Pumpkin Fluff

Nicole found this recipe here. That guy found the recipe at allrecipes.com . I love that site.

She sent an email to me with the title: will your guts please approve a nearly plastic dairy-like substance?!?

Stupid lactose intolerance.

I said, "bring it".

Ingredients

• 1 (16 ounce) container frozen whipped topping, thawed
• 1 (5 ounce) package instant vanilla pudding mix
• 1 (15 ounce) can solid pack pumpkin
• 1 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice

Directions

1. In a large bowl, mix together instant vanilla pudding mix, pumpkin and pumpkin pie spice. Fold in the thawed frozen whipped topping. Chill in the refrigerator until serving. 

This took her approximately 35 secs to make. Served with cinnamon (maybe hers were regular....can't remember) graham crackers as the dipping mechanism, this was REALLY good. Really really good. Four of us had our faces about 2 inches from that bowl, shoveling bite after bite in, for a solid 15 mins.

SUCK. SESS.

Pumpkin Pie Chia Pudding (Parfait)

(The original recipe is for a parfait, but I can't be trusted with cookies or other topping-like things in my house).


The linked blog, Oh She Glows, adds chia seeds to all kinds of smoothies and puddings and stuff. I didn't really think much of it, assuming it was the new acai trendy superfood or something. 


But then chia seeds were mentioned in the rad book I'm reading and they're the secret wonderfood of the ancient runners or whatever. Even after having used it a bit, I'm not convinced that I'm a better human being because of it, but who knows! Maybe I don't use it often or consistently enough.


Enter two things I'm interested in right now: pumpkin and chia.

Pumpkin Pie Chia Pudding

A healthier alternative to a delicious pumpkin pie filling! Feel free to play around with the ingredients to suit your taste buds. (her notes, not mine)

Yield: 2 servings or 1 & 3/4 cups
Ingredients:

• 3/4-1 cup unsweetened almond milk
• 1 cup canned pumpkin, chilled if possible
• 2 tbsp chia seeds
• 2 tbsp vanilla protein powder, optional
• 1/2 tsp cinnamon, or more to taste
• 1/4 tsp ground ginger
• pinch of nutmeg
• 1-2 tbsp maple syrup, to taste (I have pumpkin syrup, so I use that instead)

1. In a medium-sized bowl, whisk together all ingredients until combined and no clumpy bits remain.
2. Place bowl in the fridge for 1-2 hours or overnight, to thicken and chill.
3. Serve with raisins, walnuts, or crushed ginger cookies if desired.

So, chia seeds swell up, kind of like tapioca, when they're in liquid. Put too much in, they get slimy. I follow this recipe pretty closely (no protein powder because I don't have any, sub pumpkin pie spice for ginger & nutmeg, no toppings), and find the texture just fine. It's only a little sweet, a lot healthy, SUPER pumpkin-y, and seriously takes about 45 secs to whip together. I've had it as my afternoon "sweet" snack at work almost every day. Lovin it. 

Juicing!

Threw together a tasty one today, so I thought I'd share.

Friday night, LeGreg and I celebrated a friends new job. We started off decent, making chicken and steak fajitas (with sauteed sweet potato, SO GOOD). But then we drank all the beer in the world and ate a giant off the shelf pizza from the grocery store at 1am and then immediately went to bed.

I have felt better in my life than I did on Saturday morning. Let's just say that.

You know when you eat/drink a bunch of crap and you feel like you should apologize to your body and only give it organic vegetables for the rest of your life?

I was there.

I mentioned to boyfriend that some fresh juice would be so good and he offered to go to the store and get provisions.....fine by me!

Anyway, today I went through the leftover produce to see what I could throw together, and actually whipped up a really good juice!

3 apples (pretty small. no idea what kind. maybe fuji?)
1 carrot
1 orange
1 lemon

Quite refreshing, if I might say so!

Creamy Roasted Tomato, Garlic, and Onion Coconut Soup

I love Oh She Glows.


I'm clearly not vegan, as she is, but there are some legit tasty recipes on there. 


The recipe for this soup looked SO good. A must try. And I'm totally stoked for soup season.

Yield: 6 cups
Roasting vegetables:

• 5 pounds of roma tomatoes, washed & sliced in half
• 1 large sweet onion, peeled & sliced
• 2-3 large garlic bulbs, prepared for roasting
• extra virgin olive oil, kosher salt, & pepper, for vegetables

Soup:

• 3 cups roasted tomatoes
• 2 tbsp roasted garlic flesh
• all of the roasted sweet onion
• 1 can light coconut milk (reserve 2-3 tbsp for garnish)
• 3 cups vegetable broth (I used low-sodium)
• 2 tbsp tomato paste
• 2 tsp garam masala or make your own
• 1 tsp salt or to taste (you may have to reduce amt. if you used full-sodium broth)
• 1/2 tsp freshly ground black pepper
• for garnish: garlic croutons, coconut milk, pesto, herbs, garam masala, pepper, etc.

1. Preheat oven to 400F and line 2 baking sheets with tin foil (note that parchment paper will burn). Grab a small casserole dish to place the garlic in. For how to prepare the garlic, see this tutorial. Lightly drizzle on EVOO onto onions and season onions and tomatoes with S & P. Roast for about 30 minutes and then check on the vegetables. You might have to remove the onions early as they cook the quickest. When the onions are golden and lightly blackened on the edge, you can remove them. Continue roasting the garlic for about 60 minutes or so (check it after 4 5mins), and the tomatoes for about 1 hour and 20 mins. Your oven times will vary though, so keep an eye on them! (I wasn't really sure how "done" tomatoes look. I went by her pic, but her looked way flatter than mine did. I cooked for about an hour and a half)

2. Add 3 cups roasted tomatoes, 2 tbsp roasted garlic flesh, and all the onion into a large pot. Add coconut milk, tomato paste, and broth and stir well.

3. Stir in the seasonings and spices to taste. Bring to a boil and then simmer for about 5-10 minutes.

4. Carefully transfer into a blender, processor, or use an immersion blender. Pulse for just a few seconds until chunky. You can also make it smooth, but I liked the texture. Serve immediately and garnish with reserved coconut milk, a sprinkle of garam masala, croutons/bread, and fresh black pepper.

Ok. This was good. It wasn't as mind blowing as I was hoping, though. It sort of tasted like eating a good pasta sauce with a spoon. I think maybe I had too many tomatoes? and the toughened tomato skins from the roasting? Ehhh....about that whole texture thing. I will definitely make this again, and maybe tweak things a little bit. I think there are a lot of variables in play and might have made mine a little different than hers. It was still tasty, though, and I now own garam masala to play with! Smells so good. I'm totally going to make some Indian style chickpeas with it. 


Party on.