Raw granola

Raw granola (Photo by bodhilens)

I've been trying to incorporate more raw food into our diet to replenish enzymes in our bodies. This is one of our favorite raw food dishes, a super-nutritious and tasty alternative for cereal. I learned a lot of interesting and helpful information from raw foodists on YouTube. Sprouted grains and seeds are so alive that they give us extra boost of energy.

Ingredients (for 8-10 servings):

1 cup of hulled buckwheat

1 cup of oat groats

1 cup of hulled sunflower seeds

1 cup of  raw almonds

1 cup of shredded coconuts

1 cup of dry fruits (e.g., cranberries)

1/2 TBSP of cinnamon powder

1 pinch of natural salt

1/2 tsp of vanilla essence

2-3 TBSP of raw honey

2-3 TBSP of coconut oil (or melted butter)

1/2 cup of yogurt and 1 tsp of fruit spread/jam for garnishing a small bowl of raw granola

Directions:

1. To sprout grains and seeds, put them in separate bowls/containers and wash them well, soak them in water for a few hours to overnight (e.g., buckwheat and sunflower seeds for a few hours, oat groats and almonds overnight), strain water and leave them wet in the bowls, rinse them with water again and strain water twice a day until they germinate/sprout. Buckwheat gets slimy when soaked in water, so rinse them a few times after soaking. When it's warm, buckwheat and sunflower seeds sprout in a day or two (i.e., tiny white tails grow visibly). It's hard to tell when oat groats and almonds germinate, but I consider them ready for use around the time when buckwheat and sunflower seeds sprout. 

2. When all grains and seeds are ready for use, rinse them with water again and spread them on a cloth to air-dry them for an hour or so. 

3. Crush oat groats, almonds, and dry fruits in a blender. 

4. Mix #3 with the rest of the ingredients in a big bowl. 

5. This raw granola goes well with yogurt and fruit spread. 

You can dehydrate this raw granola if you like it crispy and crunchy and want to store it in room temperature. I don't bother to dehydrate it. I keep it in fridge, and it will stay fresh for several days. 

Humus with the x factor

I have tried a few different recipes for humus, but this Japanese recipe turned out to be the best. The x factor is almond poudre (i.e., powder). (Japanese adopted the French word instead of the English word.) No, you don’t have to go get expensive almond poudre. I usually buy whole almonds on sale, stock them in my pantry, and grind them into powder when I need almond poudre. I tweaked the recipe a bit to make the humus creamier. I also used sea salt instead of table salt. All the trace minerals in more wholesome forms of salt do enhance the flavor of any dish, which helps me to use less salt. When I use this humus as a sandwich spread, I don’t need mayo or cheese. That’s important for me because I tend to use a little too much Japanese mayo not only for dressing but also in cooking. (It’s addictive.) You can replace chickpeas with black beans, and a pinch of black pepper with 1 tsp of cumin, 1/4 tsp of cayenne pepper, and 1/4  tsp of paprika. The black bean version is tasty, too.

I’ll share recipes for the other items on the plate (quinoa tabouli, curry flavored falafel, and naan bread) sometime. (Photo by bodhilens)

Ingredients:

400g (apx. a regular American size can) of cooked chickpeas

2 TBSP of lemon juice
2 TBSP of extra virgin olive oil
2 TBSP of tahini (roasted sesame paste)
2 TBSP of almond poudre
1 clove of garlic (grated)
1/2 tsp of sea salt
1 pinch of black pepper
4 TBSP (or more) of bean stock*, soy milk, or cow milk

*Remember to keep the stock when you drain cooked beans.

Directions:

1. Put all ingredients in a food processor and run it until the mixture is smooth and creamy.

2. Adjust the consistency and saltiness by adding more liquid and/or salt as you like.

Citrus flavored olive oil biscotti

I had never thought of myself becoming a baker while growing up in Japan. We only had a toaster oven in our kitchen and kept a small container of margarine in our fridge. Several pieces of cookies were all I could bake at home, and my mother would be upset if I used up all margarine for cookies. So you can imagine how excited I was when I seized my first opportunity to bake cake in an American-standard size (= gigantic) oven in my apartment in Kentucky. I had fun trying out a few boxes of cake mix with different flavors, but soon I realized that they were too sweet and heavy for me. Now whenever I find intriguing recipes for sweets, I almost always tweak them. I first see if I can reduce the amount of sugar and butter. Then, I experiment with replacing white wheat flour with whole wheat flour, white refined sugar with sucanat, raw unfiltered honey, and/or pure stevia powder, and butter with extra virgin olive oil.

Here's an example of my tweaking and experimentation. This recipe is based on “Gigi’s olive oil biscotti” that I found in the DHC magazine. (DHC is a Japanese company that is famous for olive oil-based skincare products, and they recently sell fancy olive oil, too.) Although the biscotti were delicious as they were (see the original recipe here) and already healthier than buttery biscotti, I wanted to make them even healthier. You can use any citrus peals/juice/extracts (e.g., lemon, orange, yuzu) for flavor or citrus conserves/spreads to take care of both sweetness and flavor. (Photo by bodhilens)

Ingredients (for about 40 small pieces):

2 cups of whole wheat flour
1 tsp of baking powder
1 pinch of sea salt
Any combination of sweeteners that is as sweet as 10 TBSP of sugar*
1 TBSP of citrus peels and 1 tsp of juice/extract*
2 eggs
3 TBSP of extra virgin olive oil
40 roasted whole almonds (or any other large nuts)

*I have tried the following combinations of sweeteners and flavors: (a) 4 TBSP of yuzu marmalade, 1 TBSP of orange spread, and 5 pinches of stevia; and (b) 1 TBSP of lemon zest, 1 tsp of lemon juice, 5 TBSP of sucanat, and 5 pinches of stevia. Both delicious.

Directions:

1. Mix all wet ingredients (i.e., citrus peels and juice, and olive oil) and sweeteners in one bowl .
2. Add eggs in the bowl and beat the wet mixture.
3. Mix all dry ingredients in another bowl (i.e., whole wheat flour, baking powder, and salt).
4. Gradually add the dry mixture into the wet mixture to make dough. (You don't have to knead the dough, just mix all ingredients well.)
5. You can either knead nuts into the dough or half-bury them on top of the dough after Step 6**
6. Divide the dough into 4 parts and form them into 5 cm x 20 cm (apx. 2 inch x 8 inch) flat squares on a parchment paper.
7. Bake at 360 degrees F (apx. 180 degrees C) for about 20 minutes or until they are golden brown.
8. Remove the baked squares from oven, let them cool a bit, and slice each square diagonally into 10 pieces.
9. Return the sliced pieces to oven and bake them for about 10 minutes or until they are crispy.

**In the former, nuts are likely to stay inside but may be placed very unevenly across biscotti; in the latter, they can be placed very evenly but may fall off from the top of biscotti. Your choice J