Posts Tagged ‘pumpkin’

Ode to Hummus

Tuesday, February 14th, 2012

Oh hummus how I love you so/

So many foods with which you go/

So many ways to make you mine/

At this moment I see nine.

Clockwise from top: Carrot, black sesame seed, broccoli, black garbanzo bean, pumpkin, spinach, black bean, plain, tomato.

Basic Hummus Recipe

1 15-ounce can garbanzo beans (chick peas), drained, with 1/4 cup liquid reserved

2 T tahini (sesame paste)

Juice of 2 lemons

2 T extra-virgin olive oil

1 clove garlic

Salt and pepper to taste

Place garbanzo beans, tahini, lemon juice, olive oil, and garlic in a food processor and blend until smooth. Add liquid from garbanzo beans as necessary to achieve smooth and creamy consistency. Season as desired with salt and pepper; using canned beans it should not take much salt.

Note: To use dried beans, begin with 2 cups dried garbanzo beans. Soak for 6 to 8 hours or overnight. Drain and rinse, then cover with 6 cups of water and bring to a boil. Simmer for 1 hour, or until beans are tender. Drain, reserving 1 cup of the liquid. In a food processor or blender, blend the beans with the tahini, lemon juice, olive oil, and garlic. Add liquid as necessary until the hummus reaches a smooth, creamy consistency. Add 1 tsp. salt, or more to taste.

Hummus Variations:

Carrot: Steam 1 medium-sized carrot until it is tender; add to blender with other ingredients.

Black Sesame Seed: Add 1 heaping tablespoonful of black sesame seeds to completed hummus, stir to combine.

Broccoli: Steam 1 cup broccoli until very tender; add to blender with other ingredients.

Black Garbanzo Bean: Follow the directions for basic hummus, using the instructions for dried beans, with dried black garbanzo beans.

Pumpkin: Add 1/2 cup cooked and pureed pumpkin to the blender with other ingredients.

Spinach: Add 1 cup cooked fresh spinach to the blender with other ingredients.

Black Bean: Follow the directions for basic hummus using either the canned or dried bean variations.

Tomato: Core and chop 1 medium red tomato; add to blender with other ingredients. Note: You will need much less liquid because the tomato tends to be watery, so hold off on adding any additional liquid until you test the consistency.

Like these? We’ve got a million of ‘em. But you should know that for every tried and true variation, we’ve had a few flops. Red grape hummus = kind of gross. Red wine hummus (“drunken” hummus) = not as good as you’d think, plus the color was very strange. But there’s no harm in trying – and for what it’s worth, just about every vegetable we’ve tried to add has made for some mighty delicious hummus. What’s your favorite?

Posted Under: Just For Fun, Nutrition | Tags: , , , , , ,
This post was written by jollytomato on February 14th, 2012

Fun Food Saturday: Scuffins

Saturday, April 16th, 2011

When is a muffin not a muffin? When it’s a scuffin, of course. A scuffin is defined as a cross between a scone and a muffin — and beyond that it’s wide open to interpretation. Some people like to make their scuffins like muffins (soft, cake-like texture) that are in scone shape. Others prefer their scuffins in a traditional muffin shape but with a scone-like batter (more dense, biscuit-like texture and not as sweet). Either way, we wanted to try making some because we just like saying the word “scuffin.”

For the first round, we tried some muffins shaped like scones with these Pumpkin Chia Spelt Scuffins from Oh She Glows. Angela did a side-by-side to show how she made the original recipe (white flour, sugar) healthier (whole wheat spelt flour, agave nectar, and chia seeds for a little boost). Bonus tip: She baked some on a stick and decorated them with faces to make a great little kids’ treat. We didn’t have chia seeds on hand, but we still got thumbs-up from our kid tasters for the “healthy” version.

This next recipe is almost the opposite – a scone batter baked in a muffin shape. From Fragrant Vanilla Cake, we have these Blueberry Almond Scuffins. We substituted fresh blackberries for the dried blueberries, and in the end they did kinda taste like regular muffins, but still they were unbelievably tasty when they were fresh out of the oven. It also prompted our wise seven-year-old to propose making “cuffins” – a cross between cupcakes and muffins.

For a savory option, we like these Asiago Cheese Bacon Scuffins from My Bizzy Kitchen. The goal here is to make something that is scone-like but without quite so much butter. These puppies are almost a meal in themselves (you’ve got your protein, your dairy, your fruit…) and would be great to pop in a lunch box.

Conclusion? Even if they’re not radically different from your traditional breakfast baked goods, scuffins are pretty cool and it’s sure fun to talk about them. Oh, and we want to give a special thank-you shout-out to Little Ladies Who Lunch for the inspiration with their Bacon, Cheddar and Chive Scuffins.

Fun Food Saturday: Because food should be fun.

Posted Under: Just For Fun | Tags: , , , , , , , , ,
This post was written by jollytomato on April 16th, 2011

Fun Food Saturday: Pop Tarts

Saturday, March 5th, 2011

Homemade versions of Pop Tarts are popping out all over the place these days. First we saw this great feature story on make-your-own toaster pastries (we’ll call them that so we don’t step on any trademarking toes) in the L.A.Times food section. Their featured variety has a French-style almond paste – quite a step up from the usual fruit spread. Then Savoring the Thyme this week featured their Nutella strawberry white chocolate toaster pastries. And they were inspired in turn by Family Kitchen’s Nutella version. There sure must be a lot of busy toasters out there.

While we were researching toaster pastries (sounds like a great topic for a dissertation, right?) multiple sources directed us toward Smitten Kitchen’s version, which creates a dough that’s more sturdy than flaky, perhaps best suited to toasting and travel. We took Smitten Kitchens’ suggestion to substitute some whole wheat flour for the white flour. Even with that subsitution, the dough was easy to work with and easy to roll out (probably because of the entire cup of butter). Preparation note: When cutting your strips of dough, don’t make the same mistake we made with sloppy cutting the first time around. Keep the measurements exact so that your top pieces line up with your bottom pieces.

For the inside, we were inspired by some leftover pumpkin puree to make pumpkin filling, which is one variety that you’re almost certain never to see in your grocery aisle. (Jolly Tomato’s pumpkin toaster pastry filling: Mix 1 cup pumpkin puree, 1 T brown sugar, 1 tsp sugar, 1/4 teaspoon salt, 1/4 teaspoon cinnamon, and 2 tablespoons evaporated milk.) Oh, and we also made a few pastries with peach jam and a few with Nutella, because, well, who doesn’t like Nutella?

In the end, they came out tasting like very good little pieces of pie – somewhat flaky and very tender. “It’s missing that cardboard flavor that you might expect,” observed one of our taste testers wryly. We definitely wouldn’t bring these on a hike or put them in a lunchbox, for fear they would dissolve into flaky crumbs, but that didn’t matter so much because we were more than happy to eat them on the spot, right out of the oven. Extra bonus: We drizzled a little bit of simple powdered sugar frosting (1/4 cup powdered sugar plus 1/2 tsp milk) to make it more like the “real thing.” Or maybe just because it was fun.

Special thanks to Jolly Tomato’s dad – who has never in his life eaten an actual Pop Tart – for the pictures.

Fun Food Saturday: Because food should be fun.

Posted Under: Just For Fun | Tags: , , ,
This post was written by jollytomato on March 5th, 2011
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