Rhubarb Muffins - Vegan and Low-Fat

Try as I might, I couldn't find a low fat, vegan rhubarb muffin recipe, so I had to create my own. I was happy how these turned out moist, yummy and fluffy! Here's the recipe:

1 1/2 cups rhubarb chopped into 1 cm cubes

3/4 cups sugar

1 cup apple sauce 

2 teaspoons vanilla

1/4 cup soy milk

1 3/4 cups flour 

2 Tablespoons ground flax seed

2 teaspoons baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

A pinch of salt

1 teaspoon cinnamon (optional)

Lightly grease a muffin tin, or line it with paper liners. Preheat the over to 325 F. 

Sprinkle 1/4 cup sugar over the chopped rhubarb and set aside. 

Mix the other 1/2 cup of rhubarb with the apple sauce, milk and vanilla. Add flour, flax, baking powder, baking soda, salt and cinnamon. Mix partially.  Add the rhubarb mixture and mix until just combined. 

Spoon batter equally into the 12 muffin cups. Bake on a middle shelf until done. 

A footprint, a moment with my father that shaped me.

Sometimes I avoid telling stories about my dad because I'm avoiding what could be awkward.  Some people don't know that he passed away three years ago to this day, and other people, like me, don't know how to respond when the loved dead are spoken about.  But, I want to talk about my dad.  I want to share our stories.  Here's a bit of one:

Every year my dad took me on a camping/backpacking trip.  Before leaving we’d prepare the weekend’s menu and head to the grocery store.  While my dad tried to decrease our food weight, by avoiding anything canned, we had a few luxuries of our own.  We bought tomatoes for our sandwiches.  These we packaged each in their own Tupperware with paper towel for cushioning and wiping our fingers on.  We always had steak the first night.  My dad would freeze the meat, the boil-n-bag corn and any other freezable food.  Then, early in the morning we would add the frozen food to top up our backpacks and drive to Jasper.  As a young child my favourite part of the shopping trip was going to the bulk section and creating my own trail mix.  It consisted more of Swedish berries and gummy bears than of nuts or dried fruit.  We took fresh fruit as well.

Late in the evening before we’d leave, I’d help my father sort and pack all we’d purchased into our packs.  He’d crack eggs into containers and leave the shells at home.  He washed the apples and pulled off their stems and stickers.  He stuck each sticker to its stem before tossing it into the garbage.  I put my bulk candy into a single bag to create my trail mix, and he mixed up his own gorp. 

My dad fully believed in no trace camping.  Whatever we carried up the mountain we would eat or carry out.  We took granola bars with us, but left the boxes at home.  Every item we brought had a purpose, or, if possible, like the paper towel wrapping the tomatoes and our plates with high side, more than one. 

On a warm afternoon we journeyed through the woods on a broad path up a gentle hill.  We pulled out apples to munch upon while we walked.  I kept in step with my dad and we made our way speaking only through steps and crunches.  He ate around his apple’s middle and then bit off the top of the core.  He chewed the crunchy matter and went in for another bite, right at the core.

“That’s gross.” I said

He shrugged and continued crunching and walking.

I had eaten my apple down to the core.

“Might as well eat it all,” my dad said. “Otherwise you’ll have to carry it out.”

“Do I have to?”

He repeated what I assumed to be the national park’s motto “Take only pictures, leave only footprints.”

I considered my options as he tossed the last of his apple into his mouth.  Stopping I swung my backpack off of my shoulders, found a bag of garbage and added my core to the other items I was carrying out.

Neither here nor there. Searching for two feet above.

When I was in grade 11 or 12 my father read to me the theological novel, A New Kind of Christian, by Brian McLaren.  It is a story of two guy discussing seemingly dichotomous theological questions.  One would bring up the question, the other would give the answer.  The answers are all strikingly similar.  A question might be Arminianism or Calvinism.  In response the man makes two points in the dirt, one representing Calvinism, and the other Arminianism.  He draws a line connecting the dots.  He then says “the answer is neither here,” pointing to one of the dots, “nor there,” pointing to the other, “nor somewhere along this line.  Rather,” and he would wave his hand in a circular motion about two feet above his diagram, “it is somewhere up here.”

Disclaimer, it was quite a while ago when this book was read to me.  I might not have all of the details right, but I remember this answer.  The answer is not one side of the dichotomy, nor the other.  Neither is it some compromise of the two.  The answer is not on our diagrams.  It is something other.  We need a new way of seeing things.  I found this answer both compelling yet dissatisfying.  It seemed right to be, but if the answer was neither Calvinism nor Arminianism, then what was it?  I wanted more.  I was okay with him taking away the only options I saw, if he could replace them with something.  Yet all he gave us was something, somewhere, two feet above.

I want a new way of seeing food.  I can draw one dot on the ground and label it over-indulgence, gluttony and obsession.  I’ll draw another dot and label it counting every calorie, dieting, and at the extreme anorexia.  I think both dots could be considered eating disorders.  Neither of them are healthy and so we draw a line connecting them and try to find our place on the line. 

I like food.  I like food quite a lot.  I like to be eating, and sometimes find myself eating when I am not hungry and the thing I am putting in my mouth doesn’t even taste good.  So, naturally I find myself closer to the gluttony dot.  The gluttony dot exclaims, “Food is good!”  I think that food is good, but I recognise that it is not healthy to be eating all the time.  So, I try to distance myself from the gluttony dot.  I slide along the line, “watching what I eat,” and praising myself when I deny my desire to eat.  The dieting dot screams “food is bad.  It’s a trap.  Keep far away from it and rule over it.  Don’t let it rule over you.”  Again, I find myself agreeing that we shouldn’t let food rule over us, and that food is bad if we eat too much. However,  I don’t want to count every calorie.  I try to avoid these two dots, and balance on the line somewhere in between them.  I want the good from both perspective, but I want to avoid the bad.  I’m trying to tiptoe along and avoid the muck.

I hope McLaren is right.  I hope there is some answer that is neither here nor there, nor a messy compromise, but somewhere two feet above.  I hope there is a way to enjoy food without having to worry if I am eating too much.  I’m just not sure what this two feet above perspective on food really is.  Any suggestions?

Creative Vegan Baking

So this is my third post this week (and after blogging about blogging in moderation too... oops), but I wanted to show off my creative vegan baking.

I made icecream cupcakes!

 I made a white cake, and then added some red food dye and strawberry flavour, so I made strawberry tall cake.  It tasted alright, but was actually very sweet.

I did have some troubles with the cooking of these, for example, how do you get the cones to stand up in the oven?  I cut into a tin dish, but learned that the deeper you go the less your cones can tip.  unfortunately I did not learn that right away.  Like an icecream cone, on a hot summer day, where the icecream falls off, so were some of my cones.  My first remedy was icing.  But we were low on icing sugar, so I had to use it in moderation.





But some of my cones had no"icecream" left on top at all, so I had to be more creative.

At work last week I was involved in making 500 cakepops (yes I do have possibly one of the best jobs ever).  So I used my cakepop making knowledge to make a cakepop top for my icecream cone.  I then took vegan chocolate chips and melted them and dipped the cakepop in there.












 The icecream cones were not my main focus though. I really wanted to bake heart cupcakes.

I got this idea from a picture I saw on google.  The process involved first baking the white cake, then cutting it into heart shapes, and then putting chocolate cake batter all around it  (and on top if it too).  I did not do the best job of this.  many of my cupcakes had white pieces sticking out, but hey, that is what icing is for... right?  After I iced them i realised how these cupcakes are sort of impractical.  the problem is that after icing them they only make hearts if you cut them in the right way, and after you ice them, how do you know what way that is?  Well, I think they exist mostly for taking a picture of them and putting them on one's blog so that one can look impressive.  I hope you are impressed.

Vegan Banana Bread

In the past week I have perfected, veganised and modified this recipe to the extent where I feel like I can call it my own. I for one really like it when people share their recipes, so I thought I could share this with the world
1 ½ Cups sugar
1 ¼ Oil (or vegan margarine)
4-5 bananas mashed
¼ cup apple sauce (not going to lie, I never measure this, because measuring apple sauce is messy)
2 TBSP flax (again, I never actually measure this)
1 TSP vanilla (who really measures)
Salt
1 ½ TSP baking soda
2 cups whole wheat flour
1 cup white flour
1 ½ cups chocolate chips

Mix Sugar and Oil.
Add mashed bananas, flax, apple sauce and vanilla. Mix well
Add flour, baking soda and salt, mix
Fold in chocolate chips

Makes 2 loaves -grease pan (bake at 325 for a long time)
Or
18 muffins -grease muffin tin or use paper cups(bake at 365 for less time)

Enjoy!

a baker dozen of lessons

I have been thinking about posting for a while. I have been learning a lot recently, but I am not exactly sure how to put it into words.
1) I have been learning that Jesus is Lord. When I look around at the mess in this world it is hard to believe that God is in control. But Jesus is Lord! He knows what he is doing. I don’t get it.
2) God has wrath. That is not something I enjoy thinking about, but that doesn’t mean that it isn’t true. God is love. And like a lover, when he sees those he loves getting hurt, he gets angry.
3) But, he also doesn’t want to be angry at anyone, but to have peace with everyone
4) I am afraid to offend others by my opinions. I am afraid that my opinion will be wrong or foolish or something. I was driving with my sister and brother-in-law for 7 hours through the prairies, so we had to do something to pass the time. We started talking about baby names (though my sister is far from pregnant) and every time I had a different opinion about a name than they did, I kept it to myself. I did not feel free to disagree. I did not want to offend them or hurt them in any way, or be wrong for liking a name that they did not.
5) I like food too much. That is not the problem. I think the problem is that I like to eat too much, but I forget to be thankful. Gluttony leads to ungratefulness. I am there, but I don’t want to be there, but I am not sure what to do about that.
6) I am proud, and when I decide (for whatever reason) that I think I am better than someone then I think I cannot learn from them. That is a lie.
7) Up to this point in my life, personal development has been forced upon me. It is time I take responsibility for myself. The things I have yet to learn are: WHO do I want to be in five years, and what and I going to do to get there?
8) “I am not the girl I used to be, I am not yet who I will become” Suzy Welsh
9) I am unhealthily independent. While I think that we are created for community, I do not live that out, nor know what it would look like if I did. I am afraid to ask people to help me because I reckon that they do not want to help me. Maybe they are busy, or they just don’t care. Whatever it is I feel the responsibility to do everything on my own. I am learning that sometimes people want to help me.
10) My independence and self-reliance probably is at the root of my doubts that God will help me if I ask him. My independence roots from my childhood, they ways my parents forced me to be independent and the times my sister responded to me as if she did not care.
11) God is good. He is good to me. He is at work in this world. I have seen this and I cannot deny it. He has healed my dad! But sometimes I still doubt. I still lack faith.
12) God will punish the self-satisfied... is that me?
13) I am going to be learning for the rest of my life! When I was in high school I thought I knew everything. Then I realised that I do not know everything. I started trying to answer my new found questions so that I could get back to the place of knowing everything. I thought I’d better figure it all out pretty quickly. BUT I don’t have to get it all figured out pretty quickly. I will always be learning! Hooray! I have lots to learn, and some things I will probably have to learn yet again. But I am on my way. I am learning, and I will continue to learn all the more!

I really am becoming more childish. My new favourite food is "ants on a log" which is funny because I do not really like celery, peanut butter or raisins.

Vegan Double Chocolate Cookies

adapted from http://www.silksoymilk.com/recipes/chocolate-chip-cookies

½ cup vegan margarine
2/3 cups sugar
2 TBSP soy milk
1TSP vanilla
¼ cup cacao
1 cup flour
½ TSP baking soda
1/3 cup chocolate chips

Preheat the oven to 350°F. Cream butter and sugars until light and fluffy. Slowly add soy milk, cream well, then add vanilla. Combine the dry ingredients in a mixing bowl. Add the dry ingredients to the creamed mixture, then fold in the chocolate chips.Drop by teaspoons on cookie sheets. Bake at 350°F degrees for 8-10 minutes.

I am in a place I never thought I would go to...

Meat is not Green
I never thought I would become a vegetarian, though, when I slowly started such behaviours it didn’t seem so far off any more. Even during the last few months of not buy much meat I never thought I would become a vegan... but here I am... thinking.
I am not a Vegan.
I don’t think I will ever become a vegan. I have always felt so blessed to not have food allergies, and be able to accept food from people, and have no reason to be picky. I value my ability to eat everything, so I still don’t want to be picky.
That being said I have a beef with the meat industry. If you know me at all, you probably realize that I do not care very much about animals, though I think I should, and I don’t like the thought of animal cruelty. However, even if there were no animals hurt or killed in the meat industry I still have this against them: they harm the environment and oppress the poor.
God, the creator of the heavens and the earth, is whom I follow. He made a wonderful world, allowed us to live in it and asked us to care for it. Respect for God involves respecting his creation. As I look into the meat industries environmental effects, the statistics I find are repulsive. Animals poop a lot, and when their waste, ends up in water system, this is just not a happy situation. The United Nations has labelled the meat industry as one of the most environmentally destructive forces both globally and locally. It produces more greenhouse gases than all cars, truck, ships and planes combined.
“According to Environmental Defense, if every American skipped one meal of chicken per week and substituted vegetarian foods instead, the carbon dioxide savings would be the same as taking more than a half-million cars off U.S. roads."
Not only is meat industry responsible for a large portion of pollution, it also carelessly uses resources. It takes 16 pounds of grain to create 1 pound of meat. The rain forest is being cut down, not only to provide a place for cow to be farmed, but to grow food for them. About 80% of agricultural land in the U.S. is used in some way for animal production. The world’s cattle alone consume more calories than is needed for 8.7billion people, which is more than this world’s population. It takes 25 gallons of water to produce a pound of wheat; this seems like a lot (and I don’t even know how big a gallon is) until it is compared with the 2500 gallons of water required to produce a pound of meat; in fact, if the water used in the meat industry was not subsidized, it would cost 35 dollars per pound of hamburger meat. Over half of the utilized water in America is used to produce feed for livestock and provide them with water. I cannot justify supporting an industry that is blatantly devastating the world God created and continue to claim that I follow him.
There is something more important to me than all the trees in this world. On the sixth day of creation God created people in his image, and he saw that his creation was very good. Throughout the scriptures God commands us to care for the poor, and Jesus came to preach the good news to the impoverished. As a follower of Christ I have been called to care for the poor, look after the needy and love. Developing countries that are dying of starvation, are exporting their grain to feed cows.
“Human beings who could be fed by the grain and soybeans eaten by U.S. livestock: 1,300,000,000Number of people who will starve to death this year: 60,000,000
Number of people who could be adequately fed by the grain saved if Americans reduced their intake of meat by 10%: 60,000,000”
Just not eating meat will not get that food to the world’s poor, but it is standing up against something that is wrong, and reducing my carbon footprint, as I fight for justice.
The first change is to change myself. I have decided against supporting the world’s meat industry in any way. This, sadly includes giving up purchasing milk and eggs. If someone has barbequed me a steak, I am going to eat it rather than let it go to waste, but I am going to try my best to do nothing that will support the meat industry. If I get offered milk, and I know I have other options and that my consumption will cause the other person to need to get more milk sooner, then I sure hope I do not accept it. This will be hard, real hard, but if it is wrong, then it is wrong and I want nothing to do with it.
"It now seems plain that [a vegan diet] is the only ethical response to what is arguably the world's most urgent social justice issue." –The Guardian
My facts are from:
Deep vegetarianism: http://books.google.ca/books?id=Z0s3X_vh1_EC&pg=PA95&lpg=PA95&dq=meat+industry+injustice&source=web&ots=8mA-QcLh45&sig=JlaFHyzceBYBcpN6bSa5WzKCh7M&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=9&ct=result#PPA100,M1
GoVeg.com
EarthSave: http://www.earthsave.org/support/index.htm
Animal Liberation Front: http://www.animalliberationfront.com/
Vegan Outreach:http://www.veganoutreach.org/

James 5:1-6
Now listen, you rich people, weep and wail because of the misery that is coming upon you. Your wealth has rotted, and moths have eaten your clothes. Your gold and silver are corroded. Their corrosion will testify against you and eat your flesh like fire. You have hoarded wealth in the last days. Look! The wages you failed to pay the workmen who mowed your fields are crying out against you. The cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord Almighty. You have lived on earth in luxury and self-indulgence. You have fattened yourselves in the day of slaughter. You have condemned and murdered innocent men, who were not opposing you.