Black Bean Cupcakes (??)

Ever since my friend Elizabeth sent some of these over for dessert a few months ago, I've been making them over and over again, trying to get a sugar-free version of this already gluten-free treat. They were SO delicious, like seriously delicious - not in a "oh-they're-pretty-good-for-a-GF-dessert" kind of way. Moist and chocolatey. Guilt-free, kind of. Hooked.

Here's my version of the recipe that my friend used:

Chocolate cupcakes

Mix the following in a really good blender (Nutri-bullet) for about 2 full minutes:
1 can of black beans, drained and rinsed
4 eggs
1 T vanilla
5 T butter, softened
3/4 c. coconut sugar

Once blended, blend in for about 30 seconds:
5 T Special Dark cocoa powder
1 t. baking powder
1/2 t. baking soda

Pour into cupcake liners; bake at 350 for 20-25 minutes.
____________________________________________________________________________
Topping/Frosting options:

Did you know you can make powdered 'sugar' from coconut sugar? Use that handy-dandy Nutri-bullet again to blend coconut sugar and a little arrowroot powder to create a powdery sugar that is great for frostings.

PB Frosting
1 c creamy peanut butter, sugar free (everything but peanuts free, actually)
5 T butter, softened
2 c powdered coconut sugar
1/2-3/4 c heavy cream,

Beat PB, butter and sugar. Add in cream and beat til fluffy. Amazing.






Berry sauce (I use this on ice-cream, cheesecake, pound cake and now these chocolate cupcakes!)
Place a bag of frozen berry mix into a saucepan. Heat til thawed, adding a little water if necessary. Smash a bunch of the whole berries as they cook. Add a little cornstarch or arrowroot powder mixed with cold water to thicken, and add a spoonful of coconut sugar if it's too tart for you.

Waiting for Peach Cake

You know me, I appreciate a good recipe when I see one. If I find something new and intriguing, it will have to meet several criteria to make it into my favorites box where I will work it into my repertoire:

• manageable, reasonable instructions
• easily obtained ingredients
• crowd favorite
• doesn't create a disaster in my kitchen

I have also found that some foods feel right in summer, while others feel right in cold weather. I never want to eat salad in the winter. Soup in August is out of the question. 

Summer = watermelon, ribs, salads, peaches, blueberries, tomatoes, anything grilled

Winter = soup, stew, warm bread, roasts, casseroles (We visited Krakow, Poland a few times and were once served bread with a crock full of lard as an appetizer. I guess they understand the concept of fattening oneself up before a bitterly cold winter.)

I've always wanted to be great at ribs. Pork ribs. The rack you find in the meat department that is just begging for an audience of hungry men. I knew there was some mystery about slow cooking, but I was unsure of myself, and unwilling to make the investment. But then one day, I had an email pop up from Smitten Kitchen (one of my favorites) with the perfect directions. I tried it, and they were amazing. The hungry men in my life were full and happy and there were even leftovers. I discovered the secret to a great brisket when I lived in TX as a newlywed, and the plentiful meat from a slab of beef like that is also a big crowd-pleaser. Summer meats. Summer yummy. Ribs will definitely find their way into my recipe box!

Another summer treat is peaches. It almost seems sinful to do anything with a perfectly ripe peach other than just eat it in its natural form. But I have super-fond memories of being in the kitchen with my Grandma on a hot summer afternoon, peeling peaches for her Peach Cake. It wasn't really a cake; more of a flatbread with peaches on top. But we called it cake and we only got this treat once in a great while, and definitely only in summer. Now that I'm a grownup with broader culinary experience, I know that what she made is probably more like a danish that can be obtained from a bakery, but I want to remember it fondly like it is in my memory - a sweet summer treat that we rarely got to enjoy. 

Millie's Peach Cake

Peel 4 lbs. of ripe peaches and dice into a bowl. Sprinkle 1/3 c. sugar on top and let sit for an hour. 

Meanwhile, prepare a sweet bread dough (I always use this recipe from my old Better Homes and Gardens cookbook) and let it rise through the first rising. After it rises for one hour, divide in half and press each half onto a large, greased jelly-roll pan or large cookie sheet. It should be quite thin. Poke with a fork all over. Drain peaches and reserve the juice. Spread peaches over dough. 

Make a syrup with the peach juice. Add 1 T cornstarch, 1 t. cinnamon and 1/2 c. sugar to 1 c. water and combine with peach juice in a sauce pan. Cook down on medium heat, whisking constantly to form a thickened syrup. Pour over peaches. Sprinkle edges of dough with cinnamon sugar. 

Bake at 350 for 20 minutes. Serve warm. 

Here's a little commentary on delayed gratification, like waiting for those rare moments in summer when my grandmother made a Peach Cake. For those of you over about 35, remember waiting for those favorite Disney movies to come on TV only once per year? Remember when we waited for Christmas time to watch The Sound of Music? Or until Halloween when It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown came on? I can remember seeing the announcement for Swiss Family Robinson, marking it on the calendar and making it a family event to watch it when it came on TV. Such a treat. I feel nostalgic and sad when I think about that, because my grandchildren will never know what it is like to wait weeks or months in anticipation of a favorite movie. It seems everything is 'on-demand' and we don't usually have to wait for anything. Maybe part of being an excellent homemaker is to create such anticipation for special things. Save turkey for Thanksgiving and the gingerbread house for Christmas. Only serve a really good smoked ham with scalloped potatoes for Easter dinner (and for Pete's sake - have an Easter dinner!). Save cake for birthdays. Make pancakes only on Saturday mornings and pizza on Friday nights. 

We recently hosted an outdoor movie for our neighbors and we watched...yep, Swiss Family Robinson, one of my childhood favorites. Here are some pictures from that night! So much fun!

Breakfast in Bed

I love making breakfast for my loved ones. Whenever my kids had a birthday, I always let them choose their favorites for breakfast and dinner. And sometimes, they got it served on a tray! My college girl loves to be babied. Since she is the youngest, she flows in this role well; it comes naturally to her, and since I'm such a mother hen, I love doing it for her. So, when she is home, even if it's not her birthday, I sometimes make her breakfast in bed. This morning is her last morning home before she heads back to school, so I thought it was an appropriate morning for some princess treatment. 

I had this idea in my head to make french toast, but I had some perfectly ripe peaches and was trying to think how I could make a protein rich peach french toast combo...and I came up with a baked french toast casserole with peaches and blueberries. Add some OJ, fresh fruit and a little daisy on a silver tray, and even Snow White would be impressed. 

Peach and Blueberry French Toast Casserole

5 eggs

2 cups milk

1 t. vanilla (although I use 1/4 t. of my favorite super-concentrated Haitian vanilla)

1 t. cinnamon

1/4 t. salt

12 slices high protein bread (I used Sprouted Wheat Whole Grain), crusts removed

2 ripe peaches

1 c fresh blueberries

4 T butter

sprinkling of cinnamon sugar

Dice the bread and place in a buttered casserole dish with peeled/diced peaches and blueberries. Mix eggs, milk, vanilla, cinnamon and salt together. Pour over bread/fruit mixture. Mix well to be sure bread has absorbed liquid. Melt butter; drizzle over all and sprinkle with cinnamon sugar. Bake at 350 for 25-30 minutes. 

                   

I'm glad Jessie appreciates things like this. I'm up way to early for anyone to be able to do this for me, but I love doing it for others. Though I will say, I do love me some cappuccino in bed...hint, hint to any family members out there reading. :)

Dutch Oven Bread

Ever feel late to the party? I've been married, with a fairly well-stocked kitchen for over 27 years. I've raised 4 kids, fed lots of their hungry friends, hosted Thanksgiving for as many as 50, and had gobs of parties. But I've never owned a real enamel-covered cast iron Dutch oven. Until about 2 months ago.

My daughter Abby got one for an early wedding present back in the spring, and started talking it up. I knew that if I was ever going to master the art of French cooking and make Julia Child's Beef Bourguignon, I'd have to own one, but I never expected to cut my grocery bill practically in half because of it!


I buy a LOT of crusty Italian bread, and at $4 a loaf, it's hard to watch it get consumed so rapidly after exiting the grocery bag. So when Abbs told me that I can make a perfect country loaf in my new Dutch oven for pennies, I was pretty - as she likes to say - stoked (where did that expression come from anyway...I think I've always thought it was a reference to smoking pot...is it???). Why did I wait so long to get my hands of one of these hefty little gems? Why didn't anyone tell me about its miracle little steam oven capabilities?

I had a recipe from a Cucina Italiana magazine once for making that bread...you know, the kind with crust so sharp it cuts your gums, but the inside is soft and chewy, and makes those sore gums worth it. But that method required all kinds of pseudo-masochistic techniques like opening a 500 degree oven and spraying it with water occasionally! And lots of risings, and kneading...what a pain. People would have given up on making bread generations ago if it was always this complicated. Surely there was a simpler way.

Making its rounds on Pinterest, Mark Bittman of the New York Times apparently published an article about the Dutch oven method several years ago (http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/08/dining/08mini.html?ref=dining), promising that it might transform the bread baking industry. If transforming means demystifying and bankrupting the bread baking industry because all kinds of average people were making something just as perfect, well then, yes, I'd say it's been transformed.

It takes some fore-thought, but it is SO worth it. I purchased World Market's version of a 4-quart Dutch oven (enameled cast iron - it's heavy) for $40, at least a third the cost of Le Creuset, and just as good. But other sizes, and even just plain old cast iron will work, too. A lid is a must; you will basically be creating a mini-steam oven within your regular oven.

The method is quite simple: Mix 3 cups of flour with 1/4 teaspoon of yeast, 1 1/4 teaspoons salt, and 1 1/2 cups water with a wooden spoon in a large bowl (it will be super wet, impossible to knead...don't worry!). Cover with plastic wrap and let sit for 12-18 hours. Pre-heat your oven to 450 degrees; place empty covered Dutch oven in pre-heated oven for 30 minutes, to prepare the pot for the baking. Meanwhile, dump dough onto a heavily floured countertop, and sort of mound into a large ball as best you can...it is still pretty wet - I am not shy with the flour at this stage. When the pot is heated, unceremoniously gather up the the dough as best you can and place it into the ungreased, preheated Dutch oven. Place back in the 450 oven for 30 minutes with the lid on. Then remove the lid and bake for another 15 minutes. IT WILL BE PERFECT. You will feel like a CHAMP. And you will never be able to pay $4 for an Italian boule ever again.

Thanks to my newlywed daughter Abby for this inspiration and teaching me a new skill!

The Annual Gingerbread House

For the last 22 years, our family has built a gingerbread creation...not always technically a "house" but everything from a Swiss chalet to an igloo to a church. The castle makes its recurrent appearance, this year being one of them. Seems the baby of the family couldn't shake the dream of building a castle this time, and since she's technically the only one still living at home (some of the year), we decided she should have the final say on its design. Other contenders were a Gingerbread Beach Condo and a Gingerbread Yurt - ??? (Our daughter Abby travels internationally a lot for work...so I think she had some exotic rendition in mind...)

So, castle with four turrets, crenelations and a central tower it is. A few years ago Abby put together this video about the process. It has become a family tradition, though as one can see in the video, a bit of a drudgery to Pops Metty. But he loves all the attention his whining brings him. :) This year's was an epic event with lots of extra "Mettys" around to help, give advice, and just eat up the candy. It has become a well-known annual event among those who know us, and each November when the Christmas decorations start coming out o f the attic, I start getting asked, "what's the gingerbread design this year?"

I kept a book called, Let's Make a Memory, by Shirley Dobson on my shelf for the first several years of my marriage. In it, Mrs. Dobson encourages women as keepers of the home, to establish traditions that will draw all family members into a unit. Finding things that everyone enjoys and looks forward to each year is sometimes tricky. You could start doing something that is fun the first year, but no one wants to do it again. Or it's too expensive. Or no one liked it the first year! Holidays are great times of establishing these heartwarming rituals and help to create a unique personality for each family. Have you ever noticed that a home has a personality? Some homes are tense. Some are peaceful. Some fun, or loud, or sad. I have heard it said (and want it for my home!) that laughter should fill the walls.

I strongly believe that this is one of the chief roles a woman plays in her family. She is the one that sets the tone, that builds the emotional intimacy, that is the gatekeeper of influence. We often say, "when Mama ain't happy, ain't nobody happy." This is true. But when Mama sets a happy tone in her home, then it is easier for the others to fall in line. Ladies, be proactive about this. If we let the personality of our homes just 'happen,' then it is easy for negativity, criticism, and strife to exist. But if we can be intentional about building our homes, we can pass along a wonderful heritage to our children, and create a place where others will want to come and find rest. That, to me, is the true meaning of hospitality. Making your home a place of refreshment and peace. So many people need this in our world.

To wax philosophical for just a moment: our gingerbread creations may look good on the outside, full of candy and sugar. But they are always empty on the inside; no one lives there, and they sit lonely on the dining room table for weeks after they are built. I want my home to be beautiful, but I wouldn't trade the noisy, busy, fun place that it is for all the finery of a glitzy house. I always want it to be full of people, sharing our lives together.