Thursday, February 11, 2016

Pizza - Cauliflower and Almonds

 
Many people can't eat wheat products. Many choose not to and many must avoid them to lose weight. I've been cooking with almond flour now for almost 20 years since my brother was diagnosed with Crohn's Disease back then. Man, times have changed! I remember having to order 25 lb tubs of almond flour directly from the almond farmers because it was unheard of. Aren't we lucky now that any ordinary grocery story sells it! And its cheaper now too!

So, because of the diagnosis, my mother and I became experts in baking with almond flour. We've made breads, pies, cakes..you name it! Heck, even my pie crust recipe is STILL getting hits all these years later (I think I posted it back in 2002 or so)!

So here it is, pizza crust AND is actually pretty yummy! Now, there are many variations and I like two of them. One uses only cauliflower and the other which I am going to post uses both cauliflower and almond flour. I decided to add some almond flour to get rid of the extra I have in my freezer.

Half head of cauliflower
half cup of almond flour
half cup shredded cheese
1 egg
2 tbsp cream cheese

Preheat oven to 410F

1. I started by microwaving the cauliflower because it dries it out while it cooks. You DO NOT want to use wet cauliflower. If you steam or boil it then make sure you squeeze out the water.
2. Process cauliflower in a food processor, add the other ingredients and pulse until mixed.
3. Line a large cookie sheet with parchment paper, you can add a little olive oil to the paper
4. Pour the "batter" onto the cookie sheet and spread fairly thin.
5. Bake in the hot oven for 20 minutes. If it is browning, then that is good. The crust needs to dry out.
IF you can flip it over then do that and cook another 10 minutes. Its ok if the crust is brown.
6 . Spread tomato sauce and cheese over the top and cook for another 10 minutes. Let it cool slightly and then cut. You should be able to pick it up like pizza.

ENJOY


Thursday, February 4, 2016

No Rice Fried Rice (Cauliflower Fried Rice)

 Like many people, I really enjoy Chinese or Asian inspired food, just look at my previous entries! Anyways, tonight I was craving fried rice, but those of you that know me, even if I drink only water, my body turns it to fat so I've been finding out that starchy carbs are not my friend. What was I to do! I remembered a friend telling me how someone they know made fried rice with cauliflower as the "rice" and I kept thinking "how delusional."  

So tonight as I was microwaving the cauliflower I kept wondering why people try to trick themselves with horrible substitutes, and why am I one of those people tonight!  So I found a head of cauliflower, cut it in half and microwaved it til soft. I chopped it in the food processor until the size of rice and put t aside.

Now, the flavoring is up to you, but I will post the recipe I used. Oh and by the way.....It actually DOES taste like yummy fried rice!

half head cauliflower
1 tbsp soy sauce
1 tbsp fresh grated ginger
1 tbsp fish sauce (optional)
handful of peas
handful of green beans, chopped
handful of chopped mushrooms
1 onion chopped
2 tsp garlic chili sauce
1 egg
1 tbsp oil

1. Cook the cauliflower until soft. Place in food processor and pulse until you get small rice sized bits
2. Heat the oil and add the onion and cook for a minute. Add ginger and chili sauce and cook for another minute.
3. Add cauliflower, green beans and mushrooms. Next, form a bare circle in the middle of the pan where you will scramble the egg. Once scrambled, mix into the rice.
4. Strir fry for a minute then add the soy sauce and fish sauce. Stir fry more.
5. Turn off the heat and add the peas.

DONE