Growing up, my family often frequented the neighborhood Olive Garden.  My fondest memory of those visits was the single Andes mint that came at the end.  As soon as the bill appeared, I would lunge for the small green foil-wrapped rectangle enveloping a sliver of dark chocolate with a layer of mint crème on top.  

Inspired, I wanted to recreate that taste experience for dear friends who recently did some serious heavy lifting for me.  Quite literally.  It took four guys to get a one-inch thick, white and grey Carrara marble table top up three flights of steps to our place.  I can’t wait to roll out some gluten-free vegan pastry on it.  And I’ll post the recipe, I promise!  

To this day, if you ask me to choose between having 300 pounds of that stone in my kitchen or a couple-carat rock on my finger, the Carrara would win hands down.  I believe a table represents something just as important as marriage.  Community.  (And good food, of course!)  Meals are often the glue that holds friends and family together.  So for us, the dining table is the most important piece of furniture in our home.

I love it almost as much as I love chocolate.  One thing I know for sure: there is a positive correlation between the frequency of snow and rain in Brooklyn and the quantity of chocolate I consume.   The phenomena is clearly evidenced by the empty canisters of Dagoba cocoa in my recycle bin and the four bags of vegan chocolate chips I’ve burned through in as many weeks.  So…isn’t it about time I lay off a bit on the cacao?  Absolutely.  Not.  

And, if you find yourself wanting to escape “the friend zone” (and you know who you are), make these brownies and give them to your friend.  Or freeze them for a rainy day.  

For the recipe…

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This week I truly needed chocolate.  Fast.  It took three tries to get this recipe where I wanted it, but lucky for me (and for you), the process is simple and the end result is pure comfort.  I love the crunch on the edges of these cookies.  The inside reminds me of a brownie.  Just what I was looking for.  

Why did I need chocolate?  Well, why does anyone need chocolate?  While the weather hasn’t helped, I realized it wasn’t just the cold and snow casting a shadow on my days…it was a tough decision I had to make: I had to breakup with organic dairy.

Which leads me to a confession: I’ve been a flip-flopping vegan.  I’ve abstained from eggs and milk for about the past six months mainly because my son Jac has severe allergies to them.  And although I’ve been a vegetarian since I was 12, I was hesitant about going back to a vegan diet completely.

It was definitely off again when, at age 19, I landed in Paris and discovered real butter.  It had been easy to give up the watered-down, tasteless country crock stuff I’d been raised on.  But this.  Spread onto fresh baguettes, baked into croissants and whipped into soufflés, I embraced butter in every form. 

My reasoning went like this:  The European governments supported traditional farming methods, all naturally organic, and used for hundreds of years.  Surely, as long as I chose dairy made in European countries…or milk and eggs labeled Organic in the U.S., I’m not supporting questionable farm practices and I’m safe from any genetically modified (GM) foods, too.  Right?  

Recently, I’ve had a nagging feeling that it isn’t quite true.  Then, just this past week the USDA approved unrestricted planting of gene modified alfalfa.  You can read more here to find out what this means for organic milk in the U.S.

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about what it means to manipulate our food supply.  And as a result, I won’t be going back to organic dairy and eggs.

Next week After Valentine’s Day, I’ll tell you about the trip we took to Spain and France.

Meanwhile, I’ve found a delicious (and healthy) replacement for butter:  coconut oil.  Use it in your baking and you won’t miss the butter!

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I have wanted to make tiny French cakes for as long as I can remember.  Financiers, madeleines and the like were invented to be a snack: pour le goûter.  

Le goûter is the afternoon snacktime that kids get when they come home from school.  I embrace this concept wherever I’m at.  As an adult you can simply take a break and call it le thé.  Isn’t it great when a culture can institutionalize a daily time to have some cake or tea?  We need it.  After all, we are only human.  And this way, you avoid that guilt-inducing moment of weakness at the vending machine. 

Why the name financier?  Is it because of their decadent ingredients?  Almonds and butter (this recipe has neither).  Since they are often made in a rectangular mold, some thought they looked like gold bars, favored by the rich.  Another story says the cake became popular among the moneyed crowd of the Paris stock exchange.

But I must admit, the name makes me think of my not-too-distant past, right in the midst of the New York exchanges as part of a brokerage firm, talking every day with financiers, or advisors.  

One thing I noticed:  There is something about dealing with money and the markets day in and day out that makes everyone involved lose touch with reality at one point or another.  Yes, fear and greed have to do with it.  But it’s not what you might think, as in Wall Street vs. Main Street.  It has become more collective than that.

I remember, on the odd occasion, when a client had real gold bars in their account, often no one knew what to do.  How do we liquidate these?  I don’t know what button to press!  That’s just it.  There is no split-second transaction because people have to physically pick up the gold bricks and deliver them to the buyer.  

How could we forget such a basic concept?  We accept the theoretical values represented to us on an LED screen.  Yet it’s easy to forget what is real.  I benefit from le goûter, if only to stop the busy-ness and pay attention to what I am eating and to nature (these days it’s the snow on our balcony).

Maybe in some way, the simple act of sitting down pour le goûter…might help us remember our humanity.  And generosity.

How does food help keep you in touch with humanity?

Coconut Matcha Tea Financiers

• Preheat your oven to 450°F.

• With a pastry brush, use the 2 tablespoons of melted coconut oil to thoroughly butter the mini muffin tins or financier molds.

• Place the tins/molds on a heavy baking sheet and then put them in the refrigerator.  This makes the cakes easier to unmold.

• In a large bowl, add the hot water to the flax seed meal and whisk for one minute.  Set aside to cool.

• Use a sieve to sift the flour, sugar, Matcha tea, baking powder, baking soda, and guar gum together into a medium bowl.

• Add the pumpkin seed meal and the coconut flakes to the dry mix.

I believe our tendency to gravitate toward certain foods runs through our DNA.  And I’m not saying this only to excuse a multitude of sins. (Too much seitan schnitzel, mashed potatoes and cream-of-mushroom gravy?  Blame it on my German great-grandmother.)  

As a little girl my dad used to make quinoa maybe once or twice a year if a relative happened to bring back a small sack from the Peruvian altiplano.  We’re talking 1980s, pre-Whole Foods, pre-gluten-free movement.  And he definitely couldn’t get it from the local supermarket in Texas.  

The secret is out now about these high-protein, complete essential amino-acid-loaded seeds.  

But back then, quinoa showed up as an occasional odd dinner guest at our table. When cooked, a curled little white thread appeared to become detached from the kernel.  And my 8-year-old vivid imagination would get the best of me.  Was it a tail?  Is this like an Incan caviar?  Did it used to be alive!?  Some days I wouldn’t touch it because I was convinced that they were tiny eggs collected from a pirahna’s  love nest in a remote part of the Amazon.  

Now I know better.  It’s a cute little seed and I often use it in place of rice and as a flour in baking.  And recently, I paired it with butternut squash and a salad as an appetizer using this recipe for a game night I hosted for friends.

Quinoa blended up into a cereal was one of Jac’s first foods.  I rediscovered it after seeing that it was far more nutritious than the rice cereals you find on the shelf at the grocery store.  As a mother, it makes me smile when I can bring my son closer to his ancestry through food.  Food makes a heritage your own.  Tangible and special.

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I hate to admit it, but I used to throw away the greens when cooking with beets because I didn’t know what to do with them.  Little did I know…they are the best part.  The greens contain more iron, potassium, vitamin A and calcium than the roots! 

Now I use them for a simple sauté and drizzle on the olive oil generously.  Make it a main dish by adding a small can of crushed tomatoes and a can of rinsed chickpeas to the sauté.  Eat with brown rice.

The middle of the week is always very busy, but if I can throw a few ingredients together under 10 minutes, it helps me get in some easy nutrition.  Check back every Wednesday week for food that is so simple fun to make.  As the French would say: C’est si simple!

We celebrated Al’s birthday just before the new year.  He begged for carrot cake, so I made these.  

There is something about carrot cake that takes away a lot of the guilt of eating a dessert.  (That is, if you have any guilt in the first place!  I try not to have any…guilt, that is.)  You are eating your vegetables, after all.  These are made with pumpkin seeds and quinoa flour.  I love it when I can eat a cake with protein and iron, too.  

A few minutes after they came out of the oven I couldn’t resist (as usual) and tasted one.  Then I gave a bite to Jac.  A bit later out of the corner of my eye, I saw him moving his hands.  I looked and realized he was signing more!  It was the first time he did this on his own.  It was then that I knew I had to share this recipe with you.

We had these cakes with a red rooibos tea called Rouge Métis Rooibos Fleuri from Mariage Frères, which a good friend had thoughtfully picked up in Paris as a gift for us.  The fragrant flowers (Did I smell roses?) and notes of delicate spices were a beautiful compliment to the nutmeg and ginger in the carrot cakes.  Could I ever get tired of a good cup of hot tea paired with cake?  

Continue for the recipe…

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