Week(and every) day cobbler

Hello again, my friends. From the looks of it, it’s been a year since I posted – A YEAR! I never intended to take such a substantial break, but I suppose such is life. I’ve still been making delicious food and have thought about Yum For Tum too many times to count, but just couldn’t seem to muster up the power to sit down and write. Honestly, I’ve been feeling a bit (well, more than a bit) stuck and trying to figure a whole lot of things out in the last 12 months, and I think I’m finally making some headway. I’ll spare you all the details, and just leave it at that. I’m writing a blog post, so that’s progress right? 🙂

Making and eating cobbler is also a form of progress, so let’s do it.

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This cobbler is my go to dessert at all times of year, work night or no. It’s so very easy, so very tasty, and it takes about 5 minutes to throw together. You can use fresh or frozen fruit, and I’ve experimented with pretty much everything – the only thing that I’m not wild about as the sole fruit in this is citrus fruit. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a great addition to something with less water in it, but it makes for kind of a mushy final product. Adding in dried fruit with fresh or frozen stuff also makes for sweet, sweet goodness.

One more thing, this whole recipe is super flexible! You have dried apricots and frozen blueberries at home? Use them! You have a handful of raspberries, some left over blueberries, and couple apples – that’s a fine mofo of a cobbler!

Also, the amounts of every ingredient are more suggestions than anything else. Depending on pan size, you change the amounts of fruit and topping to suit what you’ve got.

What you need (makes 4 mini cocottes – see disclaimer below):

Topping:

2 cups gf oats

1 Tbsp coconut or sunflower oil (even a light olive oil is pretty good here), melted

1/4 cup maple syrup (the oats should be coated lightly with maple syrup – if you want more sweetness or find your oats aren’t coated, add more, but don’t let the oats get mushy)

1/2tsp cinnamon

pinch of sea salt

pinch of nutmeg

Filling:

2-3 cups fruit, chopped.

Juice of 1/2 lemon

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Here’s where I make a quick disclaimer: I use these little cocottes to both make and serve the cobbler. If you’re thinking, “this is bullshit! I don’t have cocottes!” worry not, my dear. Really, even I’m shocked that I have cocottes. So, take whatever pan you’re going to be using (ideally it doesn’t have more than about a 3 inch side), fill it with fruit about 2/3-3/4 of the way, then pack on the topping! 

So, first, preheat the oven to 375. Then wash your fruit (yes, yes, fresh and seasonal fruit is always sweetest, but I’ve been using up the rest of my frozen nectarines and daaaa-ummm, Gina, they’re good!)

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Next, add lemon juice, stir, and fill your cocottes or not cocottes.

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Mix all the topping ingredients together and spoon onto your fruits. I like to make each of these little guys heaping because I love me so oaty topping and they just end up so nice and crunchy. If your topping layer is too thin, the oats will be mush. I’d shoot for at least 1/2 inch, maybe an inch of topping. If you don’t have enough fruit or topping to cover your pan, just keep adding more until you’re satisfied!

Bake for about 15 minutes, until golden brown and crunchy on top and all bubbly and luscious in the middle.

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Boom, tasty dessert! Enjoy!

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Roasted Butternut Squash Soup. It’s delightful AND autumnal.

IMG_9124It’s been a while my food-loving friends, and I apologize! Late summer was filled with travels and basking in abundant laziness with my Master’s degree finished. Sure, I’m working full time, but man oh man, days off are sweet when they don’t have to be full of lectures and papers. I’ve been cooking all the while, but haven’t felt much like taking photos or writing anything. After a long respite, I’m happy to share this tasty little dish with you all.

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Ooooh, fall. How I love your colors and many squashes.

This soup is very simple to make, filled with spicy and sweet notes, and smooth as butta (as in buttanut…). It’s great for warming up after a chilly day outside.IMG_9109

What you need:

4 Tbsp olive oil

1 butternut squash, halved and roasted

1 medium onion, chopped

1 large apple, chopped

3 cloves of garlic, chopped

3 tbsp curry powder

1.5 cups de puy, brown, or red lentils, cooked

4 cups water or vegetable broth

Salt and pepper to tasteIMG_9120

What to do:

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees and prepare the butternut by slicing it lengthwise, removing seeds, rubbing with olive oil, and laying flesh down on a baking sheet. The roasting will take 25-30 min, but it’ll be done when it’s soft and the flesh side is browned.

At the same time, cook your lentils by adding 2 cups of water to a pot, bringing to gentle boil, and adding rinsed lentils. Cover and let simmer until tender.IMG_9121

While the squash is roasting, add the chopped garlic, onion, and apple to a soup pot with the olive oil. Saute until lightly browned, then add curry powder and brown for 1 more minute. Add the water or veggie broth to deglaze.

Simmer until the squash is ready, then chop the squash into large chunks (including the skin). Add squash to the pot. Transfer the soup to a blender and blend until smooth in batches (or use an immersion blender). Return blended soup to pot, simmer, and salt and pepper to taste. Add cooked lentils. Eat and be happy!IMG_9130

Glooooooorious Morning Everything Muffins – Vegan, Gf, quick and easy!

IMG_9058This week I found myself with an abundance of beautiful zucchini, apples, carrots (I know, it was a good week). While I totally love those fine veggies in their natural form, I also am a huge fan of the veggie+fruit+seed muffin, and so it only seemed right to make some of that magic happen.

Also, excitement! I have 3 weeks off from school and the end of my degree is in 3 months. WOOOOOO! Anyway, back to your regularly scheduled programming.IMG_9044What you need: Makes 12 muffins

1 cup of buckwheat flour

1 cup of oat flour (gf oats)

1 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/3 cup coconut sugar

1/3 cup unsweetened applesauce

1 cup almond milk

1 tsp vanilla extract

1/4 tsp cinnamon

1/3 cup cacao nibs

1/3 cups pumpkin seeds

1 zucchini, grated

2 carrots, grated

1 medium apple, chopped,

1 tbsp coconut oil, melted

2 tbsp chia seeds mixed with 6 tbsp water to form a gel (this is the egg replacer)IMG_9049Preheat to 350 degrees. Start by making your chia gel, it should take about 5 minutes to set. Continue by combining dry ingredients (I ground my own buckwheat flour and oat flour in my magic bullet) in one bowl. In another, combine the wet ingredients (including sugar, oil, and chia gel here).IMG_9053Add the wet ingredients to the dry, stir, and then add veggies, seeds, apple, and nibs. Stir until well combined.IMG_9054In a greased muffin tin, fill each cup.IMG_9057Place in oven and bake for about 20-30 min. When a fork comes out clean, your muffins are done!IMG_9061IMG_9060Enjoy! 🙂

Baked Apple and Pear Chips. Two Ingredients, So Much Yum.

P1030052_2We had quite a bit of extra fruit that I’d bought to make pies, and while it’s so tasty fresh, juiced, and smoothied, I’ve been feeling snackish today. Sooo…fruit chips seemed like the right thing to make.

P1030045_2Start with apples, pears or both. Preheat the oven to 250 degrees. Slice your fruit very, very thinly.

P1030048_2Line a baking sheet with parchment paper, and place slices on sheet. Pop them in the oven.

P1030050_2After about 50 minutes, flip the fruit, and bake another 30 min before removing. Eat straight away or place in airtight container and save for another day. Yum!

P1030053_2Also, making a little almond butter sammie is definitely a good idea.

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For the tolerant of gluten, non-vegans, and pie lovers everywhere…

P1030042Friends, this is an exception to the general theme of the blog (gf and vegan/vegetarian) that I just had to make for two reasons. Reason 1: these little mini pies were winners last night; and Reason 2: they’re adorable. If you’ve got some kind of event and most folks eat gluten and don’t mind buttery, flaky pie crust, with delicious fruity innards (and really, who hates pie?) these are such a nice easy option. Also, did I mention they’re really, really cute? 🙂 My man’s birthday party was last night, and these were pretty much the perfect little pie-friends to celebrate with.

I’ll start off by saying that when you’re short on time, making pie crust from scratch is very tricky, so I just used Trader Joe’s frozen pie crust. A little time economy was worth it so that I could actually make these.

P1030044What you need:

2 frozen pie crusts (or prep your own and make these gf)

about 6 small apples, chopped (or any other fruit that’s calling your name)

1 Tbsp coconut sugar

1 Tbsp lemon juice

1 Tbsp flour (I used whole wheat, and it felt so wrong, I won’t lie)

a standard muffin tin

flour to cover your rolling surface

P1030029First thaw the crust according to the package, and roll it out. Then using a mug or glass roughly the size of the top of the muffin tin, make 12 circles in the crust and remove each circle (these will be the bottoms of the pies). Roll each out until you have about an inch of overhang when they’re fitted to each muffin spot. Repeat the process with the second crust to make tops.

P1030030Mix fruit, flour, lemon juice, and sugar in a bowl and spoon into muffin tin.

P1030031Wet the edges of each pie top, and pinch the top and bottom edges together until bonded. Make a slit in the top of each mini pie. Now, very important, chill these little guys for at least 30 minutes! While they’re chilling, preheat the oven to 425 degrees. After the 30 minutes, pop them in the oven and bake for about 30-40 min until tops are golden brown. Let them cool about 20 minutes and remove from the tin.

P1030036P1030037P1030040Share and be the happiest! Vegans and gluten-free’s, I promise I’m working on a pie for us. 🙂

 

 

 

 

 

The World’s Best Green Juice, Ever. In the world! (did I mention the world?)

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I’d like to start by saying one thing: Green juice is MAGIC. Yes, it looks weird (although I like pretty much anything that looks like it may have come straight from a rainbow), and like it might taste really bad. Once you make the leap to the green, you’ll be so glad you did. This juice is a nice start to the morning, an afternoon pick me up, or a good post workout recharger. And it’s an excellent gateway juice before you start getting all hardcore with green juices that don’t have anything ungreen in them. Also, it’s amazing. 🙂

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Makes about 16 0z of wonderful, beautiful juice.

3 small apples (or 1 large, ignore the 5 pictured)

Juice of 1/2 lemon

about 3-4 cups baby kale (or 5-7 leaves grown up kale)

1-2 inches of fresh ginger

1 pear

(optional: handful of parsley)

Juice apples, pear, kale, ginger. Squeeze juice of 1/2 lemon into juice and stir. Drink it up and feel like a juggernaut of rainbow-colored goodness.

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Warm and Gingery Carrot-Apple-Parsley Juice. Zing!

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Last time I was in Portland, I finally got to stop at a juice truck that I’ve been dying to try for ages. Their smoothies and green juices were originally what I was super excited about, but being that it was October and blustery and rainy, I decided to try a hot juice to boost immunity. I didn’t fully anticipate two things: 1) Hot juice is delicious. Duh, apple cider…don’t know why I never made that connection; and 2) garlic is not something I enjoy in juice. That said, I did buck a nasty cold going around, so maybe it all worked out. Either way, I’ve been drinking hot juices of varying combinations for a few months and found myself headed back to Portland this afternoon to see some of my best friends. It just seemed right to post my favsie warm juice concoction.

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In your juicer, combine:

2 large carrots

2 regular or 3 small apples

1 handful of parsley (Italian parsley was what I had)

A generous cut of ginger (I used about 2 inches)

After juicing, place on stove in small saucepan, heat until just before boiling (if you do let it boil, it gets really, really foamy. Too foamy). Once warm, remove from heat, drink and enjoy the spicy zing!

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