We returned on Sunday to a heat wave in Aspen (not nearly as bad as
Denver, but still hot). Yesterday at 5
pm our downstairs was 82 degrees (it was probably 10 degrees warmer
upstairs). I made a swift decision to
not turn on the stove. Instead I tried a
raw menu from Roost, one of my favorite food blogs, that has been enticing me
for a few weeks. I find the raw food
movement to be inspiring and interesting.
While I love cooking too much to take it on as a diet, I think experimenting
with raw recipes provides a way to explore creativity, especially with vegan
cooking. The dinner was delicious. The best part was the walnut taco filling, which
tasted real. I of course found myself
dreaming about how great it would be with toasted walnuts, but that is the mind
of a cook. Here are the recipes I
used. All are from Roost except the pico de gallo which is my own. I will make the walnut filling
again and use it in vegan (cooked) tacos.
Raw Walnut Tacos
- 2 cups walnuts
- 1 tablespoon ground cumin
- 1 teaspoon ground chili powder
- 2 ½ tablespoons coconut aminos (or Nama Shoyu)
- 1 head green cabbage
- Pico de gallo (recipe below)
- Mashed avocado (or prepared guacamole)
- Cashew sour cream (recipe below)
- 1 lime
- Handful of cilantro roughly chopped
- Place walnuts, cumin, chili and coconut aminos in a food processor and pulse until mixture resembles taco meat.
- Peal off several cabbage leaves, and cut them in half depending on their size
- Spoon walnut mixture, sour cream, avocado and pico de gallo onto leaf
- Top with squeeze of lime juice and cilantro
Pico de Gallo
(makes 2 cups)- ½ jalapeno pepper
- 1 clove garlic
- Zest of 1 lime
- Juice of 1 lime
- 4 tomatoes
- ½ onion
- ½ cup cilantro leaves
- Remove seeds and ribs from ½ of a medium jalapeno pepper and coarsely chop.
- Combine jalapeno, garlic, lime juice and lime zest in food processor and process until finely chopped
- Coarsely chop tomatoes and onion and add to mixture along with cilantro leaves
- Pulse until tomatoes are approximately ¼ inch dice
Cashew Sour Cream
- 1 cup raw cashews
- ½ cup water
- ¼ cup lemon juice
- ¼ teaspoon salt
- Combine all ingredients in blender and blend until smooth
Spiced Melon Gazpacho
- 2 ½ cups fresh cantaloupe
- ½ avocado
- 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
- ½ tablespoon apple cider vinegar
- ¼ cup fresh lemon juice
- 1 teaspoon ground ginger
- ½ teaspoon ground nutmeg
- Pinch of chili powder
- Cashew sour cream to garnish (recipe above)
- Combine all ingredients (except the cashew sour cream) in blender and blend until smooth
- Serve in small dishes garnished with cashew sour cream
Greta the dog and me |
Dad, me, Steve (Nor) |
No comments:
Post a Comment