Special Holiday Treat! Cranberry / Strawberry Dairy Free Gluten Free Cake with Chocolate Brownie Nut Crust

If you have any type of dietary restriction, you know what it's like to stare with longing at a trans-fat-laden chocolate-covered high-fructose-corn-syrup infused monstrocity being devoured by relatives/friends/significant others and having none.

It sucks being the "special one," while everyone is eating to excess in drunken holiday mirth, even though it's pretty clear the cake won't be very good if you have it. And after that, you will either be suffering from a belly ache, headache, depression or other symptoms of sugar overload.

This gluten-free/dairy-free cake masterpiece is a favorite in any house I bring it to. Make it and become the brilliant cook instead of a weirdo with a dietary restriction. And then, of course, you can have it for breakfast, if there's anything left, that is...

Recipe
1/2 cup fresh or frozen strawberries
1 cup fresh or frozen cranberries
1 or 2 fresh apples
3-4 tablespoons of agar agar
2 tablespoons of kuzu starch
1 package of gluten-free brownies
1-2 cups of nuts
cinnamon, allspice and dried mint
1 tablespoon of honey or agave syrup


Make the nut shell:
Combine brownies and nuts in a food processor until mixture is even and easy to work with. (should be like play-doh consistency, or a bit stickier. Line a mold or some kind of pan with wax paper (or aluminum foil) and spread the mixture over the paper, forming a shell.

Alternatives for the nut shell:
Another (vegan) option is to skip the pre-made brownie, and try combining nuts with dried fruit, like prunes, apricots, dates or soaked figs. You can also add raw chocolate for that chocolate kick.

Make the mousse filling:
Boil strawberries, cranberries and apples in a pot. Add spices to taste or until a nice smell has traveled through the whole kitchen. When cranberries are cooked, add agar agar. Add kuzu to cold water to dissolve and then add kuzu water to the pot.

Take out half of the fruits and puree them in the food processor. Add it back to the pot. Stir. Pour into your brownie shell.

Stick it in the fridge to set. Should set in 2-4 hours.

For other brilliant variations, see

Passover Blueberry-Prune Cake
Raw Hazelnut Carrot Cake

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Garbanzo Wonder Salad

My favorite breakfast. It is. This salad has a lot of complex carbohydrates and protein, so instead of falling prey to the mid-morning "feed me!" stomach grumble, I last until lunch.

It's also chock full of amazing nutritious properties -- take dill, for example. Did you know that it contains oils that help neutralize benzopyrenes that are part of cigarette smoke? If you're living in the city, this breakfast will help protect your body from free radical damage.

Chickpea Salad Recipe
2 cups cooked chickpeas (also known as garbanzo bean)
1/2 onion
1 cup red cabbage
1-1/2 cup fresh dill or parsley herbs
sesame seed oil or olive oil to taste

Combine chickpeas with diced onion, cabbage and herbs. Sprinkle oil. Eat. Enjoy. Delicious, right?

makes 4 servings
total cost: $2

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Warm Healing Breakfast: Pumpkin Soup

Cold winter days bring wind and snow and sneezing. Lots of it. But I'm not worried -- I have this soup to soothe me on the days I have a sore throat, warm me on the days the icy winds blow and heal me with its immune-boosting Vitamin A, C, beta-carotine and potassium.


Simple Pumpkin Soup Recipe
1/4 of a pumpkin
1 onion
enough water to cover the chopped pumpkin (around 1.5 quarts)
cinnamon, sea salt, pepper to taste

Sautee onions in pan. Peel and cut pumpkin, and throw into a pot with water on high heat. Boil. Add browned onions to the pot with pumpkins and reduce heat to medium. Let it percolate on the stove for 45 minutes or until the pumpkin is falling apart.

Puree the ingredients, add cinnamon or other spices and slurp the sweet deliciousness.

This is a simple recipe of course. You can spice it up, add more vegetables for a more complex flavor or substitute pumpkin with other winter squashes for variety.

Pot of organic pumpkin soup was around $6 and lasted 3 days.

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Michael Phelps -- Won't you share your eggs with me?

Doesn't this egg look like a mushroom? Tasty eggy mushroom.

I dreamt that I was eating breakfast with Michael Phelps.

He was dripping wet. He offered me pancakes with powdered sugar. Spaghetti. Soggy chips. Mashed potatoes with margarine, little slices of trans fats. I kept telling him about the amazing powers of whole foods. And there he was, keeping the eggs to himself. How fair is that? Giving away all the bad stuff and keeping the good for himself.

So, as soon as I woke up, I ran into the lab, hankering for an egg sandwich.

Ingredients
1-2 slices of whole grain bread
1 - 1/2 organic boiled egg
Lettuce (I used curly endive)
Vegenaise
Black Pepper
Laver seaweed

Toast laver on medium heat in a dry pan until it's crunchy. Combine ingredients on top of the slices of bread.

Very tasty. The salty and crunchy laver are a nice balance to the mushy egg and fresh greens.

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Raw Blissful Breakfast: Fruit with Chocolate Pudding

Sugar from the fruit and the fat from the poppy seeds, avocado and chocolate combine to provide steady energy throughout the day.

1/2 avocado
1-2 tbsp of raw chocolate powder
1/2 tsp of honey to sweeten if wanted, but really, the fruit is so sweet, it balances out
Fruit
poppy seeds or ground flax seeds

Chocolate pudding: combine avocado with chocolate. Add honey.

Dip fruit into pudding, and dip into poppy seeds. Salivate. Munch. Enjoy.

Chocolate pudding came out grainy on the first try, but it was still very good.

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Help! I Can't Have any Butter or Cheese. What Do I Eat With My Sandwich?

My mother, a woman who glorifies nutrition and gives unwanted health lectures to my cat and random strangers, has yet to let go of her habitual coffee with a cheese sandwich in the morning. I suspect she has paid for her wanton ways with unstable blood pressure, general crankiness, nervousness and insane arthritis.*

While it's hard to change our habits, especially if we have been doing the same thing for decades, it's easier to ease into it slowly, substituting one thing, and slowly training our tongue to new and exciting flavors.

This is the first post of my most loved, tasty and easy "butter"/"cheese" substitutions, with my mother's reactions as she tries all of them.

Spreading on a sandwich:

1) Avocado
It is smooth and creamy and fatty, just the right consistency as butter. And yes, avocado does pack about 300 calories per fruit, most of which is fat. We do need healthy fats, though, so slather on.

Mom loved it. In fact, she said it was better than cheese. Creamier and had more flavor.

2) Roasted garlic.
Cut the top of the garlic bulb and roast for 15 minutes on 365 deg F. Spread the roasted garlic on bread and add arugula. Enjoy.

"Very tasty but a bit too dry. The consensus was to combine the avocado with roasted garlic, making a sandwich spread."

3) Pesto or Pistou. Pesto is very easy to make. Combine 1 cup of parsley, basil or any other dark green herb with olive oil, garlic and a little bit of pine nuts in the food processor until it is of spreadable consistency. Spread on whole grain bread. Enjoy. Mom did. Not as much as avocado though.

4) Hummus. Look on any shelf in the supermarket. So many varieties! There's no sense in me writing a recipe, when so many good ones exist elsewhere:
http://allrecipes.com/Recipes/Appetizers-and-Snacks/Dips-and-Spreads/Hummus/ViewAll.aspx

5) Crushed beets with garlic
Fiery and almost purple, it's a very bright, healthy spread.

... more to come. I got sick today, so going to go rest now and dream of some more substitutes...

*Read more about how dairy foods affect arthritis here: USA Weekend.com

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New Study: Baby's Sex is Linked to Mom's Breakfast Eating Habits

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