!
yum yum yum
Irish Soda Bread Scones
Very slightly adapted from Eat Drink Love, here! Makes 8 scones.
3 c whole wheat pastry flour (We used half pastry, half whole wheat bread flour)
1 tbsp sugar
1 tsp salt
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp cinnamon (optional but sooo good)
1.5 c low-fat plain yogurt (Kira and I usually keep this instead of buttermilk, but buttermilk works here too)
1/3 c chocolate chippies
1 tbsp turbinado sugar, for sprinkling
Preheat the oven to 425, and line a baking sheet with wax or parchment paper.
In a large bowl, whisk together flour, sugar, salt, baking soda and cinnamon. Make a well in the center, and add yogurt and chocolate chips (or other add-ins of choice). Stir to combine: the dough will look shaggy when its close to incorporated. Turn out onto a lightly floured surface, and knead into a circle (ish). Place onto prepared baking sheet, and slice into 8 scones (a knife works fine for this). Brush the tops with buttermilk (if using), and sprinkle turbinado sugar onto them for crunch factor :) Bake for 20 minutes, until the tops are golden! Eat. Preferably warm, with lemon curd. Mmm. Maybe share with a leprechaun, if one happens by…
Wait...are those...cookies?! 