Unprocessed: Chocolate Beet Cupcakes

As a part of Unprocessed October I really wanted to come up with a cupcake recipe that was delicious and satisfying.  One of my favorite cupcakes is the red velvet.  Let's be honest the amount of food coloring that goes into those puppies makes it far from unprocessed.  Since there are all kinds of recipes out there for beet cakes and I figured I could use beets as a natural food coloring. Add in some honey and whole wheat flour and we have the makings of an unprocessed sweet.

Upon looking for cream cheese for this recipe I learned that most commercial cream cheeses list their first ingredient as "milk ingredients."  What are "milk ingredients"?  I'm not sure I really want to know.  Since I really wanted to make this completely unprocessed, I went for the organic cream cheese, which actually listed ingredients I could pronounce and knew what they were. I am generally pro-organic especially when it comes to buying at farmers markets and directly from producers.  But am a bit skeptical about more commercially produced organic ingredients, there is such conflicting information out there as to how organic something commercially processed can be.   The unfortunate thing is that by labeling something organic it automatically jacks up the price, at least in my grocery story.  I spent twice as much on my organic cream cheese, making it it an unfortunate reality that I won't be purchasing it in the future at least not for my baking projects.

All that being said I think this is a pretty great alternative to your average sugary cupcake.  Based on a calorie counter I used over at Spark Recipes, it clocks in a just over 200 calories per cupcake, with the icing without it's at 150.  Not too shabby, especially considering I think the icing recipe made far too much. 

Meatless Monday & Unprocessed: Tomato & White Bean Soup

With the brisk weather and the coming of fall I've been on a bit of a soup kick lately.  The last few days have been particularly grey which only intensified my soup craving.  I so didn't feel like leaving the house to put together the week's Meatless Monday so I came up with this soup using simple items I always have on hand.  It is inspired by one of my favorite Tuscan dishes, Fagioli all'Uccelletto.

The ingredients in this soup are pantry staples that I think everyone should keep since they make throwing together a quick meal infinitely easier.  Carrots, celery, onions and garlic are the perfect base for soups and canned white beans are great on their own or in salad or soups or stews.  Since starting Unprocessed October I've made them from dried and keep them in the fridge the way I would keep cans in my pantry.  They are so easy to make fresh and have so much more flavor that I don't know if I will ever buy canned beans again.  

I used to buy and keep commercially canned tomatoes, but at the end of August the boy and I decided to can 2 bushels of farm fresh Roma tomatoes.  It was pretty grueling and took a whole day, but seeing my 40+ jars line up on a shelf in the basement makes it all worth it.  Being able to just pull from that shelf whenever I want to make sauce or soup and know where the tomatoes came from and exactly what is each jar is so satisfying.   Upon opening a new jar I am immediately hit with the smell of summer and sun-kissed tomatoes fresh off the vine.  It bring me back to childhood and eating a big juicy tomato like an apple while swinging on my blue and white swing set outside of our home in Shelburne, VT.  

Unprocessed: Strawberry Rhubarb Jam with Honey

This recipe is a bit out of date, but seemed just so perfect for Unprocessed October that I had to share it. While the fruits I used are past season, for me this is a simple jam that can easily be thrown together with just about anything you come across at your farmer's market or even with fruit you may have frozen from the summer.

About a month ago I walked my little pooch, Stella to our local Farmer's Market it was a gorgeous Indian Summer day and I wanted to take advantage of one of the last market weekends of the season. While visiting one of my favorite organic farm's stand a bunch of rhubarb caught my eye.  The red and green were so vibrant it was impossible to resist.  We of course bought some of Stella's favorite liver treats too.  The next stand had local honey, now not just local to Ontario but local to Toronto, gathered from hives in the Portlands where I often work.  I din't even know we had honey that was that local and had to snatch it up immediately.   I have a bit of a honey problem, I buy some everywhere we go and have amassed quite a collection of honeys from California to Vermont to all over Ontario.  I am far from a honey expert, but I love the different flavors honey can have and how it almost has it's own story.  The Portlands honey was very light in color with a strong floral flavor.  I wanted to drink the whole jar right there.

Unprocessed: Whole Grain Crusted Pumpkin Pie

I've never been a huge fan of pumpkin pie, but the spices used and the smell of it baking just automatically make it feel like fall and early winter.  That might be because as an American I am used to Thanksgiving coming at the end of November, thus the early winter memories.  Well up here in the Great White North Thanksgiving falls right at the beginning of October.  Though the boy and I were flying solo for Thanksgiving I offered to cook a proper dinner.  My preference for pie would have been apple, but he asked for pumpkin and since I still think of it as his Thanksgiving, I went with what he wanted.  We'll see if he defers to my preference when American Thanksgiving comes around.

Now the thing about pumpkin pie is I've never actually made one.  Not only was I trying this pie for the first time, I had to figure out how to make it unprocessed and I really wanted to get it on the first try.  On top of all of that I've never had the best luck with custard pies, I'm not sure if it's a patience thing or what, but I've often failed at getting them to set up properly.  Basically I had alot of things working against me on this one.  It would have been easiest to just find a recipe and follow it, but of course I couldn't do that.  I did a ton a research and ended up putting together what is one of the best pumpkin pies I've ever had.

Unprocessed: Baked Cranberries

For Thanksgiving I was presented with the challenge of making the entire meal unprocessed to fit with my Unprocessed October Challenge.  The boy is not a big fan of cranberries but loved the Baked Cranberries I made last year.  So I set about trying to recreate them in some way without using white sugar.  What resulted was more sauce-like and quite a bit more tart that the former version, but I couldn't stop eating it.  My perfect Thanksgiving plate is a few slices of turkey topped with some cranberries and drizzled with gravy.  While a sweet cranberry works well, the bright, tart flavor of this sauce with just a hint of sweetness actually made this combination ideal.

Unprocessed: BUTTER!

Those of you that follow me on Twitter or are a friend on Facebook know that not too long ago I made butter from scratch.  Well without further ado, I wrote up how to make butter as my contribution to the October Unprocessed challenge and you can find it over at our fearless leader's blog Eating Rules.  Go ahead, check it out, read more about the challenge and learn how you too can make butter at home.

Enjoy!

Meatless Monday & Unprocessed: Potato and Leek Pizza

Well I'm into week 2 of my Unprocessed month and I did have one major cheat.  After a day of painting and movers finally bringing the last of my furniture from LA I broke and the boy and I tried a fish & chip shop around the corner from our house.  Now I felt bad enough about eating the fried food, but what was even worse is that the meal wasn't even that good.  The fish was far too greasy and the chips were mediocre.  The fact that my cheat was so unsatisfying has made it easier for me to stick to my unprocessed eating and even further proof why I am partaking in the challenge.  it's one thing to eat bad for you food if it's tasty and satisfying, no matter how guilty.  It's and entirely other thing when you feel bad after eating it.

This week's Meatless Monday recipe is actually a great healthier version of one of my favorite guilty pleasures, pizza!  For me it's a healthier options because it's not loaded with cheese and though I firmly believe in cheese on pizza, this one just doesn't need it.  It's packed with flavor from the slow cooked leeks, the infused oil and the bouquet garni I use when cooking the potatoes, not to mention the hearty whole wheat crust.