Baked Apples

I had a craving for baked apples the other day, so I raided my cabinets and created this recipe. I hope you like it as much as we do!

Ingredients
apples - your choice of apple, but often the signs at the stores tell you which ones are best for baking
brown sugar
dates
raisins
ground cinnamon
Mexican vanilla extract
Soy butter

Directions
Cut the apples in half, core and peel them. (Peeling is optional if the apples are organic.)
Place the apples cored side up in a baking dish.
Add about 1/2 teaspoon of brown sugar (or more to taste) to each apple half.
Sprinkle with cinnamon and 2-3 drops of vanilla per half apple.
Take the dates and slice them open length wise. Stuff a few raisins inside the date. Place the dates in the cored apples.
Top each apple half with a tablespoon of soy butter.

Bake at 425 degrees for 20-30 minutes, or until soft. Serve warm.

Cocoa Angel Food Cake with Black Cherry Swedish Cream

A friend and I ran into Central Market for "just a couple of items" (HA!) and ended up leaving the store with a basket full of food, including these delicious black cherries and a cocoa angel food cake.

Angel food cake is dairy free, and the CM cocoa one is dangerously good! You can use plain angel food if you prefer.

We made Swedish Cream (posted March 2008) and added fresh black cherries, which turned it pink.

Black Cherry Swedish Cream
1 cup sugar
1 envelope unflavored gelatin (if you want to make this vegan, substitute agar flakes)
2 cups substituted Silk brand coffee creamer (Note: the creamer is thicker than the regular milk)
1 pint Tofutti Sour Supreme Better Than Sour Cream
(2 tsp Mexican vanilla - OMITTED in place of cherries)
2 tsp almond extract (Dr. Oetker is the best brand; one vial is plenty)
handful of fresh cherries, pitted and sliced

Directions
Combine sugar and gelatin in saucepan. Add Silk creamer and mix well. Heat until boiling then remove from heat, add sliced cherries and let cool. When cool, fold in Better than Sour Cream. Stir in almond extract. Chill in fridge until set, approximately an hour. The Swedish cream can be made a day early and stored it the refrigerator.

To serve, cut up the angel food cake. Layer Swedish Cream, chopped fresh cherries, and angel food cake in a tall glass or trifle bowl. Repeat layering until full. Serve immediately.

So simple and yet your guests will ask for seconds!

Vegan Double Chocolate Waffles

I found this recipe in the Vegetarian Times magazine this month and just couldn't resist! The waffles are deliciously chocolaty, but they are not overly sweet. They are perfect served with maple syrup, fresh berries, ice cream or even just a sprinkle of powdered sugar.

The last time I made these I had a few extra zucchini laying around (a common problem this time of year). So I decided to add a some fresh, finely grated zucchini to see how it would come out. Yum! I preferred the waffles with zucchini.

Ingredients

1-1/2 cups all-purpose flour

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/4 tsp salt

2/3 cup almond milk (or soy, or rice milk)

1/2 tsp apple cider vinegar

5 Tbs unsweetened cocoa powder (not Dutch-processed)

3 Tbs vegan chocolate chips or vegan semisweet chocolate chopped

1/3 cup dark brown sugar

1/4 cup canola oil

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

1/4 cup boiling water

Option: 1/2 cup freshly grated zucchini

Directions

Preheat the waffle iron.

Mix almond milk and apple cider vinegar in a glass and let stand for 10 minutes. 

In a small bowl combine flour, baking soda and salt; set aside.

In a larger bowl, combine cocoa powder and chocolate chips. Add boiling water and whisk until melted and smooth.

Whisk almond milk mixture into chocolate mixture. 

Then whisk in brown sugar, oil, and vanilla. 

Finally whisk in flour mixture. (Note: the batter will be extremely thick, similar to brownie batter.)

If adding the zucchini, stir it into the batter.

Coat waffle iron with oil or cooking spray. Spoon batter onto waffle iron and let cook for 3-5 minutes, until waffle is crisp. 

Since these waffles are vegan (and they do not have the egg which usually is the "glue" that holds the final product together), you will find that they fall apart easily. I had to cut the waffles into quarters and then carefully remove them from the hot waffle iron one-quarter at a time. Also, I've noticed with vegan baked goods that they are delicious fresh, but if you're not planning to eat them immediately you need to freeze them. Then you can pull the waffles out of the freezer and pop them directly in the toaster oven. Otherwise they dry out within a day.

Rosemary Cake

I was intrigued by a recipe in my Yoga Journal this month for a dairy-free rosemary cake. One of my good friends and I like to go on culinary adventures, so I invited her over for lunch and dessert (of course!). To save baking time (and reduce the length of time I had to leave my oven turned on during the summer heat) I made muffins rather than a loaf. The muffins were really good!

Ingredients
4 eggs
3/4 cup sugar
2/3 cup EVOO (extra virgin olive oil)
2 Tbsp finely chopped rosemary (luckily I had fresh dried rosemary from my farmers' market!)
1-1/2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
1 Tbsp baking powder
1/2 teaspoon Kosher salt

Directions
Preheat the oven to 325 degrees. Lightly oil a 10-inch loaf pan or muffin pan (makes 12 muffins).

Using an electric mixer, beat the eggs and sugar in a bowl until it becomes foamy and pale in color. Continue mixing while adding the EVOO a few drops at a time. Fold in the rosemary.

In a separate bowl mix the dry ingredients. Then fold the dry ingredients into the egg mixture. Pour into the pan and  bake.

If using the cake pan, the recipe recommends baking for 45-50 minutes. For the muffins I found 15-18 minutes to be perfect. The top will start to turn slightly golden brown, and a cake tester comes out clean.

We tried the muffins plain, which as I said earlier were delicious and didn't need any icing or frosting. However, I just happened to have a little left over almond-flavored (Tofutti) cream cheese frosting in the fridge. Add a few colored sprinkles and viola!

Rhubarb Ice Cream

This ice cream turned out better than I dreamed... yes, I dream about rhubarb, sometimes.

Rhubarb Sauce (see previous post from July 2010)

Dairy-Free Ice Cream

6 egg yolks

3/4 c granulated sugar

1 Tbs Mexican vanilla

1-1/4 c almond milk (or soy milk)

1-1/4 c canned coconut milk (this adds the creaminess in place of whipping cream)

Beat egg yolks and sugar until it thickens and becomes light colored. Slowing add the milk to the eggs and sugar, stirring until combined. Then heat the eggs and milk in a small sauce pan over medium-low heat, continuously stirring about about 2-3 minutes. Then remove from heat and chill.

Once cooled, add the coconut milk and stir. Strain the mixture into an ice cream maker, or freeze in a shallow pan, whipping the ice cream at least once during the freezing process. Just before the ice cream is completely frozen, swirl in the rhubarb sauce. For me there is no such thing as too much rhubarb sauce, but add to taste. 

Reserve a little of the rhubarb sauce. Top each scoop of ice cream with a spoonful of the beautiful red sauce and serve. I'd say that I hope you saved room for dessert, but there's always room for ice cream!

Rhubarb Sauce

It's summer again and that means it's rhubarb season!

I bought some fresh rhubarb a couple weeks ago, but then life took a different turn and I knew that wasn't going to have time to make anything with it right away. So I chopped it into 1/4" pieces, generously sprinkled some white sugar over it, and froze it.

Then when I had a little more time on my hands last week, I pulled it out of the freezer. Once it was mostly defrosted, I placed it in a sauce pan and heated it on low and I added more sugar to taste. I let it cook down for about an hour, and then added a teaspoon of balsamic vinegar.

Here are some basic guidelines, but you can tweak the amounts to your tastes:

4 cups fresh rhubarb
1 cup white sugar
1 tsp balsamic vinegar

The sugar and rhubarb should create enough juices that you don't need to add any liquid, but if it becomes dry you can add a tablespoon or two of water or fresh squeezed orange juice. When it's done, the pieces of rhubarb should fall apart when you stir it. Let the mixture cool before placing it in jars and refrigerating. The mixture will thicken a little as it cools.

We used this rhubarb sauce to make rhubarb dairy-free ice cream; as a topping for ice cream, cereal, and toast; and in a refreshing drink with sparkling mineral water and some fresh mint. I'll let you in on a little secret, I even like to eat the rhubarb sauce by the spoonful. Shhhhh....

Here's another recipe for rhubarb syrup that was emailed to me by a friend. I guess I'm just going to have to buy more rhubarb!
http://tmagazine.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/07/01/case-study-rhubarb-syrup/

Chocolate Pie

I remember from some of my earliest memories making chocolate pie with my mom. In the vernacular of my childhood, I insisted on calling it "chocolate peach pie" despite the complete lack of fruit. I believe that my "job" consisted of licking the spoon clean, while Dad got to lick the bowl. Then recently I thought of a new twist on this old fav.

This is a super-quick and easy dairy-free recipe, especially if you use a pre-made crust and boxed pudding. I'm still working out the details of using a homemade pudding instead, but the box pudding was surprisingly good.

It's also a great recipe for the summer, because you don't have to turn on the oven. It's what they used to call an "ice box pie."

What you will need:
1 pre-made Oreo cookie or chocolate graham cracker crust (read the label to ensure that it is dairy-free, but there isn't any dairy in that creamy Oreo filling; kinda scary, right?)
1 - 4oz package chocolate pudding (once again read the label; I have found at least two brands that are dairy-free)
2 cups plus 1 Tbs of non-dairy milk (soy, almond, rice, etc.; I prefer almond milk) divided
one-half of a 12 oz container Tofutti Sour Supreme (or another non-dairy sour cream)
4 ounces dark chocolate chopped

Melt the chocolate and 1 tablespoon of milk in a double boiler over low heat, stirring regularly. Remove from heat and stir in the fake sour cream. Let the chocolate and sour cream cool completely before mixing in the pudding, otherwise it might not set up properly.

Mix the dry pudding with 2 cups of cold milk until smooth. Then add the chocolate/sour cream mixture to the pudding. Stir well until combined. Pour into the pre-made crust and refrigerate a couple of hours until set.

Top with a dollop of non-dairy whipping cream and viola!