Easy Chocolate Pudding (Sugar Free) – Made With Sweet Potatoes

May 31, 2019July 5, 2019Leave a comment

This is my super easy recipe for chocolate pudding! Eating this reminds me of eating those chocolate pudding cups when I was a kid. I like to make a big batch of this and stash it in the fridge for a quick snack and it keeps for about 5 days in fridge.

This pudding is lovely and thick, and has a rich and decadent chocolate flavor but no added sweeteners. The pudding still tastes sweet (it gets is sweetness from the milk, coconut oil and sweet potatoes) and it’s a nice treat for days when you want to eat something that tastes delicious but also helps you get in an extra serving of vegetables.

You can make it with any kind of milk that you like (the milk that I use for this recipe is the organic lactose free 2% milk from Costco which tastes very sweet without any added sugar, but you can use coconut milk for a vegan version). Feel free to play around with the flavors of this pudding. You can add a bit of peppermint extract for a mint chocolate pudding, or swap out some of the milk with a little coffee for a slightly deeper chocolate flavor.

I like to freeze 1 cup portions of this and then let it thaw on the counter for about 30 minutes so the pudding sort of becomes this fudgesicle / chocolate ice cream-like frozen treat. In luscious pudding form or frozen, this treat is great when eaten with fresh strawberries.

You can also add about a 1/2 cup less milk and blend it in batches in a food processor for a more chocolate mousse-like texture.

Easy Chocolate Pudding

Makes 6-8 generous servings

Ingredients

28 oz cooked sweet potato – (3 medium sweet potatoes, or about 4 cups diced)

1.5 oz unsweetened baking chocolate

2/3 cup coconut oil

2 cups milk of choice

small pinch of salt

Instructions

1. Peel your sweet potatoes and cut them into 3/4 inch cubes. Steam them for about 30 minutes until they are soft and easily pierced with a fork. Allow to cool to room temp, measure out 4 cups of sweet potatoes and transfer to a blender.

2. Pour the milk into the blender and add the salt. Melt the coconut oil and chocolate over medium low heat stirring frequently (this took about 5 minutes for me). Pour the chocolate and coconut oil mixture into the blender and blend until smooth, stopping the blender occasionally to scrape down the sides and give it all a good mix with a spatula.

3. Pour the pudding mixture into a airtight container and refrigerate overnight until thickened.

4. Spoon into bowls and enjoy!

Thanksgiving Chicken

November 22, 2018Leave a comment

I love Thanksgiving! It’s one of my favorite holidays of the year.

Friends, family, good food. What’s not to love?

One funny thing about Thanksgiving in my family is that I’m the only one that really loves turkey. Everyone else prefers chicken.

But that actually works out ok (even on Thanksgiving)! Most of the turkeys at the local supermarket are really big 20 lb birds, which is way too much turkey for our family to finish, so a 4-5 lb chicken is the perfect size for us. With all the side dishes and desserts (cornbread dressing, mashed potatoes, pumpkin tarts, apple tarts, and pecan tarts), everyone ends up very happy and full by the end of Thanksgiving dinner.

Also, those turkeys are expensive. Even if you buy a conventionally raised turkey, a 20 lb turkey is going to be about $50. This chicken was $8, and it was free-range and organic to boot.

How did I get a free-range organic chicken for $8? I just bought it on the sell by date and it was marked 50% off.

The grocery store also sold a little packet of mixed fresh herbs (thyme, sage, and rosemary) for $2.50, that plus an onion and some frozen celery (that I had stashed in the freezer from about a month ago) meant that this beautiful roast chicken added up to about $11-$12 for 4-6 servings. Much more affordable than $50.

And if you’re far from home this Thanksgiving, and you’re making dinner for two, you can make this chicken and have some great leftovers to pack for lunch.

Some great things about this recipe are that it still has all those rich flavors that we associate with a Thanksgiving turkey, AND you don’t even need to make a gravy! You can spoon the rich pan juices from this chicken over mashed potatoes and cornbread dressing to your heart’s content. It will be just as delicious as any gravy, (with less work) promise.

Sprigs of rosemary and thyme flavor the chicken from the inside out, and I tuck sage leaves under the skin for some color and extra flavor. The most delicious parts of that chicken are right under those leaves, so make sure to get some chicken with a sage leaf or two!

Thanksgiving Chicken

Makes 4-6 delicious servings

Ingredients

4 lb chicken

1/2 an onion (cut into 4 wedges)

2 sprigs of thyme

2 4 inch sprigs of rosemary

8 inch stalk of celery (cut into 1/2 inch slices)

2 1/2 tbsp olive oil

9-10 fresh sage leaves

sea salt

black pepper

1 cup of water

Instructions

1. Preheat the oven to 425 degrees F.

2. Wash your herbs, measure out the olive oil and water, and cut up your onion and celery and set all of this aside onto a separate plate along with some salt and pepper and a few toothpicks.

3. Whether or not your wash your chicken is completely up to you. There’s some controversy about if you should do it or not.

Personally, I do wash chicken before cooking it. I fill a big bowl of water in the sink and submerge the chicken, then pour out the water (this way the water doesn’t splash off the chicken). I do this a few times until the water runs clear. The chicken then goes into your roasting dish (I’m using a 12 inch oval CorningWare casserole dish) and the big bowl goes straight into the dishwasher.

Once the chicken goes into the oven, I sanitize the sink and any surfaces that the raw chicken may have touched.

4. Dry the chicken off with a paper towel. Put the onion wedges, thyme, rosemary, and celery inside the chicken and tie the legs together with some kitchen twine.

Gently separate the chicken skin from the chicken breast and tuck the sage leaves around under the skin. If the skin tears, don’t worry about it. The chicken will still be golden brown and amazing! Just use a few toothpicks to arrange the chicken skin back into place.

Rub the skin with olive oil, sprinkle over salt and pepper, and tuck in the wingtips using a few toothpicks to hold them in place while the chicken is roasting.

Pour the water into the bottom of the baking dish.

5. Roast the chicken for 50 min – 1 hr 15 minutes, or until the chicken is golden brown and a thermometer measures 165F in the thickest part of the thigh.

Look at that crispy skin! Yum.

Let the chicken rest 10-20 minutes before carving. Pull out the toothpicks and serve the chicken with the delicious pan juices.

Ta-da! You just made a glorious roast chicken for Thanksgiving!

One more thing – this chicken still has a little magic left.

After dinner, pull the meat off the bones stash it in the fridge for later. Put the carcass with all the herbs and vegetables still inside of it into a slow cooker with a splash of apple cider vinegar and fill the pot with water (I cut off the kitchen twine before I put the bones into the slow cooker but I’m not sure if it’s really necessary). Turn the heat to low and cook for 24-48 hours.

Strain out the solids, and you will be left with an incredible and flavorful bone broth!

Add in some of your leftover chicken along with some vegetables and you will have a beautiful soup to warm you up on a cold day.

Wishing you and your family a very Happy Thanksgiving!

Elaine

A Trip to the Farmers Market

September 30, 2018April 17, 2019Leave a comment

It’s Fall!

My favorite season of the year.

It’s time to wear cozy socks, cuddle up with a book by the fire and drink / eat pumpkin spice flavored things with joy!

I love seeing all the autumn leaves turn color and am very much looking forward to Halloween and Thanksgiving (of course my favorite holidays are always food related…).

Recently, I discovered a local farmers market nearby and I didn’t know what I was missing until I went there. My weekly trips there are something that I look forward to on the weekends.

I’ve almost always shopped at grocery stores before, and it is so neat to be able to see all the different kinds of food that are produced in my local area. There are shelves with local honey, dried herbs, lots of different vegetables (I saw a purple bell pepper for the first time here a few weeks ago), and locally produced beef and lamb as well.

I buy fresh eggs often here. They come in a beautiful array of colors, from white, to brown, to pastel blue. The fresh eggs also taste so good, and the hens that produce them are free ranged.

These beautiful carrots were $1.99 / lb, which is more expensive than the $1.29 / lb at the local grocery store, but these were locally grown. I also usually buy kale and lettuce here as well, and they are usually about 50 cents more per bunch. For not very much more, it seems really exciting to be able to support local farmers in my area.

I love seeing all the different kinds of squash that they had at the farmers market. A lady came by with a cart piled high with all kinds of them which she mentioned that she was going to use for decoration.

I can see why, all of them look interesting. These beauties are Cinderella Pumpkins. So cool! I’ve never seen these kinds of pumpkins before.

It was also super cute to see parents taking pictures of their toddlers holding little pumpkins. What a sweet memory.

They also sell lovely herbs (both dried and live plants) there. Here are a variety of mints!

Two squash that kind of look like spaceships…

And more varieties of squash!

Do you have farmers markets where you are? What’s you’re favorite thing to buy there?

Elaine

How to “Hard boil” Eggs in a Rice Cooker (Super Easy)

August 19, 2018April 17, 20195 Comments

Hardboiled eggs are one of those things that are great to have stashed away in the fridge. They are perfect high protein snacks (they even have a built in wrapper!) and make a great breakfast on the go as well.

The not so nice part of hard-boiled eggs? The sitting / waiting for a large pot of water to boil.

As it turns out, cooking them in a rice cooker is much easier and faster too!

I first got the idea to do this when I saw an awesome post on the Digging Food blog about how to steam fresh eggs. I had no idea that you could steam eggs before I read their post.

After a little experimentation, I figured out how to make perfect “Hard-boiled” eggs in a rice cooker.

Let me walk you through how to make them…

Step 1 – Place your desired number of eggs in a heat safe bowl (ceramic or metal is fine).

I use a Tatung 10-Cup Multifunctional Cooker (the most useful piece of cooking equipment known to man). It’s a great rice cooker / steamer, and when I was in college (and living in small dorm room) I managed to make 60 tamales from scratch in one.

Step 2 – Add water. I pour about 1/2 cup of water in the bottom of the cooker before adding a rack that looks like this (you can buy it pretty inexpensively in a larger Asian grocery store like 99 Ranch).

Step 3 – Put the bowl on the rack (this ensures that your food won’t scorch on the bottom of your bowl).

Step 4 – Cover the rice cooker with the lid and turn the rice cooker on, then set your timer.

My rice cooker takes about 5 minutes until I start to see steam come out the sides of the lid. Your rice cooker make take more or less time to heat up, and it may take a little trial and error before you figure out the right amount of time to cook the eggs to your liking.

For my rice cooker (from the time you turn the rice cooker on to when you turn it off):

Soft Boiled – takes 13 minutes

“7 Minute Egg” (Like the one pictured) – takes 14 minutes

Hard-boiled – takes 20 minutes

Step 5 – Turn the rice cooker off.

Put on an oven mitt and transfer the eggs into an ice bath using tongs.

****Please be careful not to burn yourself **** The steam is pretty hot and you can use the lid of the pot to fan the steam away from you before you take the eggs out of the rice cooker.

Step 6 – Leave the eggs to rest in the ice bath for at least 30 minutes.

After this, the eggs should be pretty easy to peel. I like the keep them in the fridge unpeeled (I just like the ritual of peeling them right before I eat them) or you can peel the eggs and keep them in an airtight container in the fridge.

The most I’ve done at once is 4 eggs in one batch, and the cooking time doesn’t change if you cook 1-2 eggs or 4 at the same time.

Update – Jan 14, 2018 – I’ve found that it does make a difference what bowl you use to cook the eggs in. You want a sort of normal serving bowl and not something that’s super deep with high sides so that the steam can surround the eggs better. My preference these days is to cook 6 eggs at a time for 18 minutes (perfectly hard boiled , dunk them into ice water and then keep them in fridge for breakfast / snacking.

I hope that this helps make your breakfast / snacking / meal prep a little easier!

How do you like your eggs for breakfast?

– Elaine

Iced Watermelon Cubes – A Healthy Ice Cream Alternative

July 15, 2018April 17, 2019Leave a comment

If you’re living through a heat wave at the moment what you probably want most in the world is something sweet, cold, and refreshing to eat.

Here is the simplest of desserts to keep on hand for a hot day. These little cubes of frozen watermelon are delicious and perfect for popping into your mouth (straight from the freezer) to cool you down.

Refined sugar free, dairy free, paleo, and all that jazz… but what’s really important is that they taste so good!

Iced Watermelon Cubes

Makes lots and lots of servings

Ingredients

1 sweet seedless watermelon (pick the sweetest one you can find)

That’s it! 😀

Instructions

1. Cut the watermelon into 3/4 inch cubes (this is a perfect size as they can be eaten straight from the freezer and they thaw quickly too).

2. Freeze the cubes flat in ziptop bags.

To serve, scoop about 1 – 1.5 cups (or however much you want) of the frozen watermelon cubes into a bowl and eat with a spoon.

Ta-Da! I hope that these little cubes of watermelon joy make your summer days a little more awesome. 🙂

Easy Weeknight Cumin Lamb Lettuce Cups

July 8, 2018April 17, 20196 Comments

These easy cumin lettuce cups are super delicious and budget friendly.

I used lamb and garlic that I had frozen previously. Adding those ingredients to a few spices, a carrot, along with some diced tomato and romaine leaves makes for a quick and healthy meal, perfect for a busy weeknight dinner.

Easy Weeknight Cumin Lettuce Cups

Makes 1 serving

Ingredients

1 tbsp olive oil

3-4 cloves of garlic, finely chopped (I used frozen garlic that I had, but fresh works great too)

1/2 cup cooked ground lamb *

1/3 cup finely diced carrot (about 1 small carrot)

4 tbsp water

1/2 tsp granulated onion

1/4 tsp ground cumin

pinch of salt and pepper (add more to taste)

romaine lettuce leaves and diced tomato (for serving)

Notes – * The lamb that I used was frozen solid in a 1/2 cup portion. I added that to the pan without defrosting it (it defrosted in the pan while the other ingredients were cooking).

If you use cooked lamb that is defrosted, you may have to adjust your cooking time slightly (and probably add a little more water so that the carrots have a little more time to cook through).

Instructions

1. Add the lamb, spices, olive oil, garlic, carrots and water to a medium sauce pan and cook the mixture over medium heat for about 7 minutes until the water has cooked off.

2. Turn the heat to medium high and sauté the mixture for another 3 minutes or so until the meat has browned and the carrots can be pierced with a fork without resistance.

3. Allow the mixture to cool for a few minutes, add more salt and pepper to taste and serve on romaine lettuce leaves and top with diced tomato.

Happy Eating!

How I Save Money On Grass Fed Meat (Without Coupons!)

July 1, 2018April 17, 2019Leave a comment

I stumbled upon this money saving tip this past Father’s Day.

I was at my local grocery store early in the morning and on a whim decided to check out the meat section. It was a nice surprise to see that they had started carrying grass fed lamb (it used to be that in my area only Whole Foods carried grass fed lamb).

The grass fed lamb ribs were pretty expensive though, about $15 / lb and I wasn’t quite in the mood to spend that much. So I kept browsing and saw that they also had grass fed ground lamb.

Then I looked at the price – $6.99 / lb. Eh, not cheap but not too terrible either.

Then I saw the 50% off stickers.

Huh?

Grass fed lamb for $3.50 / lb? That is a great deal!

As it turns out, the sell by date was June 17th (which was the same day as Father’s Day this year) and that’s why the ground lamb was 50% off. That was the last day that they could sell the lamb before they took it off the shelves.

One of my family members told me later that grocery stores also do the same thing with dairy products (they discount them on the sell by date).

The sell by date is not the same as the expiration date. There’s more info on this here.

Obviously, if you’re going to buy meat on the sell by date, you do that at your own risk (’cause no one can completely guarantee the safety of raw meat).

Personally though, I looked for packages where the plastic wrap wasn’t puffy and the meat still smelled ok.

I wouldn’t use this meat for anything like a rare burger, and I would make sure to cook it thoroughly.

I ended up buying 4 lbs of grass fed meat for about $14. The ground lamb was packaged in those vacuum packed blocks and looked just as good as the ground beef that was packaged the same way (but was a week or two away from the sell by date).

So I took it all home, cooked it off in a big pot, drained off the excess fat and spooned the cooked lamb into muffin pans and froze it. I then transferred the blocks of ground lamb into ziptop bags.

The little individual portions of frozen lamb are really convenient and make life a lot easier as they defrost quickly and you can add them to anything for a quick dinner.

So far, I’ve tossed these little blocks of ground lamb into pasta sauce and paleo chili, used them to make Cumin Lamb Lettuce Cups, and made them into a soup with leftover greens and vegetables that I had in my fridge.

Altogether I got 24 half cup servings of ground lamb for $14, which works out to $0.58 per serving. This amount of meat will last me about 2 months (I tend not to eat meat every day).

If I were to do this again – (which I definitely will – saving money is pretty awesome!)

– I would go to my local grocery store and make a note of the sell by dates of the meat was I interested in buying. (This is pretty easy to do during my weekly shopping trip.)

– I would either go to the grocery store the night before the sell by date (sometimes grocery stores will put the discount stickers on the meat the night before) or early in the morning the day of (like before 8:30 am).

– I would cook the meat off that day and freeze it.

I hope that this tip helps to save you some money too!

2 Ingredient Pear Sorbet (No Churn) – Paleo, Vegan, Refined Sugar Free

June 24, 2018April 17, 20196 Comments

This pear sorbet is so simple to make and it tastes amazing! It’s flavor is light and sweet and makes the humble pear really shine.

When I first tasted it I couldn’t believe how good it was, and it was only 2 ingredients!

It’s smooth and creamy, and the perfect thing to make when you have ripe pears that you’re not quite sure what to do with. Even if they are a little bruised, that’s ok! They will still work great in this recipe.

2 Ingredient Pear Sorbet

Makes 2 servings (2 scoops each, or a generous serving for one)

Ingredients

2 ripe Bartlett pears (also known as William’s pears)

1/4 cup apple juice (I used the Martinelli’s brand apple juice as it’s naturally very sweet)

Instructions

1. Peel and core the pears. Cut them into 3/4 inch cubes (if they vary in size a little that’s ok) and freeze them in a single layer in a ziploc bag or an airtight container.

My two pears (after being peeled, cubed, and frozen) measured 2 2/3 cups.

2. When you’re ready to make your sorbet, take the frozen pears out of the fridge and let them thaw for 10-15 minutes.

Break up any big clumps of pear cubes up with your hands and add the pears to a food processor along with the apple juice and process until smooth, stopping occasionally to scrape down the sides.

If you’re having a hard time getting the sorbet completely smooth, you may have to process half the mixture at a time. I have a smaller food processor and had to process the sorbet in two batches, but it came together beautifully.

3. Spoon into bowls and serve immediately.

Happy Eating!

Glorious Orange Berry Blitz-ish Smoothie (Mango, Pineapple, Blueberry) – Vegan, Paleo

June 10, 2018April 17, 20195 Comments

When I was a youngin,’ I once went to a summer camp. The camp was located on a college campus and close by was a Jamba Juice. So most days (during the few weeks we were there), I and some of the other students would go to Jamba Juice for smoothies and a scone for breakfast.

My favorite smoothie was the (now discontinued) Orange Berry Blitz. I loved how the orange juice gave the blueberries and pineapple smoothie a wonderful brightness.

It’s funny how food and flavors can sometimes take you back, and suddenly, there you are again, cocooned in a marvelous memory.

I smile now just thinking of how happy I was that summer, and and this berry smoothie is still the perfect thing to drink on a nice summer day.

This is my version of that glorious smoothie. I added mango because I think that it gives the smoothie a little more of a tropical flavor (and an extra little bit of sweetness as well).

Feel free to play around with the ingredients. Sometimes I replace the apple juice with water, or add in a few handfuls of baby spinach (if I want to get my greens in for the day without having to give it too much thought).

Make the smoothie that you want to drink (though I will say that this smoothie is pretty awesome as written) and have fun!

Glorious Orange Berry Blitz-ish Smoothie

Makes 1 generous serving

Ingredients

3/4 cup ripe mango (cut into roughly 1 inch cubes, about 1 mango)

3/4 cup fresh pineapple chunks (cut into about 1.5 inch wedges, canned pineapple works too)

1 1/4 cup frozen blueberries

1/2 cup apple juice (I used the Martinelli’s brand)

2-3 tbsp orange juice

Instructions

1. Add all ingredients into a blender and blend until smooth. Serve immediately.

This is what the plate of fruit looked like after I added the fruit into the blender. I think that it’s quite beautiful in a wabi-sabi kind of way.

I hope that you have many happy summer days drinking smoothies with your loved ones.

Enjoy!

Oven Baked Garlic Paprika Sweet Potato Fries – Paleo, Vegan

June 3, 2018April 17, 20196 Comments

These garlicky paprika sweet potato fries make a glorious side dish when you’re craving carbs, and are my go to snack when I’m craving junk food but want to eat something a little healthier.

Sweet potatoes are a great source of vitamin A, magnesium, and potassium (which is great) but what really matters is that these sweet potato fries are really satisfying.

I love dipping them into creamy avocado mayo (sometimes with a bit of finely minced garlic mixed in) and they are also good with honey mustard.

Next time your craving junk food, give these sweet potato fries a try. If you’re anything like me, you find that you’ve eaten them all before you know it.

Oven Baked Garlic Paprika Sweet Potato Fries

Makes 2-3 servings

Ingredients

3 small sweet potatoes (the ones I used were 2 inches in diameter and 8 inches in length)

2 tbsp neutral flavored oil (I used avocado oil)

1 1/4 tsp granulated garlic

1/4 tsp + 1/8 tsp granulated onion

1/4 tsp paprika

1/4 tsp dried thyme (optional)

1/8 tsp black pepper

1/4 tsp sea salt

Instructions

1. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.

2. Give the sweet potatoes a good scrub and cut each sweet potato into 8 wedges. Place the sweet potatoes into a large glass baking dish with the oil and toss gently.

2. Stir together the salt, pepper and other spices. Sprinkle the spice mixture over the sweet potatoes and give it all a good mix so that the fries are well coated.

4. Arrange the sweet potatoes onto the baking dish so that they are in a single layer.

My baking dish was a little too small to fit all of the fries. So for this amount of sweet potatoes I used a 3 qt (9 in. x 13 in.) glass pyrex baking dish and a 9 in. pie plate.

5. Bake for 35 – 40 minutes until crispy and golden brown around the edges.

Happy Eating!

Hope and Butterflies

Category: Recipes

Easy Chocolate Pudding (Sugar Free) – Made With Sweet Potatoes

Thanksgiving Chicken

A Trip to the Farmers Market

How to “Hard boil” Eggs in a Rice Cooker (Super Easy)

Iced Watermelon Cubes – A Healthy Ice Cream Alternative

Easy Weeknight Cumin Lamb Lettuce Cups

How I Save Money On Grass Fed Meat (Without Coupons!)

2 Ingredient Pear Sorbet (No Churn) – Paleo, Vegan, Refined Sugar Free

Glorious Orange Berry Blitz-ish Smoothie (Mango, Pineapple, Blueberry) – Vegan, Paleo

Oven Baked Garlic Paprika Sweet Potato Fries – Paleo, Vegan