Vegan Coconut Bars

Chocolate and coconut vegan heaven.

Make it a Coconut Chocolate Treat

Sometimes you just need a treat. A recipe with coconut and chocolate. After all, you've been so good. You've been munching fresh veggies and brown rice. You've been slurping healing soup with cabbage and drinking green tea. You've been diligent checking labels for gluten, casein, and soy. So it's time for something sweet. Something moist and chewy and perfect with a cup of tea.

Egg-free baking is tricky. And at high altitude, even trickier. Truth be told, I've tossed a dozen egg-free experiments into the trash this summer. But these little vegan gems?

These were keepers.

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Crock Pot Curry with Coconut Milk

A delicious slow cooked curry simmered in the Crock Pot

Easy Does It - Curry Style

Certain individuals at Casa Allrich use their Crock Pot year round. Yes, even in the summer. It keeps the kitchen cool and uses no more energy than a humble light bulb. So when you crave a creamy spicy curry stirred with coconut milk and don't feel like sweating over a hot stove when the Kokopelli thermometer hanging under the portal reads 98 degrees F in the shade, consider the old school slow cooker. 

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Roasted Vegetable Salsa

Super easy salsa kicks off any party.

Why buy jarred salsa when making your own is so easy? This is a mild and flavorful salsa recipe perfect for those who find fiery fare a tad too harsh.

Easy Roasted Vegetable Salsa Recipe

This chunky salsa is delicious on grilled fish- or grilled anything, for that matter. And did I mention it's gluten/soy/citrus/milk/egg/nut/sugar free? And if you love more heat, Dear Reader, simply add it in. Or try my spicier Roasted Tomato Salsa. Keep your taste buds happy.

Ingredients:

1 pint (2 cups) of baby plum/grape tomatoes, quartered
3/4 cup corn kernels

1 red pepper, cored, seeded, chopped

1 red or sweet onion, peeled, diced

5-6 garlic cloves, chopped

Extra virgin olive oil, as needed

Sea salt, to taste

1 14-oz can Muir Glen Fire Roasted Tomatoes with Green Chiles

1-2 tablespoons balsamic vinegar, to taste

1/2 teaspoon ground cumin

A squeeze of organic raw agave syrup, to taste

2 tablespoons chopped fresh cilantro

Instructions:

Preheat the oven to 425ºF.

Combine the tomatoes, corn, pepper, onion, garlic, olive oil, and sea salt in a roasting pan and toss to coat. Spread in a single layer.

Roast the veggies in the top third of the oven until the veggies get tender- about 12 minutes.

Spoon into a bowl and set aside to cool.

Add the canned tomatoes, balsamic vinegar, cumin, agave and cilantro. Stir to combine. Taste test and adjust the seasoning to your liking.

Cover and chill for at least an hour to allow the flavors to co-mingle. Co-mingling is good.

Serving Ideas:

Serve as a dip with tortilla chips.

Serve as a condiment with grilled fish, chicken, rice and veggies, enchiladas, tacos, you name it.

Serve as a fresh uncooked sauce for pasta or polenta.

Recipe Source: glutenfreegoddess.blogspot.com

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Vegan Blueberry Cobbler Recipe

Blueberry cobbler- a taste of summer.

Fresh blueberries = summer. And lucky for me these indigo-hued gems are not only gluten-free and chock full of antioxidants (every celiac goddess needs fistfuls of antioxidants, you know) but they're pretty much everything-free. So that shoots them right to the top of a certain allergy-prone goddess' Yum List. I've been plopping them into smoothies, scattering them in bowls of buckwheat flakes and simply munching on them straight from the colander. Ah. Blueberry heaven.

Insert hazy slo-mo flashback

Once upon a time- in the innocent and carefree days of living merely gluten-free- I used to make a delectable (and ultra-easy!) Summer Blueberry Crisp. And Sour Cream Blueberry Muffins to die for. Click on those recipes for some serious berry indulgence. Go ahead. I won't mind. I'll wait. I won't be jealous. Well. Maybe just a wee bit jealous, now that I am gluten and casein-free. Not to mention temporarily egg, soy, lemon, nut, legume, blah blah blah free.

Smash cut to: my tiny blue-tiled cocina

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Blueberry July

The view from our casita last night was a painting in progress- rapidly changing washes of color from east to west. The softest pink pushing into indigo. Cerulean dropping into sea green when you least expected it.

The day had been hot and dry and discouraging- I had realized abruptly, driving home in late afternoon glare to the beat of an REM song (I've got my spine, I've got my Orange Crush) that I had used a chicken bouillon paste in the previous night's green chile. I reached for it automatically. Without thinking. Just as I had the cup of herbal tea with lemon the night before that.

I felt like an idiot. 

Armed with new information that will ease my ills I poison myself, in spite of my best efforts, in spite of my notes and lists and label reading, and spending twenty minutes stalking the cereal aisle at Whole Foods to search every package of oatmeal for evidence of gluten-free certification (the odd and unexpected good news is I tested totally negative for an oat allergy). I screwed up. Again.

And it frustrates the hell out of me.

Gluten and soy free for years, you'd think I'd know the drill. But as it turns out, I don't. I woke up last Tuesday and discovered the rules had changed. My list of verboten ingredients is too long to memorize. Lemon and mustard wreak serious havoc, we know. But now orange and grapefruit are starting to misbehave. I wasn't tested for lime, but now I'm leery. The whole sweet 'n sour citrus family doesn't seem very hospitable these days.

I am becoming kumquat-phobic.

Pecans are tempting. But with reactions to peanuts, almonds and walnuts, how smart would it be to start noshing on a walnut cousin? And then there’s eggs. They are in everything. Did you know egg whites are used to clarify many domestic and Australian and South American wines? I didn't. I blamed my sinus congestion and headache on the weather, not the wine I drank three times last week. In order to find wine that is absolutely egg-free you must find a vegan winery. Who knew?

Oh, and then there was the toasty-sweet goodness of that jar of sunflower butter I bought last week to replace my childhood comfort food, now off limits. Scanning the Food Allergy Testing results, there it was. I am mildly allergic to sunflower seeds. And almost every gluten-free corn chip is cooked in sunflower oil these days. 

Okay. Just breathe. I knew this wouldn't be easy. Or fair. I never believed life was fair but. Geesh. Give a gluten-free goddess a break. A girl does not live by bunny food alone. There are needs. There are food dreams. There are favorite recipes - the whole shebang now in exile.

I'm trying to be upbeat. Really I am.

But in all honesty? This is tough, Babycakes. Even tougher than going gluten-free. I said to Steve last night, I'm losing the will to live. Cue violins. 

Don't worry. He made me laugh with a Big Lebowski quote. I'll be fine. Really. I just need to channel The Dude. Go with the flow. Chill. And to paraphrase Walter...

F*ck it, Dude. Let's eat blueberries.