Piece of cake, piece of pie..

Anyone who’s seen Enough might be able to finish that quote.

I made my first ever pie last night! A PUMPKIN pie!

Nomnomnom!

I used to hate pumpkin pie. I know, I know. But I have seen the error in my ways and realize that I just hate store bought pumpkin pie.

I came across a fantasmic recipe over on Mama Pea’s blog! With her substitution suggestions I was able to convert her recipe to the pumpkin pie of my dreams.

Wait, is it just me that dreams about a peanut butter pie crust?

The recipe can be found on her blog. I followed it to the T, only subbing out natural peanut butter for the butter in the dough and 1/2 cup of maple syrup for the brown sugar (I reduced the almond milk to ~2/3 cup to make up for the liquid content). Vegan AND refined sugar free!

I think I may have under baked it just a bit but I’m still pretty impressed for my very first pie!

Happy Tuesday!

Pickle Cupcakes: Revisited

I’m pretty excited!!!

I’ve been wanting to rework this recipe since I became vegan even though I’m the only person I know that will eat them. Although I’ll bet it might entice a certain pearson.

I love the combination of the salty pickles with the sweet creamy peanut butter. One of my favorite combos! I find this version to be even better than the non-vegan one. Then again, what recipe isn’t?

Oh. And no, I’m not pregnant.

Pickle Cupcakes with Peanut Butter Icing (adapted from Cupcake Project – makes 4 cupcakes)
For cakes:
1/2 cup all purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon plus 1/8 teaspoon baking powder
1/8 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon dried dill
1/4 teaspoon salt
3 tablespoons canola oil
2 tablespoons cane sugar
1/2 tablespoon ground flax meal mixed with 1 1/2 tablespoons water (1/2 a flax egg)
2 tablespoons almond milk
2 1/2 tablespoons pickle juice (preferably from homemade pickles)
2 tablespoons chopped pickles (also preferably homemade)

For icing:
1/4 cup natural peanut butter
1 1/2 tablespoons powdered sugar (for a homemade version, see below)
2 – 2 1/2 tablespoons almond milk or water

Homemade Powdered Sugar
1/4 cup cane sugar
1/2 tablespoon tapioca starch

Blend all ingredients until powdery consistency is reached. Beware when you open the container, it’s dusty!!

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

In a large bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, baking soda, dill and salt. In a separate bowl, whisk together oil and sugar. Add in the flax egg, milk and pickle juice. Gently stir wet ingredients into dry until just combined. Fold in pickles.

Pour batter into muffin tin lined with papers or silicon cupcake liners (like the funky little ones I have) until the liners are 2/3 full. Bake 15 – 20 minutes or until the tops are springy! Let cool completely.

While the cupcakes are cooling, mix icing ingredients together with a spoon until smooth and uniform. Drizzle and/or heap onto cooled cupcakes and top with roasted peanuts!

Then, devour.

Un-awesome with a Side of Stardom!

You know what’s not so awesome?

When you burn your sweet potato fries.

*sob*

Don’t worry, I ate them anyway. No sweet potato goes to waste in THIS house.

See after watching Rachael Ray make oven fries during my lunch hour on Thursday, I got the brilliant idea to do the same thing for dinner! And to eat them with a nice, cold green/blue smoothie!

Well Rachael said to turn the heat up to 500 degrees and let those suckers go for about 25 minutes.

I probably should have kept a closer eye on them.

And added dates to my smoothie.

What was the star of the meal? The peanuty-lime dipping sauce.

Ooooooh yeeeeeeah..

Peanut-Lime Sauce
1 tablespoon stone ground mustard
1 tablespoon apple juice
juice of 1 lime
1 tablespoon peanut flour

Whisk all ingredients together and dip away! If you don’t have peanut flour, you could probably just substitute peanut butter. I didn’t have any peanut butter so I used my peanut flour!

Holy Buckwheat Groats, Batman!

This morning I discovered a new love. A love that might turn out to be stronger than the one I hold for oatmeal.

It makes me sad that I didn’t even pick up a full pound at Whole Foods. I don’t know if the amount I did buy will last the week.

Only time will tell.

See, for months I’ve been drooling over the buckwheat bakes on the Edible Perspective. The one that truly caught my eye was, of course, the pumpkin version. Oooh yes. Pumpkin. And buckwheat.

I stayed true to the recipe, only switching 1 tablespoon of flax meal and 1 tablespoon of quick cooking bulgur wheat for the chia seeds.

I topped my bake with some TJs peanut flour made into “peanut butter” and some unsweetened coconut. I knew I’d found a winner even before the first bite. I will DEFINITELY be making this again tomorrow morning.

Heaven on a plate, I tell you. =)

One of my all time favorites!

Another treat added to my friend’s goodie box!

I can’t believe I’ve gone almost a year without making these cookies! Well, actually, I can believe it. I’m not allowed to make peanut butter cookies. Especially not peanut butter ginger cookies. Why? Well.. because all that’s usually left are crumbs on the plate. I mean it uses my favorite peanut butter cookie recipe from Simply Recipes and it is my favorite exotic flavor combo.

These bad boys are pretty safe, though. They are for Amy. She won’t miss the two I ate to make sure they weren’t poisoned, right?

If you’re looking for something to liven up your peanut butter cookies, give ginger a shot! You won’t be let down!

Peanut Butter Ginger Cookies
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 teaspoon molasses
1/4 cup unsalted butter, softened
1/3 cup peanut butter (I used natural chunky)
1 egg
~1 tablespoon ginger root juice (I squeezed my fresh ginger with a garlic press to get the juice)
1/2 cup plus 2 tablespoons all purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon baking soda, heaping
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon sea salt

Cream butter until it starts to fluff up. Add in sugar and molasses, whipping until well combined. Add in egg, peanut butter and ginger juice, mixing well. In a separate bowl, combine flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt. Slowly add dry mixture into wet mixture, making sure the dough is well combined. Cover and refrigerate overnight.

On baking day, preheat oven to 300 (375 for crisp cookies). Shape dough into 1/2 inch balls (roughly, just make sure they’re all the same size), place on an ungreased cookie sheet and flatten gently with a fork. Bake 15 minutes (9-10 if you’re baking crispy cookies at 375) or until the cookies just start to turn brown on the bottoms.