paleo zucchini bread

Paleo Zucchini Bread
 1.5 cups almond meal flour
1.5 teaspoons baking soda
0.5 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon cinnamon
Mix dry ingredients in a bowl.

1 cup shredded zucchini, squeezed dry (1 large zucchini)
Set aside.

3 eggs (I only had two, so I substituted 1/4 cup applesauce for one egg)
1 mashed banana (I had none so substituted more applesauce (1/2 cup))
3 tablespoons maple syrup
1 tablespoon coconut oil, melted.
Blend the wet ingredients, then add the zucchini. Then stir in the dry ingredients.

I separated into about 9 muffins. I greased the pan and put it in the oven at 375 for about 20minutes.
Let cool for 5minutes, then move to rack.

So, they taste kind of egg-y, either because I melted the oil in the microwave and then added my egg to the oil, so maybe the egg cooked a little before I put all the ingredients together. Definitely very soft on the inside. Nothing like a typical muffin texture. Sam ate one and enjoyed everything but the edges.  I'll pack them in our lunches this week!

Swiss Chard

It is summer CSA time again!
This past week I received:
strawberries
head of lettuce
bunch of chard
bunch of kale
bunch of radish
bunch of beets

My parents were visiting when we received the box and my mom was super excited to eat farm fresh veggies so early in the growing season. (They had lettuce growing in the garden in VT, but not much else). I prepared the beets by boiling in water, and sauteed the kale to share at lunch and dinner.

The radish is mostly uneaten. The berries were consumed within 2 days and I am working on the head of lettuce.  That leaves the chard. Here's what I did for lunch this week:

Swiss Chard Lasagna: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/food-network-kitchens/swiss-chard-lasagna-recipe.html

I pretty much followed the recipe except I purchased a grated blend of asiago, parmesean, and romano and substituted 1% milk for heavy cream.

The recipe was easy and the lasagna was good. I ate it cold all week and the cheese flavor hid the chard flavor, so I think my husband might even eat it if he gave chard another try.

Parmesean Broccoli Balls

I have made this recipe three times now and believe it or not I have not recorded the process. This is unfortunate because I am making this recipe now based on my notes from my printed recipe card and the balls aren't turning out how I expected.
Let's start with the bones of the recipe:
http://allrecipes.com/recipe/41116/parmesan-broccoli-balls/

This time I used:
1 large head of fresh broccoli
1/2 box of Trader Joes Cornbread Stuffing Mix
3/4 cup grated parmesan/Romano cheese
1 medium onion
5 eggs
3/4 cup melted butter
1 teaspoon black pepper
1/4 teaspoon garlic powder

I steamed the broccoli florets for 5 minutes in my basket steamer. That was perfect. I sauteed the onion with some butter and onion to brown them a little, which I think works well for this recipe. I melted the butter in a saucepan and then added it to the egg, after which I realized I might have cooked some of the egg, so next time add the butter to the large mix, maybe even after the egg has been stirred in. I mixed everything together and put it in the fridge overnight.

The next day, I made them into 1 inch balls and put 20 of them on a large baking sheet. They went into the oven at 350 degrees for 20minutes. That was pretty perfect for cooking them, but at this point I saw that my balls were falling apart! They also stuck to the pan. To the second half of my ingredients I added 2 more eggs to help with binding and put it back in the fridge for one hour.

I baked the second batch on parchment paper. This was a good idea. I feel that the second batch was a little too wet, so maybe use 6 or 7 eggs for the whole batch?