March Food Photos Week 2

Time for another week recap of the March Food Photo-a-Day Challenge! The challenge is still going well and I really enjoy looking on Twitter, Instagram, and on blogs to see what everyone else is posting. It’s been a great way to “meet” new online friends, too!
I’ve had enough people ask about an April edition that word on the street is there is currently one being created

March Foodie Photo-a-Day Week 2

The second seven days have been as follows:

• Day 8: vegetable // eat the rainbow
• Day 9: lunch break // a perfect Friday lunch break for this girl!
• Day 10: most used appliance // this award goes out to the Blendtec
• Day 11: can’t live without // these days, I can’t live without cashew cheese!
• Day 12: favorite drink // besides water, I’d have to go with tea
• Day 13: silverware // the real deal, from Erik’s side of the family
• Day 14: fruit // some of my favorite fruits!

    

And that’s a wrap for now!

happy eating,

lesley

Vegan Chocolate Chip Sugar Cookies

How’s daylight savings time treating everyone that it applies to?

It happened to be a rainy day here in Kansas City, so it just kind of went along with the loss of an hour of sleep. I happened to drink a can of very caffeinated tea right before bedtime, so I easily stayed up until waaaay too late. This week is looking amazing, though, and I’m so ready for 70 degree weather all week long!

Anyways … while it was busy being all gloomy outside, Erik and I had quite a delicious Sunday evening. It consisted of pizza made by him, and cashew ice cream and cookies made by myself! Needless to say … I’m stuffed!

Let’s get down to business, it’s cookie time! These cookies would best be described as, when sugar cookies meet chocolate chip cookies.



Vegan Chocolate Chip Sugar Cookies
Inspired by Oh She Glows

Ingredients:

• 6 tablespoons coconut oil, melted
• 3/4 cup organic cane sugar
• 1 EnerG egg replacer (a flax egg or chia egg would work just as well – or of course a regular egg if not vegan)
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon sea salt
• 1 cup all-purpose flour (I used WonderFlour)
• 1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
• 3/4 cup dark chocolate chips

Instructions:

• Preheat oven at 350 degrees.
• Mix together egg replacer, and set aside. Beat together the coconut oil, cane sugar. Add egg replacer. The mixture will be crumbly looking, but will stick together when pressed into balls.
• Beat in the vanilla extract, baking soda, sea salt, cinnamon, and flour.
• Fold in chocolate chips.
• Shape large tablespoon sized balls and place them on parchment lined baking sheet. Bake for about 10-11 minutes or until golden brown around the edges. Note: Don’t bake any amount over that time or the edges will become too crispy when cooled!

Makes about a dozen. Store in air-tight container so they don’t get too crispy.



Yum! These cookies have a crunchy thin edge with a chewy, chocolaty middle tasting like the perfect hybrid of sugar cookie and chocolate chip!



Enjoy,

lesley

March Food Photos Week 1

March Foodie Photo-a-Day is in full swing!

I wanted to post a Week 1 recap here on The Purple Carrot for those that may not have Instagram, Twitter or Facebook. If you’re just now hearing about it, it’s not too late to join!! Simply pick it up today, on day 8, or play “catch up” if you’d like. Visit the original post for details to participate.

Also, I recently added a place on the original post for anyone to add their blog, or album of #marchfoodphotos, so if you’d like, add your photos!

March Foodie Photo-a-Day Week 1
 
The first seven days have been as follows:

• Day 1: breakfast // oatmeal & hot tea
• Day 2: something sweet // chocolate banana cupcakes w/ peanut butter frosting (recipe here!)
• Day 3: kitchen // my kitchen is never that clean, ever
• Day 4: dishes // it’s no secret these are my favorite dishes
• Day 5: best condiment // just had to be the classic for me!
• Day 6: what’s cooking // apple cinnamon oatmeal & water for tea
• Day 7: pantry // my pantry was a little bare, but you get the idea

    
happy eating,
 
lesley

Chocolate banana cupcakes with peanut butter frosting

It seems like it’s been way too long since I’ve baked! I joked with Erik the other day that I haven’t baked “all year”. So it was by far time to change that!

These cupcakes involve banana, chocolate and peanut butter. Always an amazing combo! I’ve been using coconut sugar lately as my main form of sugar in baking, and these came out delicious.

Why coconut sugar?

• It’s produced from the sap of cut flower buds of coconuts and is also called palm sugar.
• It’s subtly sweet and has similar characteristics to brown sugar with a slight hint of caramel.
• Has a very low glycemic index of just 35, making it a good alternative for diabetes.
• A rich source of potassium, magnesium, zinc and iron and contains vitamins B1, B2, B3 and B6, having twice the iron, four times the magnesium, and over 10 times the amount of zinc as in brown sugar.

And I also got to try out a new to me flour! I met Chef Brad, Thermador appliance’s executive chef, at a Portfolio Kitchen event back in December in which he was cooking. We got to talking about food, baking, etcetera and he offered to send me a bag of his new flour which he calls WonderFlour.

What is WonderFlour?

• WonderFlour is marketed as “the first whole grain all purpose flour that actually works”
• It’s a whole grain, wheat free blend of three grains; spelt, barley and brown rice.
• It can be used in place of white flour in all of your baking and cooking needs, with the exception of yeasted breads as it doesn’t have the sufficient gluten for yeast.
• It’s an all natural flour that is biologically grown, meaning the soil is taken care of naturally with no added chemicals or synthetic products.

 

Now let’s get to business!

Chocolate Banana Cupcakes (w/ peanut butter frosting)
-Makes a dozen cupcakes

Ingredients:

• 1 cup WonderFlour (alternatively, you could use white whole wheat flour or all purpose)
• 3/4 cup coconut sugar (or cane sugar)
• 5 tablespoons coconut oil
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 1 ripe banana, mashed
• 1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/4 teaspoon sea salt
• 1/2 cup almond milk

Instructions:

• Preheat oven at 350 degrees.
• In large sized bowl, stir together coconut sugar, coconut oil, vanilla, and mashed banana.
• In medium sized bowl, combine flour, cocoa powder, baking soda and salt.
• A little at a time, stir in flour mixture and almond milk into the sugar mixture until smooth.
• Place batter evenly into lined cupcake pan, and bake for 12-15 minutes.

Peanut Butter Frosting

Ingredients:

• 1 cup natural peanut butter (I used chunky, but creamy works perfectly as well)
• 1/2 cup agave nectar (or honey, coconut nectar, etc)
• 1/2 cup WonderFlour (about any flour would work here)
• 3 tablespoons almond milk
• 1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Instructions:

• Simply whisk it all together! Feel free to add more or less almond milk to get desired thickness.

Note: You’ll have extra frosting!



I threw a little shaved chocolate on top for fun.

The results?

We loved these cupcakes! I made a double batch and brought them to a friend’s house and everyone there seemed to really like them as well. Chef Brad’s WonderFlour gave them a light and fluffy texture that you just wouldn’t get with typical whole grain flours. I was really happy with that, as a lot of times it’s a struggle to avoid dense baked goods using more nutritious flours.

Thanks to Chef Brad for letting me try out some of his flour! You can check out where it’s sold and buy it online via his online store. All that’s left to say is yum!



lesley

Purple Carrot Pizzeria

Welcome to Purple Carrot Pizzeria!

Okay, so Purple Carrot Pizzeria only exits in my garage, but let me tell you, it’s something special. If you’ve been around for very long, then you already know my husband is slightly obsessed with pizza, specifically a New York style crust. If you’d like a refresher, you can visit this post about how his journey to perfect crust began, or check out this post for some pictures of his first stage pizzas.

Since this pizza making began, he’s progressed from baking pizzas at the self cleaning temperature in our oven to a real pizza oven, which I talked about briefly here. Not only do we have one pizza oven now, but two. They’re housed in our garage with a gamut of other pieces of restaurant equipment. You see, my husband loves to buy kitchen equipment at auction, fix it up, and keep it resell it.

Thus, Purple Carrot Pizzeria was formed in our garage. Compete with a neon sign hanging up that flashes “Pizza Pizza Pizza”.

Yes, it’s that serious.



Now we can all stare at the delicious pictures.

 

By the way, if you ever see any kitchen equipment on Kansas City Craigslist that says something like “So clean even Gordon Ramsay would approve!” then you can be sure it’s being sold by my better half!

lesley

March Foodie Photo-a-Day Reminder

Hey everyone!

Just wanted to stop in and remind you all about the March Foodie Photo-a-Day Challenge that starts TOMORROW, March 1st! For more details on participating, please visit this post.

And just so you know, I will be participating daily via Instagram (@purplecarrotkc), The Purple Carrot Facebook page, and Twitter. At the end of the 31 days of March, I’ll do a recap here on the blog.
Thanks to all who are excited, and participating! Can’t wait to share this food-filled March with you all

March Photo-A-Day Food Edition

Anyone up for a March food photo-a-day challenge??

I’ve been addicted to the recent random photos a day that have been going on via Instagram, Twitter, Facebook and/or blogs that were created by Fat Mum Slim. 

So I had a thought it would be even more fun to create a foodie edition for all of us that love all things food related! 



It’s open to anyone who would like to join, and here’s how it works!

• Beginning March 1st, take a food inspired photo corresponding to the date and cue written next to it. Feel free to interpret the cues however you’d like!
• Once photo is taken, post it to whatever outlet you’d like whether it’s Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, Pinterest, a blog, etc and use the hashtag #marchfoodphotos.

That’s it! If you have any more questions, ask away.

I’m excited to share this month of food related photos with you all. Please share with anyone else who might be interested!

Who’s in??  


 




Feel free to link up your own blog or albums from Facebook, Pinterest, Flickr, Tumblr, etc below! Just add your link, pick a picture as thumbnail and submit. Or leave me a comment with a link and I'll add it for you :) Time to share some photos!

DIY Frame Key Holder

Time for my first official DIY post ever.

Let me start off by saying I do not consider myself to be a crafty person, though I aspire to be one, ha. I have a mom who can do about anything crafty there is to do. Growing up, she managed a fabrics and crafts store, taught craft classes, sewed tons of our outfits, fixes band suits in high school, took in and hemmed prom dresses, etc etc. If you don’t believe me, she has a quilting blog to prove it!

That being said, I hope at least a little bit of that is in my blood, and that someday it will come forth.

But we will start simple.

Very, very simple with a frame key holder, inspired by Pinterest. (I posted this iPhone photo on Facebook and Instagram the other day, so it may look familiar!)

DIY Frame Key Holder

Things you will need:

• A frame.
  • It’s quite easy these days to find neat vintage or upcycled frames at antique stores. You can either find one already upcycled for you, or simply buy a frame from anywhere and paint it to your likings. I happened to have ordered some already painted frames off Etsy that I hadn’t put to use yet, so this is one of them.
• A screw driver with appropriate size screw (the box of screw hooks will tell you which size).
• Screw hooks.

What to do:

• Take your frame and plan out where you’d like your hooks to be placed. I decided to use four hooks for my frame.
• Once decided, drill correct sized holes into the frame.
• After holes are drilled, screw in each hook, and you’re ready to mount on wall and hang keys!

Yes, it’s that easy!

To some, they may not even be considered a DIY project due to it’s level of non difficulty, but it was a definite start for me.

Now I need to get pinning and find my next project!

Baked sweet potato fries

I think if asked to pick one food as my favorite, sweet potatoes would have serious potential for winning.

Since I was little, I’ve absolutely loved them. I used to go to my grandma’s house when I was little, have her cook me the biggest sweet potato she had, and I would douse it in tons of butter and salt.

Don’t worry, I have since reformed my ways and eat them in a bit healthier way. One such way is in form of fries. Who doesn’t love a good sweet potato fry?

Exactly.

I like to chop my sweet potatoes in pretty large chunks. Once chopped, I toss them in a bowl with olive oil and sea salt. They should be lightly rubbed with the mixture, not saturated.

Place them on a baking pan (I lined mine with parchment paper for easier clean up). Make sure they're not overlapped or they will not evenly cook. Here’s the part you have to pay attention to, lest you burn your sweet potato fries to a complete crisp.

Bake at 450 for 15 minutes. Turn fries over, and bake again for 10 minutes. Repeat this step two or three more times depending on how brown you want them. I like to get mine as close to burnt as possible without actually burning them into the above mentioned “complete crisp”.

We had our sweet potato fries with brown rice and lentils topped with sautéed kale and onions, served with a large portion of guacamole. If you put a bite of everything in your mouth all at once, the combination is delicious!

What’s your favorite way to eat a sweet potato?

Also, any tricks to getting baked sweet potato fries perfectly crispy?

Simple Citrus Guacamole

Guac, anyone?

I absolutely love avocados as of about a year ago. Before that, I just didn’t really got into them for some reason or another. But now, they are fabulous! And there’s so much you can do with them.

Of course one of the simplest and most delicious ways to eat an avocado is via guacamole! Eat it with rice and beans, eat it with salads, eat it with chips, eat it on burritos, it’s just as delicious each and every way!

This is our very simple guac recipe with little ingredients that’s great when you just want a quick edition with dinner or lunch. In the most delicious way, it has a perfect hint of citrus that gives it great, fresh flavor.

Simple Citrus Guacamole

Ingredients:

• 2 large avocados, peeled & pitted
• Juice from 1/2 lemon
• 1/3 medium onion, diced
• 1 1/2 teaspoons sea salt

Instructions:

• Throw all ingredients into a blender or food processor, and blend until smooth. Feel free to leave in some chunks if desired.

Note: Feel free to add some cilantro for an extra kick of flavor!

Next up, Valentine’s Day … who loves it, who hates it??

Either way … have a great day, everyone!