Mom's Cream of Wheat

- slightly more than 1/3 cup cream of wheat

- 1 cup unsweetened almond milk

- 3/4 cup vanilla coconut milk

- 1 tablespoon local raw honey

- about 1 cup strawberries

- about 1 cup homemade applesauce (local apples)

Boil the coconut and almond milk with the honey and strawberries. Add cream of wheat. Continue to boil about two minutes while stirring constantly. (The cream of wheat will stick to the strawberries making a kind of fruit nugget. I like these.)

Let simmer on low while casually stirring until desired consistency. Stir in applesauce before serving.

Rum shakes

Tonight my husband and I took some strawberry cheesecake ice cream, coconut milk and malted milk and added some of this lovely cinnamon cream rum.

On Milk Options

My daughter has had a lot of problems with fluid in her ears. She doesn't get colds per se, it all goes into her ears. We've found that a dairy-free diet helps her get rid of that fluid.

With back-to-school, she had her first incident last weekend-- on a day we were scheduled to meet friends for pizza. Instead of pizza, we had fried chicken.

I'm a big believer in moderation, so I struggle to find a go-to substitute for dairy milk. I think it partially depends on the purpose. I like to rotate my milks, primarily because I don't want to feed everyone too much soy.

Silk Very Vanilla (soy) is the family's favorite drinking milk, though the chocolate is my husband's favorite. I often use the Unsweetened for cooking.

Silk Pure Almond is common in this house, usually vanilla for drinking. My husband likes the dark chocolate, daughter does not. 

Silk Pure Coconut in vanilla is often in the house for drinking (and fruit smoothies) and plain coconut milk for cooking (especially for dishes like Mac and cheese). 

These are the alternative milks that Target carries. Coconut milk is full of fat, which for those on a paleo diet would be considered a good thing. I'm not really a low fat cook, so I don't think we need extra fat.

Almond milk doesn't have protein and since I usually need the extra protein... But we recently tried the protein fortified So Delicious Almond milk which did not have calcium.

Today we tried Good Karma flax milk, which had lots of omegas, but no calcium or protein. But no real fat either.

We also occasionally use the almond milk and soy milk from Aldi. My daughter swears their vanilla almond milk is the best.

15 years ago I always used Rice Dream rice milk that I used to purchase by the case. The nutritional value was minimal and it was all carbohydrates. 

So I still don't have a go-to milk. And rotation is not a bad thing.

Cheesy spinach orzo

It's 95 degrees here and for some reason, I get the idea it would be *nice* to have baked mac and cheese for dinner. My mother gave me this really nice block of aged sharp provolone. She deemed it "too stinky" for her crew to eat.

But then I had no full sized pasta, just spaghetti or orzo. So I made orzo. A LOT of orzo.

Ingredients:

- about eight ounces aged extra sharp provolone

- about three ounces Monterey Jack

- about two ounces cheddar

- about 4 ounces grated Parmesan 

- 3 cups coconut milk

- 2 tablespoons flour

- 3 tablespoons butter

- 3/4 teaspoon fresh ground four color peppercorns

- 1 teaspoon garlic pepper

- 1 block frozen spinach, thawed and drained

Preheat oven to 375.

Prepare pasta as desired. Set aside.

Melt butter in pan, slowly mix in flour. When bubbly, slowly mix in coconut milk so flour-butter roux blends in nicely.

Add desired seasonings. 

When bubbly, add all cheese but Parmesan, in tiny chunks. Remove from heat. Stir. When melted, add spinach.

Mix sauce and pasta in oven safe dish. Top with Parmesan. Bake, covered, for 30 minutes.

Blender day!

We finally bought a blender. A 700-watt Black and Decker with "easy pour" glass pitcher.

It was 29.99 at Target, and I was debating about a 450-watt on clearance for 19.98 or a 700-watt at a higher price. My husband kept saying not to cheap out. I just wanted the right amount of blender. My research indicated that most people and most use only require 450 watts. But lots of ice and harder to grind stuff, well, some folks get impatient with the 450.

And our old one was a Hamilton-Beach, but I have no idea what the wattage was. 

And the Hamilton-Beach models at Target were ugly and more expensive.

So, I got the Black and Decker 700-watt. It turned out to be on sale for $24 even before my employee and RedCard discount.

Made the family strawberry smoothies with coconut milk and Greek yogurt for dinner. I think my old blender was 450 watt, because I blended for the same amount of time "as usual" and they came out as strawberry milk. Delicious but milk.

Coconut milk fruity ice cream

We had a yummy food night. 

Dinner was homemade kale chips and peanut butter and fresh strawberries on Wegmans apple oat bread.

We're ending the night with homemade dairy free ice cream: vanilla coconut milk, fresh strawberries, the leftover fruit purée I froze after making quick pops last week, local raw honey, fresh raspberries, and chambord.

Cherry Coke Coconut Cream Zoku Pops

The outside shell:

- flat cherry coke

The inside cream (about 4 pops worth)

- 1/4 cup coconut milk

- 1/4 cup half and half

- about 2 tablespoons lemon juice

- about 2 teaspoons raw honey

Zoku pops

First attempt 

No cooking

Due to the recent heat wave, cooking has been kept to a minimum. Salad. Leftovers. Cheese platter.

This morning, I served Morningstar breakfast patties and watermelon as a precursor to breakfast, so child opted out of cream of wheat.

So, I got funky.

LAVENDER CREAM OF WHEAT

- 1 cup vanilla coconut milk
- 1 tablespoon honey
- about 1 teaspoon lavender
- 2 handfuls golden raisins
Heat. Add 4 tablespoons cream of wheat

PureCoconut milk

A friend gave me a coupon for PureAlmond or PureCoconut milk. My daughter is a vanilla almond milk junkie, so while she was eager to try coconut, I was hesitant to deviate from the current favorite.

Last night my husband made caramel iced coffees with it, and he really liked it. I found the coconut flavor in the coffee not enough to really add something so it was more of a distraction.

My daughter didn't like it plain, which I found odd, since when I tasted it by itself, I found it very light.

We made our cream of wheat with it this morning and she liked that. Of course, I let her make the cream of wheat in a saucepan on the stove with my supervision and minimal interference so of course she loved it. She made it.

Sweet Potato Coconut Soup

Me. My blender. No ideas for dinner.

Soup.

32 ounces kitchen basics no salt added vegetable stock
A big can of sweet potatoes with most of the syrup drained
A can of Trader Joe's organic coconut milk
A tablespoon of cinnamon
2 tablespoons organic maple syrup
And a large teaspoon of nutmeg

I overblended to a thin liquid and put in the crockpot.

My husband had two bowls. I thought it tasted like something they'd serve in a fancy restaurant with sliced almonds and a dollop of some sort of cream in the center... Daughter, who loves soup and eats just about anything, HATED it. My heart is broken.