Flourless Beet Chocolate Cake & Farmin' Friday

For my birthday I really wanted to blow out candles. I wanted some tradition this year. Oh, I got candles. I got the ones that don't blow out. Ever. I yelled "die!" and dropped them to drown in my glass of water.

OK, I wanted some tradition. What I didn't want was the traditional sugar/flour overload. The hubs wouldn't be up for making a raw carrot cake, and besides, that's boring. I wanted chocolate! I've never liked chocolate cake. Until, I had beet chocolate cake. It was so amazing. But while the one I refer to was made with whole wheat flour, coconut oil and without eggs, it was still sugary and well.. full of flour?

I've never tried to make a raw beet cake (ooh, challenge!). I know that may not sound so great, but I love beets. They are naturally sweet, healthy and I'm pretty much sold on the impossibly vibrant hue. I love how it stains my fingers.

What I've found with many gluten free recipes is they are full of butter and eggs. We do have a lot of eggs around, but after many years of baking without them, I just don't use them. Why? I'm used to vegan cooking and baking and so I just do what I'm used to when I make say.. zucchini bread or something.

I googled healthy beet chocolate cake, wheat free chocolate cake, flourless chocolate cake.. and most recipes were full of butter, cream and eggs. While, I could indulge in adding egg, I wasn't ready for the full hit on my cholesterol. So, this was a huge experiment. And, yeah, I kind of made my own birthday cake...

I was determined to add beets. Overall it was successful. I couldn't get it out of the pan very easily, but it tasted pretty good. I loved the not so sweet taste.. but my guests may have preferred it sweeter since they covered it in vanilla ice cream!

Flourless Beet Chocolate Cake
1-2 oz. melted Dark Chocolate or about 1/2 C Cocoa powder
6 Tbs Coconut Oil
3/4 Tbs Vanilla
1/2 tsp dried Stevia
2-3 Good squirts Agave
3 Beets, medium, shredded
3-4 eggs
pinch of salt
pinch of cayenne (yeah baby)

So.. a few notes:
*I used part (half of each amount shown) melted chocolate and part cocoa (raw cacao has been giving me headaches).. because I was just experimenting. You can do either, or both.
*I didn't want it that sweet and still wanted ti healthy, so I used stevia.. then I thought.. ok.. just a couple squirts of agave... soo...
I used 4 medium eggs.. if you have large eggs, use 3.. I didn't say this was vegan right? You can keep in mind when purchasing eggs (support your local egg farmer!), that free range eggs are lower in cholesterol and higher in healthy omegas. I heard it here. That's just my biased opinion. Why eat eggs that came out of an unhappy, abused animal? Some say, why eat eggs at all? Yeah, I was there once.

Back to your normal programming: CAKE.
1) Shred the beets (I used a food processor). Simmer on the stove, covered, until tender.. about 20 minutes. You won't need to add liquid.. the beets have enough.
2) In another bowl, combine melted coconut oil, and all other ingredients, stir.
3) When beets are done, transfer to food processor, puree, add the bowl of remaining ingredients, blend a bit more, scraping if needed.
4) Pour into greased (grease it better than I did) and maybe dusted with cocoa powder- cake pan. I used a 9 inch (I think.. I finger measured). You can use muffin tins too. It was thinner than I had planned. Next time I will double the recipe, or use a smaller/deeper dish.
5) Bake @ 350 for about 10 minutes. No, really. I looked in and the cake had a volcano growth on one side.. it was done. My oven runs hot.. and it will depend on your pan.. but start checking at 10 minutes.

Let cool.

Chocolate Icing
1 Tbs Cocoa powder
3 Tbs Coconut oil
1 tsp Vanilla

I whipped this together in a food processor. Then pour into a bowl, and chilled so the coconut oil would harden a bit, making an icing consistency.

Once cake is cool, ice, top with whatever you want (I did strawberries and coconut) and chill until ready to serve.

Farmin' Friday!
Dinner, one of my funny white chickens that does things like this:

Dust Bath in a Pot Full of Dirt

and was missing for a week? Story here.

Well, she is still alive! The last few days, every time I come in to feed her, she tried to stand up like "See? Don't give up on me!" and then falls back over. But today, she stood! Really, really stood! Using both feet. She's has been more aggressive with her daily strawberries (flinging them in the air) and eggs and is even eating feed now. So happy!! I think she's going to make it for sure. Every time I get that bad feeling, they prove me wrong. Except for the baby barred rock that died in my hand in May. :( I had a good feeling and she just, didn't.
Here she is in all her dirty glory..

Lost weight huh?

A lot going on. A lot growing. Fireweed is about to bloom, Lupine, Wild Iris (pictured below) Yarrow and Comfrey are out. Currants are green and I'm waiting like crazy for the strawberries on the beach to be ready!

The last photo is our 'surprise!' rooster. Silver Leghorn if I'm not mistaken. It messes up our roo to hen ratio a bit, especially given we will likely lose a few hens over the course of the year to various causes (i.e. hawks). He is very friendly and calm. I knew he was a roo when he was a few weeks old, but hoped against it anyway. He lets out a lil baby crow at sunrise (3 am or so) and when he hears me come to open the coop. Just a couple more weeks and they should be big enough to let loose with our adult flock.

I'll let pictures tell the rest:

Surprise! I'm a Purty Roo!

Blossom Salad & Farmin' Friday

Did you know you can eat many flower blossoms?? So many beautiful blossoms are ready for picking, and I definitely have all I need for salad this time of year. Summer time salads are so much more fun that the same ol winter green salads. I love bright colors, and this salad just makes me smile. You can take this as an example and create your own! I just used what I picked that day. And, I measured by hand.

Jo's Blossom Salad
Greens:
1 C Spinach
1/2 C Arugula
1/2 C Chard
1/2 C Mixed lettuces
1/4 C Kohlrabi leaves (young thinnings)

Toppings:
Handful of Arugula Blossoms
Handful of Chive Blossoms
2 Strawberries Chopped
1/4 Pear Chopped
Sprinkle of Pumpkin Seeds
Sprinkle of Coconut
Sprinkle of Alfalfa sprouts

Dressing: I just drizzled on Raspberry Vinegar and Grapeseed oil.. anything goes.. simple is best for this so you can experience all the tangy/spicy and sweet flavors. Enjoy!

Newbie Farmin Chronicles:
SO much has happened on our little farm lately, I almost need a blog dedicated to it. To keep this post as short as possible, here is a short sentence recap of the past week:

Recap: Plymouth Rock Chicken "Dinner" disappears/Black Bear on property-firearm gets carried around/Mysterious dead vole every morning (the cat)/Crazy Ptarmigan drives the dogs to lunacy/Sparky the duck fights a chicken/goshawk returns and there is a stick vs predator match/"Dinner" is found/Buff Orp Hen "Betty" is limping/Hens are hiding eggs in the fireweed and shed/Juicy Fathead the rooster is a bad ass

Ah, so, pictures may explain more briefly.... I didn't get a photo of the bear because I ran for the rifle and had the cat in my arm, and I could get a picture of the fresh vole this morning.. but no. (Just to clarify, I don't shoot to kill anything.. unless it threatens me. The sound alone scares them off).

Crazy Ptarmigan

Background: We are amateur chicken keepers. This is our second year (well, mine-not my hubs). We added to our flock this year to prepare for selling eggs in town. Duck eggs, chicken eggs, and next spring-3 different breed hatching eggs. Our adults are free range. Once they left the brooder box, we kept them penned in from age 4 wks-7wks because they were still small (and vunerable). Now, we only keep them penned in at night (they go in the coop on their own) for their safety. In the winter I have to shovel snow so they can walk out. Our young flock is currently penned (still small and it's hawk 'season' here). We'll keep them in a bit longer to grow large enough that they can protect themselves when integrated with our older flock. After giving a few away as gifts, and 5 dying (hawk/weak chicks) over the last year, we have 55 birds total.

No Yoga: Once the birds are old enough, chickens are relatively moderate maintenance. Well, at least in comparison to having one adult flock, a younger flock, a flock of ducks, a barn under construction, a special needs chicken and an injured chicken. I love having so much going on. It really keeps me busy (and outside!) however, it has disturbed my yoga routine (usually early morning before I work online) and I'm feeling stiff and maaybe a little cranky.. nah.. cranky before bed though.

Hmm.. lets start with the most exciting. Yesterday I was picking greens in the garden, on the other side of the fence my adult flock was hanging out eating the thinnings/scraps I stuck through the fencing.

stayed like this forever

  
The roo and the hawk and the woman with the stick: So, my adult rooster is a bad ass. He fought a hawk twice last year, losing many feathers. He looks for his hens when they are missing. When he hears one cackle in distress, you've never seen a fat feathered butt run so fast! He's also gentle with the hens and eats crackers out of my hand. Very cool guy.

Hii-yah!

They were eating and making happy chicken sounds.. and he makes this sound that gives me a bad feeling and I though "why is he warning them/is he mad at me?" and I look over (he is 5 inches away from me) and all the chickens look up, so I look up and holy shiz there is a hawk, head bent, low, eyeing the young chicks near the barn. I yelled "hawk!" haha! to who? The rooster? He's like "duh!" And I ran, handful of spinach (that I found later on the ground), jumped out of the garden, grabbed a stick and waited. I normally have the .22 out for bears. And we had a bear hanging out this past week. What was I thinking? Well, 2nd option is a shovel/rake.. I must have actually put those away, and had to grab a long stick (waiting to be used as a roost bar).

2010-Juicy Himself!

So, I jump into the young chicks pen area and wait. Here it comes.. I hear the rooster-who has already herded the hens into their penned area (which is safe and netted-the young pen area is incomplete). I'm standing there inbetween hot pink and orange incomplete netting, ready to swing. The young chicks see the hawk and run and hide.. the hawk hovers right over the barn, and I see how dang big it is now. She swoops down and guess who turns into Babe Ruth (oh wait-was he a pitcher?).. she is thwarted and flies into a tree across the yard. I wait. For 15 minutes. I knew she was coming back because all of a sudden a chicken cries and herds the ducks (that was funny) and they all run. So she comes even closer this time! And I just kept swinging and after a minute of this showdown (she's like WHAT is that??) flew towards the neighbors. So I ran in and called them to warn. We have wildlife phone chains here. That was pretty exciting. I felt really triumphant.

Found the Lost One: Last bit of excitement was later that night. We found "Dinner" alive and under a tarp (that was covering some lumber). A weeks worth of chicken poo dried to her butt and she had laid an egg under there. After a minute, we got her to drink some water. And after about 20 she bit at a strawberry and chowed on some wet cornmeal. But, she didn't get up. And, after 13 hours, she still has not gotten up. I carried her inside after the first hour though and put her up in a brooder box with everything she needs. She holds her wing out for balance. One wing is missing quite a few primary feathers, all except 2. Her leg might be stiff, as she holds it in one direction-back. I checked her out and see no wounds, feel no broken bones. We'll see what happens.

Crooked Beak: Lastly.. little crooked beak. She is also a Plymouth Rock and has a birth deformity that has worsened. She needs special attention with feed. She does not get picked on, which is great. Very ambitious, she escapes the pen (the only one that knows how) and follows me around the yard for food. She likes to hang out on my arm too-while I'm working. Too funny. What a character. Isn't she cute/pitiful?

Update:  Little Crooked Beak passed away over winter. :(