Tag Archives: oatmeal

Pumpkin Almond Oatmeal

27 Nov

Some of you may still have a few leftovers from Thanksgiving… some pureed pumpkin, some condensed milk from making pie or even a tres leches cake. Wink, wink…

Well, that was my predicament about this same time last year – left over pumpkin and condensed milk from making a few batches of my Pumpkin 4 Leches Cake.  I was not let them go to waste… so here’s how to partly clean your fridge from those Thanksgiving leftover ingredients.

Oatmeal made with pumpkin puree and sweet condensed milk.

PUMPKIN ALMOND OATMEAL

¾ cup condensed milk

¾ cups water

¼ cup pumpkin puree

1/3 cup quick-cooking oatmeal

½ tsp vanilla powder

¼ tsp freshly ground nutmeg

½ tsp ground cinnamon

Pinch of Salt

¼ cup slivered almonds, toasted

 

  1. In a medium sauce pan over medium heat add the condensed milk, water and pumpkin puree.  Whisk well to combine and dissolve the pumpkin into the milk.  Season with vanilla powder, nutmeg, cinnamon and salt .  Mix together to combine well.   Immediately after, add the oatmeal.  Mix well again and partially cover the saucepan allowing an opening for you to see the milk and how it’s coming to temperature.
  2. When the milk starts to boil, in about 2-3 minutes, stir everything to combine and allow all the boiling to subside a bit.  Lower the temperature of the stove to low and continue to cook partially covered.
  3. After about 5-6 minutes of cooking, you’ll see the oatmeal starts to thicken a bit, but not quite done yet.  I cover completely.  Count to 10 and turn off the stove.  Turn it off and walk away.  Don’t look, don’t peek… just walk away.
  4. After about 15 minutes of letting the oatmeal stand, it’s done.  I usually let it stand for about 30 minutes to allow it to be a tad cooler.
  5. Add the toasted almonds over the top to garnish as you’re serving it.

 

Tip:  You can also used pureed sweet potato for this recipe… or use 1 ½ cups almond milk instead of the condensed milk + water mixture, but then add 1 tbs brown sugar to sweeten the oatmeal.

Oatmeal made with pumpkin puree, sweet condensed milk and spices.

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Carob Oatmeal with Cranberries

30 Dec

When you’re trying to lead a gluten-free lifestyle, even if it’s once in a while, I need to get creative…

I love cold cereal in the morning, but most of my favorite options include some sort of wheat component. And after a few days, plain old oatmeal can get a tad boring. I know…

Bring some spark to your mornings with carob and cranberries. It’s just as easy as making regular oatmeal, just a few extra ingredients and VOILA!

Carob Oatmeal with Cranberries

CAROB OATMEAL WITH CRANBERRIES

1 ½ cups almond milk
4 tbs quick cooking oatmeal
½ tbs carob powder
¼ tsp salt
2 heaping tbs brown sugar
½ tsp vanilla powder
1/3 cup dried cranberries
  1. In a medium sauce pan over medium heat add the almond milk and season it with the sugar, vanilla powder, carob powder and salt. Mix together to combine well. Immediately after, add the oatmeal. Mix well again and partially cover allowing an opening for you to see the milk and how it’s coming to temperature.
  2. When the milk starts to boil, in about 2-3 minutes, stir everything to combine and allow all the boiling to subside a bit. Lower the temperature of the stove to low and continue to cook partially covered.
  3. After about 5-6 minutes of cooking, you’ll see the oatmeal starts to thicken a bit, but not quite done yet. I cover completely. Count to 10 and turn off the stove. Turn it off and walk away. Don’t look, don’t peek… just walk away.
  4. After about 15 minutes of letting the oatmeal stand, it’s done. I usually let it stand for about 30 minutes to allow it to be a tad cooler.
  5. Add the cranberries right before you’ll eat it to add a special chew and sweetness.

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What to buy when traveling to Peru…

31 Jul

As you know, to me the best kind of souvenirs are edible souvenirs… something to eat and reminisce about the place I am traveling in.

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In Peru, these are my recommendations on what to bring home to remember your trip by:

Perurisimas Lays

Lay’s Perurísimas Potato Chips  – Peru prides itself for having 1,000+ potato varieties. We had the chance to taste some of them during our dinners. But for munchies, the best potato chips I’ve had in a while are Lay’s Perurísimas. These are similar to a Terra chip, but made with several varieties of Peruvian potatoes. With a very light sea salt touch. De-li-cious!!! I wanted to bring back several bags of these… I will be campaigning for Lay’s to distribute these in the US and Puerto Rico.

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Maras Salt, the Peruvian Pink Salt – Near Cusco there’s a place called Salineras, where Sal de Maras is harvested. Sal de Maras is a pink, very flavorful salt only available in Peru. You can buy it in any supermarket in the area. And I suggest you do so, because if you decide at the airport, you’ll be paying a hefty premium for forgetting it while you were buying your Perurísimas chips.

Sal de Maras Airport

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Maca – Lately, I’ve been hearing about all these add-ons you can add to your morning smoothies to make them more nutritious. Among these add-ons is maca powder. Maca is a Peruvian root, similar to a radish, which has been cultivated for many, many years. It is many times eaten as a cooked vegetable but for us outside of Peru, is more convenient to have it as a powder. Maca is said to help with anemia, boost energy, improve athletic performance and memory and even help with the symptoms of menopause. It’s also used for weak bones, depression, boost the immune system, erectile dysfunction and even to arouse sexual desire.

When I went to buy this at Whole Foods and saw it was a Peruvian thing… I waited to purchase it during our trip. I was lucky enough to find organic maca. I tried it first in a blended juice drink where they added maca to it. The taste is a tad bitter, but that may be a factor of the amount of maca they added to the drink. I only plan to add a tablespoon to my morning smoothie. Will report about the effects of it later on… OK??

Selva Naranja

Selva Brand Orange Juice – I have told you about my love for Orangina… so imagine this Selva Orange Juice is like Orangina, but without the fizz. It’s sweet and tart at the same time. It’s light and delicious. We bought a few bottles along the trip to have in our room to snack or to have for breakfast. I wish I could’ve brought a few bottles home with me. I would have if I had brought with me the super large Ziploc bags to make sure there wasn’t any spillage in my suitcase.

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Oatmeal Cookies from La Gran Fruta – I’ve told you about La Gran Fruta… and these cookies make the best gifts for friends at home. Have them taste a little piece of Lima thru these cookies. They might crack into pieces, but no-one will care after they taste their deliciousness.

Ají Amarillo – My friend Mara is from Peru… and she urged me to bring home some ají amarillo, the one used to make salsa huancaína to serve with potatoes or sweet potatoes. I did not get a lot of time at the supermarket right before returning home, so I bought a packet of Ají Mirasol. I hope I bought the right thing. But in the near future I will ask my other Peruvian friend, Lucy, to share with me her papas a la huancaína recipe. We had a chance to have it at her Lima home and it was THE BEST papas a la huancaína we had the whole trip.

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And in a completely unrelated to food topic… I also bought myself a nice little knitted hat made from alpaca wool. It’s the Peruvian wool of choice. I bought it in a little town called Chincheros from the nicest and funniest Peruvian lady ever. She should have her own stand-up comedy show… so I do sometimes buy stuff that is not edible. Just so you know…  😉

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Have you been to Peru also?? What did you bring as a souvenir?

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La Gran Fruta – Great fruit franchise in Lima, Peru

15 Jul

I love finding hidden gems… and in Lima, Peru I think there is one.

If you love fruits salads, natural juices and smoothies look no further than La Gran Fruta. They are a fruit based establishment that offer great alternatives for vegetarians. It’s not a vegetarian place, but we had some wonderful breakfasts thanks to them.

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La Gran Fruta offers various sizes of fruit salads, all accompanied by yogurt, granola and honey.

La Gran Fruta - Fruit Salad

Some of us were more adventurous than others. I ordered the largest salad only because I wanted to try a few new fruits I was not familiar with (and hey, I shared with my mom and a few others who also wanted to try):

  • Granadilla – very similar to a passion fruit in texture, but the taste is sweet and not tart like a passion fruit.
  • Chirimoya – very similar to a soursop but much creamier and sweeter. My friends went bonkers for cherimoyas and were seeking them out everywhere we went.
  • Lúcuma – this fruit is very similar in taste and texture to a mamey or sapote. It’s dense in texture and a tad bit grainy. Makes a wonderful juice but I think it would make an even better milkshake or smoothie.

Lucuma Juice

New fruits to me

In this plate you also see soursop… this one I was familiar with, but this one was super tart… in my opinion, it needed a few extra days to fully ripen.

At La Gran Fruta, they not only make awesome fruit salads and juices… they also have these awesome cookies made with only a few ingredients – oatmeal, sugar and fruit pulp. My favorites were the ones made with passion fruit. Imagine a tart and sweet cookie?? I am telling you it’s something to taste to believe… They also have them with apples, figs, mango, strawberry and a combination of several fruits. These cookies are gluten-free and egg-free… perfectly vegetarian!!!!

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Because we went in wintertime, we did not get to try something everyone was recommending – Raspadillas. I am sure this is something very similar to our piraguas, shaved ice doused in pureed fruit pulp. Yum… something definitely to look forward to in the Summer, no?

La Gran Fruta has several locations throughout Lima… check them out if you’re ever in Perú.

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Pear and Blackberry Crumble

9 Nov

My nephew likes pears… but these pears at my sister’s house were DRY!!!! Dry, dry, dry… and tasteless. So I decided to make a dessert out of it. I can’t stand to waste food… and organic at that.

I forgot to take a picture of the final product… but the results were pretty different from the original raw fruit. The filling for this crumble came out juicy and sweet and a bit tangy with the addition of the lime juice. That tang balances the sweetness in the fruit and the sugar.

If the pears would’ve been juicy to begin with, maybe you can delete the extra juice. But I just wanted to show you how you can transform a not so delicious fruit into a delectable dessert.

PEAR AND BLACKBERRY CRUMBLE

2 pears, peeled and cut into small pieces
10 blackberries
The juice of 1 lime, you can add some zest if you want too
2 tbs orange or apple juice, especially if the pears are a bit dry… like mine were
2 tbs of organic or brown sugar for the fruits, plus 3 additional heaping tbs for the topping
Pinch of salt
1 heaping tbs cornstarch
2 heaping tbs of spelt flour
2 heaping tbs of butter ( I used softened butter)
1 packet of organic instant maple oatmeal
A handful of walnuts

 

Does it show that when I was making the recipe I only had a soup spoon available??? So it’s all measured by the spoonful…

  1. Pre-heat oven at 350F.
  2. Just place the fruit in a medium pyrex glass baking dish. Add the apple or orange juice. Sprinkle on top the sugar, cornstarch, lime zest, lime juice and the pinch of salt. Mix well together.
  3. On a separate bowl, mix together the flour, oatmeal, sugar, walnuts and butter. Using a fork, mash the butter into the flour/oatmeal mixture. It’ll become like the texture of wet sand. When it feels like that, add it on top of the cut fruits.
  4. Bake for about 30 minutes, until you see the juices of the fruit bubbling and the top is golden brown.

 

I always leave in the oven until we’re about to eat. I like it warm… with a scoop of ice cream on the side.

 

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