Creamy Horseradish Sauce (Dairy Free, Vegan, Paleo)

This recipe only makes a small amount, but is easily doubled. I made this to have with raw oysters, but it would also be awesome with roast beef or roasted potatoes. If you're a vegan, try it with a Seitan Sauerkraut Sandwich.

1/4 cup full fat coconut milk
3-4 Tbsp fresh horseradish, grated
1 tsp dill
1/4 tsp dry mustard
Juice from 1/2 a lemon
1/2 tsp salt
pepper to taste

Peel and grate horseradish root. I used a microplane. If you don't have one, a fine grater will do. Combine all ingredients in a bowl and mix thoroughly. Make at least 6 hours prior to serving to bring out the flavor.  Store in refrigerator.

Banana Fudgesicles

It's freakin hot out. 115 degrees. It's a good thing I had these babies in the freezer. Dairy free, no added sugar, fruit sweetened and a good source of potassium, so it does double duty on a hot day!

I got this awesome stainless steel popsicle set from amazon. Some of the reviewers complain the the pops look phallic. It's a popsicle, you lick and suck it. What do you expect it to look like. It will not turn your son gay or make your daughter a porn star. Get over it and don't sexualize your food or your children. If you're concerned about plastic and want what's best for your family, no matter what it's shaped like, this pop mold is for you. I originally bought it to make deodorant sticks, but room temperature in the summer in Arizona is 80 degrees and the melting point of coconut oil is 76 degrees. You do the math. Needless to say, I keep my deodorant goo in a small mason jar. There will be a recipe for that eventually.


1 can full fat coconut milk
1 ripe banana
1/4 cup cocoa (or cacao) powder
1/2 tsp cinnamon

Combine all ingredients in a blender. Pour into Popsicle molds and freeze. 

Cole Slaw

In my quest to get Nikos to eat more vegetable, I made cole slaw.

2 tsp salt
6 cups shredded red cabbage
6 cups shredded green cabage
2 carrots, shredded
1/2 cup paleo mayonnaise (or more if you like it extra creamy)
2 Tbsp cider vinegar
1 tsp mustard seeds
1/2 tsp celery seeds
1/2 tsp caraway seeds

Combine cabbage and salt and mix thoroughly. Drain in a colander for about an hour. Squeeze out the excess water.

Heat seeds in a pan and toast until fragrant.

In a large mixing bowl, combine the vinegar, seeds and mayonnaise. add the cabbage and carrots and mix thoroughly. It's good to prepare it a day in advance because it tastes better on the second day.

Mayonnaise

I have several recipes for aioli and flavored mayo, but none for plain mayonnaise. Mostly because it's more fun to add flavor and you can find a basic mayonnaise recipe anywhere. This is what I used in my cole slaw recipe. I figured if I publish the cole slaw recipe I should include a recipe for mayo on the site for easy reference.

1 egg
2 cloves garlic, pressed or minced
juice from 1 lemon
1 tsp dry mustard powder
1/2 tsp salt
pepper
3/4 cup olive oil

Combine the first 6 ingredients in a food processor. blend thoroughly. slowly drizzle the mayonnaise in while blending. Once all of the olive oil is in, keep blending for a couple more minutes. store in a glass container and refrigerate.

Dill Aioli

This is awesome with bacon wrapped scallops Works well with salmon too.

1 egg
Juice from 1 lemon
3 cloves garlic
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp dry mustard
1 tbsp fresh dill, finely chopped
3/4 cup olive oil

Leave all ingredients out so they're at room temperature. Combine first 6 ingredients in a food processor. Blend thoroughly. Slowly drizzle in the olive oil. You don't want to do this all at once. Take your time; it should be a thin drizzle. once thoroughly combined, put into a container and refrigerate.

Tomato Tortillas

Looking for a fun food? Are you at a loss for things to do with the plethora of tomatoes in your garden that you must use or preserve before their only fit use is to throw at mimes? Do you have an Excalibur dehydrator? If not, think about it. It's awesome. You want dense tomatoes for this recipe, I recommend heirloom. You don't want to use tomatoes that are too watery.

5 large heirloom tomatoes
1/2 a large onion
1 clove of garlic
dash of mexican oregano
dash of cumin
dash of chili powder (chipotle, cayenne, ancho, whatevere)
dash of smoked paprika
sat, pepper

You don't want to over do it on the spices because this will condense into a highly concentrated tomato leather. Line dehydrator trays with parchment paper or dehydrator liners (The parchment will be harder to peel off, so if you don't have patience, get the reusable liners) In a blender, combine all ingredients. When thoroughly pureed, pour into a 1 cup measuring cup (or 1/2 - 3/4 if you want smaller tortillas) and onto lined dehydrator trays. Spread into circles, about 1/4" thick. Dehydrate on 135 for about 12 hours. Dehydrating times may vary depending on climate. I live in vast desert wasteland, so my stuff dries quickly. Store in ziplock bags. You might want to put parchment between each tortilla to keep them from sticking.

Broclinguini

What do you do with broccoli stems? I've noticed a lot of supermarkets carry "broccoli slaw" which is basically julienned broccoli stems mixed with carrots. Apparently you can make slaw out of this. That sounds like a bag of gas to me.  I have a Benriner spiral slicer. There are several brands of spiral slicers out there, but I bought mine based on the amazon.com reviews. One reviewer bought 2 different spiral slicers and gave the one she didn't like to her mother-in-law and kept the Benriner. That was enough for me.

This is pretty simple. Cut the crown off of the broccoli and do with them as you please. I blanch mine and keep them in the fridge for a week of awesomeness. Cut the bottom 1/8-1/4 inch off the stem.

With a knife and/or peeler, remove the fibrous outer layer. the bottom of the stem is the most fibrous and as you get closer to the top, it's easier to digest. Spiral slice those stems! I had to cut mine in half to fit them on the spiral slicer. The top half where the crowns come off should be upright or they'll split apart. I used the widest blade attachment because I like linguini rather than spaghetti.

With the finished product, saute as you would zucchini linguini (or "zoodles" as some people call them. Does that make these "broodles") and serve with whatever sauce you like. Or you can eat this raw if you want a big plate o' gas.

Horseradish Mayonnaise

As seen here with crab cakes!

This is a great condiment with seafood or meat. Eat it with pastrami and eggs. Also awesome on crab cakes. This was the first time I ever used fresh horseradish root.

1 large egg
3 cloves garlic, pressed or minced
1 tsp dry mustard
1 tsp crushed mustard seeds
1/2 tsp salt
juice of 1 lemon
3/4 cup olive oil
4-6 inch piece of horseradish, grated with microplane.

First, you want all the ingredients to be the same temperature, so leave them all out for a few hours. In a food processor, combine egg, garlic, mustard, salt, lemon and about half of the grated horse radish. Blend everything together thoroughly. While blender is blending, slowly drizzle the olive oil in. Very slowly. When all the olive oil is in, blend for about 1 more minute. Remove mayo from food processor and mix in the remaining horseradish a little at a time until it reaches the level of spiciness you like.

Guacamole

I make guacamole for almost every party I go to. When I lived on the East Coast, got tons of compliments. People would tell me it was the best guac they ever had. Then I moved to Arizona where everyone has at least one Mexican Grandmother. I don't get as much love for it out here. So, I'm letting you guys in on my secret guac recipe because no one makes guacamole like Abuela. It's still pretty damn good.

Ingredients:
3 ripe avocados
Juice from 1 lime
2-3 cloves of garlic, pressed, smashed or minced
1 jalapeno, finely chopped
1/4 cup red onion, finely chopped
1/4 cup tomato, finely cubed
1 tsp - 1 Tbsp fresh cilantro finely chopped
Salt, pepper, cumin, smoked paprika or chipotle powder (optional) to taste


Cut 2 of the avocados in half. Do the fancy ninja trick to remove the pits and scoop out into a bowl. Add juice from half of the lime, garlic and salt and mash with a potato masher. You could also put the first 4 ingredients in a food processor and then transfer to a bowl.

Next add the onions and jalapenos and the rest of the spices and mix or mash together.

Add the 3rd avocado, employing the same ninja knife trick to remove the pit. Mash slightly. I like to leave some chunks. Then add the tomato and mix.

Garlic-Ginger Marinade, Dressing, Dipping Sauce for Seafood

I haphazardly plated this salad for a dramatic effect. Ok, really I was too lazy and too hungry to painstakingly arrange it for the photo.

This recipe was inspired, or should I say borrowed, from my friend Jamie. She likes to marinate tuna steaks in lemon and lime juice with fresh garlic, soy sauce and ginger powder. The first time I tried this I used fresh ginger and garlic powder. Tambien. The remainder of the marinade she uses for dipping.

This recipe works well with any kind of seafood. I used Mahi Mahi for this recipe. This time, I used both fresh ginger and fresh garlic. I use a microplane to grate the ginger root. You only need a little so the rest put in the fridge or freezer and save for something else. When I say something else, I mean the salad dressing recipe that follows.

1 lb Mahi Mahi
Juice of 1 lemon (or 1/2 a lemon and 1/2 a lime)
1/2 tsp fresh ginger
2 cloves of garlic, pressed or minced

Marinate Mahi in lemon juice and evenly spread the garlic and ginger evenly over fish. Grill.

Top a salad with it. I'm not going to tell you what to put on a salad. You're an adult, you can decide for yourself. But I will give you a recipe for salad dressing using fresh ginger. I make 1 serving at a time because I'm neurotic, but you might want to make a whole batch just so you have something to do with all the fresh ginger you have left over so it doesn't go bad.

1/4 cup lemon juice
1/4 cup lime juice
1/4 cup olive oil, avocado oil, macadamia nut oil or sesame oil. See, you have options.
1/4 cup coconut aminos (or soy sauce for the non paleos)
1 tbsp fresh ginger (I have no idea what the conversion would be if you used powder instead)
4 cloves (or more) garlic, pressed or minced
Salt, pepper

Makes about a cup. Must be shaken before every use.  You can get a little crazy and add some wasabi powder, lemon grass, turmeric, coriander, or whatever you like. Hmm, maybe tonight will be a coriander night.

Bambiballs with Zucchini Noodles and Vegan Pesto

I hit the game meat jackpot at Sprouts. They had venison, elk, antelope and wild boar! Not being a hunter, game meat is an exotic treat. This recipe can be done with beef or bison if you can't get your hands on venison.

Zucchini Noodles are my newest favorite. For some reason, if I take a vegetable I'm ambivalent to and put it through a spiral slicer, it is magically transformed into something awesome. I had my smoker going so of course, grape tomatoes ended up on there. I also through some fennel on the grill and roasted some red peppers.

I do a raw vegan pesto. I have a couple of vegan friends and one was a raw foodist for a while, so I like to make recipes I can share with them whenever possible - which isn't often. I don't think veganism is diametrically opposed to paleo foodism. I once read a New York Times article on people living the paleo lifestyle and they all seemed to snub vegans. I don't think that's fair. Even though our approach is different, our goals for better health are the same and both diets require great discipline, self-control and sacrifice. Plus, you can get lots of great vegetable recipes from vegans.

For the pesto:
Fresh Basil (I used about 50 grams because that's all I had)
2 oz raw pine nuts
1 tbsp olive oil
3 cloves of garlic
juice from 1/2 lemon
salt and pepper

Combine in food processor.

For the meatballs:
1 lb ground venison
1/2 cup eggwhites (or a couple of whole eggs)
2 tbsp tomato paste
1/2 tsp oregano
1/2 tsp thyme
1/2 tsp garlic powder
1/2 tsp fennel seeds
1/2 tsp nutmeg

Mix in a bowl ( I used my hands), make into little balls. I lined them up on aluminum foil and smoked them at about 250 degrees. You can grill or bake.

For the Zucchini Noodles:

5 small zucchinis
1 tsp olive oil
salt

Use spiral slicer or julienne slicer to make zucchini into pasta-like strands. Set in a colander and toss with salt for about an hour to drain the excess water. Saute in olive oil (or coconut oil) on a low flame. I used garlic flavored olive oil just because. I also tried to drain off the excess water that formed in the pan while cooking.It took about 5-10 minutes to cook the zucchini.

I mixed it up with spaghetti squash, smoked tomatoes, grilled fennel and roasted red peppers. This meal seems to have alot of steps, but it's really simple. You can prepare the zucchini first so it's draining, then do the meatballs and while those are cooking make the pesto and then cook the zucchini.