Red White & Blue Rice Krispy Treats

Here is a fun, healthy, patriotic treat that only takes about 5 minutes to make. Enjoy!

Allergy Friendly Red White and Blue Rice Krispy treats

Gluten free and vegan. No corn, soy, or dairy.

Ingredients

1/3 cup brown rice syrup
1/3 cup nut butter of choice
1/4 teaspoon vanilla powder OR 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
3 cups puffed rice cereal
1/3 cup dried blueberries
1/3 cup dried cranberries

Method
In a large pot, heat brown rice syrup, nut butter, and vanilla over med-low heat until melted.
Stir in puffed rice, cranberries, and blueberries
Spread evenly in a 9x9 or similar pan, and let cool.
Cut into squares and enjoy!

Great for snacks or breakfast.

You can use any puffed rice cereal that works for you, just double check to make sure it meets your allergy needs. I use Arrowhead Mills brand, it looks like this:

Note that this kind of puffed rice is not as crisp as a Rice Krispy type cereal. For that texture, I have used Erewhon brand, it looks like this: 

Brown rice syrup comes in a jar in the sweetener/baking aisle and looks like this:

Also note that you can find a variety of puffed grains, such as millet, quinoa, and corn in the cereal aisle. Play around, and mix and match various grains for your taste or allergy preferences. For example, here is a link to puffed millet treats I made for Halloween.

Have fun! Happy 4th of July.

Health benefits of: Blueberries, Cranberries

Raw Vegan Watermelon Cups

Here is a fabulous idea for a summer fruit salad. It is the perfect party appetizer. Yes, it has several steps and looks like a lot of work, but it really wasn't that bad. The most time consuming part was dicing the fruit for the fruit salad. If you wanted to enjoy this recipe with a little less work, you could simply rough chop all of the ingredients for the fruit salad and serve in bowls. I highly recommend making the cilantro-lime creme dressing to top your fruit salad- it is quite good!

This recipe was inspired by this post. I raw-veganized it for the version below. This recipe does not contain any dairy, eggs, gluten, grains, soy, corn, or refined sugar.

Raw Vegan Watermelon Cups

Ingredients


For the Fruit Salad: 
1 mini seedless watermelon, 3-5 lbs
2/3 cup jicama, small dice
4 ripe yellow peaches, small dice
1/3 cup sweet or red onion, finely chopped
1/2 granny smith apple, small dice
1 clove garlic, pressed
1-2 tbsp fresh lime juice (depending on how tangy you want it)
1/2 fresh jalapeno, small dice (seeds and membrane removed if you don't like spicy stuff)
2 tbsp fresh cilantro, finely chopped plus several small whole leaves to garnish
Sea salt and freshly cracked black pepper

For the Cream Sauce:
3/4 cup soaked cashews (soak raw cashews in filtered water for 4-8 hours, drain)
1 Tablespoon + 1 teaspoon lemon juice
2 Tablespoons agave nectar
1/4 cup filtered water
Pinch of himalayan salt
1/4 cup fresh cilantro, finely chopped
1 tbsp lime juice, freshly squeezed
1 tbsp minced fresh jalapeno

Method

To make the watermelon cups:
Cut the ends off of the watermelon. Stand the watermelon up on one of the flat ends and cut off the sides, forming a rectangle. Discard the rind, but keep the watermelon "scraps" to add to the fruit salad.
Cut the rectangle into cubes. I pretty much just sliced mine evenly into squares- think Rubix Cube :)
Use a knife or a melon baller to hollow out the inside of each cube. I made mine square because I was in the mood to put in some extra effort, but you could just use a melon baller or spoon and make little wells in the cube. Once the cube is filled with fruit salad, you don't really see the shape of the hole anyway.
Put the watermelon cubes in the refrigerator until you are ready to fill them.

To make the fruit salad:
Finely dice the remaining watermelon, jicama, peaches, onion, green apple, and jalapeno.
Add to bowl, add lime juice and garlic.
Add chopped cilantro, salt and pepper to taste, and stir to combine.
Refrigerate until ready to fill cups.

To make the creme sauce:
Blend cashews, lemon juice, agave, water and salt until smooth.
In a bowl, add cilantro, lime juice, jalapeno and 1/2 cup of the cashew creme and stir to combine.

To assemble: 
Fill watermelon cubes with fruit salad, top with cilantro lime sauce, and enjoy!

This recipe is linked to Made-from-scratch Monday, Slightly Indulgent Tuesdays and Allergy Free Wednesday- click on the links for more great ideas for sugar free, gluten free, allergy friendly recipes.

Florida End-of-Summer Farmers' Market Salad

Sprouts from yesterday's Farmer's Market:

Mmmm... pardon me while I type with my mouth full... yum... yum...

I think I will call this... the Florida End-of-Summer Farmers' Market Salad...
because this is about all you can get at the Farmers' Market in Florida right now :) I think our season is almost the opposite of many others'. Everyone else gets excited for the Farmers' Market to open in the Spring, and they enjoy fresh produce all summer long. Our produce withers away in the heat, and many of our Farmers' Markets close at the end of May and re-open in October. This may also partly be due to our seasonal population changes.

I am looking forward to Fall, when we start getting more fresh veggies at the Market. Just when markets in other areas of the country are closing up for winter, ours will finally be bursting with lots of choices!

So for now... this is what we have (and it's delicious)

Salad
One head of hydroponic butter lettuce. This lettuce was living yesterday morning! You can't say that about that plastic-wrapped head of iceberg lettuce sitting in the grocery cooler ; )
Shredded carrot
A combination of fenugreek, radish, and pea sprouts

Mustard vinaigrette 
(measures approximate) 
3 Tbsp Greek (or any kind) extra virgin olive oil
3 Tbsp Champagne (or any kind) vinegar
1 tsp yellow mustard seeds
1/2 tsp sea salt
3 dates
Blend.
Makes enough dressing for 2-3 large salads. Dressing will keep for a few days in the fridge.

The fenugreek sprouts are new to me. I've read about them (see NIH, SproutPeople), but had never tried them. I am really enjoying them... they seem to have a slightly nutty flavor.

Radish sprouts taste just like radishes.

Pea sprouts (aka pea shoots) taste like very green, green peas.

I cannot even tell you how delicious this salad is! I think it must be because everything is SO fresh. There is so much flavor in these veggies!

More on the health benefits of sprouts here, here and here

Watermelon Fresca

Watermelon Fresca

Ingredients

• 4 cups cubed, seeded watermelon
• 1/2 cup filtered water
• 2 tablespoons agave nectar
• 1 1/2 tablespoons lime juice
• 2 cups seltzer water (optional)

Method

• Blend watermelon, water, agave, and lime juice.
• Strain through cheesecloth or strainer. Chill juice in refrigerator.
• When ready to serve, combine with seltzer water for a fizzy drink. For no fizz, use filtered water.
• Best served very cold.

We found this orange watermelon at a fruit stand down the street. Curious about orange watermelon? Click here and here for more information. 

Click here to learn more about the health benefits of watermelon.

Pink eyed peas

What do you get if you cross:

Pink

with

Black Eyed Peas

Pink Eyed Peas! Hahahahahaha.

OK, I couldn't help it.

On to the real post.
About actual pink-eyed peas.

I was fortunate enough to be in the neighborhood of Beasley Farms a few weeks ago. Beasley Farm is not certified organic, but they practice "sustainable farming methods" and most important to me- they do not use pesticides. I try to stop by their farm stand any time I'm in the area.

This time, I purchased several kinds of Southern peas. Now, I've never cooked Southern peas before, and I had NO idea what to do with them, but was willing to try to figure it out.

Some of the peas were shelled, some were still in the shell. I took some of both.

The owner asked "Are you sure? Those aren't shelled yet" I said "Sure! I'll shell them." (as if I had any idea what I was talking about) Ha!

Lesson learned: When the grower asks "Are you sure" you really ought to pay attention.

Here is my first batch of Pink-eyed peas, in the shell. As you have probably surmised, they are like Black-eyed peas, only pink. I thought they tasted a little milder than black-eyed peas. They are very pretty, don't you think?

Here is a close up:

Unwashed, unshelled peas- straight from the field that morning!

So, I sat down in front of the TV to shell peas. How hard could it be? 

Bailey helped. Bailey loves it when I sit on the floor for a project. He thinks that's his cue to help out.

OK, so it wasn't difficult. But it was tedious. It was fun for about the first 15 minutes. Then I looked at my teeny tiny pile of shelled peas and my huge bag of unshelled peas and it seemed I hadn't gotten anywhere. 

It took a long time. 

They were yummy. But- next time I'll definitely buy them already shelled. I was glad I didn't buy a whole bushel! Did you know they actually sell produce by the bushel? That's an actual measure. This was half a bushel. She warned me that half a bushel wouldn't be very many peas after they were shelled. That was true- but that was ok. I just wanted to try them, and in the end, I was glad there were not more to shell.

Allergy friendly asparagus soup

This is a super-easy and delicious soup perfect for summer. Gluten free, dairy free, soy free, corn free... raw and vegan. Minimal ingredients, easy clean up!

Dairy-Free Creamy Asparagus Soup
Ingredients (adjust to taste)
5-6 stalks fresh, raw asparagus
1/4 cup soaked cashews
1/8 tsp sea salt
Dash ground black pepper
Lemon or lime juice (I used key lime)
Filtered water

Instructions
Break off the tough ends of the asparagus spears where they will snap easily.
Cut off the tips, place them in a small bowl and squeeze lemon or lime juice over them.
Cut remaining spears into pieces and put into blender with the cashews. Add a little water, adjust for the thickness you want. Blend until very smooth.
Taste and add more sea salt or pepper if desired.
Serve in a bowl with the "marinated" tips on top of the soup. Enjoy!

More info on the health benefits of: asparagus, cashews

Blueberries!

Blueberries are in season, and I've been going a little blueberry crazy...

Blueberry-guarana smoothie

Gluten free vegan blueberry-chia waffles

Raw vegan blueberry tart

Raw vegan blueberry tart

More info on health benefits of: blueberries, chia, guarana

Yum!

Key Lime White Chocolate Cake Pops

Here is the second raw vegan cake pop recipe!

Key Lime White Chocolate Raw Vegan Cake Pops

Makes approximately 8 cake pops

Ingredients
1 cup raw macadamia nuts
1/8 tsp himalayan salt
Key lime juice to taste. I don't think I measured, but probably about 1 key lime/1 Tbsp juice.
1/2 vanilla bean, scraped (keep the empty bean for future recipe: vanilla sugar)
3-4 pitted dates- I didn't use these, but will next time. I think the cake pops need the dates to hold together. I used light agave nectar for a sweetener, but if you use dates, you won't need agave.
Lollipop sticks
White chocolate coating

I made macadamia flour in the VitaMix. If you don't have a VitaMix, I think you can probably skip this step and process everything in the food processor.

Add macadamia flour (or whole raw macadamias) and salt to food processor, and pulse to combine (process a little longer if whole macadamias).

Add key lime juice, vanilla bean, and dates to food processor. Process until mixed, and dough-like consistency.

Roll pieces of dough into balls, and place on cookie sheet or tray to go in the freezer. Tip: using a parchment paper (or Silpat) liner will help prevent your cake pops from freezing to the cookie sheet.

Note: My key lime pops were very soft. I think adding dates will prevent that next time. I simply forgot to add dates when I made these! The ones I made froze well, and tasted great (and actually had a great texture once frozen- more like a truffle), but they would not have stayed on a lollipop stick upright, as suggested here. As it was, the sticks wanted to fall over rather than stay upright in the key lime balls. You can see below that the cherry vanilla ones were firmer. That's what you're going for.

Insert lollipop sticks in balls. Freeze.

While cake pops are in the freezer, mix up the white chocolate coating, described here and here.

Spoon white chocolate coating over each cake pop, and re-freeze. They won't take long, you will be able to enjoy them in about 10 minutes. They are even better the next day, after freezing overnight! Yum!

Local Farmers' Market

Today my neighbor Joan and I went to the Farmers' Market. Now that "season" (tourist season, that is) is over, it is slim pickin' at the Farmers' Markets. Many of the markets close for the summer, and those that remain have fewer vendors. The beach market has closed for the summer, and so has the little produce cart around the corner. So we decided to go to the Green Market across the bridge. Bailey agreed.

Joan came over with a green smoothie that happened to match her green ceramic coffee cup:

Bailey loves the farmers' market.

I don't even like tomatoes, but thought these were beautiful

Sprouts, sprouts, sprouts!

Yum!