New Year's Eve: Safe Swedish meatballs over noodles

This turned out amazingly delicious and stroganoffy. Thanks, mom, for making the recipe up!

1 lb ground beef

1lb ground pork (I went with veal because Muslims were partying with us)

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp pepper

1 tbsp parsley flakes

1 small grated onion

2 eggs' worth of eggbeaters

3 rice cakes

water to dampen rice cakes

Gravy:

1 cup beef broth
1 cup veal broth

1 tsp Worcestershire

salt and pepper

splash red wine for flavor (alcohol cooks off)

Into bowl crumble rice cakes and dampen with water and smash up. (use just enough water to soak rice)- let sit until mushy.

When rice is soft add meats and spices w/onion and egg product-combine well. Roll into balls and bake @ 350 for approx 30-45 minutes or until cooked through (depends on size of balls rolled). Remove meatballs and make gravy with drippings. Into hot drippings add 3-4 tbsp rice flour and stir into a roux- brown for a few seconds to remove flour taste. Slowly add 2 cups stock whisking constantly. Season with salt and pepper and heat until thickened and smooth (if lumps form you can strain). Add wine if using and additional seasoning as needed. Put meatballs back into sauce and heat through.

Served over rice fusilli and thrilled a party full of non-safe eaters.

Safe Nut Bread

I've been bragging all week about being a postapocalyptic homesteader's dream wife - I can make bread from anything! - so today I'll bake a killer loaf and redeem my internal doubts about said bragging.

1 c teff
1/2 c amaranth flour
1/4 c sorghum flour

1/2 c ground hazelnuts
1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/4 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp. ground nutmeg
2 egg's worth EnergE egg replacer
1 1/2 c plain goat yogurt
1/4 c canola oil
1/4 c walnut oil

Preheat oven to 375F. Grease medium bread pan with oil. Combine dry ingredients in a large bowl and then make a well in the center. Add eggs, yogurt, and oil to the center and combine them before folding into the rest of the dry ingredients. Pour or spoon batter into your bread pan. Bake for half an hour or until a toothpick comes out clean. Cool for a few minutes before removing from pan, and then cool on a wire rack.

Results? A bit too crumbly, but utterly delicious. Light. Crunchy edges. Rich flavor. Next time? Perhaps I'll add some agave for moisture, and another fake egg for assemblage.

It's Been Months

There was Christmas. Cheating. Bronchitis. Varied bowel disasters (Magnesium!) and pleasant surprises (no consequences after a Chick Fil-A breakfast biscuit). Disheartening trial and error baking errors. Marvelously beautiful life distractions. And now I'm going to make myself some bread.



New tack:
Fuck the wacky specifics from Wangen's blood work. I'm eating pineapple and garlic and asparagus and tomatoes.
Gluten, sugar, processed foods, yeast, dairy that isn't from goats - all still clearly not the best idea, and therefore out with exception of celebratory cheating.

Black Friday breakfast feast

My turn to cook, so pancakes were up for breakfast. Using my favorite mix (with seltzer for the water, of course) and adding in sliced bananas and chopped toasted walnuts. I also made some unsafe french toast from yesterday's baguette, much appreciated by my bread-eating visitors (classic french toast recipe, with maple sugar granules embedded in the bread).

Thanksgiving!

The Balls (the Itinerant Eater and her charming younger sister) came to indulge me with a lovingly prepared safe Thanksgiving feast.



The chef is a vegetarian, so rather than feasting on a turkey of our own, I swooped some spare bird from my loving Minnesotan coworker, who overestimated her turkey poundage and scheduled her meal earlier in the day. Looks a little worse for the roadtrip, but it was moist and delicious (Samantha brined it like a good girl, and took Elton Brown's carving tips).


In lieu of turkey as the main course, we had stuffed squash. The containers were lovingly harvested by our Colombian farmer friend Juan Jacobo and traveled cross-country in the chef's backpack. She created a marvelous rice and nut filling, with goat cheddar and wild rice and who knows what else to culminate in this heavy and satisfying main course:

Sage and Nut-Stuffed Delicata Squash (modified from The Garden of Eating's recipe)
Serves 4 as a side dish or 2 as a main dish

Ingredients

* 2 delicata squashes, halved length-wise and seeded
* 2 Tbsps fresh sage,chopped
* 1/3 cup lightly toasted pinenuts, chopped
* 1/3 cup lightly toasted almonds,chopped
* 1/2 cup cooked short-grain brown rice (I usually cook the rice in some vegetable broth for added flavor)
* 2 eggs, beaten (use organic, pasture-raised if you can get 'em) - replaced with EnerG fake egg
* 1/4 cup goat cheddar cheese
* 2 medium onions, finely chopped
* 4 cloves of garlic, minced
* 2 Tbsps olive oil
* Salt and pepper to taste

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350°. Heat the oil in a large frying pan over medium-high heat. Add onions, garlic, and salt. Cook, stirring occasionally, until onions are soft, about 3 minutes. Stir in sage and cook until fragrant, about 1 minute. Stir in nuts. Set aside.

2. In a large bowl, combine the rice, eggs, parmesan and half of the cheddar cheese. Stir in the nut and onion mixture. Divide the stuffing among the squash halves, sprinkle with the rest of the cheddar cheese, and bake until tender when pierced with a fork and tops are browning, about 45 minutes.
The only recipe I brought to the table was a white trash finger food that required some convincing and modification to be acceptable to the chef. We used beets instead of cranberries in this festive favorite (goat cheese, walnuts, chopped beets all nested in fresh endive leaves). I loved it, and gladly wound up with a spare bowl o' filling I'll be reusing for days.


The unsafe eaters of the group desserted on a classic pumpkin pie, while I enjoyed another fresh espresso and some rest to digest a delicious meal.

Safe Comfort roots

Goat milk is bomb - enabled me to make perfect mashed potatoes (a little expensive olive oil, salt, white pepper, goat's milk) to go along with my purple carrots (with their orange cousins, sauteed in walnut oil with a bit of turmeric). Cozy.

Cauliflower!