Keto recipes

[Dirgni]

Recipe from the Health and Wellness Show of 04 May 2015 (The Mood Cure) (slightly edited)

Cashew Butter Bread

I made a couple of times this week the cashew butter bread and it was very good.

Ingredients:
- 1 cup cashew butter
- 5 large eggs
- 1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar
- 1 teaspoon sweetener like stevia or xylitol
- 3/4 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/4 teaspoon sea salt

Equipment:
Mixer, bread pan or cookie sheet, knife

Baking time
45 minutes baking time

Method:
Pulse the cashew butter and the eggs together, then mix in the vinegar, then the sweetener, baking soda and salt and mix that in. You end up a batter.

Bake at 350°F (175° Celsius) for 45 minutes and let it cool for a while.

I found that cooling for about an hour, even a little bit less, was fine. I made this in a bread pan so it came out like a traditional kind of bread loaf but you could take a cookie sheet and spread it out and make a thinner version of this in which case you could cut that up into very small segments. I like this idea because this also results in ultimately less carb content per serving. We figured out that roughly each slice of this bread has 7 or 8 grams of carbs. So you can have a few and you're not going to hurt even if you're on the keto diet, if you're staying below 25 grams of carbs a day you can still stay within that and have one or two slices of this. I imagine it would go down to 2-3 grams of carbs per chunk if you cut them into 3'x1" pieces (ca. 7,5cm x 2,5cm).

One slice: 7-8 g Carbs

 

[Dirgni]

Recipe from the Health and Wellness Show of 04 May 2015 (The Mood Cure) (much edited and re-arraged)


Tapas

For our recipe, it's not so much a straight "one-half cup of this, one teaspoon of that" recipe, but I wanted to talk about tapas. Tapas are essentially Spanish hors d'oeuvres or appetizers.

So just reading from Wikipedia "Tapas is a wide variety of appetizers or snacks in Spanish cuisine that may be cold or hot. In select bars in Spain tapas have evolved into an entire and sometimes sophisticated cuisine. In Spain patrons of tapas can order many different kinds of tapas and combine them to make a full meal. In some Central American countries such snacks are known as bocas. In Mexico, similar dishes are called botanas. The serving of tapas is designed to encourage conversation because people are not so focused on eating an entire meal that is set before them. Also in some countries it's customary for diners to stand and move about while they're eating the tapas."

So you can see how it's essentially an hor d'oeuvres. It is something you can have a lot of fun with. Traditionally a tapas is a layer of bread and then some kind of meat and cheese or spice or herb on top of that. For the bread here you can get creative. I made the cashew butter bread a couple of times this week and it was very good.

So I encourage people to play around with that. If you're going to make tapas, first make a big sheet of the cashew butter bread on a cookie sheet and then take some kind of meat, whether it's sliced beef or chicken or bacon, mix those together then lay it out nicely on the little chunk of bread.

Layering the cashew bread chunk with some chicken with a little bacon and then some chimichurri on top of that could be a very good combination.

You could also do fish like trout or salmon. I know some people avoid salmon, but some people don't so that's an option. And then with the fish you could make whipped coconut cream and mix in a lemon extract with the coconut cream and use that as a faux sour crème topping.

So get creative with the top. Take a little bit of crushed almonds or a little bit of parsley or something and sprinkle that on top then dash some pepper on there, and just make it look nice.

My point in talking about tapas is to put some energy into your food once in a while, take a little bit of time to make it aesthetically pleasing, lay it out on a plate. This worked for me in the past, not from a food addict's perspective, but just if I was feeling down and I had a really long day, I might spend one or two hours in the kitchen making something that's really pleasing and then I would sit down and eat that. Even with a really healthy meal that doesn't have all those opiates and stuff in it, just that act can be very pleasing, very calming, and can help you enjoy your creative output. That's my food recipe, although like I said, not really a recipe, just more of an inspiration. Check it out and look up pictures too and see what inspires you.


Chimichurri

Ingredients:
- cilantro
- parsley
- garlic
- salt and pepper

Method:
Sometimes what I like to do is make chimichurri, which is a mixture of cilantro, parsley, garlic, salt and pepper. Cook those at a very low temperature until they mix together and wilt the greens a little bit so that you end up with a green paste that's really, really flavourful.


Faux Sour Crème

Ingredients:
- coconut cream
- lemon extract

Method:
You could make whipped coconut cream and mix in a lemon extract with the coconut cream and use that as a faux sour crème topping.

 

[Zar]

Awesome thread, finally got through reading most of it. I'm just wondering if the type of butter matters. Is it necessary to get grass fed butter(very expensive) or will regular butter be good enough?

 

[Chad]

Awesome thread, finally got through reading most of it. I'm just wondering if the type of butter matters. Is it necessary to get grass fed butter(very expensive) or will regular butter be good enough?

One thing that has come up is that most butter from the UK and Ireland will be from grass fed cows, simply because it's cheaper. But that doesn't mean that they aren't feeding them some grain in winter and we don't know if it's organic/GMO, so it seems you can't know with out looking into it specifically - there are lots of pages on the net where people have emailed the brands asking for the facts. For myself, i buy the Co-ops own brand - it's cheap but the store has been known for it's 'better' animal welfare practises, this is changing though because they sold out.

The USA is much less obvious, some parts will have them on grass but this won't be the case everywhere else, where they will feed them grain, and probably GMO. Plus the US seems to take intensive farmer to catastrophic levels, thus effecting the produce significantly (pus in the milk etc..), this is where the organic label (or the research) will pay for itself.

Elsewhere in the world will probably be similar. If i was in the US, i'd do my research on brands i can buy OR buy grass fed organic. As for the 'difference' i believe grass fed has higher and more balanced omega's (but i'm not totally sure), i think the main issue here is whether the butter is basically contaminated due to its production.

Added: Ideally grass fed or at least grass fed for most of the time, just because as mentioned it's more nutritionally balanced thus negating any issues if you're sensitive. Another option is ghee.

 

[Zar]

Awesome thread, finally got through reading most of it. I'm just wondering if the type of butter matters. Is it necessary to get grass fed butter(very expensive) or will regular butter be good enough?

One thing that has come up is that most butter from the UK and Ireland will be from grass fed cows, simply because it's cheaper. But that doesn't mean that they aren't feeding them some grain in winter and we don't know if it's organic/GMO, so it seems you can't know with out looking into it specifically - there are lots of pages on the net where people have emailed the brands asking for the facts. For myself, i buy the Co-ops own brand - it's cheap but the store has been known for it's 'better' animal welfare practises, this is changing though because they sold out.

The USA is much less obvious, some parts will have them on grass but this won't be the case everywhere else, where they will feed them grain, and probably GMO. Plus the US seems to take intensive farmer to catastrophic levels, thus effecting the produce significantly (pus in the milk etc..), this is where the organic label (or the research) will pay for itself.

Elsewhere in the world will probably be similar. If i was in the US, i'd do my research on brands i can buy OR buy grass fed organic. As for the 'difference' i believe grass fed has higher and more balanced omega's (but i'm not totally sure), i think the main issue here is whether the butter is basically contaminated due to its production.

Added: Ideally grass fed or at least grass fed for most of the time, just because as mentioned it's more nutritionally balanced thus negating any issues if you're sensitive. Another option is ghee.

Thanks, I basically avoid anything from the US, (i'm in canada). I used to buy avalon butter (organic) and switched to grass fed and I've bought ghee before but even ghee can be gmo if it's not from an organically raised animal. I was just double checking, even though I guess I already knew the answer… :/

 

[Arwenn]

OK, so following on from this thread here, I thought it might be an idea to share our keto recipes, as most of the other threads on this topic are pre-keto.

Great idea--thanks!

The link is broken!

In fact, there is no link.

So Arwenn, do you remember what was the link that you wanted to post?

Could be that one: http://cassiopaea.org/forum/index.php/topic,34392.msg484182.html#msg484182

if we follow the first quotation in the post of Arwenn: http://cassiopaea.org/forum/index.php/topic,34453.msg484820.html#msg484820

Hi Gandalf,

I must have missed your post somehow, so sorry for the late reply. Yes from what I remember, it was the Jeff Volek video which is the first link you have posted. Would you be so kind as to fix that up in my original post?
Thanks so much

 

[Jacques]

Hi Gandalf,

I must have missed your post somehow, so sorry for the late reply. Yes from what I remember, it was the Jeff Volek video which is the first link you have posted. Would you be so kind as to fix that up in my original post?
Thanks so much

Has been fixed.

 

[Dirgni]

Recipe from the Health and Wellness Show of 13 April 2015 (Gut Health) (slightly edited)

Homemade Sauerkraut

Ingredients:
- 2 medium white or red cabbage heads (ca. 4-5 pounds / 1.8 kg of cabbage)
- 2 tablespoons of sea salt or Real salt
- a couple of teaspoons caraway seeds (optional)

Equipment:
- large bowl, preferably stainless steel or ceramic bowl, or glass
- sharp knife (a mandolin slicer)
- crock
- a sterilized wide stone or
- a plate or glass plate with a weight
- a towel or cheesecloth
- a rubber band
- a big glass jar with an airlock at the top (optional; replaces other equipment)

Fermentation time:
two weeks up to even six months

Method:
It's incredibly easy to make. It's a bit of a process, but the ingredients are very simple.

For material you need a large bowl, preferably stainless steel or ceramic bowl, or glass will work fine; a crock that the cabbage is doing to go into. A crock is a tall, wide-mouthed round container that can be made also from ceramic or glass. Oftentimes the general store will have crocks or you can order them online. Look for something that two or three gallons, for a larger batch. But this can also be done in mason jars, if you have mason jars lying around.

Sauerkraut is an anaerobic fermentation, which means that the vegetable matter does not come into contact with the air. It needs to be submerged underneath a brine.

So start with two medium white or red cabbage heads, about 2-2½ pounds each, so about four to five pounds of cabbage. You can increase or decrease this recipe to your liking. Red kraut is really cool. It comes out this deep, violet colour so it's kind of fun as well. Remove the core from the cabbage and then finely shred or finely chop the cabbage with a knife and get it into strips or you can shred it with a grater or something similar.

For this four to five pounds of cabbage you want two tablespoons of sea salt or Real salt. You don't want to use table salt because you want either a mineral salt or unrefined sea salt.

Take the cabbage, put it into the large bowl, sprinkle the salt that you have over the top of it and mix it together with your hands. While you're mixing it you want be squeezing the cabbage as firmly as you can because you're breaking down the cellular structure of the cabbage then you'll see the water that's held inside the cabbage. So as you do this the salt and squeezing action on the cabbage releases the moisture and sometimes it's not necessary, but some people will salt the cabbage first and let it sit for about ½ hour to an hour until it begins to sweat and then start massaging it. You can do it either way. If it sits first it's a little easier. The salt breaks down the cabbage and makes it sweat its moisture.

Once you've thoroughly massaged the cabbage in the bowl with the salt, put it into the crock and use your fist to gradually mash it all towards the bottom so that the moisture comes up and covers the vegetable material. So as you're doing this you'll notice that, if you do it properly, the amount of moisture or water that's in the cabbage is enough to actually cover it in the crock. Sometimes you need to add a little bit of water at the end, but you shouldn't really need to. Use distilled water for this, just to make sure it's clean.

After mashing down the cabbage, you want to release all of the air that's held up in the pieces of cabbage under the water. So you don't want any bubbles underneath. Sometimes it's hard to get it all packed down. You can take a sterilized wide stone (by boiling or heating in the oven). Once it's cooled down you can put the stone on top of the cabbage. You can also use a plate or glass plate or something that's weighted to hold the vegetable matter under the water.

Cover the crock with a cloth like a towel or cheesecloth with a rubber band around the outside to hold it down. You want to keep as much material as possible from coming into the jar but you do want it to be able to breathe. An option is to use an airlock like is used in brewing beer and wine where you have a big glass jar with an airlock at the top which allows pressurized air to escape the container without allowing anything back in. The difference between these two is that if you use a cloth over your jar you'll notice that every few days you get a little bit of scum on top of the water which is completely natural and you can go in there with a spoon and scrape that off, discard it. You can flush it you can put it in the compost and then put the towel back on. If you do use an airlock you'll get less of that scum showing up, little to no scum and you can just let it ferment and not have to worry about that very much.

Some people do like the taste of kraut as it's fermenting so if you're using an airlock and you remove it, you've defeated the purpose of using the airlock. So if you use an airlock it's hard to get in and taste it as it's fermenting.

Let it sit in a cabinet or corner out of the way and let it sit for anywhere from one to two weeks up to even six months. As long as the vegetable matter says out of contact with the air, stays below the liquid, you're going to be fine. The lactic acid that's created in the fermentation process kills off the harmful microorganisms and other bacteria that are in there and creates its own beneficial culture. This fermentation creates a lot of probiotics that are beneficial for healing the gut. This is a really rewarding way to make your own.

It's popular in the German sauerkraut recipe to include caraway seeds in the solution. Throw a couple of teaspoons in. You can also experiment with carrots, ginger, anything else that lacto-ferments. Look up lacto-fermentation on Google and you'll find a lot of results for that.

Cabbage is cheap. Salt is cheap and it's very easy to make.

 

[Dirgni]

Recipe from the The Health & Wellness Show: Weekly Broadcast - 2 March 2015 (slightly edited)

Avocado Chocolate Mousse

Ingredients
- 4 Avocados
- 1 rounded teaspoon of Stevia, alternatively Xylitol or Erythritol
- 1 tablespoon of vanilla extract
- 1 cup of organic cocoa or carob powder
- 1/4 cup of oil (preferably coconut oil, alternatively olive oil or grapeseed oil)
- 1/4 cup of coconut milk (optional)

Praparation time: ca. 10 minutes

Method
Avocado Chocolate Mousse is a little uplifter - a nice little sweet treat.

Yes, this is safe for a keto-diet: avocados, nice and high in saturated fat. For this Avocado Chocolate Mousse, start with four avocados - and they can be a little bit browned or bruised; that's okay. You use a rounded teaspoon of Stevia or if you like, Xylitol or Erythritol. A tablespoon of vanilla extract. One cup of organic cocoa or carob powder if you like that. One-fourth cup of oil - preferably coconut oil but if need be you can use an olive oil or even a grapeseed oil. And if you like the taste of coconut, you can add one-fourth cup of coconut milk. The recipe is super-easy.

You just scoop out the avocados, chop them into small pieces and put everything in a blender or a food processor or even a magic bullet or a hand mixer. Mix them all together until they're a creamy consistency and it will turn a little bit brownish because of the cocoa powder; and it takes about ten minutes to make.

 

[Jacques]

Recipe from the The Health & Wellness Show: Weekly Broadcast - 2 March 2015 (slightly edited)

Avocado Chocolate Mousse

I will definitively try that recipe. Thanks for sharing.

 

[riclapaz]

Recipe from the The Health & Wellness Show: Weekly Broadcast - 2 March 2015 (slightly edited)

Avocado Chocolate Mousse

I will definitively try that recipe. Thanks for sharing.

Yes, thank you very much Dirgni , a great option to consume more fat

 

[Yupo]

Zucchini Chips, or what to do with the mountain of oversized zucchini coming at you from the garden.

Slice the squash into 1/8" thick discs (about 3 - 4 mm?).
Blanch in simmering salted water for a few minutes.
Spray dehydrator trays with olive oil or coconut oil.
Arrange sliced squash on the trays.
Season lightly as desired while still wet (err on the side of less than you think).
Spray again with (same) oil of choice
Dehydrate until crispy.
Taste test, so as to adjust seasoning level for any future batches.
Seal in zip top bags.

I am planning/doing 6 flavors; cajun, salt+pepper, curry+coconut, vinegar BBq, thyme+salt+zatar, rosemary+salt. I think the salt+pepper are the best so far. Really, there is no end of possibilities for flavors. Nori/anchovie anyone? Mmmm!

In first image, level of cajun seasoning is perhaps too much, even for me. In second image is the finished salt + pepper.

I don't know the fat content, sorry. I think it could be uniformly boosted by using a dropper to give each slice a nice dollop of oil prior to dehydrating. This might be a better way to apply salt and seasonings, too.

 

[Yupo]

Poor Man's Crabcake
(something else to do with all that zucchini)

Peel and finely shred/grate the zucchini into a non-metal bowl. You can remove the seed pulp before doing this if desired, by halving the squash longitudinally and scooping it out. Stir in some/enough salt to pull most of the water from the squash. Let sit a while and then strain and rinse well. It should make less than half the original volume of grated squash. Pat dry, squeezing out as much moisture as you can.

To this, add your standard crabcake fillers (use a standard recipe of choice), substituting desired breadcrumb substitute (coconut or almond flour or ground pork rinds), egg, finely diced pepper, celery or whatever you like in there. (I like at least 75% 'meat' in mine.) "Old Bay" seasoning is the trick to get it tasting right.
Form into 3/4" thick x 2.5" diameter patties.
Dredge these in ground pork rinds.
Cook in oil of choice, slowly, in a skillet, turning to brown both sides, until crispy and cooked through.
Serve with mayonnaise or high fat condiment of choice.

Note: Be careful to get most of the salt out of the zucchini. It should taste just right as far as salt level preference. Make sure it fully drained of water, or the recipe will be too wet.

Baltimore Harbor, this isn't. But it is pretty good. :)
Peeled zucchini has very little flavor, so it's easy to use it as a filler for just about anything.
Hope you enjoy!

 

[casper]

Yupo, try to make a keto zucchini moussaka or lasagne according to the recipe of RedFox
https://cassiopaea.org/forum/index.php/topic,39314.msg596274.html#msg596274

 

[idiaysan]

All these recipes sound divine...I will be trying them soon! Thanks everyone for sharing them :)