Puffed Brown Rice chocolate squares

When Orion was really little we used to give him  organic puffed brown rice to snack on, or to let him feel like he was included in the meal. I still have multiple bags in my pantry, I was struggling to find something to do with them and thought of how much I used to love puffed wheat squares. Now the original version would not work with our allergies and the fact that I have an aversion to corn syrup. I had to laugh at all the versions I found that labeled them as healthy when they contain cups upon cups of sugar. My recipe is by no means healthy but it isn't made with refined sugars so I consider it ok in moderation. This would be really tasty with coconut stirred in but my husband hates coconut and would be very disappointed if he couldn't eat these.

1/2 cup palm shortening (You could sub coconut oil here if you would like)
1/2 cup honey
1/2 cup Palm sugar
1/3 plus 2 tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder

8 cups organic puffed brown rice
1/4 cup chia seeds

Line a 9x 13 pan with wax paper
In a medium sauce pan, on medium heat melt shortening and honey together, mix in palm sugar and cocoa powder until a smooth consistency is reached.
In a extra large greased bowl mix brown rice puffs and chia seeds, Pour chocolate sauce over it all and mix until it is all evenly coated.
Firmly press mixture into your pan refrigerate for 30 minutes. Pop out of pan and cut into desired pieces

Blueberry raspberry mini muffins

 I've got a thing for muffins, they are a delicious comfort food. After a night up with a cranky toddler I decided to make some muffins. I strongly dislike overly sugary muffins that leave you with a sugar high after eating them. With Orions allergies I have to make sure these are dairy and egg free as usual, I find it is helpful to look for vegan recipes. As usual I can never find a recipe that I like so I altered one to suit my purposes. I can't ever decide which type of berries to use, so I used them both! Mini muffins are perfect for portion control and for toddler hands. My toddler has such a short attention span, I was forever finding full size muffins with one bite taken stashed in creative places. FYI a stale month old muffin can double as a cat toy at the most inopportune moments. Enjoy these we certainly did :)

Original unaltered recipe here at egglesscooking.com





1/4 cup Ground Flaxseed

3 tbsp hemp hearts
1 and 3/4 cups Whole Wheat Pastry Flour
1 and 1/2 teaspoons  Alumininum free Baking Soda
1/2 teaspoon Cinnamon

1/2 teasspoon epicure gingerbread spice
1/4 teaspoon  salt
1 cup Coconut Milk
1 tablespoon Apple Cider Vinegar
1/4 cupVegetable Oil
1/4 cup Maple Syrup

1/4 cup Local Honey
1 teaspoon Vanilla Extract
1  cup Blueberries (fresh or frozen)

1/2 cup raspberries


Preheat oven to 375F/190C for 15 minutes. Line a muffin tin with paper liners and grease it well with non stick cooking spray.
Mix together the  milk and vinegar; set aside.
In a large bowl combine together the ground flax seed, hemp hearts, flour, baking soda, cinnamon, gingerbread spice and salt.
In a medium bowl, whisk together the maple syrup, oil, milk mixture, vanilla extract and orange zest.
Make a well in the dry ingredients and stir in the wet ingredients with a rubber spatula until just moistened. Fold in blueberries and raspberries

Scoop into mini muffin pan, fill each cup 2/3 full.

Bake for 12 minutes

Lemon dill shrimp with green beans

Sometimes you have a night that you just really don't feel like cooking, or you get home late and don't have much time. In these cases it is nice to have an easy meal to fall back on, everything in this meal is something from the pantry or freezer. If I am in a big hurry I will make brown basmati rice or sprouted brown rice. Tonight I wasn't in a huge hurry so I made Calrose brown rice. This recipe is dairy less, casein free, gluten free, egg free. It contains no soy or peanuts. We are lemon lovers in our house, I have included a less lemony version.

2.5 cups chicken broth
1/2 cup lemon juice + 1 tbsp (For the less lemony version only use 1/4 cup lemon juice)
3 tbs lemon dilly dip mix (Epicure)
4 cloves garlic minced
1/2 tsp fresh ground pepper
1 tbsp coconut or other high heat stable oil
2 cups cooked shrimp
 3 tbsp corn starch (For the less lemony version only use 2.5 tbsp of corn starch)
2.5 cups Frozen green beans (I used mixed green and yellow beans since that's what I had in the freezer)

Thaw shrimp, toss shrimp in tbsp lemon dilly, 1 tbsp lemon juice pepper, pepper and garlic, set aside.
Whisk together lemon juice, chicken broth and and remaining  dip mix, reserve 1/4 cup liquid and whisk in corn starch.
On medium high heat sautee shrimp 2 minute in the coconut oil , take out of pan and set aside.
Pour first broth mixture in pan scraping pan bottom well,  add beans bring to boil, then lower to a simmer covered for 3 minutes. Whisk in reserved broth (You may need to give it a little stir before you pour it in), making sure you are stirring constantly, mixture should thicken nicely.
When mixture is thickened put your shrimp back in stir well and simmer for 2 minutes.
Serve over rice

Sloppy Joes with a twist

I haven't been feeling like cooking this week for some reason, we have Orions birthday party on the weekend and many things to do to get ready for it. I made up this easy recipe to just toss in the crockpot. The twist is that these contain carrots, but you barely know they are there.

Sloppy Joes (Marikas style)
1lb beef (Thawed, never use frozen beef in the crockpot)
1 1/2 cups grated carrots (About 3 medium)
1 tbsp 3 onion dip mix (Epicure)
1 Diced onion
1 400 ml can of tomato sauce
1 tbsp sucanet (or brown sugar)
1/2 tsp EACH salt and pepper
1 1/2 tbsp Apple cider vinegar

Put everything except the liquid smoke in the crock pot and cook on high for 3 hours or low for 8 hours.
10 minutes before serving stir in the liquid smoke.
Serve over buns with a salad on the side.

Dairy free Butter Chicken

Sometimes I just get a craving for something that will not be satisfied until I make it. This time around it was butter chicken, Clay hates curry so I have to pick and choose which ones I make. He actually ate this one without complaining. Orion gobbled his up. I searched and searched for a dairy free butter chicken recipe. The ones I found just seemed to leave ingredients out instead of substituting them, so I found a normal recipe that got rave reviews and substituted items to make it allergen friendly.

Here is the original recipe at "Crockpot 365"


Here is my allergen friendly version:


2 chicken breasts with backs attached, deboned and diced (You could use other chicken this is just what I had in the freezer)
1 onion diced
8 garlic cloves, minced
4 Tbsp coconut oil
1 1/2 tsp ground cardamom
2 tsp mild curry powder
2 tsp garam masala (I only trust Mcormick brand)
1/2 tsp ground ginger
1 3/4 cup coconut milk (I use coconut dream, if you use a canned milk leave out the cornstarch)
1 Tbsp corn starch (Feel free to substitute for any other type of thickening starch)
1 small can tomato paste
2 T lemon juice
1 cup plain Coconut milk yogurt plus 1 tbsp lemon juice (So nice makes a great one) (Reserve for just before serving)


Turn crockpot on high, melt coconut oil in bottom.
Place garlic and onion in bottom of Crockpot.
Debone and dice chicken. Place in Crockpot.
Mix spices together and sprinkle over chicken stirring to coat evenly.
In a measuring cup whisk together, coconut milk, tomato paste, lemon juice and corn starch. Pour over everything. Cook on high for 4 hours or low for 8. Stir occasionally.
15 minutes before serving stir in yogurt and lemon juice. Serve over rice

Roasted garlic and red pepper hummus

It is Grey cup Sunday here in Canada. While I'm not much of a football fan I do love using it as a excuse to spend time with family and eat appetizers for dinner. Every year my mom asks me to make hummus, for some reason hers never turns out like mine. With her kids grown and flown the coop my moms food processor gets little use these days except for making hummus. Since she prefers my hummus she has passed on the food processor and the hummus making duty to me. I find that the key to a good hummus is using good beans. I have never had good hummus from no name brand beans. I will ONLY buy Scarpone canned beans. I have tried cooking the garbanzo beans myself and they just leave something lacking. Since Orion has a sesame allergy I substitute sunflower butter instead, you could leave it out but I find it lacks something in flavour without it. This year I am switching it up a little and making red pepper hummus.

Roasted Garlic and red pepper Hummus
1 medium pepper cut in half
1 head garlic peeled
Scant 2/3 cup lemon juice
2 little cans  (Just under 600ml total)Scarpone Garbanzo beans drained with 4 tbsp of liquid reserved
1/4 cup Sunflower butter (If you run the measuring cup under hot water before measuring the sunflower butter it will slide out easily)
1/4 cup EVOO
1 tsp Himalayan salt
1 tsp Black Pepper
Paprika to garnish if you would like

Preheat oven to 400F
Take pepper halves and spray with Olive oil, Wrap head of garlic in foil. Bake in oven for 1 hour. Let cool.
Put beans, liquid, peppers and garlic in food processor and process until chopped,  Dump in Sunflower butter, lemon juice, blend again. while food processor is going drizzle in olive oil. Taste, then add salt and pepper (Some beans are saltier then others) (I find that  by not rinsing the beans you don't need much other flavourings.
Let sit at least an hour before serving