Gratitude Monday -- Unbaked Edition

I wanted brownies, but it was too hot to bake.
Instead I began experimenting with rolled oats mixed into coconut oil with molassess, cane syrup, and coconut.
And I liked it.
It took out the craving nicely without heating up the house. In a hot, dry summer, that's important.
I was grateful for having done it and liked it enough to play around with the basic premise. I've added goji berries, raisins, peanut butter, vanilla, sea salt, walnuts, and pecans in various versions.
They're all good.
But the raw rolled oats took its toll. I  had half -expected it as years ago I used to soak oats overnight in cranberry juice for breakfast. I made various versions of it and loved it, but I got nasty stomach pains, fevers, I lost weight, and it wasn't good.
I thought it might be the raw oats so stopped eating it and the tummy troubles magically disappeared.
I'd hoped the oats would cook enough in the hot oil, but I was out of luck.
Giving up on the uncooked chocolate goodness was out of the question so I made a batch omitting the oats and cranking up the coconut.
It was very good and I was content for a short while.
Then it occurred to me to cook the oats and see what happens. So yesterday I made one serving size of porridge with goji berries and raisins and as it cooled I threw together the other constituents of the squares except peanut butter.
I am so grateful I did.
My Chocolate Porridge Squares are filling, satisfying, and they are really quite healthy.
I will have to make the peanut butter version soon.
Science demands it.

Gratitude Monday -- Food of the Gods

Chocolate.
It helps me write.
It's a pleasant diversion.
And it's health food.
How could I not be grateful?

If you're wondering, the Latin for chocolate is Theobrama Cacao which means food of the gods.
Here's a link on for more:

Chocolate history.

How do you feel about chocolate? 

It's Twofer Tuesday Time

I’d wondered the other day where to mine the sentences I’d read from for this Twofer Tuesday. The answer came, as it so often does, while I was busy doing something else.
The something else in question was debating which bit of writing chocolate I ought to have. It was an important question yesterday as I hadn’t gotten around to doing the day’s writing yet.
Should it be a promise? Or a reward?
Promise won, of course and I had some Lindt. As I was going through the varieties I had on hand I decided the sentences ought to come from one of the packages.

From the Lindt dark chocolate with chili we find this compelling prose:

“Lindt Excellence Chili is a unique and sophisticated new taste experience from Lindt’s Maîtres Chocolatiers. Enjoy this combination of Lindt’s finest aromatic dark chocolate with the well balanced spice of premium red chili.”

This is good chocolate, but in the end I went with the company’s milk chocolate and caramel offering yesterday.
Disclaimer: I don’t work for the company, and no one has paid me to say this. Dammit.

In keeping with the theme, albeit a thin one, of sustenance, here’s something from A Fly on the Wall. In it, Brelyan has just returned to this century. He’s traced his mirror to a recycling center and has to wait outside overnight.

“Mosquitoes of the 21st Century were vicious, bloodthirsty hooligans. The spread-on skin covering that protected him in the future did nothing in the current time.”

For more, or to find out how to participate, please see the Women of Mystery.

My Name Game Post

Here's my version of the name game that Reb did the other day.

1 Your rock star name (first pet, current car) – Trixie Corolla

2.Your gangsta name (favourite ice cream flavour, favourite type of shoe) –
Chocolate Gaucho Boot

3.Your Native American name (favourite colour, favourite animal) – Blue Wolf

4.Your soap opera name (middle name, city where you were born) – Jocelyn Barrhead

5.Your Star Wars name (the first 3 letters of your last name, first 2 of your first name) Utale

6.Superhero name (2nd favourite colour, favourite drink) – Red Whiskey

7.NASCAR name (the first names of your grandfathers) – George John

8.Dancer name (the name of your favourite perfume/cologne/scent, favourite candy) Coffee Caramel

9.TV weather anchor name (your 5th grade teacher’s last name, a major city that starts with the same letter) Fleming Frankfurt

10.Spy name (your favourite season/holiday, flower) – Samhain Tiger Lily

11.Cartoon name:(favourite fruit, article of clothing you’re wearing right now) – Strawberry Socks

12.Hippie name (what you ate for breakfast, your favourite tree) – Granola Pine

13.Movie (or porn) star name (first pet, first street where you lived) – Trixie Klondike


I can certainly understand why Trixie Klondike changed her name in later years to Jocelyn Barrhead. It's bad enough having been a porn star, but can you imagine if her fans ever found out she was once Granola Pine?!
And we'll not be discussing the years as Coffee Caramel . . .

Okay, I'll stop, but those names clearly have a story to tell.

The Wild Amyloidosis Chase Begins

I was monitored virtually constantly. The nurses’ station was right outside my door in the Special Care Unit. This enabled them to keep a close eye on both me and the fellow in the next bed, 60ish lifelong diabetic who’d had a very high blood sugar spike, in the 20s or even 30s. For a while a nurse sat in a chair between us watching.

My vitals signs gave the assorted nurses and my doctor quite a time. They made several tries until they got a pulse and blood pressure readings they were willing to believe. They came to not trust their machines and usually did it the old-fashioned way, but not after up to three tries with the automated cuff. It seemed to be done every 15 minutes or so at first, then calmed down to every hour.

Irregular heartbeat can lead to blood clots so I was put on an IV drip of Heparin, an anticoagulant. Blood was drawn every four hours and I was on absolute bed rest.
Next I was given a nitro patch for overnight. It’s a vasodilator and it works. My feet got warm for the first time in days. I also enjoyed the common side-effect of a nitro headache. It wasn’t that bad, and my warm feet were a reasonable trade-off.
I was awakened in the night frequently for the vitals and bloodletting. This was good. The only problem was at one point in the night the catheter got a vapor lock or some such and didn’t work. It was unpleasant, but a nurse was in checking my vital signs at the time so it was corrected immediately.

My doctor likes to understand why things happen. He was flummoxed why someone my age, 49, my weight, about 145 lb., and in good health got hit with congestive heart failure. An ECG had suggested damage, possibly from a heart attack. I couldn’t think of anything in the past 3-6 months that would fit.

Meanwhile, I’d had Mike email my cousin The Bag Lady the first night as the next day was her birthday and she would wonder if she didn’t hear from me. This led to her doing a bit of sleuthing, as is her way, and found a cousin who said his family members had heart problems at around my age and he further suggested the doctor check for amyloidosis. That’s a disease where rogue proteins break off and attack organs.
My doctor is an animated fellow to begin with. When he heard this his eyebrows shot up to his hairline, his eyes bugged out, his mouth flew open, and he madly drummed his pen against my chart. “Yes! Yes! We’ll look for this. It would cause the kind of damage suggested in the ECG! Yes!”

Meanwhile I had more important things on my mind. Could I have chocolate?
I could, but my doctor said it had to be dark and “only two blocks.”
Now to me that’s a 4” x 6” x 1” slab. My husband said it meant two square sections of a chocolate bar. He won. Mike, who was at my side every day all day through this, got me chocolate and made sure I stuck to the daily allotment.

My doctor wanted more tests done so after two days here I was transferred to Red Deer Regional Hospital 55 miles away. It was the only time I was scared. Being transferred to a larger, city hospital meant unequivocally there was something seriously wrong.




I got my appetite back within about an hour of getting the diuretic that morning. I never knew how much I liked salt until I couldn’t have it.

Yippee-Ki-Cayenne

I often use cayenne pepper in baking and never thought much about it other than to acknowledge it was, well, unusual.
But the other day Clare2e at the wonderful Women of Mystery blog made mention at the end of her post about accidentally using red pepper instead of nutmeg in an apple pie.

I’ve done that on purpose. I made one on the weekend that barely lasted two meals.

Hot pepper is great in hot chocolate. This was how the native South Americans before took it before the Europeans came along and added sugar. For the record, I use sugar too.

Knowing the traditional use and having eaten mole sauce, which contains chocolate, I decided to play a bit with it.
It’s lovely in brownies. The heat smoothes the chocolate and give a wee bit of an after bite. It’s very pleasant especially on a cold Canadian winter day.

It’s also absolutely stellar in gingerbread. I went to make some gingerbread last winter and didn’t have quite enough dried ginger. Rather than going out and getting some I paced a moment, drummed my fingers on the table and Ha! The obvious solution was revealed.

Ginger is hot. So’s the pepper. The trick is to get the mix right so the heat augments, not overpowers, the ginger.
I added about a one-quarter teaspoon to the mix. It worked fine and made it seem like I’d used especially strong ginger, nothing else.
I was so tickled with what I’d done it’s part of the recipe now. I’ve used up to a half-teaspoon of cayenne, but I increased the ginger to a teaspoon. If you like spicy, this is adequate. I love the hot/sweet combination and always have. We’ve got an old family recipe for mustard that uses sugar and turmeric that’ll clear your sinuses.

I find reasons to put it in other baking as it occurs to me. I’ve even thrown it in an ordinary loaf of bread.

Last winter I was taking cayenne capsules and discovered the cayenne warded off hot flashes. Sadly, my body adapted and that’s not working for me anymore.

But it still tastes good and with the autumn here and baking season upon us I’ll be finding even more uses for cayenne. Meanwhile, I may need to bake another nice, hot, apple pie.

Me And My Typeaus

Faux French spelling aside--I did it on purpose--I routinely find typos and editing jewels in my blog posts.

I’m sorry.

I do the best I can. I can reasonably conclude from recent history that my best is woefully inadequate. For example, a recent post contained the gem “tipped his hat to me other . . ." While it does offer a lovely Irish-esque lilt, it makes no sense.

At least I do eventually find them. When I do I go in and make the correction. Can’t help myself. Even if no one will every see it again I feel the need to make it right.
It’s my writing. It’s got my name on it. If I am going to make wild allegations about the Web that I am a writer, then I should make the copy as clean as I can.
I’d like to find someone or something to blame but I can’t. It’s all me.

Oh, sure, I had laser eye surgery seven years ago and that’s certainly a . . .well it definitely plays a . . . no, I can’t blame my eyesight or the weather or lack of chocolate or an improper chew toy regimen. I simply think that everything is as it should be when I post.

Later I find out that I am once again wrong.

Sigh.

All I can do is my best and hope I catch every slip of the finger later on.
If I don’t, then any chance we can write it off as part of my charm?

The Writing Hour

I’m trying an experiment.
Each day I devote one hour exclusively to writing. No playing on the internet, no email, no looking out the window, no getting up for a drink of water or to pick out a simple melody on guitar.

Nothing.

Just put my head down and write. I throw a CD in so I have some music doing. It helps me focus and gets me into a writing/correcting rhythm.

I’ve done it three times now with good results. I’m getting something done on the WIP. Substantial movement. Actual material gain.

I don’t even allow myself to get up for chocolate in that hour. If I actually stick to the hour then I’ve earned this rich reward. If not, then it pulls consolation duty.

This was prompted by a change in the household routine. I’ve recently taken over laundry and dishes. My husband has taken a job driving truck and commonly works 12 hours a day so I took over some traditional chores. Laundry had been my duty for a while way back when, but in our 17 years together he did the dishes. I did them only when he was away or when I’d done a lot of baking.

Now that I’ve got more work I felt the need to structure my time and that’s what brought on the experiment.
I still have plenty of time in the day to go back to the manuscript if I want, but if I don’t it doesn’t matter. I’ve done something.

Banana Pudding Pie

A comment a few posts ago (thanks Talia) contained the suggestion that I ought to post recipes for my crustless banana pudding pie and the attendant chocolate Schnapps sauce.
Tasty idea.
This recipe is suited for celiacs. I’m not a true celiac though I am wheat intolerant. I can get away with having a bit of wheat flour, but I chiefly use spelt and other lower gluten flours. I keep rice, tapioca, and potato flours around for when I feel the need to be gluten-free.
You gluten-eaters can substitute white flour in this recipe.
I’m not big on following recipes. I consider them something to be simultaneously referred to and ignored.
Although the following is my own invention I learned how to be gluten-free from the cookbooks by Bette Hagman like “More from the Gluten-Free Gourmet” and “The Gluten-free Gourmet Cooks Fast and Healthy.”
Here goes.

Crustless Banana Pudding Pie

Three ripe bananas.
About 1/2 cup of sugar. The sweetness of the bananas lets you cut down on the sugar content.
Three large eggs.
One-quarter cup of rice flour or potato flour (or starch) or tapioca flour (or starch)
¼ tsp of vanilla
½ tsp salt
1 tsp lemon juice
1 tsp guar gum (omit if using wheat flour)
Mixture may be thinned slightly with non-dairy milk substitute or non-dairy sour cream substitute if lactose intolerant.
Milk drinkers can use the real thing.
Blend in a food processor at a vigorous setting. Give it about three minutes so everything is properly mixed.
Pour in greased pie plate and bake at 350 for 40 –45 minutes. Depending on the temperament of your oven it could take longer to set.
Cool thoroughly and store in refrigerator. This gets better every day.

This is the base recipe. Stir in fruits and/or nuts like frozen raspberries and crushed pecans prior to pouring it in the pie plate.
This is good on its own and even better when topped with a sauce such as chocolate Schnapps sauce.
It’s very easy to make. Here’s the recipe. It’s my own invention.

About a cup of brown sugar.
A tbsp or so of water.
One 100g Lindt Extra Fine chocolate bar. Use the 85 per cent cocoa variety. Trust me.
Melt the sugar over medium heat and mix in the water. Break Lindt bar and add. Mix as it melts. If mixture is too thick add more water to desired consistency.
Allow mixture to simmer as you stir in a minimum of two tbsp of Schnapps. Use the real stuff for heaven’s sake. Don’t use that infernal abomination peppermint. I used apricot Schnapps. I had to choose between it and pear and the apricot won this time.
Simmer for about two more minutes stirring occasionally.
Remove from heat. Stir once more and pour into container.
Store in fridge.
If mixture hardens set container in a warm water bath until it gets runny. Stir vigorously and serve.