Bryanna Clark Grogan’s Vegan Feast Kitchen/ 23rd Century Table

Today's Cranberry Fact: "Cranberries are rich in polyphenolic antioxidants which protect against cancer and cardiovascular disease. The proanthocyanidins and other compounds inhibit the oxidation of LDL cholesterol while cranberry powder has been observed to decrease the LDL cholesterol levels of animals with elevated blood cholesterol levels. The proanthocyanidins in cranberry and lowbush blueberry are known to inhibit tumor growth." http://www.vegetarian-nutrition.info/herbs/cranberry.php

Well, we've had our cranberry-laced breakfast, cranberry-studded dinner, and now dessert!  This is one of my favorite cakes.  Not only is it delicious and easy to make, but it gives you the feeling of being decadent when, really, it's pretty low-fat and it's made from whole wheat pastry flour.  How good can it get?

I had a bite or two of a similar cake at a local restaurant a few years ago and the memory lingered.  It took me a while to get around to making a vegan version that came "up to scratch" with what I remembered, but I'm happy with this recipe. That particular restaurant still has the cake on its menu, but they've omitted what I would consider the essential caramel sauce and instead drown it in a pile of whipped cream! You can "gild the lily" with a small dollop of vegan whipped topping or non-dairy ice cream if you like, but don't leave out the caramel sauce!

Printable Recipe

BRYANNA'S “DECADENT” CARAMEL-CRANBERRY-PECAN CAKE
Serves 8
This cake actually isn't that decadent, but it really seems so! This is a great choice when you want something rich, not too sweet, and special, but not chocolate.  It can be made either with fresh cranberries or dried cranberries.

THE CAKE:
Dry Mix:
1 2/3 cups whole wheat pastry flour
3/4 cup brown sugar
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp ground nutmeg
1/2 tsp ground allspice
1/4 tsp salt
1 cup chopped lightly-toasted pecans
1 cup fresh or frozen cranberries, chopped (or 2/3 cup dried cranberries, soaked in hot water and drained well)
Wet Mix:
1 cup water
3 Tbs oil
3 Tbs smooth unsweetened applesauce (TIP: Freeze canned or homemade applesauce for baking in ice cube trays and pop the cubes into zipper-lock bags-- each one is 2 tablespoons!)
1 Tbs cider vinegar
1/2 Tbs pure vanilla extract
CARAMEL SAUCE:
1/3 cup brown rice syrup
1/2 cup plus 2 Tbs. brown sugar
2 Tbs vegan butter (such as my homemade palm oil-free vegan Buttah)
1/8 tsp salt
1/3 cup organic vegan creamer (these are made for use in hot coffee, so less likely to curdle in hot liquid)
1/2 tsp pure vanilla extract

Preheat the oven to 350°F. Oil an 8" square pan and line the bottom with cooking parchment cut to fit.

Whisk all of the Dry Mix ingredients, except for the pecans and cranberries, together in a medium bowl. Add the pecans and cranberries and mix briefly.

Whisk together the Wet Mix ingredients in another bowl. Pour into the Dry Mix ingredients and stir briefly, just until mixed. Scrape the batter into the prepared pan. Bake for 35 minutes.
Cool the cake on a rack.

To make the sauce:
Bring the syrup, brown sugar, Earth Balance and salt to a boil in a heavy saucepan and boil over medium heat, stirring constantly, until the consistency of heavy syrup.

Remove from heat and cool a bit. Heat the creamer just until warm. Whisk into the syrup along with vanilla.

The cake can be served warm or at room temperature, but the sauce should be hot. Cut the cake into 8 triangular servings and drizzle each serving generously with some of the hot sauce. You can also serve this with a scoop of your favorite vanilla non-dairy ice cream, or a little of your favorite non-dairy whipped topping.

Nutrition Facts
Nutrition (per serving): 485.6 calories; 33% calories from fat; 18.8g total fat; 0.0mg cholesterol; 163.5mg sodium; 368.6mg potassium; 80.5g carbohydrates; 4.9g fiber; 54.1g sugar; 5.4g protein; 10.5 points.

Enjoy!

Apple and Cranberry Oat Crisp

This has been a great year for apples and pears, and those of us with friends who are generous with their bounty are busy trying to use it up in ways that will insure that it does not get lost at the bottom of the freezer! (By the way, sometimes people are downright desperate to get rid of extra fruit this year. Don’t forget your local Food Banks, food salvage, gleaning and reclamation programs, church programs, and other social agencies that feed people.)

Having already made applesauce and apple butter, and also pear sauce (make it the same way as applesauce— smooth or chunky but with some ginger —it’s good!), I was searching for some low-fat ways to use up the rest of this bounty that keeps coming my way (I’m not complaining!). I didn’t want to make pies this year because we’re trying to keep off the weight we lost earlier in the year. (But, if you want to make pie, there are a couple of yummy pies on the recipe list below.) So, #1, I made pear chutney, because we love chutney and it keeps well, plus I had everything I needed in the house already.

I’ve been asked, “What do you serve chutney with if you don’t eat meat or cheese?”. Well, curries and other Indian dishes, of course; veggie “sausages” and seitan; smoked tofu (this is a terrific combination!) or tofu cream cheese on crackers—and that’s just for starters!

And, #2, I had some cranberry sauce leftover from Canadian Thanksgiving, and I decided to mix that with an impressive amount of apples to make a very large and low-fat apple crisp, some of which could be frozen for a future desserts. Both of these recipes were hits and now I’d like to share them with you.

Allow me a short rant....

It amazes me that people will pay up to $50 a bottle for some exotic-sounding tropical juice that is supposed to be loaded with vitamin C and antioxidants (and, incidentally, cure everything that ails you!), when they can go to their local grocery store or natural foods market and buy some locally-grown fruits and berries that are every bit as good for you! Or, they can even go pick wild berries for free!

The three tropical fruits that immediately come to mind (and that some companies are getting VERY rich on) are goji berry, noni, and mangosteen. The newest one on the market is acai berry from Brazil. Now, there's nothing wrong with these fruits. They are perfectly good. But why should you pay $40-50 a bottle for the juice (often sold via a multi-level marketing [pyramid] company), when it's no better than any bottled apple juice that you can buy, and certainly less healthful than local fresh fruit or homemade juice? These fruits are no doubt purchased dirt-cheap from Third World countries (Tibet, or, more likely, China, for the goji berries: Tahiti for the noni; and Southeast Asia for the mangosteen). They are then processed into juice (thereby eliminating the fiber, and using a heating process to preserve them for bottling, eliminating alot of the vitamin C and other heat-sensitive nutrients. (Click on the links in this paragraph for more info.)

So, the farmers or pickers in those Third World countries are getting ripped-off, and you are getting ripped-off by paying so much for a bottle of this stuff! The truth is that we have fruits and berries in North America that have just as many (if not more) nutrients and antioxidants as those tropical fruits! Whatever happened to "buy locally"? You can even pick many berries for free in the summer and fall and freeze, can or dry them for winter use, keeping the money in your pocket and treating yourself to some good eating as well as plentiful nutrition.

Here's an article about the new, CHEAP "super-fruit" that's been hiding in the hedgerows of Europe and North America-- black currants! (Remember Ribena?)

If you read the article at the bottom of this blog post that I wrote on antioxidants, you will see a list of the 20 foods with the highest antioxidant activity. You will notice that they are all grown in North America!

One of my favorites on that list is cranberries, which are grown in BC and many other areas in North America, and which is a cousin of the blueberry (high up on said list). You can read about the many health benefits of the cranberry here. The season for cranberry delights is coming upon us, but they are good all year round, and they are widely available, fresh, frozen, and dried (look for the UNsweetened dried ones).

So, what if you don't go for the juice, but go for the fruit or the dried fruit of these tropical fruits? Well, as far as I know, noni is not available in North American markets, and maybe just as well. Here's how the Wikipedia entry for noni fruit describes it:

"The fruit is a multiple fruit that has a pungent odor when ripening, and is hence also known as cheese fruit or even vomit fruit." It eveidently tastes so bad that it has to be cut with other fruit juices.

You can sometimes find mangosteens in markets in large cities, but, again, what about eating locally? Goji berries are generally sold dried. So why not just eat fresh North American fruits that are high in antioxidants, and dried North American fruits and berries? Dried goji berries cost from $19.95-$39.95/18 oz. online. It is not always clear whether they are organic or not, and how could you tell anyway, when they come from China? Organic dried unsweetened cranberries, on the other hand can be had for $14.25/18 oz. (tierrafarm.com), and organic dried blueberries for $14.92/18 oz. (traversebayfarms.com). Or, you could buy or pick wild or organic blueberries in the summer and dry them yourself!

Here is some info about the hype around goji berry, noni, and mangosteen juice (some are sold by companies that use pyramid schemes). I couldn't find anything on acai berry juice that wasn't from a company or website trying to sell it or get you to sell it!

Here's a Nutrition Action Newsletter pdf file article "Squeezing cash out of three 'hot' juices". (One of the juices is pomegranate, but it's quite a bit cheaper than the others [about $10 a bottle], and at least it tastes good, and can be grown in some areas of North America. Here is an article by Ralph Moss, Phd, from cancerdecisions.com, about the health benefits of pomegranate, and a warning.)

Another short article about the above. Here's a quote: "Salespeople for Tahitian Noni juice were caught on camera by a CBS affiliate in Los Angeles, claiming that the tropical juice “does miracles” for lupus, dementia, and macular degeneration, a leading cause of blindness among older Americans. But no good studies have shown that noni, a lime green fruit found in tropical Asia and islands in the Pacific, has any unique benefits. A distributor was also recorded telling new recruits that the juice tastes “just like money.” No kidding—a 32-ounce bottle of Tahitian Noni juice runs $42."

The CBC program "Marketplace" featured a piece on the goji berry juice scam: watch the whole show here .


On Noni juice by Ralph Moss, PhD of The Moss Reports (Alternative cancer Treatments)


Is there more about mangosteen juice, or Xango, one name that it's sold under?  Here's another article. And here's the last bit of that article:

"Some Anti-Oxidant Rich Foods: Cheap Alternatives

Okay, now that I feel a little better to have expressed my truth about this mangosteen juice, let me give you some quick tips that these companies certainly don’t want you to know.

1- Berries — Berries are by far the one of the richest sources of antioxidants, particularly wild blueberry. I suggest having as many berries as you can. Plus they are particularly enjoyable to eat. When wild blueberries are in season, freeze them in ridiculous quantities and use them throughout the year.

2- Pomegranate Juice — Pomegranate Juice is a very high source of cancer-fighting anti-oxidants. You can either purchase fresh pomegranates and make the juice yourself, or purchase pomegranate concentrate (which is still a high source of anti-oxidants). The good thing is that even a big jug of pomegranate juice will only cost you about $7, so 5 times less than the mangosteen juice (which is made mostly with other juices). And best of all, you can find it in most health food stores.

3- Prunes — According to recent studies, prunes rank really high on the “anti-oxidant” score. Good thing, because they are also very delicious.

4- Greens — Dark green leafy vegetables are also an excellent source of anti-oxidants. But not just that. Greens contain more nutrition than any other foods!

5- Mangosteen — Finally, you can also get the health benefits of mangosteen… by trying them out fresh. They are very delicious. You can find them in many Asian markets. Even at $5 a pound, you’re still going to get a better deal than you would get on the Xango juice. And if you ever travel to Costa Rica in September, or Asia in the winter, you’ll get all of the mangosteens you can eat, at dirt cheap prices."



Unsweetened dried cranberries and cranberry juice-- other ways to enjoy cranberries


ANTIOXIDANT POWER!
by Bryanna Clark Grogan
First published in The Island Word from Courtenay, BC, and then in my Vegan Feast subscription newsletter.

I was once teaching a cooking class and meantioned the power of antioxidants to protect us from ‘free radicals”. One woman quipped, “I married one of those, and he’s not free or radical anymore!”

But, to get serious, “Free radicals”, in the case of our bodies’ internal workings, are like gangs of vandals in your body. These molecules are released when oxygen is burned along with fuel for energy in your body (so free radical production is as natural as breathing). Free radicals have at least one extra electron, which gives them a negative charge and drives them through your body, scavenging for cells with which they can react. These reactions can damage DNA and other substances in your cells. Your body’s natural defense system, ideally, should be able to cope with this. But environmental assaults on the body, such as ultraviolet radiation, tobacco smoke, the wrong kinds of fats, alcohol, injury, over-strenuous exercise, chronic disease, and environmental pollution, can overpower the body's ability to neutralize free radicals, allowing them to cause damage to the structure and function of the body's cells.

That’s where antioxidants come in.

Antioxidants are the most widely known of the phytochemicals. These antioxidant molecules exist as vitamins, minerals and other compounds, and they have a positive charge, so they can neutralize the free radicals. When you are young, your cells usually have the capacity to repair much of the damage themselves, but, as you age, the body’s ability to repair itself diminishes (sigh). So, as you age, you need more antioxidants to prevent and repair the free radical damage.

Heart disease, Alzheimer’s, cancer, autoimmune diseases, degenerative retinal damage, and stroke are only a few of the conditions which are now thought to be related to free radical damage in some way.

We shouldn't take an antioxidant pill (not there aren’t people out there trying to sell them to you!) because we haven’t even identified them all yet (it is estimated that there are about 4000)! The most studied antioxidants include vitamins C and E, betacarotene and the mineral selenium. You CAN take pills for these particular antioxidants, but recent studies are showing that—surprise, surprise!-- they are more efficacious when taken in food. And a whole lot tastier, too. So, do like the healthiest and longest-lived people in the world, the Okinawans, and eat 10 fruits and vegetables every day!

In a recent USDA study, the antioxidant levels in over 100 different foods were analyzed. Fifteen out of the top 20 ranked foods that help protect cells from the damage caused by "free radicals" are fruits or veggies. Several dried beans ranked high, as well.

The Top 20 antioxidant foods, according to a USDA ranking by antioxidant value per serving size: (notice that ALL of these foods are grown in North America and are relatively inexpensive-- some can even be picked wild)

1.) Small red beans (dried)
2.) Wild blueberries (some people say that these are #1, but every list I’ve seen list them #2)
3.) Red Kidney beans
4.) Pinto beans
5.) Blueberries (cultivated)
6.) Cranberries
7.) Artichokes (cooked)
8.) Blackberries
9.) Prunes
10.) Raspberries
11.) Strawberries
12.) Red Delicious apples
13.) Granny Smith apples.
14.) Pecans
15.) Sweet cherries
16.) Black plums
17.) Russet potatoes (cooked)
18.) Black beans (dried)
19.) Plums
20.) Gala apples

ADDENDUM:
From “Becoming Vegan” by Vesanto Melina, RD and Brenda Davis,RD, p.148)

“Cooking can alter the structure of phytochemicals, resulting in very different health effects. In some cases cooking increases the availability of phytochemicals, while in others it is reduced. For example, lycopene is better absorbed from the cooked tomatoes than from raw tomatoes. Cooking can also change phytochemicals, giving them entirely different properties. For example, when garlic is cooked in water, vinyldithiins are produced; when cooked in oil, ajoenes are formed. It looks as though we are best to include a variety of both raw and cooked foods in the diet.”

Here are some recipes on this utilizing these foods, but be sure to check the Recipe Links page for more berry, pomegranate and plum recipes, and recipes using pecans, beans, artichokes, and potatoes. There's a list of apple recipes here.

Rich Vegan Stew with Cranberries

Baked Vegan Orange French Toast with Bumbleberry Sauce

Quick and Easy, Creamy Berry Frozen "Soygurt"

Vegan "Chick'n Breasts" with Savory Blueberry Sauce

Blueberry/Pomegranate Vinaigrette

Chard and Apple Salad with Maple-Glazed Squash and Raspberry-Balsamic Vinaigrette

Eggplant Pomegranate Relish

Warm Salad of Autumn Greens with Plum Vinaigrette and Roasted Hazelnuts

Italian Plum Jam

 

Enjoy!

BRYANNA'S VEGAN CRANBERRY-PECAN "EGGNOG" STREUSAL MUFFINS
Yield: 12
I developed these muffins to use up some commercial "soynog" that I tried and didn't really like for drinking-- found it too spicy. I like my own homemade soy nog with just a little nutmeg grated on top for drinking.  But any commercial vegan nog would work well in this muffin recipe. The muffins are not overly-sweet and make a nice snack or breakfast item. I tried to keep the fat reasonably low and the fiber over 5 g.

DRY MIX
1 cup whole wheat pastry flour
1 cup unbleached white flour
1/2 to 3/4 cup organic unbleached granulated sugar
1/4 cup wheat germ
1 Tbs baking powder
1 Tbs ground golden flax seed (measure AFTER grinding)
1/2 tsp salt
WET MIX
1 1/4 cups commercial vegan "nog" (see text above-- nutrition facts calculated using "So Nice Noel Nog")
6 Tbs smooth unsweetened applesauce
2 Tbs oil
1 tsp pure almond extract
ADDITIONAL:
3/4 cup dried cranberries
1/2 cup chopped lightly-toasted pecans
STREUSAL TOPPING
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup oat bran
2 Tbs vegan butter (try my homemade palm oil-free "Buttah")
1/4 tsp freshly-grated nutmeg

Preheat the oven to 400°F. Insert large paper cupcake liners in 12 muffin cups in a cupcake pan.
Combine the Streusal ingredients in a medium bowl, mixing with your fingertips. Set aside.

Mix the Dry Mix ingredients in a large bowl. Add the dried cranberries and pecans and stir briefly. Whisk or blend together the Wet Mix ingredients. Add the Wet Mix to the Dry Mix and mix briefly, only to moisten the Dry mix.

Divide the batter evenly between the muffin cups. Top evenly with the Streusal mixture. Bake for 20-25 minutes or until they test done. Cool in the pan for a few minutes, then transfer carefully to a rack. Serve warm.

They can be frozen. To reheat, slice in half and heat in a toaster oven at 400°F for a few minutes.

Nutrition Facts
Nutrition (per muffin): 385.7 calories; 20% calories from fat; 9.1g total fat; 0.0mg cholesterol; 119.3mg sodium; 321.1mg potassium; 74.8g carbohydrates; 5.5g fiber; 23.3g sugar; 69.3g net carbs; 4.7g protein; 7.7 points.

Happy New Year!

A new version of my old Christmas cookie recipe "Chinese Chewies", which I'm calling "Pecan-Cranberry Chewies"-- these were gluten-free, but you can also make them with wholewheat pastry flour. I made these just before the power went out! This photo shows the cookies cut and un-sugared, cut and sugared, and cut, rolled, and sugared. UPDATE, Dec. 2011: here is a page about the origin of "Chinese Chews" and the original  recipe from 1917. "The origin of the name “Chinese Chews” for a snack with dates and English walnuts is a mystery that has not been explained."


This was the heavy, slushy snow coming down last Thursday-- picturesque, but mucky!

Well, the good news is, after 8 days, we finally have power again! The bad news is, now we have no phone access, until about Thursday! I was so depressed about that I could hardly enjoy the good news! I regret to say that I was in a really foul mood about the phone and DH had to put up with alot of whining and whingeing (as they say in the UK!). But, we attended our first Christmas party last night (very reluctantly on my part), and had a lot of fun and good food, and good laughs, so I feel better now. What can you do about it anyway?

Saturday, our close neighbors got their power back, but we had to wait because we were not a "multiple outage". Our neighbors just below us lent us their 1000 watt generator for the last 2 days or so, so at least we could have a lamp or two on, watch TV now and then, or even use the computer or a kitchen appliance. But, to use the computer, I had to bring the whole set-up down to a different spot and it was a bit of a nuisance, so I only did it once for 1/2 an hour.

Now, I can use the computer, but of course, this means we have no internet access because we have no phone line! I was able to download the photos off of my camera to my computer, resize them and put them on a disc, though. So I could put them on Photobucket from the disc here at work and use them on the blog.

Anyway, you're probably getting tired of hearing about it! I'm getting tired of writing about it! I hope that by Thursday, things will be normal, and I can write about Christmasey things!

Thank you all for your comments and good wishes!


Here is a not very good photo of the debris on our deck after the windstorm. It really doesn't do the whole thing justice, but it's all I have.

FOOD:

Here is a photo of the bamboo steamer set-up on the butane burner, reheating leftovers:


Here are some photos of that Breast of Tofu dish I described in my last blog post:






Here are the pyrogies with Soycurls that I mentioned in the last blog entry:


Here's the recipe for the "chewies". They are fat-free except for the nuts-- very sweet, but pretty good for you, and really delicious. Ps: i will add the nutritional info later.

Printable Recipe

BRYANNA’S VEGAN PECAN-CRANBERRY CHEWIES (CAN BE GLUTEN-FREE)
Makes 32-36 squares or balls
(Adapted from a recipe in my book “The Almost No-Fat Holiday Cookbook”)

The original version these bars (called "Chinese Chewies", and I have no idea where they got the name!) have been a favorite Christmas cookie for years. The original recipe contained eggs. I veganized it, and now discovered that a gluten-free version works just fine!

The first time I tasted these was at a Hanukkah party at my cousins' Baba's (grandmother's) house many years ago. Had to try to make them myself! They were originally made with just dates and walnuts.

3/4 c. wholewheat pastry flour  OR Bryanna's Gluten-Free High-Fiber Flour Mix (recipe below)
1 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. salt
8 tsp. (2 T. plus 2 tsp.) powdered egg replacer mixed with 1/4 c. cold water
1 c. brown sugar
1/2 T. vanilla extract
OPTIONAL: 1 T. grated organic orange zest or 1 tsp. orange extract
1 c. chopped pecans
3/4 c. chopped pitted dates
1/4 c. dried cranberries
OPTIONAL: powdered organic unbleached sugar

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.

In a medium bowl whisk together the flour, baking powder and salt.

In a small, deep bowl beat together the water and egg replacer with an electric or rotary beater until like softly-mounded beaten egg whites. (NOTE: You can actually beat this with a hand immersion blender for this recipe, beacuse it doesn't have to get really stiff.)

Beat in the sugar and vanilla briefly. Scoop this into the bowl with the flour mixture, along with the dates, cranberries, and pecans. Mix gently but well.

Scoop the mixture into a nonstick or lightly-oiled or sprayed 8" square cake pan (you can line the bottom with cooking parchment, if you like). Bake for 25 minutes, or until it begins to turn golden (it will be soft).



Cool slightly on a rack, then cut into small pieces (32-36) and roll in powdered sugar, if you like.

You can also take the squares while they are pretty hot and roll them and squeeze them into little balls, and roll in powdered sugar, if you prefer.

Cool thoroughly and store airtight.

Nutrition Facts
Nutrition (per 1 square or bar, recipe cut into 36): 80.1 calories; 24% calories from fat; 2.3g total fat; 0.0mg cholesterol; 15.9mg sodium; 84.2mg potassium; 15.1g carbohydrates; 1.2g fiber; 8.4g sugar; 13.9g net carbs; 0.7g protein; 1.6 points.

Printable Recipe
 
BRYANNA'S GLUTEN-FREE HIGH-FIBER FLOUR MIX
Makes about 13 cups

7 and 1/2 c. brown rice flour (I grind it from short grain brown rice)
2 and 1/2 c. potato starch (NOT potato flour!)
1 and 1/4 c. tapioca flour
1 c. ground golden flax seed
1 c. chickpea flour (besan) OR soy flour
4 and 1/2 T. xanthan or guar gum

Mix well and store in a moisture-proof container in in the freezer. Use cup-for-cup instead of regular flour.

NOTE: Because non-gluten flours lack the structure that gluten provides, xanthan gum or guar gum (available in health food stores) is often added to gluten-free baked goods. This mixture contains enough xanthan or guar gum for cakes, cookies, pancakes, and quick breads. For yeast breads, you may have to add up to 1 tsp. more gum per cup of gluten-free flour.

Nutrition Facts
Nutrition (per cup): 607.8 calories; 9% calories from fat; 6.8g total fat; 0.0mg cholesterol; 19.0mg sodium; 399.0mg potassium; 126.2g carbohydrates; 10.4g fiber; 0.9g sugar; 115.8g net carbs; 10.3g protein; 11.9 points.


Enjoy!