Grain Free Maple Bacon Cookies with Thyme

These grain free lovelies are a palate pleasing combination of sweet and savory. The bacon marries the maple syrup and thyme into a wonderfully different cookie, in a very good way. Use dried thyme if you must, but try to find fresh if you can!  If you don’t have bacon fat, you can sub in a good quality lard, coconut oil or butter, but the bacon fat contributes to the uniqueness of the cookie!

Grain Free Maple Bacon Cookies with Thyme

1 cup almond flour

½ cup arrowroot flour

1 Tbsp coconut flour

½ tsp baking soda

1 tsp apple cider vinegar

Pinch of salt

¼ cup dark (grade b or c) maple syrup

¼ cup cooled bacon fat

1 tsp fresh thyme leaves, woody stem and big peices removed, (sub ½ tsp dried thyme)

¼ cup + 2 Tbsp diced precooked bacon, separated.

Preheat oven to 350F

Whisk dry ingredients in medium mixing bowl. Add bacon fat and maple syrup,
 and mix with wooden spoon until well combined.

Fresh thyme has a bigger flavour profile than dried, try and find it if you can!
Luckily I still have some in the garden :)

 Add the fresh thyme and the  ¼ cup diced bacon and mix in well. Dough should be slightly sticky.

Using 2 spoons place approx 1 tbsp cookie dough on pan,

Top with a smidgen of the leftover bacon, pressing down slightly into the top of the dough to secure. 

Bake in preheated oven for 12-13 minutes or until the edges start to brown.
Remove to a wire rack to cool. 

Store any leftovers in the fridge for a few days or freezer for a few months,
if you can keep them that long!

Makes approx 16-18 cookies.

I keep bacon drippings in an empty jam or mason jar
in the fridge until I have enough to use

Creamy Broccoli Salad with Bacon

I had a craving for broccoli salad, and decided to make a batch for lunch one day last week. The particular salad I was hankering for uses mayonnaise. But being Thursday, I didn’t want to make a whole jar of mayo because of its short shelf life. (My recipe uses a whole raw egg, and it only lasts in the fridge for about 5 days. We don’t go thru enough mayonnaise to use it up quickly, especially on the weekends when we are not packing lunches for the household).  I did have a jar of cashew butter in the fridge though, so I came up with this scrumptious dressing to top the crunchy broccoli. I added some chopped carrots, leftover bacon (I know, leftover bacon???) and some dried cranberries, and this little bit of deliciousness was born. The sriracha in the sauce adds flavor, but not a lot of heat. Adjust if you want it more or less spicy.

Creamy Broccoli Salad with Bacon

Optional: lightly toast your cashews

Dressing:

½ cup cashew butter

2 tbsp apple cider vinegar

1 tbsp avocado oil

1 tsp sea salt

1 clove garlic

1/3 cup water

½-1 tsp sriracha sauce (optional, increase or decrease for desired heat!)

Salad:

1 head broccoli, chopped (peel stems, chop and use too)

2 carrots, peeled and chopped small

1 cup chopped cooked bacon

1 cup chopped cashews (I toasted mine J )

½ cup dried cranberries (fruit juice sweetened)

----------

2 tbsp black sesame seeds (optional)

Handy chopper is great for
chopping the carrots

Measure dressing ingredients into a blender. Blend until well mixed and creamy.  Set aside.

(Alternatively, measure into a wide mouth mason jar, and blend with a stick blender)

Toss all of the ingredients together in a large bowl. Top with dressing and mix well. Sprinkle with black sesame seeds if using and serve immediately. Store leftovers in fridge for 2-3 days.

Shown without black sesame  seeds,
I realized after I took the pictures
that I hadn't added them!

Grain Free Pizza Crust

We topped this one with my tomato confit, fresh
grape tomatoes, black olives, fresh basil, and
a sprinkle of Black River old cheddar/brick
shredded cheese. 

A while back, on my Facebook food page, I posted a link to these delicious little cheese balls. Pretty easy to make and darn tasty to boot! They were the closest thing to real bread that I have had in years! The recipe got my brain to working though, as I thought of all the things that this type of dough would be great for.  Naan bread was the first creation, and although I still want to tweak the recipe a bit before I share, it is exactly what my curry dishes have been missing since going grain free. Pizza was the next experiment, and it was a beautiful success. It goes on the parchment paper as a sticky gooey mess of muck, and comes out as a wonderfully crisp thin yet chewy pizza crust. Add some toppings, bake again on a hot pizza stone, and you have an amazing grain free pizza, no yeast, no grain and no belly ache to be found!

I played around with the technique from the cheese ball recipe, as I found mixing the hot milk into the dry ingredients in the mixer was much easier, and I changed up the ingredient list a wee bit to get a better texture for what I was aiming for.  The results are amazing, and I am so excited to share!

 If you don't have a pizza stone, I am sure this would work fine on a baking sheet, just be sure to use the parchment

 paper in the first step, as i think it may stick to the pan without it. The stand mixer is necessary, as getting everything mixed would be impossible without it!

Grain Free Pizza Crust

1 cup milk

1/3 cup avocado oil

1 ½ cup tapioca starch

1/3 cup arrowroot starch

¼ cup coconut flour

1 tsp salt

2 eggs

Put a pizza stone on the middle rack of your oven. Preheat oven to 450F

Heat milk and avocado oil in a small pan over med low heat until you just see bubbles forming on the sides, not boiling, but nice and warm.

Meanwhile, measure the dry ingredients into a stand mixer and mix on low until blended.

With the mixer still running, slowly pour the warm milk/oil mixture into the dry ingredients and mix until blended. It should come together in a nice, somewhat sticky dough.

Mix on medium for 3-4 minutes until the “dough” cools down enough that you can touch it with your hand (with the mixer turned off of course!!) . If it is too hot the eggs will cook instead of blending in. 

When the dough is cool enough, add the eggs one at a time and continue to mix on low until everything is well combined. It will take a bit to come together into a nice smooth but sticky dough.  When the dough starts coming together well, turn to medium and mix for a full 2 minutes until thoroughly combined.

Using a rubber spatula, turn dough onto a large piece of parchment paper. 

Wet your hands (you may need to wet them a few times during this process, it is sticky!) and spread dough out on parchment paper with hands into whatever pizza shape you desire, making it nice and even and about 1 cm thick.

Using a pizza peel or the bottom of a cookie sheet, slide the dough (still on the parchment paper) onto the preheated pizza stone and bake for 10 minutes.

Remove from oven, using a pizza peel or the back of a large cookie sheet.

 top with desired ingredients, and bake again until toppings are hot thru 

and cheese is bubbly (if using), usually 6-8 minutes ish. 

Slice and serve hot!

This one was topped with a smokey bbq sauce, bacon, pepperoni,
mushrooms, jalapenos, and an old cheddar/brick cheese blend
 from  Black River Cheese, that was perfect!

Bacon Wrapped Stuffed Jalapenos

We generally have very little luck growing peppers of any kind in our garden. So when the lone jalapeno plant that we very apprehensively planted this year sprouted these beautiful spicy babies, we felt they were worthy of something special.
 Add some lovely Mark’s Almost Famous Bacon,

(can't seem to find a website to link to, but we sell it at Goodness Me!)

 and some cheese, and you have an awesome appetizer, guaranteed to please! I used a lovely Gouda that paired nicely with the flavour of the thyme and smoked sea salt. (If you don’t have smoked sea salt, substitute with a nice Celtic or Himalayan sea salt.) The red peppers are actually just ripe jalapenos. When they ripen and turn red they have a slightly sweeter and hotter piquancy to them. Green or red, whatever colour you happen to have, this recipe is tasty and so darned easy, you have to make them!! I highly recommend wearing gloves when you take the ribs and seeds out of the peppers, my thumbs are still tingling as I type out this recipe, and I really was being ever so careful to limit my exposure to their heat.

Bacon Wrapped Stuffed Jalapenos

I had two very large and two
fairly small Jalapeno's, this
amount of filling should fill 4
average sized jalapenos
very nicely.

4 Jalapeno peppers

8 slices of nitrate free bacon

2/3 cup cream cheese

2 cloves garlic, minced

½ tsp dried thyme (rubbed between your palms to crush well)

½ cup grated Gouda cheese (Mine was a very generous ½ cup!)

Smoked Sea Salt and Fresh Ground Black Pepper to taste

Preheat oven to 375F.

Wearing gloves, cut the jalapenos in half lengthwise, and remove the ribs and seeds and discard. Set peppers aside.

In a medium sized mixing bowl, mix the cream cheese, garlic, thyme, Gouda, salt and pepper together until well incorporated.

Divide filling evenly between the pepper halves, and wrap each with a strip of bacon, securing with a toothpick.

Place in an oven safe dish and bake for 35-40 minutes or until the bacon is fully cooked and just beginning to crisp up. The cheese should be softened and starting to bubble.

Remove from oven and cool slightly before serving. Best eaten while still warm J

We served them with prime rib steak,
pan fried portabello mushrooms,
freshly picked Swiss chard and
pan fried potato slices...heaven!!

Chunky Butternut Squash Soup With Bacon And Kale

With fall settling in to Southern Ontario, the days are rapidly changing from salad days to soup days. Hearty stick to your ribs kind of soups that comfort , nourish and warm you to the core. This is a perfect recipe for a fall lunch or dinner, I hope you enjoy it!

The squash could be roasted in advance to save a bit of time, making this an easy soup to get on the dinner table fast. 

Chunky Butternut Squash Soup With Bacon And Kale

1 large butternut squash

1 tbsp coconut oil

1 cup finely diced bacon

2 onions, peeled and chopped (a very generous cup full!)

1 bunch kale, tough stems removed, and chopped

1 tsp dried oregano

½ tsp paprika

½ tsp turmeric

1 clove garlic

1 tsp salt

7 cups bone broth (I used chicken)

Preheat oven to 375F

Cut squash into manageable chunks, peel and remove the seeds. Cut into 1 ½ inch chunks, toss with coconut oil, and roast in a large pan in preheated oven for 60 minutes. The squash should be softened and just starting to brown slightly. Remove from oven and set aside. 

Sauté the bacon in a heavy bottomed large pot, stirring often until just cooked thru, approx 4-5 minutes. Add the diced onions and cook until the onions start to soften, another 4-5 minutes. Add the Kale and the spices, and sauté for another 2-3 minutes.

Add the pre-roasted squash to the pot and lightly mash to break up the chunks slightly. This helps add some body to the soup.

Add 1 cup of the bone broth to the pot, and stir, scraping  to deglaze the bottom of the pan. Add the remaining broth and bring to a boil. Simmer for 5 minutes, and serve.