Flourless Peanut Butter Chocolate Cookies

Many (good) gluten-free recipes require expensive almond meal, quality gluten-free flour, or a myriad of ingredients like brown rice flour, sorghum flour, xanthan gum, potato starch … not ingredients found in your average kitchen pantry!

So when the request came to make a gluten-free treat, I turned to this peanut butter cookie recipe from Joy the Baker’s blog. With my own addition of dark chocolate chunks, this recipe uses only six ingredients: peanut butter, brown sugar, white sugar, an egg, baking soda, and chocolate.

They taste delicious – and you can’t even tell they’re gluten-free!

Recipe: http://joythebaker.com/2009/04/flourless-peanut-butter-cookies/

 

Baby Potato Halves with Garlic Aioli, Toasted Sesame Seeds, and Pistachios

Delicious and beautiful, this is an amazing dish to share. Imagine: Tender baby potatoes tossed with wholegrain mustard and garlic aioli … topped with a crumbling of toasted sesame seeds and pistachios … Trés jolie!

Baby Potato Halves with Garlic Aioli, Toasted Sesame Seeds, and Pistachios

1kg baby potatoes

Half a batch of aioli – I used Jamie Oliver’s aioli recipe, exchanging the Dijon mustard for wholegrain and using 2 whole garlic cloves (rather than just a half)

¼ c sesame seeds

½ c pistachio nuts

Method

1. Wash the potatoes and cut them into halves.
2. Boil the potatoes for 10-15 minutes, or until tender (but not mashable!). Leave to cool a little.
3. Meanwhile, if you haven’t already done so, make the aioli. Then toast the sesame seeds in a pan over medium heat.
4. Next, roughly chop the pistachios and toast them a little, in a pan, over medium heat.
5. Combine the potatoes and aioli. Transfer to a platter.
6. Just before serving, sprinkle over sesame seeds and pistachios.

Broccolini Mushroom Stir-Fry: Clean and Simple

They say cats eat grass when they’re ill. Some believe cats eat grass to relieve sore throats. And I’ve also heard it’s a natural laxative … As for me, grass probably isn’t going to do it, but I know green’s what I’ve yearned for while feeling under the weather.

So, broccolini has been it. This broccoli-kai-lan hybrid has been around for a while, but it’s only recently that I’ve really come to love it. Light cooking produces a bright spring green colour and it has an easy-to-eat appeal, particularly when you’re feeling like baby-bites of food – it’s so tender that you can eat the entire stalk. It’s also high in vitamin C, A, and B6; calcium, iron, manganese, and potassium.

When fresh, broccolini needs little attention. On this occasion, I stir-fried it with a few crushed garlic cloves; then added some tinned straw mushrooms, as well as some pre-marinated honey-soy tofu for protein. Keeping things clean and simple, I paired the stir-fry with rice (sushi rice, my favourite) and finished it off with a sprinkling of cashews.

Voilà. Clean, simple, healthy food for humans.

Pantry treats: Clafoutis

As a rule, I try not to shop too far ahead – food-wise – in case plans fall through, or I change my mind. However, sometimes my desire for being prepared and organised overtakes! On this occasion, I’d bought ingredients for a cherry custard tart. Sure enough, plans fell through. A rich custard treat for one was out of the question, but I still had eggs that needed using …

My solution? A cherry clafoutis. A clafoutis is a French pudding, which has become one of my ’pantry’ recipes for quick and delicious; cheap and easy; low-fat and healthy. And the choice of fruit? Well, yes cherries are out of season, but I got some preserved ones for a steal at the supermarket!

Recipe-wise, there are a myriad of interpretations out there. Some that use two eggs, three eggs, six … varying amounts of milk, flour, and butter … and some recipes even call for ground nuts! Yum.

On this occasion I was looking for a recipe that used just a few eggs; ‘healthy’ enough to be enjoyed over several serves. But I also wanted a stodgy pudding to provide some winter comfort. This led me to Neil Perry’s recipe on goodfood, which sits in the middle of the road, clafoutis-wise. It uses three eggs and a cup of flour, perfect for my intent and purpose.

Here’s the result!

Recipe: Cherry clafoutis