Author: Daisy

Cooking Invention Week: Crumble Bumbles! (7/7)

Gosh, what’s the point of cooking (or eating?!) if one never gets to dessert? Keine Ahnung (“no idea”) as they say in these German parts! Hello my beloved Gluten-Free peoples, Today’s recipe can be adapted to just about any fruit: perennial, tropical, whatevers! The secret is in the crumble. Everything tastes good with a little crunchy oatmeal! It’s super healthy (no sugar, no yuck!) and vegan. An all-round win!

A juicy cherry crumble to demonstrate this delicious Adapt-a-Recipe process...
A juicy cherry crumble to demonstrate this delicious Adapt-a-Recipe process…
A cherry version... Mmmmm...
Mmmmm… a spoonful of heaven…
A version with strawberries!
A version with strawberries!
A crunchy yet healthy topping...
A crunchy yet healthy topping…

Ingredients

  • 2 cups gluten-free oats (ideally not the processed kind or the quick-cooking kind – super important that it is certified gluten-free – as you know, oats milling has a high probability of cross-contamination with wheat milling)
  • 1/2 cup EVOO (you know it, extra virgin olive oil)
  • 1/2 cup of cashew milk or water
  • 1/2 teaspoon of vanilla powder
  • 1 teaspoon (or more! pile it on, baby!) of cinnamon powder (I even throw bits of cinna-stick in there)
  • A dash of grated nutmeg
  • 1/4 cup of maple syrup (Grade C only please – also optional!)
  • Any bakeable fruit of your liking. In this recipe, I used one over-ripe banana and 2 cups of frozen cherries. You may opt for pineapples, berries, mangoes, apples, oranges, kiwis, pears… honestly, whatever you have lying around that needs to be used up. Frozen or fresh works just as well. It doesn’t need to be in perfect condition either!
  • Topping: roasted nuts and cranberries, soy yoghurt
  • Also good with: vegan ice-cream
Close-up of the crumbly topping... you don't have to use a lot of oil!
Close-up of the crumbly topping… you don’t have to use a lot of oil!

Method

1. Lay the fruits of crumble at the bottom of a baking dish. I find small square ones work well for this recipe.

2. In a medium mixing bowl, add all the other ingredients. Start with the dry (oatmeal, vanilla, cinnamon) and then add the wet.

3. The mixture should form little clumps. Don’t mash them too well… just kind of sprinkle them on top of the fruit. Crumbles are often made the same way with castor sugar and room temperature butter. The mixture will form clumpy oatmeal lumps that you just sprinkle over the fruits, trying to cover as much of it as possible (so the fruit doesn’t burn). In this recipe, you won’t quite have the buttery crunchiness of a butter-containing granola, but you will have something just as delicious and way more healthy! If you don’t want to use a lot of oil, you can substitute even more (or all!) of the oil for water or nut milk. It will form a softer texture, not unlike cooked oatmeal.

4. Bake at 180 degrees Celcius for 15 minutes. Voila! Done! 🙂 Serve with a scoop of vegan yoghurt or sorbet or ice cream.

A side view of the stacked crumbly goodness...
A side view of the stacked crumbly goodness…

That’s it for Cooking Invention Week (err… Month!) 2019! Now go out there and experiment… make your own recipes and share them below if you’d like. 🙂

Peace,

Daisy

 

Cooking Invention Week: Qui-sotto (6/7)

Hello Alle Zusammen (all of you)!

Today’s invention is a really neat little trick, really! It’s a quick and dirty way of making quinoa risotto. Why quinoa? Well, to switch things up a little, of course! Quinoa also has an inherently nutty flavour, which can be interesting to those precious, little gluten-free tastebuds of yours!

The secret? Lentils. Cook the quinoa together with the lentils. They will essentially melt into your quinoa, giving your quinoa a thick and soupy texture.

Quinoa Risotto to go!
Quinoa Risotto to go!

Ingredients

  •  2 cups quinoa
  • 2 cups lentils (I use the red split ones, but you can also use beluga, brown, any kind you like, really)
  • 2 bell peppers, ideally of different colours
  • 150g of mushrooms (shitake is lovely for this recipe)
  •  2-3 stalks of scallions (and a little extra for the plating)
  • 1 medium leek
  • 2-3 stalks of chopped kale or bokchoy (or any leafy green)
  • 1 veggie stock cube (careful to get a gluten-free one!)
  • Salt and Pepper to taste

Method

1. Wash and soak the lentils for at least 2 hours. Drain.

2. In a medium pot, put the cups of lentils and quinoa together, along with the chopped leeks, chopped scallions and salt and pepper. You can add a veggie stock cube if you want the dish to be more flavourful. Add 3-4 cups of water and start cooking for approximately 10 minutes! Stir from time to time, especially closer to the end (when there is less water). The mixture will be heavy, so don’t turn the heat up too high.

3. When the dish is almost done, add in your chopped mushrooms, chopped kale/leafy green and chopped bell peppers, in that order. Mushrooms need to cook a little, so you can even add while the rice/lentil concoction is still cooking (depending on the type of mushroom you chose for the dish).

And you’re done! A delicious, one-pot meal that has essentially all the carbs, protein and veggies you need! Enjoy!

Peace,

Daisy