Food Blog with No Food

I'm 28 hours into a water only fast.  Over the next few days I'll do my best to keep the blog updated with my progress.  I've heard a few bizarre tid-bits about fasting, and I hope to add to those.  In some ways, I'll be disappointed if something weird doesn't happen, such as my urine turning brown.  I'm really pushing for that one.  I'll definitely post about that if it happens. Although a picture probably won't accompany it since we mellow in this household.  Don't want to skew the results, ya know.  

For the background info:  I've never fasted in my life.  I may have skipped a few meals here or there, but nothing intentional.  I'm a complete novice, and I'm sure I didn't read up on the subject as much as I should have.  My initial spur for starting the fast was reading Alan Tillotson's One Earth Herbal Sourcebook over Christmas.  A truly great book.  My biggest issue with the book was the inadequate index, but, as I found last night, he provides the entire book online with a SEARCH FEATURE!  Awesome.  Anyways, there's a tidbit in the book on detox as a spring-cleaning type of activity.  It's not much, but you can read it about it here, just scroll down to the part on Detoxification First.  

I followed his advice, and ate only fresh fruit (2 apples, a pear, 1 1/2 bananas, and 1/2 an orange) for dinner.  My breakfast was a homemade granola bar (a super secret recipe from The Covert Cupboard subscription bakery we're opening in Kirksville, MO), a slice of mexican pizza (with refried beans, enchilada sauce from Veganomicon, corn, onions, and peppers), and a few apples throughout the day.  

So far, the insights are: my first night was the most difficult.  I instinctively wanted to snack, although I'm not really a big eater.  I mean, I love food, but I'm 5'3 and only weigh 105 lbs.  My wife and I split a meal at a restaurant then still bring home leftovers.  This morning I was hungry, but not excruciatingly so.  It was pretty identical to just feeling hungry.  That feeling lasted all day, but has subsided for the evening.  It's being replaced by a sensation of emptiness in my stomach, almost like it's sinking in.  On a grosser note, I took a laxative last night and tonight in the hopes of clearing out my colon.  Moving on.  (Get it?!)

Also, I haven't had a desire to eat a big meal or stuff myself.  Moreso, is the desire to eat an apple or granola bar or chips and salsa.  Just a snack.  My body feels kinda hungry, so I think, "I should eat something."  Then, I think, "oh yeah, I'm fasting.  Whoops."   In short, the most difficult part isn't the hunger, but breaking the habit of eating.

Finally, the only physical ailment I've felt is getting light headed when I stand up.  This has only started happening in the last few hours (about 24 hours into the fast).  I've read it goes away after the first day or two, and I sincerely hope that it's true.  It's just blasted inconvenient to feel as though you'll faint anytime you want to go somewhere.

Here's to hoping.

 

19 Loaves

Farmer's Market is tomorrow, and this time, we're coming prepared.  

11 baguettes from poolish

3 round loaves from poolish

3 whole wheat round loaves

2 oval loaves from poolish

All recipes from Bread: A Baker's Book of Techniques and Recipes by Jeffrey Hamelman.  An incredible book to say the least.  

Long John Doughnuts

While we were visiting my parents back in Illinois, we had two full days of cooking and baking.  In all, we handmade cinnamon-raisin bagels, fajitas with flour tortillas, two round loaves of french bread, 30ish cinnamon rolls, oatmeal-raisin cookies, grilled pizza, zucchini brownies with chocolate mousse and black raspberry topping, and, finally, these long johns.  Looking back at that list even sounds ridiculous to me, but I swear we did it.  

The doughnuts were nice and fried (not oily) on the outside, but stayed sweet and doughy on the inside.  A nice combo, but at times seemed undercooked.  Depends on your preference, I guess, but we loved 'em.  Within 24 hours four people consumed all 17ish doughnuts.  

I had never deep fried anything in a ridiculous amount of oil, and it was a lot easier than I expected, as well as took way more oil than I expected.  In all, we used two 48 fl. oz. jugs of canola oil that amounted to 2 1/2 inches in the huge pot.  Also, these take a little chunk of time to make.  There's a 2 hour refrigeration time and the deep frying keeps you on your toes for at least 20 minutes, but it's quite worth it, as the picture below proves. 

Long John Doughnuts

4 c flour

4 t baking powder

3/4 t salt

1 T whole flax seed, ground or 2 1/2 T pre-ground flaxseed

3 T soymilk

1/4 c apple sauce

1/4 t baking powder

2 T maple syrup

3/4 c sugar

1/2 c soymilk

5 T vegan butter, melted

Chocolate Glaze

1/4 c soymilk

1 1/2 c confectioner's sugar

3.5 oz  semi-sweet baking chocolate (or chocolate chips), melted

Directions: Mix the flour, 4 t of baking powder, and salt in a medium bowl.  In a large bowl, cream together the ground flaxseed and 3 T of soymilk.  After it's nice and goopy add in the apple sauce and remaining 1/4 t of baking powder and mix well.  When it's all combined, pour in the sugar and maple syrup and cream it, cream it real nice.  For the finale, mix the soymilk and melted butter into the sugary mix.  When all that's finished, slide the flour mixture on over to the sugar bowl and mix until it first becomes a homogeneous mass, kinda like pancakes, but way thicker.  No need to overmix.  It'll still be gooey, by no means a typical bread dough.  Mixing is all done, so put a dishtowel over the top of the bowl and seal it with a large rubber band or hair tie.  Put the bowl in the fridge for two hours and kick back on the sofa.  Maybe watch some cartoons, whatever.

Now that you're good and relaxed, it's time to get serious.  Flour your work surface and place a floured sheet of wax or parchment paper to the side.  Be light when handling the dough so it doesn't get overworked.  If you need to, imagine your hands belong the the gentlest masseuse this world has ever known.  Now, divide your dough in half and roll out one of the halves on your floured surface to between 1/4 and 1/2 inch thickness in a long, flat rectangle about 4 inches wide.  When it's rolled out evenly, cut away the edges of the top and bottom so you have a flat edge, and place the scraps to the side.  This can be uneven, so the final cuts will look like a cityscape of sorts. 

Now, make the individual long johns however wide you'd like.  Mine were about 1 1/2 inches wide, I think.  Gently lift each piece up and place it on the floured paper.  You can slide a spatula underneath to transfer too.  Repeat this process with the other half of dough, and then put your scraps all together and roll them out and cut.  Whatever scraps result from this final rolling, turn into donut holes by rolling on the floured surface or in your hands, or if you'd prefer, just take all the scraps and make 'em into donut holes. 

 

Time to move to the stove.  Let the cut doughnuts rest and heat up 2 inches or more of oil in a high walled pan or pot.  The oil needs to be at 375ish.  I played around with temperatures from 360 to 380 and it didn't seem to make a big difference.  Have some metal tongs or metal slotted spatula nearby for fishing out the doughnuts after cooking, as well as a layout of paper towels or dishtowels for absorbing excess oil off the edge.  After the oil is hot, lift the donuts one or two at a time with a slotted metal spatula and slide them into the hot oil.  After 15-45 seconds they'll plum up and rise to the top.  After they've risen, turn them and cook for another 20ish and place onto a paper towel.  

Goodness you've done a lot of work, but we're not quite finished.  Mix all the ingredients of the frosting together, and when the donuts have mostly cooled, drizzle or spread the glaze over the top of the doughnuts (if drizzling, you can probably halve the recipe).  Eat leftover chocolate with a spatula or spoon. 

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Granola

Yup. It's just granola. No frills here. Sorry if you wanted one of those snappy titles like Old Skool Granola or Cinnamon Nutmeg Almond Granola, which would still be fitting. But that doesn't mean this granola isn't incredible. This is the kind of granola that starts wars over the last bowl, the granola that Spain would set sail over vast oceans for, the granola that Sesame Street would create a new character, the Granola Monster, for.

Granola

1/4 c. vegan butter (melted)

1 1/2 c. rolled oats

1/2 T cinnamon

1/4 c. almond slices

2 T agave nectar

1/4 t nutmeg

Pre-heat the oven to 250 and combine all the ingredients until everything is evenly distributed. Spread the mixture in a thin layer over a walled cookie sheet and bake for about an hour, stirring halfway through the bake (so, 30 minutes-stir- another 3o-ish minutes). Let it cool completely before storing in a closed container. Congrats. You've made the perfect breakfast cereal.

Grilled Cookie

BEST IDEA EVER.  

Grilled Cookie

Fire up the grill.

Make up your favorite cookie dough.  

Put a lightly oiled cast iron skillet on the grill to heat up for a few minutes, then pat down the dough.  It'll be patchy at first, but as it heats up the top will smooth out a bit.  Cover the grill and let it go.  It's generally done when the sides are a deep golden brown.  The texture is a bit like a cookie bar with a thick bottom crust.  

So far we've made your general chocolate chip cookie and a peanut butter banana chocolate chip cookie.  Both, obviously, were incredible.

Chickpea Salad

Alas, my 7:30-4:00 summer school schedule is over and our week-long stomach sickness has passed (mostly).   Life is sweet.  Our only responsibility is to take care of little O and our gardens.  So, here's our long overdue chickpea salad recipe.  It got me happily through many a quick lunch during the semester and summer classes (thanks Michelle). 

Chickpea Salad

1 can (15 oz) chickpeas, drained

2 T veganaise

1/2 t ground mustard

1/4 t dill

1/4 t basil

1/8 t celery salt

1/8 t garlic powder

1/2 C cucumber, chopped

1/4 C celery, chopped

fresh ground pepper to taste

Smash the chickpeas with a fork and add in the rest of the ingredients.  Mix it up.  

That's it.  You're done.  

Now spread it on some bread and top it with a tomato and some lettuce. mmmmmmmmm

BBQ Tempeh with Grilled Potato Wedges

Since pretty weather has finally graced Missouri with its presence, we've been practicing the right of any rural Missourian by grilling anytime there are friends and a sunset around.  Michelle's dad brought up a grill we got as a wedding gift (two years ago this Monday!) and my dad bought us a chimney starter so we could recycle (burn) paper to light the coals.  It works (and looks) pretty cool.  Smoke billows up for about 10 minutes then the coals burst into flames, except not quite as awesome as that.  If anyone has any ideas for more eco-friendly grilling (gathering firewood, maybe?), please let us know.  

Our biggest grill setback has been how to perfect grilling potato wedges without using wasteful aluminum foil.  Direct grilling would always burn the wedges on the outside before the inside got cooked.  Turns out just coating them with oil (spray) is enough to slow down the burning and cooking.  I would have thought the opposite, but I'm no scientist.  Oh yeah, the tempeh was awesome too.  Serves 3 people and 1 grill.

 

 

BBQ Tempeh

_______________

1 square o' tempeh (8 oz)

enough broth to just cover the tempeh in a pan (we used a beefish broth)

BBQ sauce of your choice

___________________

Cut the tempeh into strips 1/4 inch strips and slap em down in a pan and just cover with broth.  Bring it to a boil and leave it for 10 minutes.  Remove from the pan and coat each side with BBQ side and toss em on the grill.  Put on your apron, and GRILL IT.  They're done when you say they're done, Grillmaster.

Grilled Potato Wedges

_____________

2 russet potatoes

garlic powder

onion powder

paprika or chili powder

salt

pepper

any spray oil

__________

Wash and cut the potatoes into wedges (Michelle's style is to cut the potatoes lengthwise until each wedge is 1/16th of the potato (but use your best judgement based on the size of the potato so you don't cut your fingers off)).  Spray 'em with oil and cover with garlic and onion powder being the most used, paprika or chili powder to your preference, and use salt and pepper sparingly.  Put 'em on the grill perpendicular to the  grate and cook until tender.  We didn't need to turn or flip them at all and they were generally done when the underside was browned.