Baked Custard

How many of you got a creme brulee torch (or 5, if you're like us) for your wedding? I kind of wonder how many people ever use theirs. We do, but we really like creme brulee. Can you tell yet what an amazing sweettooth I have? Someone should track the percentage of dessert posts on here. ;-)

I wanted to share this recipe for custard that I'm making for tonight. The ingredients are all wonderfully healthy. If you so choose, at your own discretion, to dust a bit of sugar to the top and torch it then, well then that's another story. But I can tell you that the custard itself is a wonderful treat full of great, whole ingredients.

And it was incredibly easy.

The Recipe:

1 cup whole milk

1 cup heavy cream, not ultrapasteurized

1/4 cup maple syrup

5 egg yolks

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Grab out a small pan (or, if you're fortunate enough to have one, a small enameled cast iron or stone pot) and start warming the milk and cream slowly over a low flame. While that's heating up, beat the egg yolks with the maple syrup. Add the heated milk mixture slowly to the eggs, beating constantly. Blend in vanilla. Pour into 5-6 individual custard cups that you have placed in baking dish(es). (If you don't have custard cups, I've used my teacups before - just make sure they're ok to go in the oven.) Pour water around the cups.

Bake at 325 for about an hour, until the center is just set and a knife inserted into the center comes out clean. Chill.

If desired, you can sprinkle some sugar over the top and convert this yummy custard dessert into a more sophisticated Creme Brulee fit for your snobbiest guests. Add some berries for garnish if you like.

Gelatin Juice Blocks

We don't do juice in our home. Our pediatrician was adamantly against introducing juice, which was further backed up by the counseling I took for the gestational diabetes I had throughout my second pregnancy. I finally asked my counselor: "Hey, what's the big deal if it's just fruit?" She explained that juicing fruit takes all the fiber out of the equation and leaves your body processing it the same way it would regular sugar. Furthermore, when you drink a glass of OJ, you're probably drinking more like 4-5 oranges instead of sitting down to just 1, which would cause your blood sugar to spike anyway. Basically, you're better off eating a cookie. Fruit's great, but in moderation, because it does have sugar. All I needed to hear. If my kids are going to have a sugar-rush, I just assume they enjoy a cookie or cake or something really worth it on the rare occasions that's okay, ya know?

Juice blocks are my only exception. And since I make an exception, I make sure I'm making it worth my time. I get this juice at Trader Joe's, because it has things like spinach, broccoli, and spirulina listed on the ingredients. Sure, it's listed far below the apple and pineapple juice, but I'll take it. And, ugly as it is, my kids enjoy every last bit of it!

This is really, REALLY easy. So if you've never made gelatin blocks from scratch before, let me show you. There's simply no reason to go for the boxed Jell-O after you see how easy it is.

As far as gelatin goes, I bought this stuff here on Amazon. It was a great price for gelatin, cheaper than Knox packets from the grocery store, and I know it comes from beef. Knox doesn't disclose on the package where their gelatin comes from, so I've got no clue. Gelatin is great because it helps your body be more efficient at processing protein. Since grass-fed beef is expensive, we don't eat it too often. My kids aren't huge meat-eaters anyway. So gelatin is an important part of our diet, allowing us to get the most we can out of the meat we do eat.

It's just 1 Tablespoon of gelatin for every 1 cup of juice. If you're using Knox packets, there's 1 Tablespoon in each packet. (If you want to make regular gelatin you'd eat with a spoon, it's half that.) I use 4 cups of juice in my 9x13 baking dish.

Measure out 1 cup of juice and pour into your 9x13 dish. Then measure out 3 more cups into a pot. Turn the heat on. Once the juice is well on it's way to boiling, sprinkle your gelatin over the cold juice in your dish and let it sit for 1 minute. Here it is, just gelin':

After a minute, add the boiling juice to the dish and stir for about 5 minutes until the gelatin is dissolved.Cover and put in the fridge for about 3 hours. You can speed up the process by putting it in the freezer for the first 1/2 hour.

Cut 'em and scoop 'em, and that's it!

Comfort Drink

It's still cold, rainy, and wet outside. I'm not complaining! I love change and, since I've spent pretty much most of my days living in Southern California, this comfy, dreery weather is a welcomed change for me!

I decided to join the masses and make myself a mug of cocoa as I gear up for the peace that awaits as the children nap. (I'll have a fire going, shortly.) But I used all-natural, healthy ingredients and, of course, fair trade chocolate. So I'll take my cocoa less the guilt, please!

There's not much to this story aside from the ingredients I chose. I'll tell you about them and let you find the ratios that work for you.

The chocolate comes from Sweet Earth Chocolates. You can find fairtrade cocoa powder at other places, but I buy a lot of my chocolate from this place because it's the best place for chocolate chips. I did recently see them at Sprouts, but they were very expensive. Fairtrade is very important to me and I think it should be to you, too. Chocolate is a luxury, so I would first do without than buy something I don't need that is tainted by the blood of child slavery. If you'd like to know more about this, you can check out Stop the Traffik for starters.

I use raw milk for drinking, but it's very expensive. Trader Joe's has unhomogenized milk that is pasteurized, so I sometimes mix it with the raw stuff and use it for cooking. There's just no sense paying $16/gallon for unheated milk that I'm just going to be heating up anyway! If you can't afford either option, definitely look for milk that is not ultra-pasteurized. Ultra-pasteurization is a violent process that heats milk to 280 degrees for 3 minutes, the end product devoid of important enzymes and nutrients we drink our milk for. Ordinary pasteurization heats milk to 180 degrees for 30 minutes. It's not a great option, but it beats ultra-pasteurized hands-down! If you want to learn more about the subject of pasteurization (why we started pasteurizing milk, what it does to the product, the benefits of raw milk, how to determine if your unpasteurized milk is safe, etc.) check out the Real Food book on my bookshelf. She's dedicated a lot of her book to this topic.

And, of course, our good friend agave nectar. Agave is an all-natural sweetener that does not raise your blood sugar. There are other appropriate sweeteners you can use: pure Grade B maple syrup with it's multitude of nutrients, and raw honey which has anti-viral properties among other things. I usually choose agave, though, since it doesn't affect blood sugar.

Rain Calls for Lemons

So it's rainy outside today. Rain means lots of things in the Sudduth house. It has always meant cozy, inside, sleepy days. With the advent of children it has meant stir-crazy days filled with lots of creative activities. For me, today, it just seemed like lemons were in order. We've been getting lemons in our produce box, and I've yet to do anything with them.

My mom makes the best, no the BEST, no THE BEST lemon bars ever! Trust me, I've tried others. Nothing like reaching for something that looks to be just as good, my mouth watering expecting that yellow, perfectly tangy, perfectly sweet yummy goodness when reality hits. That's just not my mom's lemon bar! No, Corner Bakery, your lemon bars do not even come close. Well, today I decided to do the unthinkable: change the recipe. I wanted to make lemon bars a little more healthy. All the yummm without the guilt, ya know?

Here's her recipe:

~ Sift together 2 cups flour and 1/2 cup powdered sugar. Add & combine 1 cup melted butter, and then press into the bottom of a greased 9x13 baking dish. Bake for 20 minutes @ 350 degrees.

~ Meanwhile combine: 2 cups sugar, 1 tsp baking powder, 4 eggs, 4 T lemon juice (from real lemons, and if comes in a bottle and is self-proclaimed "Real Lemon Juice", it's not from real lemons) and 4 tsp (or so) grated lemon peel.

~Pour over warm crust and stick it back in the oven for 25 minutes. Chill, and before serving cut into 2" squares & sprinkle with powdered sugar.

Here's my new (and hopefully improved) recipe:

~ Blend: 2 cups whole wheat flour, 3 oz agave nectar, 1 1/2 sticks butter. Press into the bottom of a greased 9x13 baking dish. Bake for 20 minutes @ 325 degrees.
~ Meanwhile combine: 1 1/2 cups agave nectar, 1 tsp baking powder, 4 eggs, 4 T lemon juice (from real lemons, and if comes in a bottle and is self-proclaimed "Real Lemon Juice", it's not from real lemons) and 4 tsp (or so) grated lemon peel. (I got enough juice from 1 lemon, but needed 4 to get enough rind. Buy 4 lemons, just in case.)

~Pour over warm crust and stick it back in the oven for 25-30 minutes. Chill, and before serving cut into 2" squares. Sadly I omitted the decorative powdered sugar.

So I gotta tell ya, my updated version of one of my favorite dessert recipes is pretty darn close. I used the agave substitution suggestions here very carefully and it seems to have worked great. They aren't nearly as pretty, and perhaps a bit more crumbly. If making for guests, you may want to use unbleached flour and a lighter agave (I used blue agave) for aesthetic reasons only. I will definitely be making these again. Enjoy!