So stoked on this Paleo Banana Bread with Pears and Honeyed Chocolate Sauce, for reals, it’s gluten and grain free, super moist and indulgently delicious. All I wanted today (and most days) was something rich and chocolately, warm and comforting, with a nice hot chai, and it doesn’t get much better than this banana bread folks. We have these two bountiful pear trees bordering our driveway, most of them are still unripe but one was ready, I wanted to make something special with the first pear of many to come. The bottom of the bread is caramelized gooey pears, which is surprisingly easy to achieve with a little coconut sugar and oil, the loaf pops right out, truly worthy of a pat on the back, a nice book and a cozy blanket. Monday moods.
We had to go to the court house today for a little ‘business’, apparently babies aren’t normally guests at such places since no change table was present anywhere. All the serious lawyers were ogling Mavi’s monkey pants, and he had plenty of smiles to share with all. What a gift children give to the world with their endless joy. The little one is starting to eat some solids, we’re taking a bit of an unconventional route and holding off on the grains and fruits. Instead, pastured egg yolks and grass-fed beef liver are the first foods. Quite the stretch from Pablem and other processed baby gruel. The reasoning behind this is that babies don’t produce amylase, the enzyme needed to break down all carbohydrates. Babes are much better equipped to digest protein and fat. At about 6 months they don’t have any iron stores left from when they were still inside momma, stealing all her iron for their journey outward. Liver is rich in iron and many vitamins, and the egg yolk from pastured chickens is high in healthy brain building cholesterol and lutein. I’m grateful to have this knowledge for our son, I’m sure at his age I was downing cheerios and goldfish, and I actually remember those vanilla baby cookies that one would just suck on until they disintegrated, yum?
Banana Bread with Pears and Honeyed Chocolate Sauce
Prep Time: 10 minutes
Cook Time: 50 minutes
Ingredients
For the banana bread
3 ripe bananas,mashed
2 eggs
1/4 C almond butter, raw or roasted
1 tsp vanilla
1/2 tsp sea salt
3 Tbs+1 tsp coconut oil,melted
2 Tbs coconut sugar
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 C dark chocolate chips
1 ripe pear, thinly sliced
1/3 C coconut flour
For the chocolate sauce
2 Tbs coconut oil, melted
2 Tbs cacao powder
2 Tbs honey
pinch of salt
Instructions
Preheat oven to 350F or 170C
Combine bananas,eggs,almond butter,vanilla, baking soda,sea salt, coconut oil and 1 Tbs coconut sugar until smooth and creamy.
Add coconut flour and baking soda until well incorporated, then proceed to mix in the chocolate chips.
In a loaf pan spread 1 tsp coconut oil on all sides until well coated and sprinkle a Tbs of coconut sugar over top, spread pear slices evenly over top.
Carefully pour the batter over top of the pear slices and smooth it all out.
Bake for 50 min. until a toothpick comes out clean.
Makes about 10 slices
For the chocolate sauce
Combine all ingredients and leave at room temperature to thicken. Stir well before pouring over your finished banana bread.
This salmon is ahhhh-mazing. It tastes way better than the candied salmon from the market loaded with weird preservatives and junk. Bourbon glaze is good with just about anything, I mean really, it’s syrupy liquor tainted goodness that you will want to douse everything in, yes, even salad. Maybe even brownies, if you leave out the savouries. The salmon is broiled to crispy perfection, and coated with a thick layer or glaze, some sesame seeds and greens onions, the whole marvellous dish comes together in under 30 minutes. That is, if you don’t nearly light your house on fire like I did, but at least we got to test the smoke alarm. J is a firefighter so while I frantically wave the door open and closed trying to do…something, he actually deals with the situation and I love him for it. My track record for starting fires is, ahem, not favourable. But J got over my negligence as soon as he took one bite into this melt in your mouth nom nom salmon.
It’s the time of year where the Kokanee salmon spawn, what a beautiful sight of red fish flowing in the river. A feast for the grizzlies and black bears of the region, not to mention the eagles and osprey. There are a few places around us to go and marvel at the fishies. This time of year is always challenging in that summer is over, you can feel the haze of endless sun dissipate. The shift occurs so rapidly you barely notice it until the tip of your nose is red and frozen and your little babies feet now need to be covered with a pair of woolies. And here we are, my favourite time of year, pumpkins, colours everywhere, calm acceptance that the sun still shines and the world is turning. You can expect more soups and roasted delights, comfort foods and pumpkin spice being churned out, especially once we get all settled in to our new nest.
Bourbon Glazed “Candied” Salmon goes great in a salad, I made a dressing with a Tbs. of the glaze, olive oil, apple cider vinegar and a touch of dijon mustard which was tantalizing. This recipe was inspired by the one at How Sweet Eats with a few little tweaks and a whole lot of extra smoke.
This Sweet and Spicy Beef Stir Fry was gobbled up so fast, it was hard to even wait and snap at least one shot. Home made kimchi was made for a dish like this, if you can get your hands on some, your tastebuds will cheer. As we unpack our house and kitchen, and attempt to organize and create a functional space, the nourishment is often a quick throw together. The result is often better than something slaved over for hours. This honey laden, zippy sauce would go great with grilled chicken or a vegetarian version of the stir fry.
I have a question, what does stir fry mean to you? To me, growing up, stir fry was pretty meh, not very exciting, and often soggy. (I love you mom, your cooking has gotten so much better over the years. ) Nowadays stir fry is just a common term I use for a flavourful,colourful, sexy dish of pretty much whatever’s in the fridge, yo. For those days when you get carried away creating, focused and slightly flustered stir fry is my go to. With whatever seasonal delicious vegetables and a few key flavour combinations you can create a simple and fantastic stir fry in a flash.
Oh yeah, purple carrots! Closest thing you’ll ever get to a tye-died vegetable, technicolor wonderment indeed. But all hippie kaleidoscope lingo aside, purple carrots are how carrots should be, or at least how they used to be, until those crazy Dutch lovers of all things orange came along. The first domesticated carrots were white and purple, they still grow wild in Afganistan and some of the locals use them to make a charming carrot alcohol brew. Personally, I prefer my purple carrots sliced lengthwise to show their inner beauty, stir friend, roasted, grilled or just as is. They are an heirloom that just seems way cooler than plain old orange carrots.
My friend Aya makes amazing kimchi, she makes the best kimchi in all of the Kootenays, and she gave me a special korean chili powder so that I could make delicious kimchi like her. Fermented foods delight my inner child, they are magical, after all. Somehow, amidst delicious crunchy vegetables, lie invisible beneficial microbes who help to heal our beings on so many levels. You can read more about the magical and scientifically proven benefits of fermented foods here. I adapted my recipe from the one over at use real butter. Instead of water I wanted to add some extra umami by infusing kombu seaweed. Aya (kimchi specialist) informed me that no two Korean red pepper/chili powder are the same, I would make sure that their is no added MSG or pseudonyms, see this article for a list ingredients that have MSG.
4 purple carrots or regular carrots, cut lenthwise into strips
1 bell pepper, chopped
1/4 head of napa cabbage or regular cabbage, cut into strips
a few kale leaves, chopped
1 tsp rice wine vinegar
2 Tbs coconut cream
1 tsp chopped red hot chilis or hot sauce like sriracha
1 Tbs tahini paste
1/2 tsp sea salt
1 Tbs honey
black sesame seeds, for garnish (optional)
green onion, for garnish (optional)
For the Kimchi
5 lbs. napa cabbage, chopped into 1-inch portions
1/2 cup salt
1/4 cup sweet rice flour or tapioca starch
1 1/2 cups water
1-2 strips kombu seaweed
2 tbsps coconut sugar
1/2 cup garlic, crushed
1 tbsp fresh ginger, minced
1/2 cup onion, cut into medium chunks
1/2 cup fish sauce
1 1/4 cups korean coarse ground red pepper powder
5 green onions, sliced on the diagonal
1 cup leek, chopped (greens too)
2 cups daikon radish, julienned
1/4 cup carrot, julienned
Instructions
For the Sweet and Spicy Beef Stir Fry
Heat sesame oil in a wok or skillet. Add onion and garlic and cook on high just until they start to turn golden, add carrots, pepper, cabbage and kale and stir continuously until cabbage and kale start to wilt significantly.
Add your rice wine vinegar followed by the coconut cream, chilis or hot sauce, tahini paste and sea salt. Stir until well combined and bubbling.
Lower the heat and cover for 5 minutes. Turn off the heat and set aside.
Heat a separate cast iron skillet or a grill for your steak. Dry off the steak and sprinkle with salt and pepper. When the pan or grill is nice and hot add the steak, without any oil, sear for 3 minutes each side for a medium rare steak or 4-5 minutes for well done. If your steak is thicker than 1 inch, you can turn the broiler on in your oven and pop it in for a few minutes after searing. Allow steak to rest and cool for a few minutes before slicing into thin strips. Add to the stir fry.
Finish with a drizzle of honey, black sesame seeds and green onion slices
For the Kimchi
Using a very large vessel (a roasting pan works perfectly) add to it the chopped napa cabbage along and cover with purified water and sprinkle with the salt, creating a brine. Turn cabbage every 30 minutes, for a total of 90 minutes. Rinse cabbage in clean pure water 3 times, drain and set aside.
Boil the 1 1/2 C of water with the kombu for 10 minutes. Remove kombu and add rice flour, if you are using tapioca, allow the infusion to cool before mixing in tapioca so that it doesn't clump. Mix in the sugar and red pepper chili powder.
In a food processor or blender add garlic, onion, ginger and fish sauce and make a paste. Combine with the starch and chili paste, mixing in the carrots leeks and green onions. Add cabbage and mix well, until everything is thoroughly coated. Use gloves for this as the chili powder can stain easily.
Press kimchi into airtight glass jars (you may need a few, this recipe makes 1 Gallon) leaving about 1 inch of space and make sure the liquid covers the top. Place a towel or plates under your jars to soak up any spillage and leave to ferment for 2-5 days. Make sure to open the kimchi jars twice a day to relieve the build up of pressure in the jars and push the kimchi back down. When it's ready depends on your personal preference, taste daily to see if you like the flavour/texture that has developed. Store in the refrigerator
Oh you are going to love these morsels of ooey gooey comfort! They are so akin to my favourite childhood chocolate chip cookies that it sort of scares me. Because they’re not, these cookies are blow your mind grain free goodness, no weird hydrogenated oils or any of that nonsense. Simple to put together but very difficult waiting for them to cool. I shed a tear for my pops who’s doing a ketogenic/atkins diet and couldn’t indulge, his strength in resisting these babies is inspiring.
The original recipe is from Slim Palates Josh Weissman, he adds a touch of flaked sea salt to each cookie to really amp it up. The original recipe calls for raw almond butter, he says it adds to the caramelized effect. All I had was roasted almond butter so I used that and it turned out just lovely. Its up to you- either way these cookies are a hit and will find a permanent home in my cookie collection.
4 ounces dark chocolate coarsely chopped (I recommend 70-85% the actual cookie is fairly sweet so a darker chocolate contrasts best) or chocolate chips
Instructions
Preheat oven to 350F and line 2 baking sheets with parchment.
Combine coconut or cane sugar with the almond butter until smooth, add baking soda,vanilla and salt.
In a separate bowl combine the egg and egg yolk, add to the almond butter mixture and combine until well incorporated.
Mix in the chocolate chunks.
Drop about 1-11/2 Tbs of the dough onto baking sheets, make sure to leave adequate space between cookies as they spread out quite a bit. 6 cookies per sheet works well, or you can do it in batches.
Bake for 10-12 minutes and allow to cool for 5 minutes before transferring to a cooling rack.
3.2.1311
The past 2 weeks have been a veritable whirlwind whipping by. Seriously hard to believe it is September and the leaves are commencing their shift into auburn shades. I missed you all, the writing, the sharing, all that good stuff. Along with our transition into a new community, we’ve elevated our internet prowess to the high speed variety. Now I can actually have more than one window open at a time, hip pity hip hooray! Integration is slow and steady, smiling faces welcome us and the mountains here give you even more of a feeling of sitting in the palms of mother nature herself. Living in a small town seems to be more impact prone than a rustic woodland cabin but I am already seeing the opposite is the case. No more driving 20 minutes for a dollop of cream, now we can just go for a stroll. With a manageable amount of garden to tend, and a plethora of local producers around, I feel we’ve found a lifestyle that we can sustain. The blessings showered by my parents to help us make a little home were monumental and so appreciated. Thanks to my crafty dad we now have a hefty island to roll around to places with the best light for photographing all the gorgeous food we procure. I promise next summer we’ll have our sh!t together and you can actually have fun and go for some hikes and adventures!
This Almond sauce I make always makes everyone happy. It’s multi-purpose, I make a really similar sauce for my pad thai, but you could use this sauce for satay dipping sauce for skewers, salad dressing, stir-fry sauce, roasted sweet potato…My parents are visiting, so I toned down the hot chili spice and focused on creating a flavourful umami dish even the pickiest of eaters will love. I’m betting even kids would gobble down this sweet & sour almond chicken. Roasted sweet potatoes are the perfect side, they soak up all that luxurious sauce just perfectly.
As the move continues I realize how much stuff we have amassed in the past year, and just how much of it is unnecessary. It’s nice to have a well stocked kitchen, and I’m a sucker for cool gadgets and pretty things but I’m realizing I could fare pretty well with just my cast iron skillet and the vita-mix. Those are the two things I would bring to my desert island if it had electricity. And a stand up paddle board, those are rad, I really want one wide enough that you can do yoga on the water.
This meal is a cinch to whip up, it’s paleo friendly, but you’d never know.
½ tsp sambal chili sauce of ½ of a bird chili, seeds removed
1½ tsp lime juice
1 Tbs tamarind concentrate
2 Tbs honey or coconut sugar
1 tsp fish sauce
1 Tbs coconut aminos or tamari
1 tsp rice wine vinegar
1 Tbs tapioca starch (optional)
Instructions
Preheat oven to 400F
In a blender or food processor add almonds,coconut milk,garlic,chili,lime juice, tamarind,honey, fish sauce, coconut amino or tamari and rice wine vinegar and blend until smooth.
For a thicker more gravy like sauce, mix 1 Tbs tapioca starch with 1 Tbs cold water to form a paste and add this to your sauce.
Heat a skillet on high and add coconut oil, place chicken skin side down and lightly salt. Allow skin to get nice and crispy, about 3 minutes per side.
Hey I'm Chantelle, my alter ego would be a mermaid if I wasn't such a terrible swimmer. I love writing authentically and cooking in my pyjamas. My favourite pastimes include eating avocados, travelling the world and hanging out with a toddler.
The best gooey paleo chocolate chip cookies 
