Raw Walnut Meat, salsa, guacamole

I was working from home this week and was trying to decide what to make for lunch. A few blogs I follow had posted recently about raw walnut "meat", so I decided to try it with a salad.

Change up the spices to your tastes. This is a great recipe because it comes together quickly.



Serves 1 - 2

Ingredients
Walnut Meat
1/2 raw walnuts
2 - 3 sun-dried tomatoes, soaked in hot water for 10 minutes
soy sauce
sriracha
salt
pepper
chili powder
cumin powder (We are out of cumin powder, so I added cumin seeds)

Garden Salsa
Tomatoes (I used cherry and roma from the garden)
Onion
garlic chives
hungarian wax pepper
olive oil
salt
pepper
juice from 1/2 lime

Corn Guacamole
1 ear corn
1/2 avocado
salt
pepper
lime juice

Lettuce

Method
Walnut Meat
Place the walnuts and tomatoes in a food processor (I used the smaller bowl because I am using such small amounts). Pulse until it appears to have the texture of ground meat. Add the seasonings to taste.

Garden Salsa
This is just what I had ripe in my garden, feel free to use whatever you think would be good in salsa.

Roughly chop the tomatoes, onion, and chili. Place the tomatoes, onion, chili, and herbs in a food processor (again I used the smaller bowl) and pulse until still chunky, but mixed. Transfer to a bowl and season to taste.

Corn Guacamole
Shuck the corn. Place the ear of corn upright and using a knife, cut away the kernels into a bowl. Add the avocado and mix. Season to taste.


Wash and dry the lettuce. Chop into a bowl and add the meat, salsa, and guacamole.

Notes
This was really really good. The walnut meat has A LOT of flavour. I'm going to try it again with pecans because my husband is sensitive to walnuts. I'm happy that I was able to make the salsa completely from our garden. Garden vegetables taste waaay better than anything bought from the store.

I had a couple of tortillas in the fridge that needed to be used. I put them in the toaster oven until they were crispy and served it with the salad.

Hummus Board

My husband and I are more grazers than set meal eaters. When we eat smaller meals, we are generally in better moods and have more energy. This is one of our "meals".



Ingredients
Homemade hummus - crockpot cooked chickpeas, tahini, lemon juice, garlic, sriracha sauce, salt, pepper
pita bread
cucumbers
carrot sticks
celery
avocado
pickles
strawberries
peaches


Notes
We love making our own hummus. We add a lot more garlic and spice it up with the sriracha. It tastes so much better than store bought.

Zucchini Noodles

There has been lots of talk about zucchini noodles around the vegan blogs lately. And for good reason. Zucchini noodles are easy to make (even without a spiralizer!), fast, and delicious. I have a vegetable peeler that has two sides. One side makes long flat peels, much like a regular peeler. The other side has small teeth and makes spaghetti sized noodles when used.



Ingredients
Zucchini
spices to taste, I used basil, oregano, salt, black pepper, red pepper flakes

Tomato sauce

Method
Using a vegetable peeler, peel the zucchini in strips until you start seeing the seeds. I generally turn the zucchini as I go.

Add spices and sauce to taste.


Notes
This turned out really well! I might even like the zucchini noodles better than regular pasta. I have also turned cucumbers into noodles, mixed it with zucchini noodles, and topped with a peanut sauce for a faux pad thai.



Our cat was contemplating why I was taking pictures outside.

Almond Veggie Pate

Recently, I have been toying with doing a raw food diet. I have book marked lots of recipes, checked out several books from the library, and I'm slowly starting to make more raw foods. I'm doing it mostly because I enjoy the challenge of making tasty food in nontraditional ways. Also, the arguments I have read for adding more raw foods to your diet seem to make sense to me.

I came across the following recipe and thought it looked good. I made a month or so ago and my husband and I still talk about it. Very tasty!



Ingredients
Adapted from Ani Phyo Website

3/4 cup almonds
1 cup cashews
1 T grated ginger
3 cloves garlic (this was a little high even for me and I love garlic, I would probably do two cloves next time)
1/2 cup grated carrots
1/4 cup chopped onions
1/3 cup dried plums
salt
pepper
juice from 1/2 lemon
sriracha sauce

lettuce leafs
bean sprouts
cilranto
cucumbers
carrot sticks

2 T orange champagne vinegar
1 T sugar
1 T water

Method
Process the almonds and cashews until they are powdery. Add the rest of the ingredients and pulse until combined and the desired consistency. Adjust seasoning to taste.

Using lettuce as a wrap, place a tablespoon or two of the pate with the other toppings and eat.

For the dipping sauce, over low heat heat up the vinegar, sugar, and water until the sugar is dissolved, whisking continuously. Take off the heat and serve.

Notes

The original recipe called to wrap the pate up in nori, but the nori I had in my cupboard was a bit stale and chewy and after trying a few in the nori, we decided to just use lettuce as a vessel for the pate. My husband really enjoyed this.


He couldn't wait until I was done taking a photo!