Simple Baked Maple Egg Custard

This recipe is so simple, I am not sure why we don’t enjoy it more often. With 4 ingredients that we usually have on hand, it is easy to throw together and throw in the oven to help warm up the kitchen on a blustery rainy day. This recipe does make a large batch, feel free to half it and bake in a 8X8 glass dish instead. This custard needs to bake in a water bath, much like a typical creme brule. This helps to give a nice, moist, steady temperature to cook the custard evenly.  A lot of custard recipes on the internet use a longer slower bake, with lower temperatures, but I haven’t had an issue with the higher heat of my recipe.

Simple Baked Maple Egg Custard 

4 cups milk, preferably full fat and non homogenized

8 Large eggs,  preferably pastured

Served with Roasted Pears

½ cup pure organic maple syrup

1 tsp Vanilla powder or 2 tsp pure vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 400F

Break eggs into a medium mixing bowl and whisk well. Whisk in milk, vanilla and maple syrup. Pour into 9X13 glass pan. Set this pan inside a larger 10x15 glass pan.

When oven is preheated, fill a pour-able vessel (I use a glass measuring cup) with very hot tap water.

Carefully place pans into the preheated oven, and fill the outer glass pan with the hot tap water until it reaches just over halfway up the inner glass pan that is holding the custard.

Bake for 40-45 minutes or until the custard is set in the middle. It should jiggle a bit like jello, and a knife inserted in the middle should come out damp but clean.

Let cool before enjoying. 

Roasted Venison Stew

This is a great recipe to make on a Sunday afternoon. It fills your house with a mouth-watering aroma, and a taste that is wonderfully nostalgic-- comfort food at its finest. The browning/sautéing step deepens the flavours, and is a step that shouldn’t be skipped. The acidity of the wine, along with the long oven roast helps to tenderize the venison.  If you cannot find venison (we usually find it here), you could always substitute bison or beef stewing meat.

Roasted Venison Stew

2 tbsp coconut oil

1 lb venison stew meat, cut into bite sized pieces.

2 tbsp arrowroot starch/flour

2 tsp each dried thyme and rosemary

Salt and pepper to taste

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1 ½ cups chopped onion

4 large carrots, scrubbed and chopped into bite sized pieces

4 stalks celery, chopped

4 yellow potatoes, chopped into 1-2 inch cubes

1 ½ cups red wine

1 946 ml can of organic diced tomatoes (Eden comes in a BPA free can!)

2 cups of bone broth

Turn your oven onto 375F to preheat.

Toss the cut up venison with the arrowroot, thyme, rosemary, salt and pepper.

Heat the coconut oil in a large Dutch oven over medium high heat. Add the tossed venison, and brown. Don’t worry about cooking it right thru, it will finish cooking in the oven. You just want to create some nice colour and flavour. When it is nice and browned, remove to a plate and keep warm, leaving the pan on the burner.

Add the onions, and sauté for a few minutes. Add the red wine ½ cup at a time to deglaze the pan. Use a wooden spatula to loosen the brown bits from the bottom of the pan. The wine will reduce during this step, further enhancing the flavour of the stew. When the wine is all added,  stir in the chopped carrots, potatoes and celery, and sauté a few minutes more.  Add the tomatoes, bone broth and the browned venison and stir to combine. Bring the mixture to a boil, put the lid on the Dutch oven, and place into the preheated oven  to roast for 1 ½ hrs. Remove lid and leave it off. Stir well and roast  for another ½ hour.

Remove from oven and serve hot. 

Amazing Grain Free Nut Free Banana Bread

Since going grain free, there are some old staples that have been lacking in our house, or so I was reminded (with all love and affection of course) by my eldest son recently. Upon seeing some really ripe bananas on the counter, he pointed out how long he has gone without banana bread (poor thing J ) I have not made any grain free loaves of any kind as of yet,  so the challenge was on. The resulting loaf was awesome, very moist and banana-ey, and received two thumbs up from the poor banana bread deprived teenager. I had used an entire cup of chocolate chips in the trial run, but I thought the chip to bread ratio was a bit much, so reduced it to ¾ of a cup , and thought the results were much better. (Said teenager however, said that 1 cup was just fine, so use your judgement on the amount of chips to use!)
The first batch I made had some issues with the very bottom sticking in the pan, so I lined the pan the next time with a strip of parchment, and it came out beautifully. 

Amazing Grain Free Nut Free Banana Bread

4 eggs, preferably pastured

3 small bananas or 2 large ones

¼ cup coconut oil, softened  

½ cup Coconut flour
1/4 cup chickpea flour

2 tbsp arrowroot flour

1/3 cup coconut sugar

1 tsp baking soda

1 tsp vanilla

1/3 cup plain kefir or yogurt, preferably full fat

Pinch of salt

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¾-1 cup chocolate chips (Enjoy Life are great)

Butter or coconut oil butter ghee spray to grease pan, plus a piece of parchment if desired.

Preheat oven to 375F.

Grease a loaf pan well with butter or the coconut oil butter ghee spray (add a layer of parchment if desired)

With an immersion or stick blender blend all of the ingredients together until very well blended. Scrape sides to incorporate everything well. Stir in chocolate chips and let batter stand for 5 minutes to thicken up.  Scrape into prepared pan.

Bake in preheated oven for 45-50 minutes or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean.

Loosen edges with knife, remove from pan and cool on wire rack before cutting.