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Ok, so this is where I should come forward and admit something. I friggin love hot, spicy food. Whether its wasabi slathered on sushi, jerk chicken with scotch bonnets, four pepper chili, you name it, I am game. We have even found jellies made by the wonderful people of One Screw Loose that are made from habeñeros and ghost peppers; excellent products. Ok, so this will not be like that, but jalapeños are still in the league of hot peppers in my opinion.

Before going any further (starting to feel this post is going to have a lot of links in it), you should also check out daiya foods. If you have not had cheese since before you can remember, this is a great brand to get introduced to. I have only tried the shredded mozzarella so far (only one I have found local), and will definitely be making the trek to find their products in other places.

With that said, back to the peppers. I highly encourage wearing latex gloves (or non latex alternative if allergies deem necessary) whenever working with hot peppers, because the oils from the pepper can get on your hands and can transfer to other things you touch. I have known people to get oils from the peppers in their eyes, underneath fingernails, none if this feels good. So, gloves, yes, good.

Next pretty darn important thing; cleaning out the peppers. Jalapeños range anywhere from mild to moderate on the spectrum of heat (scoville units). I have tried to find good information on how to tell if a pepper is going to be hot, and there just isn’t any definitive data either way on this. Comes down to this, if you buy a jalapeño, it might be mild, and it might kick your butt, end of story. That said, a LOT of the heat is held in the seeds and veins insides of the pepper. We want to remove all seeds and remove everything on the inside there. If you want, you can keep some of the seeds to put in the mix to ensure that you get a lot of that heat; may the lord have mercy on your soul.

Next is our mix for stuffing the peppers. 3 ingredients; shredded cheese, Tofutti Better than Cream Cheese, and the sausage of your choice.

We have done them wrapped in bacon, as well as with sausage, both work just fine, and you could absolutely sub out the sausage with ground round meatless crumbles if desired.

Ingredients

About 6 Whole jalapeno peppers, halved, cleaned and seeded
1/3 Cup Tofutti Better Than Cream Cheese
1/2 Cup Daiya Mozzorella or Cheddar Shreds
1/2 Cup Cooked ground sausage of your choice

Steps

· Preheat oven to 375 F.
· If you took them off, put your gloves back on.
· Set halved peppers on cookie sheet.
· Mix other ingredients in medium bowl.
· Fill each pepper half with mixture.

· Bake for 30-35 minutes
Enjoy and repeat as needed.

Keep living the daydream!

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I think one of the few things we do more often than these mushrooms is jerk chicken, which, incidentally goes really well with the mushrooms. As we approach Labor Day, it feels right to get a few things out there that can accompany grilling out. I’m not going to say that we are approaching the end of grilling season; as quite frankly, we are in Georgia, and we grill out about 50 weeks out of the year. 47 of those weeks it’s because it’s too dang hot to cook in the kitchen, the other three are because it’s actually nice outside for a change. Ok, back inside to the mushrooms.

These have adapted over time, and I know you will love what they have become. First rule: waste not want not. We were cleaning the mushrooms and pulling out the stems and getting rid of them. One day it dawned on us, why the heck are we throwing away mushrooms when we want to eat mushrooms? So, clean the mushrooms, pull the stems, and set those aside. Check the stems afterwards to see if they need to be trimmed up a bit, and then chop up the stems fine. This will get added to the stuffing mix, and there is usually some extra on the side that otherwise would not have any mushroom component; see how smart that was?

The next major change was adding ground Italian sausage. I got some to do some jalapeno poppers (should have that recipe ready tonight), and there was so much extra, we added it into the mix. Now that extra side serving that doesn’t have a mushroom, has mushroom in it AND sausage, it’s a beautiful life.

Ingredients

about 15-18 Medium Sized Mushroom caps, cleaned and stems separated
2 TBSP Olive Oil

2 Cup Pepperidge Farms Herb Stuffing Mix
1 Cup Chicken Broth
1/2 Cup Tofutti Better Than Sour Cream
Chopped Mushroom Stems
1/2-3/4 Cup Cooked ground sausage of your choice

Instructions

· Preheat oven to 375 F
· Have mushroom caps in a large bowl; pour olive oil over caps so all mushrooms get some oil on them
· Place caps on cookie sheet.
· Chop up stems fine, removing any ends that you deem need to be trimmed off; put in large bowl
· Add stuffing mix, broth, Tofutti BT sour cream and ground sausage
· Fill each cap with mix, you will have a rounded top overfilling the cap, but not so much that it falls out

· Bake for 30-35 minutes
Enjoy and repeat as needed.

Keep living the daydream!

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I love baking with oats, as this site will continue to reveal. I eat oatmeal for breakfast almost every day, just for how awesome it is. Transfer that into a muffin, and I’m sold. Step aside, Wheaties. So how could you go wrong with having walnuts and honey in there as well? These are a fantastic hearty wholesome muffin to start the day off with. I gravitate towards using large muffin tins, but you could do 12 regular instead of 6 large. Just reduce the baking time by about 5-10 minutes, depending on your oven.

The honey really stands out in this muffin, which I enjoy a lot. I don’t like that taste in everything, but LOVE it in these muffins. When putting this together, a lot of it came from the thought of turning my bowl of oatmeal into a muffin. granted, we eat some pretty awesome oatmeal around here, so that serves as a good base.

For almost anything with nuts, I enjoy using the mortar and pestle. You can get such a great mix between finely ground that adds flavor, and larger pieces for texture/flavor. Anything to get the pieces to where you want them will work, but anytime you see nuts crushed up in a recipe on this site, more often than not, that is how it was done.

Just a great way to start the day, maybe a fruit smoothie to go with. Do we need a post on making killer smoothies? Summer’s not over yet, I’m sure we can make time for this soon.

Ingredients

2 Cup Unbleached All Purpose Flour
1/4 Cup Granulated Sugar
2 tsp Baking Powder
1/4 tsp Salt

1 Egg
1/4 Cup Honey
1/4 Cup Canola Oil
1 tsp Vanilla Extract
2 Cup Rice Milk

3/4 Cup Old Fashioned Rolled Oats
1/2 Cup Crushed Walnuts

Instructions

· Preheat oven to 375 F.
· In a large bowl, mix together flour, granulated sugar, baking powder and salt.
· In a medium bowl, beat egg, add honey and beat together. Add in oil, vanilla and rice milk.
· Add in baking powder, baking soda, and salt.
· Pour wet ingredients into dry ingredients.
· Fold in oats and walnuts.
· Grease or spray large muffin tin.
· Fill each of the 6 tins about 3/4 of the way, this should use all the batter.
· Remove any excess spray and batter from around the top of the muffin tin (gotta take care of your muffin tins!).

· Bake for 20-24 minutes.
Enjoy and repeat as needed.

Keep living the daydream!

Continue reading »]]> Chocolate Chip Peanut Butter Oatmeal Cookies

Ahhh, cookies. So easy to have one, so easy to have three more, gotta love it.

The first time I went to make chocolate chip cookies, I looked in the pantry, and though my recipe called for shortening, I didn’t have any. When trying to think this through without going to the grocery store for one item, as I often do, I had a thought. It is something of a life philosophy for me: “When having difficulty answering a question, try using “peanut butter” as the answer, and then see if the problem has gone away. Ok, not going to work in SOME situations, but its come in handy a few times, and this is absolutely one of those times.

That was years ago, and while we make a lot of cookies, some form of chocolate chip cookie is always good to come back to. I adapted this to be more of a blend between an oatmeal cookie and a chocolate chip cookie, with, of course, peanut butter. Substitute out any nut butter that you like, or just swap that out for shortening if you would rather go nut free.

After you make up the dough, it works well to put the dough in the freezer for about an hour before putting cookies in the oven. I can rarely wait that long. This is partially because Mrs. Dairyfreedaydream and the two little Dairyfreedaydreams like to snack on cookie dough if I am not watching it. Also because I just can’t wait to eat the cookies, but if you can make it that long, there you have it.

Ingredients

1/2 Cup Peanut Butter
1/2 Cup Earth Balance

1 Cup Brown Sugar
1/2 Cup Granulated Sugar

1 tsp Baking Powder
1/2 tsp Baking Soda
1/4 tsp salt
2 Eggs
1 tsp Vanilla Extract
2 Cup Unbleached All Purpose Flour

2 Cup Old Fashioned Rolled Oats
12 oz. Chocolate Chips

Instructions

· Preheat oven to 375 F.
· Beat Earth Balance and peanut butter together with electric mixer for about 30 seconds.
· Add in brown sugar and granulated sugar.
· Add in baking powder, baking soda, and salt.
· Add in eggs and vanilla.
· Add in flour. If using hand-held mixer, you may haven to fold in some of the flour by hand.
· Fold in oats and chocolate chips.
· Place cookie dough in freezer for up to 1 hr (optional).
· Using a tablespoon, scoop rounded balls onto cookie sheet, separating about 2 inches apart.

· Bake for 8-11 minutes.
· Cool on wire rack for several minutes before enjoying.
Enjoy and repeat as needed.

Keep living the daydream!

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I heart oatmeal, I think is the correct expression. I may just stop writing there. Oats are a wonderful grain and fit into breakfast, cookies, everything, etc. Groats, steel-cut, or rolled, they are amazingly fulfilling, enjoyable to eat, and fit into even the, “I just moved to New York and am sharing a closet as a room with a friend” budget. Regular oatmeal is great on its own, but lately we have been going nuts over baked oatmeal.

We have had baked oatmeal nearly every day while fine tuning this one. Even my four-year old, who had forgotten that he liked oatmeal for two years, has been lining up for this. Truly, this is not a hard sell.

I have seen recipes for baked oatmeal that call for eggs. Now, I eat eggs, but usually not in my oatmeal. I do, however, love flax seed in my oatmeal. And since I regularly use flax seed in place of egg, this was the easiest decision I made all day. With the flax seed, the more ground the better, if you have flax flour, awesome; we have a Baby Bullet from when we were making baby food for our youngest, and this works great.  If you do want to do the eggs, this converts over as 2 eggs in place of the flax seed and water.

I swear I am trying to space out the blueberry recipes, but when they are in season, pretty much goes in everything for a while. To balance that out, we’ll have two versions of this.

The other top contender in this area has been Apple Cranberry Walnut. There’s raisins in there too, but you have to stop the name somewhere, right? Both of these go quick, so be prepared for that. Recipes as they stand are roughly 2.5 servings. I am sure in some homes this is actually 3 servings, but for us, 2.5 is already stretching it.

Peach Blueberry Baked Oatmeal

Ingredients

2.5 TBSP Ground Flax Seed
7 TBSP Warm Water

1 Cup Blueberries
2 or 3 Whole Ripe Peaches

1/4 Cup Brown Sugar
1.5 tsp Baking Powder
1/2 tsp Cinnamon
1/4 tsp salt

2 Cups Rice Milk
2 Cups Old Fashioned Rolled Oats

Steps

· Preheat oven to 325 F
· In a large mixing bowl, combine ground flax seed and water, set aside.
· If you are using frozen blueberries, place in a small colander and rinse thoroughly.
· Peel and cut up peaches, set aside
· In the large mixing bowl, add cinnamon, baking powder, brown sugar, and salt. Whisk these together.
· Mix in oats and rice milk.
· If you are using frozen blueberries, rinse again.
· Fold in the peaches and blueberries

· Pour into an oven-safe 2 QT dish
· Bake for 50 minutes

Apple Cranberry Walnut Baked Oatmeal

Ingredients

2.5 TBSP Ground Flax Seed
7 TBSP Warm Water

1 or 2 Apples

1/3 Cup Brown Sugar
1.5 tsp Baking Powder
1 tsp Cinnamon
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 Cup Walnut pieces
1/4 Cup dried Cranberries

2 Cups Rice Milk
2 Cups Old Fashioned Rolled Oats
1/2 Cup Water

Steps

· Preheat oven to 325 F
· In a large mixing bowl, combine ground flax seed and water, set aside.
· Cut up apple, put in oven safe 2 QT dish and put in oven while preheating.
· In the large mixing bowl, add cinnamon, baking powder, brown sugar, and salt. Whisk these together.
· Mix in oats and rice milk.
· Fold in the walnut, cranberries and raisins.

· Carefully remove dish from oven. Pour remaining ingredients into oven-safe 2 QT dish.

· Bake for 50 minutes
Enjoy and repeat as needed.

Keep living the daydream!

Continue reading »]]> Vegan Mocha Almond Fudge Melted Ice Cream Cake

Ok, bear with me, I know I am doing dessert two nights in a row, but these are worth it, and this one has coffee in it, so it’s at least partially a breakfast food. This cake was a spin-off from my Vegan Peanut Butter Zig Zag Melted Ice Cream Cake for the So Delicious 2013 Recipe Contest earlier this year. The idea of melting the ice cream and turning it into a cake worked out great a way to enjoy the ice cream in a new form. The almonds add a good texture and some crunch that compliments the coffee-chocolaty goodness from the ice cream.

Ingredients

For the Cake

1/2 pint So Delicious Mocha Almond Fudge Ice Cream
1-1/2 tablespoons ground flaxseed
4-1/2 tablespoons water
1-1/4 cup unbleached all-purpose flour
1/4 cup cocoa powder
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup dairy-free buttery spread (such as Earth Balance)
3/4 cup sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Frosting

5 tablespoons unbleached all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon cocoa powder
1/2 cup dairy-free buttery spread
3/4 cup sugar
1 tablespoon safflower oil (or other neutral-tasting oil)
1/3 cup strong coffee
1/4 cup vanilla dairy-free creamer (such as So Delicious French Vanilla Coconut Milk Creamer)

Ganache

1/2 cup dairy-free chocolate chips
2 tablespoons dairy-free buttery spread
2 tablespoons vanilla dairy-free creamer (such as So Delicious French Vanilla Coconut Milk Creamer)

Instructions

For the Cake

Preheat oven to 375ºF
Get ice cream out of the freezer and set aside in a bowl allowing to melt.
Mix flax and water in small bowl and set aside.
Mix flour, cocoa powder, baking powder and salt in a medium mixing bowl.
In a large mixing bowl, beat together the buttery spread, sugar, flax mixture and vanilla. Add in the melted ice cream.
Gradually add in the flour mixture
Pour into a greased 9-inch cake pan.
Bake for 30 to 40 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean.
Cool completely before adding frosting & ganache.

Frosting

Mix together the flour and cocoa, and set aside.
Mix the buttery spread, sugar and oil with an electric mixer on medium for one minute. Blend in the coffee and creamer, followed by the flour mixture.
Refrigerate for 10-30 min before frosting cake

Ganache

Combine ingredients and heat in small saucepan until melted. Drizzle over cake.

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I did this cake for the So Delicious 2013 Recipe Contest earlier this year. The idea was placed out there to come up with ideas using one or more of their products. Let’s just say, the research and development department had been well primed for this project. I LOVE their ice creams, and make a point to highlight them whenever someone starts to go down that “man, you can’t eat ice cream” road. Having a mild-to-moderate obsession with chocolate and peanut butter combinations, this zig zag had been something of a staple in the house for several years now. Coming back to the recipe contest, it was a given that I was going to do something with the ice creams, just a function of what it would be. Melting the ice cream and turning it into a cake worked out great a way to enjoy the ice cream in a new form.

Ingredients

For the Cake

1/2 pint So Delicious Chocolate Peanut Butter Dairy-Free Frozen Dessert

1-1/2 tablespoons ground flaxseed
4-1/2 tablespoons water
1-1/4 cup unbleached all-purpose flour
1/4 cup cocoa powder
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup dairy-free buttery spread (such as Earth Balance)
3/4 cup sugar
1 teaspoons vanilla extract

Frosting

5 tablespoons flour
3 tablespoons cocoa powder
1/2 cup dairy-free buttery spread
3/4 cup sugar
1 tablespoon safflower oil (or other neutral-tasting oil)
1/4 cup creamy peanut butter
1/2 cup vanilla dairy-free creamer (such as So Delicious French Vanilla Coconut Milk Creamer)
Ganache

1/2 cup dairy-free chocolate chips
2 tablespoons dairy-free buttery spread
2 tablespoons vanilla dairy-free creamer (such as So Delicious French Vanilla Coconut Milk Creamer)

Instructions

For the Cake

Preheat oven to 375ºF
Get ice cream out of the freezer and set aside in a bowl allowing to melt.
Mix flax and water in small bowl and set aside.
Mix flour, cocoa powder, baking powder and salt in a medium mixing bowl.
In a large mixing bowl, beat together the buttery spread, sugar, flax mixture and vanilla. Add in the melted ice cream.
Gradually add in the flour mixture
Pour into a greased 9-inch cake pan.
Bake for 30 to 40 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean.
Cool completely before adding frosting and ganache.
Frosting
Mix together the flour and cocoa, and set aside.
Mix the buttery spread, sugar, oil and peanut butter with an electric mixer on medium for one minute. Blend in the creamer, followed by the flour mixture.
Refrigerate for 10 to 30 min before frosting cake
Ganache
Combine ingredients and heat in small saucepan until melted. Drizzle over cake.

Enjoy, and keep living the daydream!

Continue reading »]]> “Buttermilkless” Blueberry Pancakes

OK, so I’m a dad. There seems to be an unwritten rule that dads make pancakes on the weekends. I don’t know if this has to do with dads being at work Monday to Friday and moms getting a break from preparing every meal throughout the week; I didn’t write this rule, I just revel in it. My dad made pancakes when we were growing up, and he still loves making pancakes for family gatherings;  Uncle Paul’s Pancakes are kinda world-famous, for us.

Translating over pancakes into a dairy free recipe is fairly straight forward. You are substituting out the milk, and then adjusting for the change in consistency. One other option we are going to do to aim just a bit further by mimicking the acidity of buttermilk. The reason buttermilk pancakes are so popular, is how the acid from the buttermilk reacts with the baking soda to increase the leavening that happens. We can recreate this by adding a small amount of vinegar to the rice milk and letting this sit for several minutes while we get the dry ingredients prepared. I could not believe how much difference this made; lighter, fluffier, and gone quick!

And yeah, so its blueberry season (if I can get this posted before apple season, that is), so what better thing to do to your pancakes than add blueberries. Fresh is of course best for this recipe, but frozen thawed berries work great as well. Timing the thawing is important, though, as too long and they may get mushy before you get them on the griddle, and not enough time to thaw and they will be too frozen when you put them in, interfering with how the pancakes cook. When using frozen, bring them out as the first step before you start putting the batter together, and this should give them the right amount of time.

I use a counter top plug-in griddle set to 300 F, and Pam baking spray on the griddle. I have tried others, but some of the other sprays do not do well with the heat of the griddle, so I keep coming back to the baking spray.

Ok, technique tip, very important. You want to let the pancake cook on the one side as long as you can before flipping it, this makes all the difference in that light n fluffy awesomeness that you want in the pancake.

Ok, technique tip, very important. You want to let the pancake cook on the one side as long as you can before flipping it, this makes all the difference in that light n fluffy awesomeness that you want in the pancake. The two pictures below are to highlight what you are looking for. First, notice how the blueberries are disappearing, yeah, that’s a good sign that we got our acidity right for the leavening. Next, the bubbles have come up, and popping along the outer edges. At that point you have waited as long as you want to wait, flip ‘em now!

Great sign that you timed it right, golden brown all the way across.

Once they are done, the bottom sides will have that same golden brown – “let’s get a plate and syrup and some buttery dairy-free spread” look to them, and you know you’re ready for breakfast.

Ingredients 

3/4 to 1 Cup Blueberries (fresh or frozen)

1 tsp White Vinegar
1 Cup Rice Milk (or soy, almond, etc)

1 Cup Flour
1 TBSP Granulated Sugar
1 TBSP Baking Powder
1/4 tsp Baking soda
1/4 tsp salt

1 Egg
2 TBSP Canola Oil

Steps

• If using a griddle, set to 300 F.
• If you are using frozen blueberries, place in a small colander and rinse thoroughly.
• Mix the vinegar and the rice milk in a medium bowl and set aside.
• If you are using frozen blueberries, rinse again.
• In a large mixing bowl, combine the flour,/ sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.
• Beat egg and add egg and canola oil to rice milk mix.
• Pour wet ingredients into dry ingredients and mix. If you are using frozen blueberries, rinse again.
• Once cooking surface is heated, apply non-stick spray to area before adding batter.
• Pour 1/3 C of batter onto surface, repeat as surface area permits.
• Add several blueberries to each pancake on the cooking area.
• When bubbles along edges begin to pop (see image above), flip pancakes.
• Second side will take less time than the first, and is dependent on how hot your surface is.
• When the second side is done, remove and serve, adding your favorite buttery non-dairy spread and real maple syrup.

Enjoy and repeat as needed.

Keep living the daydream!

Continue reading »]]> So I wanted to do a test post as I am continuing in my crash course in WordPress & blog creation. I am very anxious to get things going but there are a few things that I do have to figure out still. You are definitely going to get to observe my learning process, but I want to make that part as painless as possible for y’all. So the other day we had some friends over, and there was a request for something with some kick.These jalapeno poppers seemed like the right answer to the question. Here’s a pic of the sliced jalapenos before adding the stuffing to them. That post with the full recipe should be soon to follow. For now, going to see how this translates onto the site.

Add in sausage or tofu crumbles, Daiya shredded mozzarella and Tofutti cream cheese, and bake until they just start to brown on top. They did not last very long, and the conversation quickly turned to wrapping them in bacon next time.

Cheers!