Aw, Just Stuff it!

ב"ה

My friend Leora recently lost her father. I knew him and he was a very nice man. I'm going to miss seeing him walking down the street. I mention this because in our community (and most other Orthodox Jewish communities I know of), when someone is sitting Shiva (from the Hebrew work for the number "7" which is the number of days of the strictest mourning period), particularly the member of the family who does the food preparation, the members of the community cook meal for them.

One of the recipes that someone brought over was acorn squash stuffed with five grain pilaf & tempeh. I read the recipe and thought it sounded interesting but, of course, I never keep a recipe as is (well, to quote Gilbert and Sullivan, "hardly ever"), so I took the idea and ran with it.

I took 1/2 cup each dried chick peas, adzuki beans and pinto beans -- or black beans instead of one of the others -- and 1 cup of millet. I soaked the beans overnight, drained them, added the millet and 5 cups of filtered water, added a couple of squeezes spicy brown mustard, 1 1/2 to 2 teaspoons each turmeric, coriander, paprika, 3/4 teaspoon (or so) cumin and a bit of (1/4 teaspoon) cloves. I boiled this, then cooked for about 20 minutes (until most of the liquid is absorbed and all the beans are cooked to taste). While it was cooking, sauteed up some veggies -- scallions (2 bunches), garlic (about 4 cloves, chopped and allowed to sit for 1/2 hour), several kinds of mushrooms (got the fresh ones from H-Mart and the frozen ones from a bag of mixed mushrooms), 1 small sweet potato (diced) and 1-2 carrots (also diced), cauliflower (about 1/4 head chopped up), 1 zucchini (diced). I added the veggies to the bean/millet mixture and mixed it all up. (I've been making this recipe (the bean and millet one) for a few weeks and I love it).

Our town has a farmer's market every Friday from July to Thanksgiving. I go to the Organic table when I go there. Lately, they've been selling some small pumpkins (well, I've been buying the smaller ones -- I only cook for myself) and I had one from last week. I cut off the top (as close to the stem as I could), cleaned out the seeds (you can roast the seeds if you like -- they're delicious), sprayed it with olive oil (from a pump spray) and sprinkled it with pumpkin pie spice (my recipe, based on one I found on line -- 1 part coriander and cloves, 2 parts allspice and nutmeg, 4 parts ginger and 8 parts cinnamon), put it in a 350 degree oven until it was baked through.

After the pumpkin was baked (until it was soft), I added some of the bean/millet mixture to the cavity.

I also made a cake today. I sifted (through a plastic screen strainer) 1 cup teff flour, 1/2 cup sorghum flour, 1/4 cup each almond flour and cocoa powder. I also added 1/4 cup cacao nibs. Then I added 1/4 teaspoon stevia powder (equivalent to 1 cup of sugar) and 3 teaspoons (1 tablespoon) baking powder. In another bowl, I blended together 1 can of pumpkin puree, 1 cup (unsweetened) almond "milk", 1/4 teaspoon maple extract and 1 teaspoon vanilla extract. I blended this all together, then mixed it into the dry ingredients. I put it in an 8" X 8" baking pan liked with aluminum foil. I baked it for about 2 hours at 245 degrees. It can bake longer if needed.

I haven't tasted it all yet, but I'll report back to everyone when I do.

Update 11/19/2012: I have tasted the cake and even made it twice more -- it's delicious. Update 12/9/2012: I've been making the chocolate cake now a few more times and I've been using 1 3/4 cups of teff flour with 1/4 cup cocoa. I reduced the maple extract to drops from a dropper -- 3-5 drops. This week, I also added 1/4 cup sesame seeds.

Update 8/30/2018: I was adding a recipe to the blog when I noticed this post and I decided to try the chocolate cake recipe again. The only thing is, I can no longer eat teff, sorghum, or pumpkin puree. So, instead I used 1 1/2 cups almond flour and 1/4 cup coconut flour and about 1/3 cup unsweetened organic peanut butter. I didn't sift the flour and I also started using coconut "milk" instead of almond. I also baked it in a loaf pan (or, should I say, two loaf pans?) and only baked it for an hour (+or-). I made a glaze with about a cup of cacao butter (pieces), 1 tablespoon of cocoa powder, 1/4 teaspoon stevia powder, and 1/2 cup coconut "milk". I put all the ingredients in a double boiler (ok, my double boiler is chipping enamel, so I used a pot sitting in a frying pan with water to boil around the pot). I also put into this 1/4 teaspoon vanilla and 1/8 teaspoon maple extract. It really came out delicious.