chai spice + almonds

I’m very hit or miss when it comes to chai spices.  I guess my only real experiences with the chai-flavor, is in tea form.  It’s rare that I try a chai tea that I fully enjoy.  They typically end up too sweet or spicy, and sometimes too potent.  Once in awhile though, the spices are just right.

Spice mixing can seem scary.  Especially when dealing with 6 very strong spices.  Alone, each of the below spices have very deep + complex flavors.  Mix them together and who knows what will happen?

I typically add the tiniest pinch of cloves in my recipes, so deciding to put a whole whopping teaspoon into this fairly small mixture, had me a bit scared.  But somehow, once all mixed together, it turned into everything I was looking for.

warm.

spicy.

deep.

rich.

Tastes like winter.  Feels like it around here too!  Hello temperatures in the single digits!   

Chai Spice Mix

• 2t cinnamon
• 2t ginger
• 1t cardamom
• 1t cloves
• 1/4t nutmeg
• 1/4t all spice

1. Mix together and store in a sealed jar or spice container.

If you’re lucky enough to have a bulk spice section in your store, this should cost well under $1 to make.  If you don’t have a bulk spice aisle, try to find the mini McCormick jars, for a great deal!

This spice mix is totally customizable.  If you want a little more spicy zing, add 1/2-1t more ginger.  White pepper is another common spice added to chai.  You can also get away with just using the ginger, cardamom, clove + cinnamon. 

So what made me randomly decide to mix up these spices?

Oh you know, to make nut butter!  I’ve had this recipe in mind for at least 2 months, but have become quite lazy with my nut butter making.  There hasn’t been a new recipe in far too long.

I’ve become strangely addicted to the oh so convenient + cheap, peanut butter.  Somehow I’ve banished buying cans of beans, to soak + cook my own, but started by jars of peanut butter??  In my defense, they’re on sale all the time, and I always have coupons!  They end up costing less than buying plain organic peanuts, to then process into nut butter, so I tell myself it’s acceptable. 

I seem to have completely forgotten how easy it is to make and how freaking delicious it tastes.

Customizing your own nut butter will make you feel extra fancy, especially when you have guests over.  You can wow them with your creations.  They will have no idea how you did it!

Better yet?  Fill an 8oz mason jar with this fancy stuff, tie an even fancier ribbon around the outside, and gift this to your friends + family.

Chai Spice Almond Butter

• 2c almonds
• 1T honey
• 2.5-3t chai spice
• 1t vanilla extract
• 1/4-1/2t salt

1. On a baking sheet, lightly toast your almonds at 175* for 40min, turning a few times.
2. Let cool 10min, then add to your food processor and turn on.
3. Let run for about 8-12min, scraping the sides of the bowl when necessary, until the almonds become creamy.  It will change from crumbs, to a big ball of dough and then eventually smooth out to a creamy texture.
4. In a bowl, combine the honey, chai spices, vanilla + salt and mix well.
5. Empty the nut butter into the bowl and stir together until completely combined.
6. Store in a sealed jar in the fridge.

tips/substitutions:  You can toast the almonds at 350* for about 15-20min, turning once half-way through.  I like to keep the oven temp lower, to maintain the integrity of the oil in the nuts.  Sub any liquid sweetener you like instead of honey.  Never add milk or water to nut butter to thin it out as it doesn’t work at all.  If your nut butter has been processing for over 15min, try adding 1/2T oil and see if that helps to loosen it up.  Add 1/2T more if needed.  I use a heavy duty, 11c food processor, which works really well with 2c of nuts.  If you’re using a 7c, I would reduce the amount to 1.5c and adjust the spices accordingly.  In my experience, I’ve found that adding liquid sweetener to the nut butter can thicken it to the point where it won’t smooth out.  Adding it after, and mixing in a bowl, helps to solve this problem.

related recipes: maple cinnamon almond butter, vanilla bean maple almond butter, pumpkin spiced almond butter, cinnamon crunch almond butter

If you don’t have a food processor, stir this into about 1.5c of store bought, unsweetened almond butter.

Please prepare for an onslaught of chai recipes.  I already have at least 5 in mind, some of which I’m sure you can guess.  Be thankful, as it seems to have drawn my attention away from pumpkin. 

But I don’t know….pumpkin chai sounds pretty tasty to me.

Ashley

My about + pricing pages are finally complete over on my photography site!

molasses doughnuts

I think it’s time I start spelling donuts, doughnuts.  Technically, that is the official spelling.  And technically, these are officially the best doughnuts I’ve made to date.  And since we’re being all kinds of official, I should finally stop being lazy with the spelling.

This flavor was spurred by a Christmas classic.  My dad’s, grandmother’s recipe for molasses cookies.  I’m pretty sure it’s thee official recipe, that you can find almost anywhere, but over the years my dad has done little things to perfect it.

My dad makes dozens upon dozens of these cookies to ship out to family + friends as a little early Christmas present.  When my brother + I were younger, molasses cookie night was one of my favorite nights in the whole year.  There was so much raw dough eaten, and brown sugar straight from the box!  Whenever I’m home for the holidays, my dad and I like to whip up a fresh batch.

Since Chris + I won’t be in Ohio until Christmas Eve, I came up with a new way to get my yearly molasses fix.

Where did these little baby doughnut holes come from??  I recently learned this from the Two Peas & Their Pod.  You can use a mini muffin tin to make doughnut holes!!  I have a 24 mold mini muffin pan, that held one full batch perfectly.

They’re not completely sphere-like, but covered in sugar they look more doughnut-hole-like than muffin-like.  This is especially great when making a lot of doughnuts, since the pan only holds SIX. 

Chris’s work Christmas party was this past Friday, and I was on dessert duty.  Instead of taking hours to make batch after batch of 6 doughnuts at a time, I made 3 full sized doughnut batches and 2 batches of the minis.  This means I only had to run the oven for 3 cycles, instead of 5!  I baked the minis with the full sized doughnuts.  It worked perfectly and the minis were a hit!  All 48 vanished within minutes, and I was only sent home with 4 large doughnuts. 

I also gave a few to my official taste tester, Kelsey.  I delivered them to her door and about 10min later got an email saying the following:

HOLY FLIPPING MONKEY TAILS!!!!!!!!!!!! The chocolate donuts are delicious per usual --- BUT THE MOLASSES .......OH THE MOLASSES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I think they may be your best invention yet. They seriously made me dance around the house.  I want to stay up all night eating molasses donuts + sipping hot cocoa by a fire.

Her reaction made my night!

These little gems are very cake-doughnutty, not just cakey.  There is a difference!  I wish I could invite you all over for samples.  A popped amaranth + doughnut party!? 

Dad, you would be so proud!

 

Molasses Doughnuts [makes 6-8 depending on pan size or 24 minis in a muffin pan]

• 1/2c GF oat flour
• 1/2c sweet rice flour
• 3T coconut flour
• 1/4c sucanat
• 3T sunflower oil
• 2.5T blackstrap molasses
• 2 large eggs
• 6T unsweetened almond milk
• 3T pumpkin puree
• 1.5t vanilla extract
• 1t cinnamon
• 1t ground ginger
• 1/4t ground cloves
• 1/2t salt
• 1t baking powder

1. Preheat your oven to 350* + grease your donut pan with butter, coconut oil or cooking spray.
2. In a medium sized bowl mix together all dry ingredients.
3. In a small bowl, whisk together all of the wet ingredients.
4. Stir the wet into dry, until just combined.  Do not over stir. 
5. With a spoon or spatula transfer the batter to your greased pan, filling about 1/8-1/4” from the top.
6. Bake for 20-25min.
7. Test with a toothpick for doneness.  You want a slightly moist toothpick.  Not gooey but not bone dry.  The tops of the donut should be golden brown and slightly firm.
8. Let them cool in the pan for 5min then turn out onto a cooling rack.  Loosen around the edges if needed.
9. Add toppings when cooled.

tips/substitutions: You can sub brown rice flour instead of sweet rice flour, almond flour instead of the coconut flour, or 1T oat flour + 2T more rice flour instead of the coconut flour.  Use any type of unsweetened milk you like.  You don’t taste the pumpkin in these, but it’s added for texture.  If you don’t have any, sub 2.5T unsweetened applesauce instead.  Pure cane sugar can be subbed for the sucanat. High altitude, set your oven to 375* and decrease baking powder to 3/4t.  The mini doughnuts took about 15min to bake.  You can grind your own GF oat flour from certified GF rolled oats, or GF oat groats.  Bob’s Red Mill packages GF oat flour.

Topping

• 1/2c sucanat
• 1/2t cinnamon
• ~3T butter, melted

1. Combine the sucanat + cinnamon in a bowl.
2. When cooled, lightly dip the donuts into the melted butter then directly into the cinnamon/sugar mixture.
3. Place on a cooling rack to dry.

In case everyone at the party wasn’t a molasses lover, I also made triple chocolate doughnuts.

I’m seeing chocolate peppermint with a candy cane topping in the near future!

And now it is technically time to hit publish and officially time to zone out + watch TV.

Mondays are better with donuts doughnuts!  Have a good one!

Ashley

sun butter banana protein bars

I cannot believe I just made a photo folder for the month of DECEMBER. 

And to kick off December 1st, Colorado knew just what to do.  With temps all week in the 50’s, today plummeted to the 20’s, and we got about 4” of snow.

It was a bit of a crazy day, evidenced partially by the photos below.

My morning + afternoon were jam packed, leaving me with not much time to bust out this delicious experiment.

Complete chaos, for one pretty easy recipe.  I’m making it look much worse than it actually needs to be.  I was also in a bit of a hurry because the snowy sunlight was fading fast. 

So fast that I had to crank my ISO up to 1600 and leave you with this craptastic image.

crappy quality

fantastic tasting

Bringing it closer to the window, did absolutely nothing to help the situation.

Even taking it outside, proved useless.

But, that’s life.  Sometimes the sun doesn’t cooperate when you want it to.

Sometimes, other things are more important.

Like the recipe.

Sun Butter Banana Protein Bars [serves 9] vegan/GF/nut free

• 1 1/4c GF rolled oats
• 1/2c GF oat flour
• 1 1/2c GF brown rice cereal
• 1/2c plain protein powder
• 2 med. bananas [just less than 1c mashed]
• 3T ground flaxseed meal
• 1/4c sunflower seeds
• 1/4c sunflower butter
• 1/4c dark chocolate chips
• 5T brown rice syrup
• 1T vanilla extract
• 1t cinnamon
• 3/4t salt

1. Preheat oven to 350*
2. In a bowl, mash the banana until there are no lumps and then whisk in all other wet ingredients.
3. In a large bowl, mix together all of the dry ingredients, except for the chocolate chips.
4. Mix wet into dry and stir until just combined.
5. In a lightly greased, or parchment lined 9x9 pan, spread the mixture evenly and bake for 30min.
6. Let cool completely.
7. Melt the chocolate in a small bowl, in the microwave in 20sec increments, stirring in between.
8. Drizzle the chocolate on the bars, cut the bars, then place in the freezer for 5-10min until set.

tips/substitutions:  Buckwheat flour or whole wheat pastry flour should work in place of the oat flour.  You can grind GF oat flour from GF rolled oats or GF oat groats in a blender/coffee grinder/spice grinder.  I use Raw Protein, which was completely undetectable in the recipe.  I would suggest using a plain or possibly a vanilla flavor protein powder.  The protein powder I use has 80 cals + 18g protein per 1/4c serving.  I used 2 servings in this recipe.  You can most likely sub pumpkin or squash puree for the banana, at just under 1c, but it will take away a lot of the sweetness.  Sub any nuts or nut butter instead of sunflower if desired.  Honey or maple syrup can be subbed for the brown rice syrup.

When these first came out of the oven, I didn’t have my hopes set too high.  I was betting that the texture would be off, but after fully cooling the bars, the texture was spot on.  Soft and chewy, but also held together very well.  Chris loved them too!  Double score. 

For me, 2 of these are the perfect mix of carbs, fats + protein to get my day started right.  It will be so nice to wake up to breakfast already made. 

More photos coming soon…

Ashley