Quinoa Oatmeal

The first time I cooked with quinoa I was shocked that something so tiny, with the consistency of sand and the tendency to find its way into every nook and cranny of the kitchen could be so tasty. It's an interesting little grain well suited in both sweet and savory dishes. For people cutting back on carbs its also a great whole grain substitute for in recipes that call for things like white rice or couscous. And I'd be lying if I didn't mention that half the reason I've been so keen in it lately is that it's really fun to say.

Quinoa has also helped me solve one of my biggest complaints on this diet: boring breakfast. I can only do the whole grain cereal or whole grain bread with low fat yogurt and fruit so many times before I'm tempted to trade meals with the dog. Enter quinoa oatmeal. Fulling and versatile. I make a big batch at the beginning of the week and eat off it whenever I'm in the mood. It's good hot or cold. Sweetened with fruit and agave nectar or salty and crunchy with cashews.

Technically this recipe only works for the maintenance stage of the diet but it would be just as good without the dried fruit, perhaps adding in some other spices to give it a kick instead. I've also started making it with half milk and half water for the liquids as the full milk makes it a little too porridge like for me in the summer. You can do whatever you want to the quinoa to make it suit your tastes but you'll want a little sweetness and some flavor added in or it can be a bit too bitter.

Quinoa Oatmeal

1 cup quinoa
2 cups milk

1/3 cup dried fruit
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 tablespoon agave nectar

Place quinoa in a sieve and rinse well under cold water. Tip the quinoa into a saucepan and add the milk. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat to a simmer for 5 minutes.

Add fruit and cinnamon then simmer for 8-10 or until all liquid is absorbed.

Stir in agave nectar. Serve topped with fruit or cashews and milk.

Grain-Free Lemony Almond Pancakes

All the pictures I took of this lovely breakfast are horrible blurry because I was too busy making yummy noises and doing the happy I love my life dance to take a good picture. These pancakes were out of this world. The impromptu blueberry and agave nectar sauce only made things better. I don't think I stopped fawning over them the entire time I was gobbling them down. The fella is the best one ever for making these lovelies.

The rich crunchy almonds and flax seed contrast nicely with the citrus and they create a great texture. You would never know that they are grain free. Add in a blueberry syrup and this is the breakfast of champions. Even the dog loved her couple bites of them. You can see how stunned she is over getting to eat some of the best pancakes ever.



My only pointers to you are that if you decide to use dairy instead of soy milk that you add it towards the end as you probably won't need to use the full amount called for in the recipe as regular milk is much runnier than soy. We ended up with pancakes that had some structural integrity problems because of this. We also didn't have any bean flour and ended up grinding some oats as a substitute which probably didn't help the batter stay together. They were still outstanding and you can bet we will be making these again, next time I'll invest in some bean flour to see what a difference it makes.

Grain-Free Lemony Almond Pancakes

1/2 cup natural almonds (raw or lightly toasted)
1/4 cup finely ground flax meal

2/3 cup plain or vanilla soymilk (if using regular milk you won't need as much liquid)
1 tablespoon agave nectar
1-1/2 teaspoon extra virgin olive oil
1 teaspoon freshly grated lemon zest
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice

1/3 cup chickpea flour (I used finely ground oats as it was the only comparable thing in my kitchen)
1/4 teaspoon cream of tartar
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/8 teaspoon fine sea salt

In the bowl of a food processor, whir the almonds and flax until you have a very fine meal the texture of coarse cornmeal. There should be no large pieces of almond visible.

Add the milk, agave, oil, lemon zest and lemon juice and whir again. Allow to sit while you prepare the dry ingredients, or at least 2 minutes.

Heat a nonstick frypan over medium heat (I use cast iron). Add the remaining ingredients to the processor and whir just until blended.

Pour a small ice cream scoop or 2-3 tablespoons worth of batter onto hot pan and cook for about 3-4 minutes, until bubbles appear and then pop on the surface of the pancakes and the edges look dry. Gently flip and then cook another 2-3 minutes on other side. Keep cooked pancakes warm while you continue with the rest of the batter. Makes 8-10 small pancakes.

Original recipe from Diet Desserts and Dogs Blog.

Super Simple Blueberry Carrot Salad

To celebrate getting back into the habit of blogging after a whirlwind month that included moving, I am giving you a salad that is both super simple and very delicious. I dare you to not love this salad. It's a healthful easy to make salad for the lettuce phobic or just someone tired of the same old romaine routine. Technically it doesn't even need a recipe just a combination of six ingredients you probably have in your kitchen on a regular basis.

Aside from the amazing minimalism of it this is a beautiful salad. The contrast between the blueberries and carrot in color is reveled only by the juxtaposition of the crunchy and then sweet soft berries. It was outstanding with a lean steak and a microbrewed local beer. This was the perfect meal to christen my kitchen with and I fully plan on preparing many more of the salads from this article in the New York Times. My life needs more simple, light, no fuss dishes and the dwindling days of summer seems like the right time to work my way through 101 salads.

Blueberry and Carrot Salad

2 carrots, ribboned or grated
1 handful fresh blue berries
1/2 handful sunflower seeds
equal parts olive oil and lemon juice
lots of black pepper

Grate or ribbon carrots into a bowl. Toss on blueberries and sunflower seeds.

Whisk oil, lemon juice and pepper together. Pour over carrot mixture. Toss to coat.

From a recipe suggestion by Mark Bittman in the New York Times The Minimalist column.

A Whole Lot of Sauvignon Blanc and Puy Lentil Salad

I'm really blessed to know a lot of great people who love wine almost as much as I do. I few of them even love wine more than I could ever hope to and put me to shame with their knowledge. Once a month for a little over a year now we've been getting together to taste wine and get Wasted. Well we do tend to get tipsy but that's also the name of the group. It's all Lindsay's fault she started it.

This month the fella and I hosted a Sauvignon Blanc tasting, the perfect wine to ring in summer in our backyard. Unfortunately the weather didn't cooperate and we ended up packed into our tiny living room enjoying ourselves immensely until the rain ended. We tried some good and no so good stuff. I'll leave it up to Lindsay to do the hard core reviewing and I'll stick to taking ridiculous pictures of the wine and posting a recipe for the lentil salad that had everyone making yummy noises.

The 2008 Cloudy Bay Sauvignon Blanc from the Marlborough region of New Zealand was the winner of the tasting as far as I was concerned. It was light with just the right amount of citrus and sweetness. At about $22 it is well worth investing in especially if you don't think you like Sauv Blancs this one will prove the varietal has redeeming qualities.

There is this weird thing with Sauv Blancs where in the $15 or under range buying them is a bit of a crap shoot. There are a few good ones like the Riesling-esque $9 a bottle Quarry Hills Sauv Blanc that just came in to the wine store and we can't keep on the shelves for all the people buying it by the case. Aside from getting lucky and finding the rare keeper a lot of them make you wonder if you've accidentally poured yourself a glass of lawn clippings or cat urine (sorry for that image.) And four of our wines that day definitely fit in the overly green and grassy category.

I chose the 2008 Vicar's Choice Sauvignon Blanc once again from the Marlborough region of New Zealand and the 2008 Kim Crawford Sauvignon Blanc from the same region. Both grass monsters. The Vicar's Choice Reserve Sauv Blanc is actually complex and has a slightly sweet grapefruit kick, I should have spent the extra couple of bucks and got that. The Kim Crawford was just disappointing, it's been so good in past years and tasted like the lawn this time around.

The 2008 Starborough Sauv Blanc from the Marlborough region was the best of the grassy wines since it wasn't over poweringly green but still not something I would buy. The 2008 Beau Joubert Oak Lake Chenin Blanc/Sauvignon Blanc blend from Stellenbosch South Africa was interesting but also packed too much green-ness to really fall in love with. I was just glad to have a South African wine that had none of the artificial banana flavor that so many of the whites in that area seem to be ruined by.

In the midst of the young Sauv Blancs that were making us all feel like we were chewing on field of clovers there were a couple really nice bottles that shook things up and surprised us all. The 2008 Boogle Vineyards Sauv Blanc from Clarksburg California was a delight. It was a bit sweet and light, something I would find and buy. The 2007 Luna Vineyards Freakout White Blend from Napa Valley was just a good departure from all the New Zealand wines and gave us a chance to rest our palates on something super easy to drink.

And then sadly there were the two wines that just didn't quite work out in the scheme of things. I'm almost positive the bottle of 2006 Ceago Sauv Blanc from Clear Lake California was a bad bottle. Supposedly it doesn't happen much in screw tops but I've heard really good things from customers and my wine genius boss about this wine. I refuse to believe all these people are drinking vinegar and enjoying it so I will give this one another try and get back to you.

The 2007 Domaine Sauvete Sauvignon de Touraine Oneiros from the Loire Valley might just have been too different from everything else to be enjoyable. We probably should have drank it first with clear palates because it was very French and very typical of the traditional Sauv Blanc with a heavy cat pee nose. It wasn't my favorite but I can see someone who enjoys French whites really getting into it.

Blah, blah, blah. Wine, wine, wine. I know you all just came for the lentil salad so here it goes.

Nigella is amazing and I want to cook everything from her book Forever Summer and am very happy I started out with this lentil and goat cheese divinity. It's simple and oh so delicious. Just make sure to use the Puy lentils as they have the structure to hold up to this salad. My other advise is to use the oil from sun dried tomatoes for the olive oil in the recipe, it added an extra layer of yummy go the recipe and it made sure that oil didn't go to waste which I always feel guilty about. Now I will always know what to do with it.

The hard part is resisting the urge to eat all the marinated goat cheese before you serve this. Not that it would be too much of an issue considering this recipe makes enough to serve a hungry houseful of winos and have enough left over for three people to eat for lunch. It is the gift that keeps giving.

As you can see the fella was a big fan. Or maybe it was just the wine. Who knows.

Puy Lentil and Goat Cheese Salad

1 10-ounce log goat's cheese
1 lemon, zested and juiced
4 tablespoon olive oil
1 teaspoon dried mint (I omitted this)

3 cups Puy lentils
1 onion, quartered
4 cloves garlic, crushed
1 tablespoon chili oil

4 tablespoons olive oil
12 ounces jarred sweet peppers in oil
bunch fresh mint, chopped (also omitted this)

Crumble the goat's cheese and marinate in half the juice and zest of the lemon, 4 tablespoons olive oil (I used excess oil from a jar of sun dried tomato) and dried mint. Seal in a container and reserve until just before serving.

Put lentils in a large saucepan of water and add onion, garlic cloves and chili oil. Cook for about 25 minutes or until tender then drain. Keep an eye on the lentils so they don't get too soft and don't think of substituting the Puys for another lentil with less character and structural integrity.

Pour 4 tablespoons of olive oil over the warm lentils in a large serving bowl. Season with salt and pepper, then add the remaining half of the lemon juice and zest. Drain the sweet peppers, chop them coarsely and mix them into the lentils. Mix with your hands or very carefully with a wooden spoon making sure not the crush and mangle the lentils.

When the lentils have reached room temperature add the marinated goat's cheese and sprinkle over them with the fresh chopped mint and serve immediately.

Original recipe from Nigella Lawson's Forever Summer cookbook.

I Heart Cline

There are some benefits to writing a food blog. You have an excuse to collect all your favorite recipes somewhere that you go back and find easily and cook from again and again (the fella keeps laughing at me every time he finds me cooking off my own blog.) People share their favorite recipes with you. Your significant other won't argue as much when you keep asking him to do ridiculous amounts of dishes. And sometimes your favorite winery sends you wine in the mail.

I wrote about how much I love the Cline Mourvedre a couple months ago and had a holy-crap-people-other-than-my-mom-read-this-thing moment when Cline contacted me to say how much they liked my quote about them. Their thank you was to send me a couple bottles of their wine, the Cashmere blend and a bottle of Mourvedre. To which I have to say a huge thank you back to them because their wine is freaking fantastic but I think we all know wine that comes to your door on a Friday afternoon is somehow just a little bit better.

The fella and I opened the Cashmere right that second (well after I stopped jumping up and down and cooing over it.) I've kept meaning to buy a bottle as I remember loving it in years past but never got around to it. My memories of past vintages are so fond however that I suggest the Cashmere to a lot of people who come into the wine store looking for a nice un-scary red for under $15. So I was excited to try the 2007.

It's delicious. Seeing as its a blend of Mouredre, Syrah, and Grenache its a pleasant surprise that the wine tastes like the best aspects of each varietal. The fruity complexity of Mourvedre, the huge chocolatey tannins of Syrah, and the interesting spice of Grenache. It very much lives up to it's name as it somehow combines these huge powerful grapes and makes a very smooth drinkable wine. I'll be buying another bottle soon.

The Mourvedre I'm saving for the next evening I come home after a long day and need something I can count on to make my mouth very happy. And speaking of things that are happy making I will leave you with a picture of the fella smelling flowers at Cline during our trip there last year. And since I'm not leaving you with a recipe let me at least share with you yet another reason I don't respect Gary V's taste in wine though he is a fascinating character. Here is what he has to say about Cline. To which I can only say bah! He needs to spend more time drinking and less time wasting all that wine in the dump bucket.

I can't believe him. "It reminds me of a diner...a little too candy, candy, candyland..." say what? More Cline for me I guess, you can have the snobby wines Gary.