Pizza-flavored flax seed crackers
One thing I really miss since the overhaul of my diet is crunchy food. Sure, carrot sticks and celery batons have crunch … but it’s a different kind of crunch. A wet crunch. When I’m sitting in front of Project Runway or watching the latest Netflix has delivered, I want something crisp and crackly, a vehicle for some guacamole or something that substitutes for my fingernails during a scary zombie chase scene.
These flavorful flax crackers fit the bill perfectly.
I was introduced to flax seed crackers during a short stay at Canyon Ranch up in the Berkshires a couple years ago. The food there was great, but I don’t remember anything specific except for their flax crackers. Oh, and their lemonade in the workout rooms. I ate their flax seed crackers like potato chips … and came home two pounds heavier. Oh well.
Flax seeds are loaded with good stuff, including alpha linolenic acid, or ALA, an omega-3 fatty acid that’s somewhat similar to the fatty acids found in oily fish (super good stuff if you’re vegetarian or vegan!) Omega-3 fatty acids are anti-inflammatory, which is good news for anyone suffering from conditions like arthritis or asthma. Flax seeds have lots of fiber … over 5 grams in two tablespoons. Lots of fiber in your diet = good digestive health + fewer hunger pangs during the day.
(Read more about all the health benefits of flax seeds here.)
Since my son likes to go out for pizza a lot, I need to bring foods with me that really satisfy my taste buds, because if I may be honest, there’s nothing I’d rather do than dive head-first into a Jay’s Heart pizza at the Flatbread Company and not come up for air until the whole pie is gone. But I can’t. These crackers help. They really do have a strong pizza-like flavor. I find that two or three large pieces can get me through the first few minutes after the pie is delivered to our table. They give me time to regroup and remind myself of how bad I’ll feel in a few hours if I eat wheat or dairy.
And these crackers really do taste damn good.
Pizza-flavored Flax Seed Crackers
Yield: about 12 large crackers
While these crackers will satisfy the munchies, don’t devour a whole plate full of them in one sitting — they’re loaded with fiber. Too much fiber in one sitting can not only be painful, but it will wreak hell on your social life. A dehydrator works best for this recipe, but you can also make the crackers in your oven set on the lowest heat setting.
1 cup golden flax seeds
1 small tomato, roughly chopped
1/2 cup sundried tomatoes, soaked in hot water for 15 minutes and drained
1/2 red pepper, roughly chopped
1 tbsp. lemon juice
1 small clove of garlic
1 tsp. salt
A handful of fresh basil
Fit an “S” blade in the bowl of a your food processor. Add all ingredients to the bowl. Process for about 1 minute, stopping once to scrape down the sides of the bowl.
Pour the flax seed mixture onto your nonstick dehydrator sheets. Using an offset spatula, smooth out the flax seed crackers until they’re even and about 1/4″ thick. At this point you can use the edge of your spatula to cut your crackers into sections; I don’t. I just break the large cracker apart with my hands.
Dehydrate for about 8 hours on the “nuts & seeds” setting. When the top of the cracker is nearly dry, peel off the sheet, turn over and dry for 2 to 4 more hours. The cracker should be completely dry and crisp. Break apart and store in an air-proof container.
(If you’re using an oven, spread the flax seed mixture out on a silicone baking sheet, such as a Silpat, set on a rimmed baking sheet. Set your oven on the lowest possible temperature — 150 degrees Fahrenheit on most ovens — and check every hour or so. When the top of the cracker is almost dry, peel it off the baking sheet and turn it over to dry on the other side.)
Chocolate flax granola bars
As a biker and someone who often has to eat on the run, I love healthy handheld foods like granola bars. They fit nicely into my bike pack, they’re easy to eat, and they give me energy when I need a boost, whether I’m tackling a steep hill or a long afternoon filled with errands.
Unfortunately, a lot of store-bought granola bars are loaded with too much sugar (including corn syrup), wheat (which I don’t eat), and raisins. Raisins are okay, but for some reason, I don’t like them, or other dried bits of fruit, in my granola bars. Moreover, for what’s in these little bars, they’re darned expensive. So I decided to make my own this summer.
I started with a recipe from Emily Franklin’s Too Many Cooks: Kitchen Adventures with 1 Mom, 4 Kids, and 102 Recipes and made a few modifications to suit my tastes. Here’s my version, with lots of chocolate flavor, no wheat, and a palatable price tag.
Chocolate Flax Granola Bars
Yield: 8 bars
The beauty of a recipe like this is that it begs for experimentation. Substitute hemp cereal for the flax cereal, or if you don’t like chocolate, use plain puffed rice and skip the chips. Don’t like pumpkin seeds? Add crushed hazelnuts or toasted almonds. And of course, raisins will work too.
3 1/2 tbsp. almond butter
3 tbsp. honey
3 1/2 tbsp. brown rice syrup
1 tbsp. brown sugar
2 tsp. vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups chocolate flavored puffed rice (I use EnviroKidz Organic Koala Crisp cereal)
1/2 cup flax cereal (I use Perky’s Nutty Flax cereal)
1 1/2 cup old fashioned rolled oats (not the instant kind!)
1/2 cup salted, roasted pumpkin seeds
1/4 cup miniature chocolate chips
Dash of ground cinnamon (optional)
Preheat oven to 325 degrees Fahrenheit. Line an 8″ x 8″ baking pan with foil or a large sheet of parchment paper, leaving the ends hanging over one side so the bars can be lifted out of the pan after baking.
In a small saucepan, stir almond butter, honey, brown rice syrup, and brown sugar together over medium heat. When the sugar has melted and everything looks syrupy, take the pan off the heat and stir in the vanilla extract. Set pan aside.
In a large bowl, stir together the puffed rice, flax cereal, oats, pumpkin seeds, chocolate chips and cinnamon, if using. Scrape the syrup mixture over the cereals and mix until all the grains are thoroughly coated and sticky with the syrup. Dump the mixture into the prepared baking pan.
Now wet your hands with cool water and press the mixture down into the pan evenly. When the cereal starts sticking to your fingers, wet your hands down again.
Bake for 22-25 minutes, checking at 20 minutes. Remove the bars from the pan by picking up the long ends of the foil or parchment paper, and let the bars cool on a baking rack. When totally cool, cut the bars into eight triangular bars. Wrap each bar in plastic wrap and store in the refrigerator. Enjoy!
No cooking, just quilting
I blame my mother:
She’s a quilting fanatic and it looks like her fanaticism has finally rubbed off on me. This is my first attempt at real quilting, and I have to admit, I’m a wee bit proud of myself. I’ve done other “quilt-like” projects, but none have involved batting, or stippling the fabric, or binding edges with bias fabric.
The design of the pillow is not my own. A few months ago, I was stopped cold by the cover of a seasonal sewing magazine called Stitch, put out by the Quilting Arts folks. The photo of the pillow on the cover is what grabbed me. It was designed by a fiber artist in Austin, Texas, named Malka Dubrawsky. Go check her blog — she does amazing things with dyes and fabrics, and if you love this pillow design as I do, you’ll love her aesthetic.
Anyhoo, the directions for the pillow couldn’t have been easier. They were well written (something I find lacking in a lot of craft magazines) and everything was so clearly explained that even I, a home ec flunkie, had no trouble turning out a beautiful pillow of my own. I was so proud of my work when I finished it up last night that I carried the pillow around room to room so I could let my eye catch the colors as I tidied up.
I told my husband I was making it for a gift, but come on — it’s my first real quilting project. I can’t give it away now! Besides I made a couple of mistakes (the binding is not as lovely as I would like it) — the next pillow will be better.
Here’s the back:
P.S. This pillow is also my inaugural sewing project to receive a custom label from my workshop. I ordered them last week from Hong Kong. I feel so Seventh Avenue. 
Of baby blankets and apron strings …
Since I’ve radically changed my diet and stopped doing so much professional recipe development, I’ve been spending less time in the kitchen, which leaves a lot more time for my other obsession: sewing! I put my sewing machine away soon after my son started walking, a little over six years ago, because I was afraid he’d put a pin in his mouth or slice himself with one of my rotary cutters. Now that he’s almost eight, I decided to drag everything back out … and boy, is it ever fun. There’s something about sewing that really relaxes me and puts me into the “zone.” Know what I’m talking about? Where you’re so involved in a project, you look up and realize it’s 2:30 … in the morning?
One of my “big” projects was a quilted blanket for a good friend of mine from college. Actually, the quilt was for her son Liam, born in December. It took me awhile to finish it, but here it is … my second attempt at “quilting.” I was pretty happy with it (loved the fabrics, which came in a little kit), but I hated working with the faux fur. My friend wrote to me after I sent it and said her little boy loved the fur, so it was worth it. Here’s the little guy enjoying his new blanket. Isn’t he the cutest little thing!!
Next up is something I finished this morning, an apron that I’m giving as a belated birthday gift. I liked the design of the pattern a lot (Butterick 4945), with the contrasting facing and band along the bottom. My son picked out the material — not what I would have picked out, but I think he did a good job picking a polka dot contrast against the ladybug material. (The apron is seriously wrinkled in the photo — I wanted to take a photo of it outdoors before it started raining again.)
While I love the design, I’m not sure I’ll make this apron again. It was a little too fiddly for my tastes, with all the hand whipstitching along the facings. However, I watched the YouTube video that Barbara at Cat Fur Studio posted about her experience sewing this apron, and it looks like I made more work for myself by following the pattern’s directions. So maybe I’ll give this apron another shot; I got back from our local quilt shop not 15 minutes ago and have already fallen in love with some Kaffe Fasset prints that would look lovely made into this apron.
Okay, speaking of aprons — I do have some new food recipes to post, which I’ll get to throughout the next couple days, including one for yummy gluten-free vegan lemon poppyseed muffins.
Golden sesame tofu
Spring fever has hit me hard this year, and I’ve been spending whole days outside, digging out and fertilizing gardens, putting plants in my container gardens, and doing yard cleanup after a brutal winter. I’m hoping to avoid the produce section of my local grocery store as much as possible this summer by participating in our CSA, as well as growing a significant amount of food, including lettuces, kale, swiss chard, spinach, and green beans. Our first home-grown harvest should be ready in a few weeks … that is, if the damned groundhogs don’t get to harvesting first!
As for health and weight loss, both continue to improve. I’m free of any PA symptoms - woo hoo! - and I’m down 22.5 lbs. since January. Yesterday my mother came up from Connecticut and was teasing me about my butt crack — yep, my size 8 boy-cut Levi jeans are falling off my hips. And now people I see every day are starting to notice … mostly it was just friends and family who hadn’t seen me in awhile. It’s really nice because it’s not, “Wow, you’ve lost weight” but “You look great! Tell me what you’re doing …” People really seem interested, and I’m always happy to evangelize about good, wholesome food. 
OK, recipes. I said I’d start posting them, and here’s something you soy-eating vegetarians will like. Last year, I became addicted to the golden sesame tofu in Whole Foods’ prepared foods case. These rectangular slices of tofu are fried until they’re golden, then covered in toasted sesame seeds and glazed with a slightly sweet/salty sauce with just a hint of heat from hot red pepper flakes. They’re also kind of expensive — something like $7.99 a pound. Since tofu’s cheap — and so am I — I decided to replicate the recipe at home. It took a few tries, but I think I’ve nailed it.
I’m pretty sure the Whole Foods’ folks fry their tofu in lots of oil, because all six sides are crisp/chewy. I just use a little oil and fry on two sides. I’ve also used a silcone basting brush to lightly coat each side of the tofu with oil, then cooked them on a grill pan. Yum, but it doesn’t give the tofu that chewy coating I like. If you’re watching your fat intake, you can skip the cornstarch dusting and bake the tofu in a 350 degree F oven for 20 to 25 minutes with the sauce, turning the tofu every 10 minutes or so, checking that the sauce isn’t burning (add water if it’s getting too dark). The tofu will have no chew at all, and the sauce will get thick and sticky, but it’s still yum.
Instead of stuffing these slices of tofu in my mouth like I do when I’m at Whole Foods, I pack them in a plastic container and store them in my fridge for lunches. I cut them up into tiny cubes to add flavor interest to salads — when I put them on top of a potluck salad at Easter, tasters asked me about the delicious croutons … umm, I didn’t have the heart to tell them. This wasn’t a tofu-loving crowd. They also make great sandwich stuffers.
Golden Sesame Tofu
Yield: 4 servings
The Whole Foods version has scallions in it. I’m not a huge fan of scallions, so I skip them. The secret here is the cornstarch … it gives the tofu its chewy coating, but you have to sprinkle it over the tofu evenly and with a light hand; otherwise it’ll get gloppy. Since I make this recipe a lot, I put cornstarch in a fine-mesh shaker; it gives me excellent control when I’m coating the tofu. You’ll find toasted sesame oil and mirin in the Asian sections of well-stocked supermarkets.
1/4 cup raw sesame seeds
14-oz. extra firm tofu
1/4 cup cornstarch
Canola or peanut oil, for frying
For sauce:
2 tbsp. agave nectar (for vegans) or honey
3 tbsp. soy sauce
2 tsp. minced fresh ginger root
2 tbsp. toasted sesame oil
2 tbsp. mirin (Japanese sweet cooking wine)
2 garlic cloves, minced
Dusting of crushed red chili flakes, to taste
Heat a fry pan over medium-high heat. Add sesame seeds and toast until golden and fragrant, stirring frequently. Remove pan from heat and place sesame seeds in small bowl to cool.
Remove tofu from package and drain. Press the tofu gently between the palms of your hands to squeeze out water, then wrap the tofu in paper towels, place it on a plate, then put a another plate on top of it. Place a 28-oz. can of tomatoes or a cast iron fry pan on the plate. This will press out any remaining water from the tofu. Let sit for 20 minutes or so.
Unwrap the tofu and slice into eight rectangular slices. To make even slices, I slice the block of tofu in half, then half each half, and then half each quarter. Make sense? Then dust the slices with tofu evenly with cornstarch on all sides.
Heat about 2 tbsp. of oil in your fry pan over medium high heat. Add the tofu slices, but don’t crowd the pan. You might have to fry in batches. Fry until the tofu is a light golden color, approximately 2 minutes, then turn the tofu over to cook another 2 minutes on the other side. Remove to drain on paper towels. If frying in batches, add more oil to the pan. Note: it is normal for the tofu to splatter, so wear an apron if you don’t want to ruin your clothes.
While the tofu is frying, stir together the agave nectar/honey, soy sauce, gingerroot, sesame oil, mirin and garlic together in a small saucepan. Bring to a boil over medium heat and cook until slightly syrupy, about 5 minutes or so. Remove from heat and set aside.
Place tofu in glass container to hold. Pour sauce over tofu and turn to coat. Dust tofu with toasted sesame seeds and turn again to coat. Season with crushed red chili flakes. Can be served warm or chilled. Will keep for about 5 days refrigerated.
