a midsummer hello

Hello everyone! I know I’ve totally dropped off the face of Fancy Fig earth, but I am trying to soak up summer before possibly going back to work in a little over a month. Honestly, sitting inside blogging in the middle of Minnesota’s hot, steamy summer isn’t appealing, regardless of how much time I have on my hands! Here’s what’s been going on lately:

First of all, I had a birthday.

Lighting the birthday candles requires multiple people as you get older. I’ll worry more about that when I’m 80 (because there will be 80 candles on my cake).

I’m trying to keep this food-related. We went to the Boundary Waters with another couple in early June. Packing for 5-day canoeing and camping trips introduces new and exciting challenges to my PKU diet (note sarcasm). I usually bring low-protein pancake mix, bread (I’ll make jelly sandwiches, sometimes with a little bit of nutella for extra flavor and calories), additional higher calorie formula (PhenylAde Chocolate), dried fruit, noodles, granola bars, and fresh fruit or vegetables if we can fit it in the pack. The fresh produce adds a bit of weight to the pack and doesn’t always hold up too well. This time I also brought dried mushrooms, which was a treat. Also, sometimes I will eat a little bit of oatmeal for breakfast or lunch if I need an energy boost, particularly on days when we portage. Above is a blueberry pancake (made with MixQuick).

Speaking of jam, the first batch of jam happened a few weeks ago. I went strawberry picking up near Cambridge and ended up with about 11 jars of pectin-free strawberry jam. The texture turned out to be somewhere between syrup and jam. I mostly use it on toast and bread, but it works great on pancakes too.

I usually like to listen to Bob Marley while making jam, except this year I threw in some Justin Bieber, Miley Cyrus, James Brown, Brandy, and Neil Young to mix it up. It makes for a pretty well-rounded soundtrack. Basil was a big help in the kitchen too, she provides a lot of moral support when she isn’t stealing towels or trying to sneak in the garbage. I reward her with the stems I cut off the strawberries, which she appreciates immensely, even though they are technically garbage.

In mid-June we picked up our first Driftless Organics CSA box. This is the second year we’ve done this, and it’s been great! I split it with my sister, so each week we divide everything up. Splitting the summer share makes it affordable and enables us to actually make use of all the produce we receive. My favorite things so far have been the beets, carrots, lettuce mix, garlic, zucchini, broccoli, potatoes, cucumber, fennel, onions, and strawberries. Looking forward to tomatoes, leeks, squash, corn, melon, and sweet potatoes. Maybe even eggplant!

Beets, which ended up in a salad with cucumber and honey ginger dressing.

More veggies. Can you tell that I am a fan?

We made a large batch of pesto from two huge bags of basil we bought at the farmer’s market. We got a great deal. We ended up with a large freezer Ziploc bag full of the green goodness. We lay it flat in the freezer to form a sheet of pesto and just break off chunks when we need it. Since we didn’t put cheese or pine nuts in it, we needed less oil than the recipe called for.

I’ve recently enjoyed biking to the beach on the north side of Lake Harriet in the morning. It’s very pretty and peaceful, except when the geese swimming by threaten to attack me. Nothing food-related on this one.

You can’t blame me for not blogging, now, can you?

Here’s a little summer snack I made this morning after I got back from the lake. It’s just coconut-based (non-dairy) yogurt with fresh cherries and honey.

Alright, I feel grossly overwhelmed with the amount of effort and time that post took, but I don’t regret it. My next summer cooking goal is to make homemade sweet and spicy pickles. They are one of my favorite low-phe snacks but are four dollars a jar, have corn syrup in the juice/syrup, and they’re a pain to carry home in the grocery bag! I am hoping to make them tonight if my motivation doesn’t wane.

I hope you are all enjoying your summer! Thanks for visiting. If you feel so inclined, share some of your favorite low-protein summer recipes or ways you manage your diet during summer travel and vacations.

banana bread. yogurt parfaits. zucchini fritters.

Hello Fancy Figtopia. It’s me. I have three recipes to share today! (There is going to be more recipes and less talk in this post. At least I think so.) Well, a few weeks ago I made a loaf of my favorite banana bread. I use Cook For Love’s recipe. It tastes like real life banana bread! It’s soft. It’s tasty. If you fed it to non-PKUers they wouldn’t even know the difference. I love having it for breakfast or lunch.

Secondly, I have been trying to come up with make-ahead snacks and meals. One of my recent favorites is coconut-based yogurt parfaits in a jar. It’s not anything complicated, but it looks kind of fancy (it’s in a jar and anything in a jar is cute). Isn’t the idea of being able to eat yogurt just so satisfying to you as PKUer? It is to me. And in case you’re confused, I am referring to dairy-free coconut yogurt. I use So-Delicious coconut yogurts. I am not sure if there are even any other PKU-friendly yogurt options? Anyway, so So Delicious has two types of coconut milk yogurt. There’s regular and there’s the fiber-rich Greek style yogurt. The Greek style is the bomb. It is absolutely amazing. I thought the regular stuff was good (particularly the vanilla and blueberry), but this stuff is so creamy and the flavor is great too. The texture makes a big difference.

Okay, so back to the point. The parfaits. Here’s what I do:

I get a half-pint mason jar. I alternate layers of coconut milk yogurt, jam, and berries. I put the lids on. I store it in the fridge to have a ready-made snack or lunch. Usually, I will make a few at the beginning of the week. If you store them too long in the fridge everything starts to settle together and it just isn’t very…fresh. You can get creative. If I am using a flavor other than vanilla, I might not add the jam because it gets too sweet. If you need some extra phe or a treat for a special occasion, add a tablespoon of Nutella and some raspberries. These are good for lunch boxes, snacks, or dessert.

Zucchini fritters. I like this name. Fritters makes me think of critters. But don’t worry, no critters in these fritters. When I decided to make this recipe, I wasn’t sure if it would turn out without the egg. I decided to use Ener-G Foods egg replacer and it worked out well! I made a fritter for myself and a fritter for my husband using RL (real life) eggs. I kind of improvised the ingredients and measurements based on two recipes that I found on the Pinterest machine: one from Smitten Kitchen and one from Alexandra’s Kitchen. I can’t recall exactly what measurements I used, but I do know that I did not add as much flour to the recipe as Smitten Kitchen calls for. Make sure that you squeeze or strain out the excess moisture from the zucchini after grating it!

This is the batter pre-egg replacer. Zucchini, leeks, maybe some garlic, baking powder, salt, and pepper.

Frying up the fritters, after adding the egg replacer and a small splash of lemon juice. I also added roughly 1 T of wheat starch and 1 T of all-purpose flour to hold it together and so it would get a golden crisp.

There you have it, a little bit of what’s been going on in my kitchen over the past month. Until next time, keep in touch on Twitter @TheFancyFig.