Quinoa Tabbouleh

Harry Potter is coming out next week.  So. Freaking. Excited.  I mean, I am reading, errrm listening to on tape, all the Harry Potter books in preparation.  I'd like to say I'm going to watch the movies too but seriously, I have a life people.  As I blog I'm on The Chamber of Secrets, somewhere around 11 minutes into chapter 15.  So if I randomly type an "alohamora!" or "but 'Arry!!!", please, don't be alarmed.

Even though I've been listening to HP non-stop, I've still been eating.  Can you think of anything better than listening to Stephen Fry while eating some tabbouleh?  I didn't think so.  I made this a week or so back soon after I received my first CSA box.  I had a bunch of new & fancy ingredients as well as a well stocked pantry.  Pouring through my surplus of cookbooks, I came about this recipe.

If you've ever gone to a hot bar with me at Metropolitan Market, Whole Foods, PCC…etc, you know I ALWAYS get tabbouleh. ALWAYS.  However, I had never made it at home before.  Nor have I ever bought Bulgar.  You'd think I would but no.  I don't always think ahead.  But when I saw that I had all the ingredients for a this recipe, I'm pretty sure I squealed with joy.

The ingredients are fairly adaptable, but I'd try and stick to the more traditional ingredients as much as possible.  I also increased the amount of parsley and lemon juice so if you aren't a fan of these, feel free to reduce the amount.

Black Bean Hummus

Sorry that I’ve left you hanging friends.  I have some pretty big news.  No no, I didn’t win the lottery.  Nope, did not meet the man of my dreams and am currently siting on a beach in Fiji honeymooning.

I’m moving.

BAM.

Not anywhere particularly exciting.  Actually, I’m only moving one neighborhood over and about 4 miles away from my old apartment.  What is exciting is that this is the first time I’ll have my “own place.”  Probably shouldn’t have said that on the internet, now creepers are going to be coming after me and my single self.  Regardless, Queen Anne, get ready for my arrival! 

So you probably know what that means, almost everything I own is in a box, waiting to go in a box, or somewhat unpacked at my new place.  Basically, my cooking is pretty much non-existent at the moment.  I’ve been sustaining life on some bean soup I made an embarrassingly long time ago, Amy’s frozen meals and lots of coffee.  Lots.

But this black bean “hummus” (it’s really more like a black bean dip, but who’s calling the PC police here) is from a few weeks ago.  My friend Julie & her family hosted a glass sale out of their home to raise money for her dad & brother to go to Russia. John McComish (Julie’s dad) is an extremely talented local glass artist and he went to Russia to install some glass work at an orphanage.  I really recommend you check his stuff out: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Hot-Glass-Seattle/209400679084056

Food.  Right.  To help nourish the shoppers, Julie and I cooked and catered for the event.  She made some delicious “faux-mosas” (samosa filling in phyllo dough), I made the black bean dip, cut up some veggies, laid out some tortilla chips & we attempted to make gluten free macaroons (they failed MISERABLY).

The original recipe called for 2 tablespoons of tahini but as we didn’t have any of hand, and Julie conveniently doesn’t like tahini, we did without.  I think it made the texture a little thicker and the bean flavor a little more prominent, two things I was completely ok with.

In other news, I am starting the re-integration process for gluten & dairy!  Today (and today only) I get to eat AS MUCH GLUTEN as I WANT!  (insert evil, maniacal here)

Roasted Pear and Toasted Pecan Ice Cream

Three more weeks.  I keep on having to repeat that to myself over and over… only three more weeks until I will (hopefully) start reintegrating gluten and dairy.  My doctor thinks I am sensitive to one of the two and I need to "cleanse" my system more before I nosh on a hunk of bread or block of cheese.  While I wouldn't call my current diet ideal, not being able to have dairy hasn't been too hard.  I've known for a while I'm lactose intolerant.  I mean, haven't you noticed that 99.9% of my recipes use a milk substitute?  But what has been hard is finding a soy ice cream without brown rice syrup.

You'd think having the word rice in the name would mean it was gluten free.  You'd be wrong.  It's one of those sneaky glutenous ingredients.  So, if I can't buy it I'll make it!  I had some pears that were at the edge of being over ripe and a craving for some ice cream.

 When you make this ice cream (which I highly recommend) make sure you set aside a chuck a time.  While not being labor intensive, there is a lot of down time.  At least at the end of it all, your house will smell like roasted pears, toasted pecans and you will be snacking on some freshly turned ice cream.

Mint Chocolate Brownies (Gluten & Dairy Free)

Here is it - my first recipe post that follows my gluten free, dairy free diet.  I would be lying if I said this wasn't difficult.  I have never read so many nutrition labels with such concentration in my entire life nor have I had to pester so many waitresses to make SURE that smoothie has NO DAIRY (not even milk powder) in it.  That's not even the hardest part, I think that titles belongs to having to say no to friends.  To eat at certain restaurants, restrain from diving headfirst into their sandwich (still on the hunt for a good DF/GF bread) or just seeming like the weirdo with the nitpicky dietary concerns. 

Really though, it's not that bad.  I haven't had to deal with this for years, I don't even know if I'll have to deal with much longer (doctor's appointment is on May 5th) and I live in Seattle.  I think out of all cities to be gluten and dairy free in, Seattle must be one of the best.  PCC, Metropolitan Market AND Whole Foods are my meccas now.  Even Trader Joe's does a pretty good job (I'm a big fan of how well they label things).

And you know what's even better?  NO ONE knew these were gluten and dairy free until I told them!  In my book, that's a a huge success on the GF/DF front.  I brought them to the kickball game last week and everyone (the other team, the ref, my teammates) raved over them, asked for seconds and still contested that the fact that they were GF/DF free.