Elimination Diet Diary, Day 30

Judah's Mario cookie creation

These cookies are from Ali's recipe over at Whole Life Nutrition...they are so amazing!! They are totally sugar free, made from almond flour and coconut ground into flour...sweetened with stevia. I used 1 cup of almond flour and 1 cup of coconut. I grind my own almond flour in the food processor...I ground up 1 cup of almonds then measured a cup and saved the extra. I put the ground almonds back in the processor with the coconut and let it run til it was all nicely powdered. Other than that I followed the recipe exactly.

Delicious! You do need to keep them in the freezer to keep them crisp and flaky...if you leave them out they soften. They are tasty that way too...but we eat them straight from the freezer. So good with or without Ali's yummy frosting...which is amazing and so pretty as a glaze.
I did get interrupted while I was making these and stored some frosting in the fridge. It turned a different, thicker texture and did not return to a glaze state even at room temp. But it was still good...just not as pretty as the glaze...more of a matte finish than a glossy finish. (Can you tell I am a paper crafter...lol!) Another thing to note, as I was working with the dough I noticed 10 minutes was great for baking when the dough was straight from the fridge but as I re rolled the leftover pieces and the dough became more room temp it only needed about 8 minutes. The taste and texture of these cookies is amazing. I usually feel the need to tweak a recipe. Not this one, Ali got it right on! Try these, you will be delighted! So yummy and nourishing too!

The picture above with the toothpicks added is Judah's creation.:) It's Mario. :) He had a blast making and eating these! :)

Easter morning I made a delicious coffee cake from almond flour...I may share the recipe some day, when I have it perfected. :)

Family Easter gathering was at my brother Matthew's house. My assignment was to bring a vegetarian main dish and a healthy dessert. Someone else was doing mashed potatoes but we can't have milk or butter or cream cheese etc that was in them so I also took roasted potatoes in the crock pot. We took the sunflower seed burger's from Ali's book...yum! For the dessert we took the cookies above as well as the cookies I made the other day, and a raw apple pie (recipe below) that is really tasty. My sister in law Mariya loved the cookies and my niece Savannah (7) loved the apple pie. :) There was also a delicious green salad there and a to-die-for Russian Carrot Salad that I put on top of my salad in place of dressing...yum! Being together with the whole family was the highlight and we enjoyed all the babies, the Easter egg hunt and the good stories being shared! Mariya's parents came as we were leaving so we enjoyed visiting with them a bit too. Mariya is from Ukraine and her mom has all kinds of interesting remedy recipes...equal parts lemon and garlic pureed and stored five days in fridge and then take 1 tsp a day at night helps with cholesterol and blood pressure. I will have to try it! :)

Last night we went to hear the Jostie's and skipped dinner...I snacked on some almonds and fruit roll. When we got home I made some teff cereal. Then I put the small pot in the fridge. This morning the cereal was hard so I dumped it out onto a plate. It was round, the form of the pot. I sliced it in 1/4 inch thin rounds and fried it in a skillet in some coconut oil. We put a bit of maple syrup on it and it was such a good breakfast, really enjoyed it! I will share that recipe soon...forgot to get a picture of it this morning.

Raw Apple Pie
Here's my recipe for the Raw Apple Pie...I have shared this post at Amy's Slightly Indulgent Tuesday, check out all the great recipes everyone is sharing.

Favorite Raw Apple Pie

1 3/4 cups sunflower seeds
1 cup medjool dates, no pits
3/4 tsp sea salt
1 T coconut oil

Process the sunflower seeds until ground well. Remove 1/3 cup of the ground seeds and sprinkle around the bottom of a large deep dish pie plate. Add the dates, sea salt and coconut oil to the remaining ground seeds and process well. Shape into a ball and press into the pie plate. Using a hand held pizza dough roller, roll the dough flat, then use your hands to press the dough up the sides of the plate. Or you can roll the dough out between pieces of plastic wrap and then transfer to pie plate.

For the filling you will need:

1/3 cup medjool dates, no pits
2 small pears or 1 extra large pear
6 organic fuji apples, processed very thin slices
1 cup organic raisins
2 T ground cinnamon
1 T lemon juice or juice of small lemon
1 T coconut cream concentrate

Place the apples into a large bowl. Stir the cinnamon, raisins and lemon juice into the apple slices. Blend the dates and pears well. Add the pureed pears/dates to the apples and stir well to incorporate.

Store the bowl of apple slices in the fridge until ready to serve. Store the pie crust in the fridge as well. When ready to serve, fill the crust with the apple slices and cut into 12 slices. Serve with a topping of toasted pumpkin seeds, sunflower seeds and coconut flakes if desired. Enjoy!

So...we have made it to day 30. :) We are doing well. Those of you who are praying for us, thank you! Please continue. God is so good and faithful!

Tonight for dinner we had millet and tomato sauce and garlicky green beans. I loved the beans...so good. :) Jeff and Judah had brown rice pasta, which I don't think we are allowed as it's made from brown rice flours.

We were supposed to add Salmon in on Sunday but didn't until Monday and even then we couldn't do it 3x's a day. Can't afford it and can't stomach it...I hardly like it at all...I ate a 1/2 portion and said skip it. Oh well, we never ate it very often anyways, we are likely not allergic to it and if we are, we eat it so rarely it probably doesn't matter. Or does it? Maybe I am getting lenient...maybe we will just add it in later.

We are thinking of skipping adding tofu and tempeh...we don't care for either really and I am still not sure what to think of soy products. How do you feel about the soy debate?