Well, that's random!

I'm excited to see that my blog is highlighted today as "Today's Ten Random Blogs" on the Foodie Blogroll. A very warm welcome to my new visitors! Thanks for stopping by. I needed that kick in the butt to write a new post, so I'm going to make this a good one.

Oh boy, you're going to love this.

Chocolate Beet Cake! Let's get ready to rumble!!

This week, I received three beautiful red beets in my CSA box. If you've been to my blog before, you know how much I adore beets, but have only used the golden variety. Honestly, I feel like Lady Macbeth after chopping up a vegetable that oozes red juice everywhere.

However, red beets were present and accounted for and I had to carry on. Carefully.

Recently, I've read that the natural sugar in beets can enhance the flavor of chocolate. Yes, you read that right. So, I found a recipe for chocolate beet cake and decided to give it a go.

You're shaking your head in disbelief, right? You've shoved your chair away from the computer desk in disgust. Hands thrown in the air in utter contempt. You may even be sticking your fingers in your ears and singing "I'm not listening!" But if you trust me at all. Even the tiniest bit. Please, please make this cake.

Chocolate Beet Cake, posted by Paula Borchardt, Tucson CSA

approximately 1 cup cooked, chopped beets
1/4 cup water
approximately 1 cup applesauce, unsweetened
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon apple cider vinegar
1 whole wheat flour
1/2 cup white flour
1/2 cup cocoa
1 cup sugar
2 teaspoons baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1 cup chocolate chips

Puree the beets and water in a blender or food processor. Pour into a large measuring container and add enough applesauce to make two cups total. Mix in the vanilla extract and apple cider vinegar.

In a separate bowl, mix all the other ingredients together; fold in the beet mixture and mix all thoroughly. Bake in a pre-greased 9×13″ pan at 325° for 35 minutes.

• I boiled one large beet in a saucepan with just enough water to cover it. After I drained the water and pureed it, it was only 3/4 cup. I probably should have thrown in another half a beet to make it 1 cup. Oh well.
• Quality ingredients make for a quality end product. I splurged and bought Ghirardelli cocoa and chocolate chips. No regrets here.
• The original recipe called for 1 1/2 cups of whole wheat flour. I decided to take a chance and split that between 1 cup of whole wheat and 1/2 cup of white flour. Don't get me wrong, I love baked goods with whole wheat flour, but it tends to create a denser product. I wanted this cake to be light and moist. It was all that and more.
• Notice there's no oil, eggs or milk in this recipe. If you used vegan chocolate chips, you would have a vegan dessert. Remind me to tell you sometime about my trip to San Francisco over a decade ago and my first visit to a vegan bakery (yes, JB, you were with me!) Aah, what a mere child I was then. So much to learn.

Notice there's no picture of the chocolate beet cake in this post.

That's because it's gone. Gone, baby, gone.

Now go make it!

Four fruits. One dessert.

Sweet, caramelized baked apples. What's a more perfect dessert than that? Well, I found a recipe that kicked it up a notch.

This Passover-friendly dessert uses four different fruits: lemon, orange, banana, and of course, the apple.

Here's what you'll need:


Two apples
One ripe banana
Pinch nutmeg
A few drops of lemon juice
Juice of one orange
1 teaspoon sugar

Recipe makes two servings.

Directions:

Mash the banana. Add nutmeg, lemon juice and sugar. Peel the apples and divide into two. Scoop out the centers and fill with the banana mixture. Pour the orange juice over the top.

Bake in a hot oven at 400-degrees for 20 minutes or until the apples are soft. Serve hot.

• The flavors were really terrific, but it wasn't as easy to make as I expected. First it took me forever to pare the apple. And I was on the phone talking to my friend at the same time. Accident waiting to happen, right? Next time, I'm purchasing an apple corer.
• Then, it took forever for the apple to get brown and caramelize. Twenty minutes just didn't cut it. Even the extra ten minutes I added didn't help much. I used a Fuji apple, my favorite. I wonder if they're just too crisp? Next time I'll try a Granny Smith or a Red Delicious. Don't you love all the different names for apples? I even tried a Pink Lady once (at a farmer's market, not at Rydale High)
• I added a 1/3 cup of vanilla ice cream. You really don't need a lot. Trust me. This is good stuff.

Passover memory for today:

It's March 2001 and I'm no longer the youngest child in my family at Passover seder. Being the youngest child meant that every year I'm expected to sing the four questions in Hebrew. The questions are meant to engage meaningful discussions about the Passover story and how we celebrate the holiday. It's an honor to sing it - I've had it memorized since I was 8 years old. This year was different, though. The youngest child is now my three month old niece who is barely awake through dinner, much less ready to test her vocal abilities. She's my parents' first grandchild. We're all in total and complete awe of her.

I took her in my arms, held her in my lap and sang the four questions to her. Welcome to the family, sweet little one.

It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown

If you're a child of the 1980s like me, you must remember Linus waiting in the pumpkin patch for the Great Pumpkin on Halloween and missing all the fun of the holiday. Perhaps, Linus knew something back then that we didn't. That pumpkin is a great big superfood.

From Superfoods Rx, "Pumpkin is extremely high in fiber and low in calories, pumpkin packs an abundance of disease-fighting nutrients, including potassium, pantothenic acid, magnesium, and vitamins C and E."

And guess what? It's mighty tasty, too. I'm a big pumpkin pie fan, but I'm always willing to mix things up. Today I went to Whole Foods (insert angels singing) and purchased four cans of pumpkin puree. I'm on a mission this weekend to expand my pumpkin palate.

You may have seen somewhere on the internet that pumpkin puree can replace eggs, milk and oil when using a brownie mix. I decided to try it so I bought the Whole Foods Organic Brownie Mix. Let me just tell you that it was divine. Totally scrumptious. I cooked it for 40 minutes, then immediately put it in the fridge to cool and turn into gooey, fudgy goodness. The best part? I only ate two small pieces. I was totally full. The fiber in the pumpkin did it's job and helped me to get my chocolate fix while controlling my appetite today.

Quick update: the pan of brownies in my fridge is disappearing fast. One thing I wanted to add was the mix from Whole Foods had chocolate chips in it. So everytime I warm up a small piece in the microwave, it melts. The lucious chocolate mixes with the pumpkin even more. It is reminding me more and more of a warm molten chocolate cake rather than a brownie. Serve this dessert warm with a spoonful of Cool Whip Lite and some fresh berries. This is a winner, folks.

I can't wait to hear what you think about it. Try it, you won't regret it.

"Superfoods" for Breakfast and Dessert

I love the term superfood. It brings up images of blueberries wearing red tights and a cape, doesn't it? C'mon that's funny.

But seriously, this "super" title is given to a handful of foods that we all should try to include in our daily meals. Considering the nutritional powerhouses that they are, they might as well leap tall buildings in a single bound. Chocolate, a superfood? You betcha. Hopefully that thought will entice you to check out this link: http://www.superfoodsrx.com/superfoods/

In the meantime, I made a recipe from the website above today that doubled as breakfast and dessert. Pretty cool. I managed to squeeze in five superfoods: blueberries, oats, yogurt, oranges and honey.

For breakfast, I made my usual Bob Red Mill's 5 Grain Oatmeal and added the following recipe:

2 pints strawberries, oganic
3 medium bananas, ripe
1 pint of blueberries, organic
2 medium oranges, zest and juice
2 tablespoons honey

Quarter the strawberries, slice the bananas, andadd the blueberries. Gently toss with fresh orange juice, zest, and honey. Put the mixture in the fridge for at least 30 minutes.

• You can also toast some crushed walnuts and add to this mixture. I burnt mine accidentally while toasting them this morning, so I didn't use them. 1/4 cup of this mixture was a tasty and filling addition to my 1/2 cup of cooked oatmeal this morning. I enjoyed this meal at 8:30am this morning and didn't feel a hunger pang until 12:30pm. And I worked out in between - that really blows my mind. I used to graze between meals because I was so hungry. But not anymore. This meal will fill you up and give you tremendous energy.
• Almost 12 hours later, this mixture was even better. The longer it sat in the fridge, the more the flavor deepened. I topped a 3/4 cup of fat free French Vanilla yogurt with another 1/4 cup of the fruit. It was so good, that I started to imagine this as a parfait for my next dinner party.
• By the way, I found a "microplane" buried deep in a kitchen drawer today. Basically it's a zester with an attitude. Sadly, I've been using a grater to get some zest off my oranges, but man that microplane zests like it was its job and it wanted a promotion.