(no subject)

[ocelot]

We have food. Come over :) (Directions here.

Our somewhat impromptu "excuse to get the porch useable" party was a success, regardless of whether or not anyone actually shows up, as the porch is now useable, and Leif happily played legos out there all afternoon.

I had a fun and exciting and slow experience at the clinic getting a TB test. Yay or something.

Whenever Beeb nurses these days, I get really sleepy. This is a normal nursing thing... but why suddenly after 8 months?

I threw some cherries into the marinara sauce for the raw lasagna. They were sitting their next to me, already pitted, and it just seemed like a good idea. It certainly made the sauce a more typical marinara color. Let's see if anyone notices.

I also made a raw cake, which is an experiment to see if it will work for a Leif birthday cake. I think he'll accept pretty much anything as long as it has a big strawberry on top.

I may make the avocado chocolate ice cream if anyone shows.

Comments

[barelyproper.livejournal.com]

Sorry Dear...

I'll be busy sewing the next couple weeks and at faire on weekends.

[therealocelot.livejournal.com]

No worries :) People came and the porch is clean, and that was the real point.

We may try to start up some sort of "work on a project" get together at some point if you're interested.

[barelyproper.livejournal.com]

I would love that... Keep me informed please :-D

[meglimir.livejournal.com]

raw cake ... avocado chocolate ice cream ??

actually they sound kinda interesting, would you be willing to share the recipes? can the avocado ice cream be made with a non chocolate flavor (anything else but coconut)?

[therealocelot.livejournal.com]

Can't submit long comments right now. Bug me if I don't post by next Tuesday or so.

[therealocelot.livejournal.com]

Avocado ice cream... hmmm... you'd need something with a strong flavor of it's own to cover up the avocado, unless you wanted avocado flavored ice cream (which might not be bad with the right seasonings - my avocado pie (seasoned similar to pumpkin) turned out good). The chocolate covers up the flavor pretty well. In any case, the recipe I start with is 1/4 cup cocoa and 1/4 cup sweetener per avocado, then a pinch of salt, a teaspoon or so of vanilla, and more chocolate or sweetener to taste. I generally throw in an apple - it evens out the taste a little and provides a nice texture. Then some coconut milk to thin it down a bit, though you could use some other sort of milk, dairy or non. If I'm making pudding instead of ice cream, I skip the coconut milk and add ground flaxseed to thicken it.

I wonder if good quality vanilla might work, or if that would just make vanilla flavored avocado? If you like carob, that supposedly works well too. I made some avocado-banana-mango once that I liked, and that didn't turn out too avocado-like, though it wasn't as mango-like as I wouldn't have liked, either. Lime or lemon would likely woork, as I've seen avocado-based key lime pie recipes.

The avocado makes the texture really wonderful and gourmet. Makes up for any flavor oddities :)

The cake from memory because I'm too lazy to go get the cookbook...

1 cup each of hazelnuts, walnuts, and almonds, soaked overnight and drained (I don't know how necessary it is to have those exact nuts, and, if doing it again, would use half again as much walnuts and almonds and skip the super expensive hazelnuts)
1 1/2 cup dates, soaked 30 minutes
1/2 cup cocoa
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1 cup dry almonds

Food process soaked nuts until fine-ish. Add dates, cocoa, and vanilla. Add more dates to taste if necessary (I ended up adding some honey, too). When it gets all dough-like, dump it in a bowl. Food process the dry almonds and then mix them into the dough.

Press dough into a cake pan. If doing layers, separate into two parts first. I used banana slices between the two layers, and that worked well.

For the frosting:

3/4 cup "raw" cashews (they're lightly cooked, as truly raw cashews are poisonous... but not roasted cashews), soaked 30 minutes and drained.
1/4 cup pine nuts (I used brazil nuts as the pine nuts mysteriously disappeared, and that worked fine), soaked 10 minutes and drained
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
sweetener to taste
1/2 cup water

Blend it all together until reasonably smooth and spread on cake.

I refrigerated it all for a few hours, and think that helped it set up well.

I'm sure this would work fine as a spice cake or something instead of chocolate.

[lysandra.livejournal.com]

hmm... cherry marinara sauce... how did that turn out?

[therealocelot.livejournal.com]

Good. I was tasting the whole time so it didn't get too cherry-fied :)