#27 on my list, Try 30 new dishes (#3)

WOW, even though I like to eat I feel really behind on this one for my list. My new food that I tried was a recipe that I got out of my book 'Gluten Free Girl'. It's Popped Amaranth Cereal. She writes about this grain in her chapter 'Going against the grain', the thing for people with celiacs disease is that we tend to not be able to get a lot of grains into our diet due to the fact that most of them are tainted through gluten infested bread, especially if you were like I used to be and you like the 12 grain breads and that kind stuff. These grains are important though since the lend a lot of fiber to a persons diet and we all know why we need fiber in our diet;) Well through this book I was able to find one, Amaranth, that should help out with that.

Really when I first saw the tiny little seeds I wasn't sure if I was buying the right thing when I was at the Co-Op last night. I thought that they would be more the size of flax seeds, trust me they're not! They're so tiny that upon looking at them a person would scoff at what these babys are capable of, I know I did. But I really wanted to try the cereal so I got just a little, I mean I don't want to waste money on something that I may not even like. But after making my mew cereal this morning I can safely say that is not the case. Not only were these hearty little seeds that fill you up pretty fast, but now my kitchen smells like popcorn! Now who can argue with something that great. The cook time in the book said that the seeds should take about 5 minutes before they turn brown, it was much less then that for me so I actually ended up burning some. I discarded those, but the rest were fine. Then I added some chopped pecans and brown sugar. GFG's recipe called for cinnamon and ground ginger which I'm sure is good to I just didn't have any, and I'm not a fan of putting dates in food unless they are ground in (I'm not big on the texture). Anyway the recipe (as I made it) is below for those of you who are intrigued to try something new.

Popped Amaranth Cereal

1/4c. Amaranth seeds (Tthese can be found in the bulk foods section of your super market)
1/2c. Warm milk ( I used more since I like my cereals with more milk in them)
1Tbsp Light brown sugar
2Tbsp Chopped pecans (I used more since I like nuts)

Over high heat, heat up a skillet until beads of water can dance accross it. Once the skillet is this hot put the seeds it. It does not take long for them to start popping so when this happens stir the seeds continually until they satrs to brown. If you start to smell burning popcorn take them off the stove immediately since you might have burned some (they're sill good, but it's not fun to taste burnt, and then eventually wet, popcorn).

Add the milk and extras to the cereal. If you don't want to heat the milk before cooking the cereal that's fine the seeds will stay hot in the bowl while you heat up the milk. I reccommend this way so that the milk doesn't get cold while you're cooking the seeds. Of course if your tast buds lean you to other things then by all means try it. Now Enjoy!

If you want to try GFG's way then add 1/2tsp. cinnamon, 1/2tsp. ground ginger, 1Tbsp organic cane sugar, and 1/4c. dates. The nuts and milk stay the same.

#27 on my list, Try 30 new dishes (#2)

For my birthday last week Kali made me a wonderful, and flourless, cake!!! She even made raspberry sauce to counter act the sweetness of the cake. IT WAS AWESOME!!! So here is the recipe for ya'll to try for yoursleves. Enjoy!

Flourless Chocolate Cake

INGREDIENTS:
-1/2 cup water
-1/4 teaspoon salt
-3/4 cup white sugar
-18 (1 ounce) squares bittersweet chocolate
-1 cup unsalted butter
-6 eggs

DIRECTIONS:
-Preheat oven to 300 degrees F (150 degrees C).
-Grease one 10 inch round cake pan and set aside.
-In a small saucepan over medium heat combine the water, salt and sugar. Stir until completely dissolved and set aside.
-Either in the top half of a double boiler or in a microwave oven melt the bittersweet chocolate.
-Pour the chocolate into the bowl of an electric mixer.
-Cut the butter into pieces and beat the butter into the chocolate, 1 piece at a time. Beat in the hot sugar-water.
-Slowly beat in the eggs, one at a time.
-Pour the batter into the prepared pan.
-Have a pan larger than the cake pan ready, put the cake pan in the larger pan and fill the pan with boiling water halfway up the sides of the cake pan.
-Bake cake in the water bath at 300 degrees F (150 degrees C) for 45 minutes. The center will still look wet.
-Chill cake overnight in the pan. To unmold, dip the bottom of the cake pan in hot water for 10 seconds and invert onto a serving plate.

NOTE:
It is important to let it chill all night. Unless you want pudding;) Seriously though, when it's done it should have the consistency of a mouse or cheese cake.

#27 on my list, Try 30 new dishes (#1)

The other day in my Spanish class we had a moment of culture getting to try different food from the Spanish culture, or as they would say 'la comida'. Anyway, I got to try Ceviche. Ceviche is a seafood dish by which the seafood is cooked by marinating in the acidity of different juices like lemon juice, and vinegar (used as a substitute for wine since I don't drink). It's a simple enough dish, but it takes a while to make just because it has to marinate for so long. The only thing that I would have done differently, if I had made it, would be to use rice vinegar or something that would be clear. The guy that made it used balsamic vinegar. Now balsalmic vinegar is good on salads or things that look OK being brown, but really there's nothing that's looks OK about brown seafood. Seriously I know some of the best cooks around are men, my dad I qualifies since he did a lot of cooking for us growing up, but someone really should have been with this guy in the kitchen baby sitting him. I also would have served it with lettuce or something that would make it as a salad dish, instead of chips so that it reduced the dish to a dip. However, brown seafood and chip aside, it is a delicious dish and it definitely falls in the realm of my dietary restrictions. I'll post the recipe for it soon.