Mochi

I have discovered a great thing today. Mochi. I keep saying it in my head. "Mochi Mochi Mochi". Where have you been all my life, oh lovely gluten free thing that you are.
So, what is this wonder food? The best thing is to check it out on www.grainaissance.com/mochi.html for all the information.

I foresee a world of exciting possibilities with this food. I bought the sweet one by mistake and decided to try to cook it just to see what it was like. You cut the slab into about 1 inch pieces and bake. They puff up like little profiteroles and have an amazing texture when you bite into them. I had many ideas for these little puff balls. They are not that sweet on their own but imagine with a drizzle of maple syrup or honey and some dairy free ice cream or yoghurt. Oh yes!

My trip to the store this morning was prompted by me being very hungry and opening the fridge to find nothing remotely edible for lunch. There were no leftovers as we ate out last night with friends before going to see the new Harry Potter. We had asian food which I love and is so easy for an endo diet - lots of rice and not a sandwich or bowl of pasta in sight (just beware of egg noodles - I usually go for the rice noodle dishes).

Anyway for lunch I decided on a baked potato with something - didn't know what. However every potato in the organic shop was seeded - not the most appetizing - should have probably mentioned it to them, but just abandoned idea of baked potato. Ended up with mochi and a tub of hummous. Quite what I thought I could do with that I've no idea. In the end I decided on another Quinoa salad with some cucumber and cilantro that were already in the fridge so. While the quinoa was cooking I added some frozen sweetcorn. Dressing of lemon juice, olive oil and mustard. Be careful with mustard - depending on how committed you are about the wheat free as it does contain some. Anyway the dish was actually quite tasty and I even have leftovers.

Salads for summer

For me summer is all about messing around with salads and create some new things. I am feeling very virtuous this week as my diet has been a picture of health since last week when we ate out and drank far too much for my now delicate constitution. We have eaten in every night since then - mainly variations on a theme. Quinoa salads, rice salads.

There was a gorgeous chickpea salad one night from a British book I had called Good Food Magazine : 101 Veggie Dishes. I suggest buying this book if you can get hold of it - its not expensive and is full of fantastic things.

Indian Chickpea (Garbanzo bean) salad

6 tbsp olive oil
3 garlic cloves
2 red chillies, seeded and sliced
4tsp cumin seeds, lightly crushed
2 x 400g cans chickpeas, drained and rinsed
3 tomatoes, halved, seeded and diced
zest and juice of a lemon

For the salad:
25g/1oz cilantro
half a cucumber cut in batons
1 medium red onion, sliced
4oz/100g baby spinach leaves

1) Fry the garlic, chillies, and cumin in 5 tbsp of the oil over a medium heat for 10 minutes taking care not to burn the garlic. Add chickpeas and heat through for 5 minutes.

2) Add tomatoes, lemon zest and juice. Season and set aside. Toss together the salad ingredients and divide between serving plates. Spoon chickpea over the top.

Serves 4.

This is not the exact recipe as it says to have it with naan bread too but obviously I left that part out and I layered some quinoa on top of the salad before spooning on the chickpeas.

Salads with a grain as a base are great for lunch the next day too, you just need to make a little extra. I always find it hard to know what to have for lunch as sandwiches are now off the menu.
Mostly I try to eat leftovers but if that is not an option, I have some of the following things:
- rice cakes with cheese and chutney
- I make a batch of say fritters, lentil burgers, that kind of thing and freeze. You can pull them out of the freezer in the morning and take to work with a salad.
- salads
- if it has to be fast food, chipotle does a great Vegetarian Burrito Bol - all the elements of a burrito without the wrap, also great because you can choose to leave out the sour cream and cheese!

My fantastic new blender arrived on Monday so smoothies are back on. Yeah! Stopped at the organic shop on the way home today to stock up on fruit. I now have a fridge full of Strawberries, blueberries, rasberries. I also got some bananas and a pineapple. Plenty for smoothies every day!

Birthdays!

Its been a great week so far for birthdays. It is my birthday week so some of the rules are going out the window, but if you can't break a rule on your birthday when can you? Went out to Georgia Browns on Tuesday for a friends birthday. This is a great DC restaurant featuring southern style food. I had the vegetarian sampler, which was rice and beans, succotash, fried green tomatoes. Okay, I know they're fried in batter but it was a birthday party. Food was really tasty. Had a glass or two of wine but what the hell.
Yesterday we went to a 4th July BBQ. I ate loads of salad and a couple of chicken sausages, without the bun, I just can't resist BBQ food. Then loads of fresh fruit for desert. Yummy. However, it was all I could do to resist the cake and cookies, but I did.

The local organic shop has just started selling these coconut covered dates. Bought some yesterday and they are really tasty. Great to satisfy that sweet craving.

Then yesterday was my birthday! Went to Ardeo in Cleveland Park. Lovely meal. There was nothing veggy that was wheat-free so I went for tuna with a lentil salad and leeks. Tasty.
I did succumb to panna cotta for dessert and half a bottle of wine but it was my birthday - whats a girl supposed to do?!

Today's lunch was Quinoa salad. I am trying to make up for a few bad days with something perfectly healthy. I never know what to do with Quinoa really and haven't found a really great recipe for it yet so I normally make it up. Todays was a dressing of olive oil, red wine vinegar and dijon mustard. I whisked all this together in the bottom of a salad bowl. Then added baby spinach leaves, cherry tomatoes, red onion, feta cheese. Then added the cooked quinoa and mixed it all together. It was really tasty. I used 1/2 cup of quinoa and that was plenty for lunch.