Vegan Whole Wheat Banana Flax Muffins

I'm not a vegan, although some days I could easily have people fooled. I have no problem with eggs, but I have a big problem with the way chickens are treated on factory farms; and since cruelty-free eggs are expensive, it's rare that I actually have eggs in the fridge. Luckily there are plenty of ways around it when I'm baking.

For today's recipe, I used the flaxseed trick: for each egg, mix 1 tbsp ground flax seed (either grind your own or buy it pre-ground as flaxseed meal) with 3 tbsp warm water. I do this right when I start gathering my ingredients together, since the longer the mixture sits, the more the flax absorbs the water, and the more egg-like its consistency gets.

This was a highly experimental recipe, finalized by glancing at standard banana bread recipes, making my substitutions, and adjusting mid-process to get the right consistency to the batter.  I have to say I'm quite pleased with the result!

2 tbsp ground flaxseed + 6 tbsp warm water
1 cup whole wheat flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 cup brown sugar

1/4 cup mashed apples (or unsweetened applesauce)

2 medium ripe bananas, mashed

Preheat your oven to 325°F. Mix your flaxseed and water and let it soak, stirring occasionally, while you put the rest of the ingredients in a bowl. Add the flax-and-water mixture and mix everything well. Grease two muffin pans or line with paper baking cups. Fill 10 of the cups halfway and bake for 35 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the middle of a couple of the muffins comes out clean. Cool the pans on a wire rack, or if you used paper cups, remove them immediately and cool.

The results: Moist, dense, and delicious.  I promise you, you won't notice the whole wheat flour and you won't miss the oil or the eggs.  I used paper baking cups but I didn't let them cool before digging in (twice).  As a result, my muffins stuck to the paper, but this could simply be because they weren't cool enough.  If I have the same problem with the cooled ones tomorrow, I'll nix the cups and just oil the pans.

The skinny: Each muffin has 91 calories, 0.8 g fat, 123 mg sodium, 19.6 g carbohydrate, 1.4 g fiber, 7.1 g sugar, and 1.8 g protein. If you use 2 tbsp brown sugar instead of 1/4 cup (which I will be trying next time), each muffin has 84 calories, 17.9 g carbohydrate, and 5.4 g sugar. This makes each muffin count as 1 Weight Watchers Point for my parents :)

The alternatives: These muffins are admittedly small.  I wanted something snack-size, but you could easily make half as many normal-sized muffins.  You might just have to lower the temperature to 300 and increase the time by 10-15 minutes.  I'll also try this the next time I make them to get the exact formula.

Pineapple-Ginger Glaze

It was Hawaiian night at empo's house as I invited a recent high school graduate over for dinner.  On the menu: veggie medley served over red and brown rice with lentils, topped with a pineapple-ginger sauce, with piña colada smoothies for dessert.

If you've never had red rice, try it!  Its nutty taste is a great compliment to any number of flavors, and its rich color (seen here with long grain brown rice and white basmati for reference) is sure to add some visual interest to your rice dishes.  Red rice takes longer to cook than brown rice, so when I plan on serving both I use separate pots.  The time difference isn't extreme, so you could just as easily cook them together; the brown rice would just be a bit softer than the red.

In addition to the rice I boiled some lentils and steamed a colorful mix of vegetables: broccoli, yellow squash, sliced baby carrots, and red, yellow, and green peppers.  Since I knew the pineapple-ginger sauce would be full of flavor, I didn't bother seasoning anything while I was cooking it.

Now onto the sauce!  If you'd like to try it, you'll need: 

2 tsp minced ginger

2 tsp minced garlic

1 20-oz can crushed pineapple in its own juice

6 tbsp reduced-sodium soy sauce

First I sautéed the ginger and garlic in a bit of water over medium heat.  (I prefer not to heat my oils.)  After a few minutes I added the pineapple and soy sauce and cooked for a few more minutes until it started to boil.  Yes...it really is that simple!  This makes 4 servings of 166 grams each.  (I often forget that normal people use measuring cups and not food scales, so next time I'll measure by volume, not by weight.)

The result: Delicious!  I will definitely be making this again!  You just can't beat a sauce that comes together this quickly and still tastes great.  It's also great cold: I had leftovers for lunch today and didn't even bother to heat it up.

The skinny: A serving of the sauce alone has 101 calories, 750 mg sodium, 23.3 g carbohydrate, 1.2 g fiber, 17.3 g sugar, and 4.2 g protein.  (The sodium is high, but considering this sauce eliminates the need for seasonings anywhere else in the dish, it's not that bad.  Sodium content will also vary depending on which brand of soy sauce you use.)

The alternatives: For you meat-eaters out there, I'm sure this would be wonderful over grilled chicken with veggie kabobs and rice.  I have a sneaking suspicion it would even be good as a sweet-and-sour dip for baked pita chips.  If only I had some freshly-made pitas lying around so I could test that theory...

(Admittedly we never got around to making smoothies, but they're on my mind and I think I might have to try to concoct something tonight.)

Whole Wheat Pitas

Tonight's recipe is courtesy of Emeril Lagasse from the Planet Green website (found here).

The process: I followed this recipe as written and ran into problems right away. The dough was very sticky and a good bit of it wound up under my fingernails. I ended up adding extra flour while I was kneading (once I removed half of the dough from my hands), probably 1/3-1/2 cup.

The next "problem" I ran into (which was more likely a typo in the recipe) is that the dough made 12 2-ounce balls (using a food scale for consistency), not 16. I'm suggesting it's a typo as opposed to chef's error since it made exactly 12 balls, with no dough leftover.

The recipe called for an oven temperature of 500°, which is just a tad frightening, but hey, anything for homemade pitas. I was able to bake 2 pitas at a time on my upside-down baking sheet. There's a satisfying little "pop!" when the pitas puff up, creating that trademark pocket. Since I had to open the oven so often, I ended up turning the temperature up to 525°. That way the actual temperature stayed where it needed to be, and all 12 pitas came out well. I'll tell you this: baking these things is not for the faint of heart...that oven is HOT!The results: They look beautiful, if I do say so myself, golden brown and flour-dusted. The texture is very nice: soft with just the right amount of chewiness. They're very salty, however, and next time I'll definitely be cutting back to 1 teaspoon.

The skinny: As I made them, each pita has 160 calories, 3.2 g fat, 390 mg sodium (!), 28.3 g carbohydrate, 1.1 g fiber, and 4 g protein. (With only 1 tsp salt in the recipe, sodium content would be reduced to 196 mg.)

Introduction

I'm horrible at introductions. They always seem to be a bit corny, no matter how well-thought-out they are, so instead of posting some all-encompassing "about me" entry, I'll keep it short.

I'm a 24-year-old laid-off student: what basically amounts to the trifecta of Broke. Lucky for me I enjoy cooking, which makes feeding myself on a pauper's budget much easier than it would be if I had a weakness for eating out or buying meals in cardboard boxes. Also helping in the money department is not eating meat. Lentils are a girl's best friend, and the people who say it's diamonds clearly have not had my curried lentil soup.

I think that's plenty of introduction for now. After all, it's not about me...it's about the food!