Almond bars

[cjsmith]

OK, I'll be honest and state up front that these things taste like sawdust. But that's not the point. They're full of protein and "good fats"; that too is not the point.

They are a baked snack using no grains or sweeteners. THAT'S the point.

I adapted a recipe from Gourmet Nutrition v1.0. Some of the ingredients were problematic. But hey, BAKING is EASY. Substitute, switch, omit, make up off the top of your head, and voila. What I wound up with was a big honkin' pile of almond meal, three eggs, a handful of walnut pieces, and an ingredient I have never before purchased for my kitchen: whey protein powder (sorry, abqdan!).

This is the first time I've ever baked without using any form of flour whatsoever. Massive breakthrough for me!

Now that I've eaten some of these bars, I know exactly what I'd do to them. Unlike the target audience of Gourmet Nutrition, I'm not aiming to become the fittest person on the planet. I'm just aiming to survive Lyme treatment. So: I'd add a teaspoon of vanilla flavoring and 2-3 tablespoons of melted butter. After that go-round I'd see whether I still liked the egg proportion, and I'd try some with unsweetened cocoa powder added, and some with cinnamon and nutmeg. I might decrease the whey protein if it doesn't hose the texture -- the whey protein is sawdust, no question, and it ain't cheap stuff either. Variants I'll probably have when I'm done: chocolate almond bars, chocolate peanut bars, and "spice cookie" bars.

After that, if I can manage it, I'll start trying to figure out how to make a thin cracker kind of thing I can use to scoop up hummus. Nut meal probably doesn't make a good base for that, but you never know 'til you try.

I can BAKE again!

Comments

[allanh.livejournal.com]

Have you tried these?

http://www.marysgonecrackers.com/ns/intro.php

I usually find them at Whole Foods, and they're a nice alternative to chip-like (potato, tortilla, etc.) snacky things, especially with salsa or sandwiches.

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

I'd probably try them except they're made from grains.

[allanh.livejournal.com]

D'oh! Sorry. I was fixating on "wheat-free" and all of the seeds in the ingredients, and didn't think about the quinoa.

I'll shut up now.

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Oh, no worries! I bet they're scrumptious, and I apologize for being curt. That was unwarranted. It's just that I'm starting to notice that some people are asking questions ("Can you have...? I could bring in some...") as if what I have is gluten intolerance. I heartily appreciate the offers and the help, and shouldn't jump on them, but I also gotta say I'd sing for freakin' joy if all I had to avoid were gluten! :-)

PS: I'll ask doc on Monday whether I can have some quinoa. Rice would probably be the limiting factor on those particular crackers, but if I can have quinoa, there's stuff I can do with it. :-)

[eichin.livejournal.com]

hmm, the mention of almonds reminds me that I should dig up the Alice Medrich brownie recipe - all I remember was that it used ground almonds instead of flour, but I don't now what other tricks it pulled to get away with that. (I don't remember them being enormously sweet, either...)

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

There are some scrumptious chocolate balls I had once at a winery -- they are of course made with a bit of red wine -- also based on almond meal. I snarfed the recipe, naturally. :-) They're pretty sweet though.

[ladycelia.livejournal.com]

How about making a dessert version and dipping it in chocolate?

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Yeah! Or melting chocolate all over the top of it, and slicing the bars up after it cools, kind of like a toffee bar thing.

[datagoddess.livejournal.com]

Yay baking and finding stuff you can eat.

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Baking is so FUN! I admit, the sawdust taste does detract a bit, but I know I can cover that up with vanilla and cinnamon, or clove and ginger, or... :-) :-)

[ladyqkat.livejournal.com]

Okay - I have lots of protien powder which I believe is whey protien (I don't feel like going into the kitchen to check right now) and would like the recipe if you are willing to share. It would be one way to use up the protien powder and give us some healthier snacks. I have both vanilla and chocolate. I don't like the vanilla as a drink so I would probably use that.

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Here's what I did, my version for this first attempt:

1.5 cups almond meal
1/4 cup walnut pieces
3 eggs
6 scoops vanilla whey protein powder (Do all protein powder tubs have the same size scoop???)
1/4t salt

Mash it all up with one hand and one spoon - takes work. (More egg next time, maybe?)
Push dough down into bottom of 8x8 greased pan and make it kind of even.
Bake at 350 for 15 minutes.

It smells really good because the "vanilla" whey protein powder I bought smells vanilla-ish. It doesn't TASTE vanilla-ish, though! And it's unsweetened, so the taste of the bar is about what you might expect. You could probably add any sweetener of your choice, whether you're going healthy with something like stevia, organic with something like honey, or just what the heck, sugar. :-)

[ladyqkat.livejournal.com]

I'm allergic to tree nuts so I'll have to omit the walnuts, but it sounds like a recipe I can play around with. If it works okay, I can make them for SCA events. Thanks!

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Yeah, if you're going to make them for SCA events, definitely fuss with it a bit and I'd recommend some sweet! :-)

Wait, almonds grow on trees too. Is the almond meal okay for you?

[ladyqkat.livejournal.com]

An almond is a seed and a member of the peach family. I can't remember what family tree nuts are in, but I do know that the reaction to cashews is the worst, walnuts aren't far behind. Trying to scratch your upper palate and eustacian tubes is not fun. What is really annoying is that I do like the taste of cashews and walnuts. It also means I can't cook with some of the more 'exotic' oils that are made from nuts. Plus, I am allergic to pine so I can't even use pine nuts.

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

OK, I thought they were somehow different, but just wanted to make sure. Bummer about liking the taste! It's not so bad being allergic to something you hate, but being allergic to something you like is no fun.

[inflectionpoint.livejournal.com]

FAscinating!

I love learning new things about food. Thank you.

[sharya.livejournal.com]

So how is the Lyme treatment going anyway? Are you noticing anything with it? Are you supposed to?

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Other than side effects (like difficulty sleeping, weird taste in mouth, digestion not perfect) no I'm not noticing anything. About 80% of patients notice a flareup of symptoms as bacteria die off in a big wave within a week of beginning treatment. About 15% just get very gradual improvement in symptoms over a long time. The other 5%, I presume, give up, 'cause nothing happens. I didn't notice a flareup, so I'm hoping I'm in the 15%. :-)

[cyan-blue.livejournal.com]

After that, if I can manage it, I'll start trying to figure out how to make a thin cracker kind of thing I can use to scoop up hummus.

I wonder if these Huuraw crackers that are seed-based would work for you - I need to scare up the full ingredients list, I think this is just the highlights.

http://www.thrivinedibles.com/what-snacks.html

Alternately, these, but they're denser and less chip-like. Still would be tasty with hummus, though:

http://www.itsalivefood.com/crackerandpate.htm

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Oh wow. Those might indeed work. My basic rule of thumb, when some ingredient or other isn't on my handout, is "is it high-glycemic", and then "if I made a bread out of it, would yeast make it rise?" Pretty much, for seeds or veggies, the answer's no. :-)

[cyan-blue.livejournal.com]

Here's the full ingredients list for those Huuraw crackers from the first link:

Huuraw Chips - Bell Pepper variety

Organic Ingredients - Ripe Bell Peppers, Germinated flaxseed, red onions, lime juice, germinated sesame seeds, ground flaxseed, chia seeds, garlic, Himalayan salt

Vegan, wheat-free, gluten-free, dairy-free

[hitchhiker.livejournal.com]

yay! alternative cooking has a marvellously geeky tinge to it, doesn't it?

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Baking does! ;-)

[hitchhiker.livejournal.com]

i dunno, there's something very hackerish about finding ways to make dishes even when you can't use all the ingredients :) (also, http://www.foodsubs.com is a brilliant site, if you haven't seen it yet)

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Wow, that's an amazing site. They don't substitute across categories much, but once you can do all the categories, they're probably great for "oops I don't have _________ in the house and the store's closed". I will freely admit those are a large category of my own baking substitutions in the past. The store's 24h, but sometimes I'm just not up for it.

[just-cyd.livejournal.com]

hooray for baking!!

i should try your sawdust bars. i don't have almond meal, but i have everything else, and as i'm sure you can imagine, i'd KILL for something new and different right now.

Def. ask your doc about quinoa, millet, amaranth and other "ancient" grains. you might tolerate those in small quantites. and really, and little bit of variety is going to help in the sanity in the long run.

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

If you like eating Kleenex, you should try these. Although I bet they'd be way better with some artificial sweetener, and you tolerate some of those, right? They'd be quite good with that. They also need something to make them less dry. I'm thinking oil or (for me) butter. I'll keep fussing. They're amazingly quick to make.

Almond meal might be hard to come by unless you have a blender or food processor, in which case you can just make it. I got mine at Trader Joe's.

[essaying.livejournal.com]

You might do a websearch for a recipe called "oopsies" and its variations. Grain-free (although some people add a little wheatbran for body -- dunno if you can tolerate that or not; I can) and quite nice.