Sundays with Sparky - Homemade Gummy Worms

Part two of our Halloween special: homemade candy, specifically, everyone's favorite - gummy worms!  The recipe is pretty simple:

4 packets unflavored gelatin
1/4 cup and 1/3 cup light-colored fruit juice (e.g. orange juice,) divided
1/4 cup and 1/3 cup light-colored fruit juice (e.g. grape juice,) divided
6 tablespoons sugar, divided
2 tablespoons corn syrup, divided
2 tablespoons maple syrup, divided
Demerara sugar

Ice "stick" tray or loaf pan (we had better success with the ice stick tray)

Pour 2 packets of gelatin into a small container and mix with the 1/4 cup of OJ.  Do the same in a separate container for the grape juice and remaining gelatin.  Set aside for 5 minutes.

In a small saucepan, combine 1/3 cup OJ, 3 tablespoons sugar, 1 tablespoon of corn syrup, and 1 tablespoon of maple syrup.  Whisk over low heat until the sugar is completely dissolved.  Add the OJ/gelatin mixture, stir until dissolved and remove from heat.  Prop your ice stick tray or loaf pan on one side and pour the OJ mixture into the tray so that it fills at an angle; place propped mold into refrigerator for 15 minutes.

Prepare the grape juice and remaining sweeteners and gelatin in the same manner.  Allow to cool to room temperature.  After the OJ mixture has set slightly, remove the prop and allow the mold to sit flat; pour the grape mixture into the mold.  Refrigerate for one hour.

For the loaf pan, we tried a couple different methods of cutting the gummies into strips; we found that the ice stick molds worked much better.  To remove or cut the gummies, heat your knife or cutting implement in hot water.  Roll unmolded gummies in demerara sugar and enjoy!.

Mmmmm....worms....

The Food Desert Project - Evil Dead Pasta

In case you haven't surmised, we are big into Halloween in our household.  While we wait and prep for the big day, I was casting about for a dish that was spooky enough to serve your young goblins after a hard afternoon of candy-hunting.

I've been wanting to try dyed noodles with beets for a while, and had some Labneh left over from my previous recipe, so I thought I would combine the two ideas, and name them for my favorite scary movie, Ev-Ah!  (Evil laugh)

Blood Pasta:

1 can shredded beets
1 bottle red wine (any variety)
1 tbsp salt
About 2 cups water
Pasta of your choice - I used linguine

Drain the beet liquid (reserve the beets for the sauce) into a large pot (I use a 3.5 qt); combine with, red wine, salt, and water   Bring to a boil.  Add pasta and cook according to the directions on the package.  Drain, reserving about 1/2 cup of the cooking liquid.

Brains and Bones Sauce

Labneh bones*

Reserved beets
1/2 cup walnuts
1/2 cup pepitas or pumpkin seeds
Olive Oil
1 tsp jarred garlic
Reserved pasta water

Pour about 2 tbsp of olive oil into a skillet; toast the walnuts and pepitas until they are fragrant.  Add the garlic and beets, saute for 2 minutes or until heated through.  Add a small amount of pasta water to bring the sauce together.  Nutrition Information for sauce.

* Labneh Bones: knead about 1/4 cup of really well-drained labneh with a tablespoon of dried parsley and a teaspoon of dried chives.  Pull off about a tablespoon of flavored cheese, roll it between your fingers into an oblong shape, and pinch the ends flat to make "bones."

Serve the dyed pasta topped with the beet sauce and scatter a few Labneh bones over the top.  (PS.  Leftover sauce makes a terrific cold salad with the addition of a bit of viniagrette.)

Don't forget the words!

(Allow the maniacal laugh/noodle slurping contest to begin!)

Policy Point Wednesday - Mapping Tools and Food Access

The Reinvestment Fund, an organization that provides support for neighborhood revitalization, has created a fascinating mapping tool on their website.  This tool aggregates different data by geography - for instance, you can plug in your own address and find out whether you have access to grocery stores, what the census data information is for age and education level, and where local WIC and SNAP-eligible vendors are in your area.

TRF hopes to use this data to help attract businesses to underserved areas - the map also includes a data layer of areas eligible for New Market Tax Credits: redevelopment there is supported by a federal tax credit that allows community development organizations to lend or invest in projects in low-income areas.  By both identifying a market opportunity and offering support to businesses, TRF hopes to make changes in the food desert landscape.

Sundays with Sparky - Apple-Cinnamon Rolls

So, we've got this bushel of apples from apple-picking and are finding all kinds of ways to work them into meals.  Everyone in our family loves wonderful, gooey (and bad for you) pull-apart cinnamon rolls, and I thought adding apple to the mix would make them even better.

In the interests of our health, however, I thought I would find a recipe that was slightly better for us than running down to the Cinnabon.  Cooking Light had a recipe I used as a starting point, but I figured I might as well work in some whole grain, so I made a number of tweaks.  I started the dough the night before, allowed it to rise once and put it in the fridge for Sparky the next morning.

For the dough:

1 cup warm fat-free milk (100° to 110°)
3 tablespoons melted butter
1/3 cup granulated sugar
1 package quick-rise yeast
2 cup whole-grain Chapati flour

1 3/4 cups All-Purpose flour
1 large egg, lightly beaten
1/4 teaspoon salt

I made a "sponge" with the milk, a small amount of the sugar and the yeast and let it sit in the mixing bowl of my KitchenAid for 5 minutes until the yeast woke up and frothed a bit.   I then added the beaten egg, the remaining sugar and the salt along with 1 cup of the flour, mixed briefly, and waited another 10 minutes.  After that, the remaining ingredients went into the mixer and was kneaded for 10 minutes.  The whole thing was covered with a warm damp cloth (right in the bowl) and allowed to rise for 35 minutes, after which I put it in the refrigerator overnight.

Filling:

3 tablespoons melted butter
1 large apple, peeled, cored and diced

1/2 cup raw sugar

1 tablespoon cinnamon

1 tablespoon Wondra or All-purpose flour

The next morning, I peeled and cored a large apple and chopped it into small dice; added 1/2 cup of raw sugar and a heaping tablespoon of cinnamon and a tablespoon of Wondra flour and set it aside.  Sparky got to work:  working on a floured surface, he rolled the dough out into an 11 X 18 rectangle, with the help of some markings we'd made in the flour with a ruler.

After rolling out the dough, Sparky spread it with 3 tablespoons of melted butter, keeping about one inch of the nearest edge butter-free (when he asked how much to use, I said, heartily - "All of it; there's no such thing as too much butter!"  He looked at me, laughed, and quipped "Who are you, and what have you done with my mother?!")  He then spread the apple mixture over the butter, and rolled the whole thing up the long way, sushi-roll style (it rolled pretty easily, but if it gives you trouble, move the dough onto a large clean bath towel and use the towel to help you roll) and pinching the long seam to seal the roll in a tube. Then, using the ruler, we cut even 1-inch slices.


    

The apple-roll slices went into two buttered 8" springform cake pans and were set aside to rise for 35 minutes, or until doubled in size.  Then we baked them in a 350 degree oven for 20 minutes, and brought them out to cool when they were deliciously golden-brown.

Icing recipe

5 ounces cream cheese
1/2 - 3/4 cup powdered sugar
1/4 cup (1/2 stick) butter
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

Cut the cream cheese and butter into small pieces and cream in your mixer with the whisk attachment.  Add the powdered sugar and vanilla extract.  Taste, if it's not sweet enough, add more sugar (I like mine not too sweet)  Whip for several minutes until the frosting is light and fluffy and the sugar no longer has a grainy consistency.  Spoon into a ziploc freezer bag (quart size should be enough) and place in the refrigerator for at least 10 minutes or until ready to ice the cinnamon rolls.

To ice the rolls: snip off one corner of the ziploc bag and squeeze the icing directly onto warm (but not hot) cinnamon rolls.  Be careful as you squeeze to protect the zipper part of the bag; you don't want an icing blow-out!  I let Sparky channel his inner Jackson Pollack, and in no time we had delectable Apple Cinnamon rolls for breakfast!

The Food Desert Project - Far Breton (Dried Fruit in Custard)

My very first food desert recipe was an attempt to make one of our Sunday-breakfast standards: Clafoutis.  Unfortunately, neither sour nor sweet cherries are available regularly in the food desert even in canned form, so at the time, I tried a version with canned pears and rehydrated dried fruit.  The custardy base really needs an assertive accent, and canned pears just didn't do it.

People tend to send me random recipes.  I don't remember why, but I was in an unrelated correspondence with my brother when he forwarded me this recipe for Far Breton or Prunes Far.  Intrigued with the poetic name (unfortunately, in Breton, far prosaically translates to flour) I decided to take a stab at this one instead.  It's much more dense custard than a clafoutis, making it one of those dishes that could easily be either breakfast or dessert, and the prunes are rehydrated overnight in brandy or rum - definitely assertive.

2 cups milk (I use 1%; traditional recipes use whole)
3 large eggs
1/2 cup sugar
5 tablespoons melted butter
1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/8 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup flour

1 cup small or medium-size pitted prunes
1/3 cup raisins (I used yellow raisins for the color contrast)
1/2 cup brandy or dark rum

The night before you plan to make the far, put the prunes and raisins in a small container and pour over the brandy.  Allow them to steep in the refrigerator overnight.


The next morning, pour your dried fruit into a heavy saucepan with whatever liquid remains on low heat.  Allow it to heat slowly as you prepare the batter and pan.  Line an 8" high-sided springform cake pan with aluminum foil (this will prevent leaks as the batter is fairly thin,) and butter and flour the foil VERY WELL - make sure every crevice is buttered, or it will be difficult to unmold.

Dump all the other ingredients into your blender and blend on high, stopping to scrape down the side as necessary, until completely combined.  Pour the batter into the prepared pan, and sprinkle the fruit over the top (the liquid should have been absorbed, but if not, drain the fruit first.)

Bake at 375 degrees for 1 hour, or until a knife poked in the center comes out clean and the far is puffy and golden brown.  Allow to cool thoroughly before unmolding and peeling off the foil; cut into wedges and serve. Nutritional Information.

Policy Point Wednesday - Corollary: How Food Corporations Spin Statistics

You may remember my post a few weeks ago on Birds Eye Food's study on eating behaviors in the UK.  In it, I mentioned that I had found the study while in search of a specific statistic (1 in 4 children in the UK regularly eat their evening meal in their bedroom) ...but that the statistic wasn't included in the only study linked on Birds Eye's UK website.

So, like any good blogger, I followed up.  I sent an email to the Daily Mail, the newspaper which had been my initial source for the statistic...and got nothing.  So, I emailed Birds Eye foods - surprisingly, their corporate office responded almost immediately, and they sent me the executive summary via snail mail!  Using information from Time trends in adolescent well-being: Update 2009 and studies commissioned by Birds Eye through Lightspeed research, this more recent summary (September 2010) highlights the discrepancies the information I had posted previously.

According to this summary, only 2 in 10 (or 21%) of families in the UK eat together every night (If you recall, my earlier post noted that "80% of parents say their children eat their evening meals with at least one of their parents...but the table notes that only 19% of respondents say their children eat with Mom, Dad and their siblings - as a family." )  Also, it states that 78% of children eat their meals in front of a TV, as opposed to the earlier study implying that only 36% eat in front of the TV.  As the study was offered to me with no admonition to keep it private, I have posted it as an image file here.


What interests me most, beyond the horrifying eating habits revealed in these studies, is that the first study is proudly displayed on the Birds Eye UK website...but I was unable to find the information from the press release they mailed to me anywhere on the internet, including the 100% Challenge, which is referenced by the second study.  It is fascinating to see statistics and PR in a head-on collision.

Sundays with Sparky - Special Effects Food and a Healthy Fun Snack

Last year, Sparky was delighted to receive a vintage 70s cookbook from his grandmother, entitled "Special Effects Cookbook"  Now, most of the recipes from the era of Jell-O salads are a little over the top - though the recipe for Glow In The Dark Gelatin is certainly tempting.  After allowing Sparky to experiment with spray cheese and a pita bread, I decided we should get some mileage out of special effects, and make some food that's both good to eat and to play with.

One very simple recipe in the book, See-Through Sandwiches, uses an old Bento trick:  one simply makes a template, uses it to cut a face in a piece of bread;

 

spread the cut piece with peanut butter and place it on an uncut slice of bread with jelly.  the jelly shows through the face.

  
Sparky enjoyed having a grisly and frightening monster friend for lunch.

For Sparky's snack day at school, I wanted something that fit the special-effects bill but was still a healthy treat.  We'd gone apple-picking a few days before, and remembering the fun we'd had in first grade making Apple Monster Mouths, we decided to do them again.  

First, you quarter apples and remove the cores (or remove the cores first, if you've got an apple corer.)

 

Then, slice a wedge out of the peel side of the apple to make the mouth.  Dump the sliced apples in a bowl of water with about a cup of orange juice and a tablespoon or so of lemon juice or vinegar added (water should taste sour.)  This will keep them from browning later.  Then, using a skewer, make four upper "pilot holes" for your teeth - this step isn't neccesary, but it's helpful.

   

Put two slivered almond slices in the outer pilot hole for fangs, and two pepitas (we found these were easier) or sunflower seeds in between for front teeth.  

Dump your finished product back into the acidulated water.  Drain, refrigerate, and serve within a day (we did these the night before and they were fine for an afternoon snack; I packed them in an insulated cooler bag with some ice.)

The Food Desert Project - Bagels with Fig Jam and Labneh

For some time, I'd been looking for a way to get dried figs into this project: figs, one of the earliest cultivated foods, are a nutrition powerhouse.  Ounce per ounce, they have more calcium than milk, more potassium than a banana, and one fig has more fiber than one slice of whole-wheat bread.

Many people have an issue with the texture of dried figs: they can be a bit leathery, and the seeds are a crunchy contrast to the outside.  Making them into a jam softens the leathery exterior and allows the crunchy nature to come through.  Traditionally, fig jams - which are often savory - are combined with tangy goat cheese to offset their natural sweetness.  We've already discussed bagels in an earlier post, but since I don't expect to find goat products in the food desert, I needed to improvise, we will be topping our bagels with fig jam and yogurt cheese, also called Labneh.

Labneh is extremely simple.  If you have ever tasted a Greek-style yogurt, you are already halfway there: Greek yogurt is just strained plain yogurt, and Labneh is just strained until the yogurt is nearly a solid.  To make Labneh, line a cup with a coffee filter attached around the rim with a rubber band so that the filter doesn't touch the bottom.  Place plain, fat-free yogurt in the coffee filter, put it in your refrigerator at least overnight (you may want to wait 36 hours if you're using regular yogurt.)  

Next, coarsely chop your dried figs until you have about 1 cup.  Put these into a saucepan and add orange juice until the figs are completely submerged.  Bring to a simmer, then cover and cook on low for half an hour, adding juice as needed to keep the figs covered.  Remove the lid, turn the heat up to medium, and allow the liquid to reduce to a syrupy texture.  Remove from heat, pour into a container and put in the refrigerator overnight.

Remove your coffee filter and cheese from the cup (save the liquid whey that remains!  It still has good nutrition; add it to smoothies or replace water with whey in your baking,) unwrap the cheese and serve as you would cream cheese - it's nonfat but lighter in texture than cream cheese, tangy but not sour.

Your figs should have absorbed most of the orange juice at this point.  Put your soft, orange-y figs in a food chopper or blender and pulse until you can't see the cut pieces; you should have a thick, chunky paste.  Spread the fig jam on your bagel, top with the Labneh and enjoy!  Nutritional information (topping only)

Policy Point Wednesday - US Foreign Food Policy and malnutrition

Doctors without Borders, an excellent charity I am proud to support, recently released a report entitled Starved for Attention, regarding the effects of malnutrition on children outside the US.  In it, they make an interesting connection between the Corn and Soybean Blend (CNB) we offer as food aid, and malnutrition in children.

Fortified blended foods, such as corn soy blend (CSB) have long been used in food assistance programmes to prevent nutrient deficiencies. The composition has remained largely unchanged despite better knowledge about how to meet the nutritional needs of young children.

Animal (dairy) protein is best suited to maximizing growth of young children. The composition of CSB, being an exclusively plant-based food without any dairy component, is not ideal to facilitate growth of children during the first few years of life.

In a video documentary Starved for Attention: the US Standard and A Double Standard, MSF (Médecins Sans Frontières -Doctors Without Borders in its native French) shows how WIC offers children in the US high-quality food aid...but offers only CSB for international aid.  It suggests that while CSB relieves hunger, it does not offer the same nourishment as milk and fish - particularly that these flours lack easily absorbed iron, zinc and calcium.  MSF states that USAID would be both more efficient and more effective if it financially backed current nutrition support efforts, rather than exporting agricultural products.


Interestingly, the system producing CSB is the same system that has been implicated in the obesity epidemic in the US. Our current agricultural system has been engineered to increase efficiency, especially corn, soybeans and wheat.  While there is much discussion of how this came to pass, the link between unhealthy eating habits and the amount of farmland producing corn in the US has global ramifications.

Sundays with Sparky - The Friday Cookie Gazette

Sometimes, food can offer us more than just nutrition.  For instance, a couple years ago, as I prepared to pile my son out of the car and into school, he turned to me, said simply "I hate Fridays."

"Fridays?" I replied in surprise, "Really?  It's the last day of the week - don't tell me you're afraid you'll miss school on the weekend?"  "Mom, Fridays stink."  A little probing revealed that Fridays do, indeed, stink (I have been forbidden to say "suck," though apparently it's perfectly OK for my eight-year-old to say "pottymouth.")  The poor child not only had a spelling test (which is in Spanish two out of three weeks) but also a math quiz, and to top it off, the "specials," the classes he most enjoys: library, music and art, are replaced on Fridays with an entire extra period of math.

 "Wow." I said "Fridays really do suck..I mean stink.  What about if we went out for ice cream after school on Fridays, would that make it better?"  Sparky shook his head.  "Too cold," he said morosely.  Suddenly, my eyes fell on the unused free cookie coupon he'd won at the library this summer.  Inspired, I said "What about we go out for a cookie?"

His face brightened considerably.  "Could we make it a food adventure, Mom?  Maybe we could go a different place every time, and get a different cookie.  Maybe I could talk about it on LTHForum.com.  Then it would be a food adventure!  I could call it the Cookie Gazette!"  So, true to my word, after school on Friday, we took Sparky and his buddy cookie-shopping, our stop driven mostly by proximity: Bennison's Bakery.  Following is a transcription of his cookie review of a sandy Christmas sugar cookie:

Sparky:

These cookies are really, really interesting, 'cause it's got a lot of sugar...I especially love the sprinkles and everything: it just represents Christmas and stuff.  I don't get it, but I just completely like this.  It tastes good, just like a cookie should taste like.  It's sort of chewy and crunchy at the same time, and I really like it.  Oh, and I just noticed it has sugar on here.  Neat!

Realizing suddenly that descriptive language might be easier to develop if cookies are involved, we made our little Friday adventures a tradition that year.  It was interesting to watch Sparky grow through this exercise: at first, he assumed that everyone could see what he saw and taste what he tasted: he didn't understand the purpose of description.  The next week, with a little prompting, we got:

Sparky:

OK, well it looks like a mini pie and it's got nuts all over it and a little red speck that I don't know what it is, and I think they must have been almonds and I really like it, it's chocolaty on one side and nutty on the other side, and it tastes buttery and I just like it.

Later that year, we were able to convince one of Sparky's buddies to come along and make the review something more of a debate.  I had explained that you need to describe cookies as though you were talking to a blind person, as though they'd never seen a cookie before - I was pleased with the response:

Sparky:

This is a peanut butter cookie, of course, you can tell by the peanuts - I mean 'cmon, look - peanuts!  It's really good, it's basically crummy (crumbly) it basically was like all made out of crumbs, check out the interior there's basically like a thousand crumbs in this thing {and you like that, that's a good texture} Yes, and it tastes like - well the peanuts taste like peanuts, and this {the cookie} tastes like...I have no idea what this tastes like...it basically tastes like vanilla, all I taste of the peanuts is the actual peanuts.  The first flavor is vanilla and then it tastes like peanut butter.  It's sorta sweet, it's basically not candy-sweet, it's sweet.

Here is our normal potato-chip cookie and here is how I think it got it's name.  In reality, when it wasn't all eaten up by me, it was in the shape of a potato.

Master X (Sparky's friend):

Half of a potato!

Sparky:

And, well, I like it because it tastes like walnuts.  It's hard, it's really soft, though -in originality, it's supposed to be pretty soft, but now since we've been in the car and are at my house and are not at the bakery 'cause my mom forgot the camera, well, it was softer at the bakery but now it's pretty hard.  It's good hard - crunchy, sweet, not candy sweet.

Master X:

The flavor {of the potato chip cookie,} well, I don't know what it reminded me of but the flavor just wasn't good and I think it was a little too soft in the middle on the inside, but the chocolate chip was good, but only the outside was hard then you got to a reasonably soft in the middle.  I would say it was medium {sweet.} And it also tasted like oatmeal raisin, maybe some raisin hid, 'cause it kinda tasted like an oatmeal raisin cookie.

Later that year, at still another bakery, we tried a Whoopie Pie; the resultant commentary was like a couple of little newscasters.

Sparky and Master X:

Hi, Sparky and Master X again.  So, now, we have Whoopie Pies from Kim's Kitchen and they are just like the last cookies so far, except there's WAY more chocolate cookie, and it's like and ice cream sandwich, so the filling is white, and obviously the sandwich part is dark brown..very dark brown

Almost..almost about black

And almost about red when you bite into them, they have a red tinge, and they're really good - texture is smooth and the cookie (I wasn't talking about the filling, I was talking about the actual cookie) it's smooth on the inside, but rough on the inside.

It's rough

Thanks, Master X

It's more like cake, 'cause...

This took us what, 15, 16 minutes, Master X?

Yea, and I only ate about

Half

Yea

And I ate a half-moon of it

Yea, a half-moon is like this

...well, almost a half-moon

You ate about...two-thirds.

Two thirds!  OK!

They're

CHOCOLATE!

and

VANILLA!

The Food Desert Project - Flourless No-Chocolate Cake (for the toaster oven)

You see...I ate all the chocolate.  No, no - don't worry.  I am firmly opposed to chocolate substitutes like carob or..."chocolate flavor," whatever that is.  But I have a terribly bad habit of eating chocolate chips...and then mug cakes came around and I ate all the unsweetened chocolate...so there I was, nine o'clock at night, staring at a canister of Ghiradelli's finest cocoa (you know, considering how much money I've sunk into them, they really ought to offer a sponsorship!)...and suddenly this came to me - a rich, creamy not-quite-set-in-the-middle flourless chocolate cake...with cocoa!

  At least there are only two servings - but I'm not going to bother with the nutritional information: this stuff ain't good for you.  Unless, maybe, you top it with raspberry jam, which you should.  Or not.

3 tbsp unsweetened cocoa
1/3 cup packed brown sugar
4 tbsp butter
1 egg

2 single-serving microwave and oven-safe ramekins

Melt the butter in the microwave - if you melt it directly in the ramekin you won't have to bother buttering it, just pour it from one into the other  while you get your other ingredients into a blender jar.  Add the cocoa and sugar first, and pour over the butter.  Mix with a spoon.  Add the egg and blend on high until completely blended and slightly thickened.

Scoop this mixture into your ramekins and put them in the toaster oven at 350 degrees for 10 minutes, or until the top is set but still leaves a dent when touched.  Allow to cool (the flavors won't come together if it's screaming hot.) Enjoy warm - or chilled, if you can wait.

I've heard that jogging is a good way to offset the damage done by an inventive cook.  Or maybe yoga.