celery | Earthgiven Kitchen

Hi all, happy August long weekend!

First, my thanks for stopping by. I just hit 3,000 views which is no big deal for pro bloggers but I’ve been casually blogging for less than three months so seeing this number is pretty exciting for me. I’ve recently started a facebook page, so you can “like” me to see my posts in your newsfeed. New likes make my day; thanks for following me!

Second, one of my favourite salad recipes. This is one of the recipes that has been in my repertoire the longest, well over ten years. It’s easy to make, scrumptious year round and everyone seems to loves it. It’s one of my favourite dishes to share at potlucks. I enjoyed this salad earlier this summer when I could use fresh spinach and basil from my garden.

Spinach, Rice and Cashew Salad
3 cups cooked brown rice
4 stalks celery, chopped
1/2 red pepper, chopped
2 cups bean sprouts, cut in half
1 cup (packed) baby spinach, torn
1/2 cup sunflower seeds
10 pieces fresh basil, torn
1 cup raw cashew pieces

Dressing:
1/2 cup canola or other light oil
1/2 cup Bragg’s/soy sauce/nama shoyu
1/2 tsp garlic powder
1/2 tsp agave (optional)
1/2 tsp dried basil

Combine the dressing ingredients together. Add the rest of the ingredients in a large bowl, pour the dressing in and stir gently until well combined. Refrigerate for at least an hour before serving. This nutritious salad can double as an entrée.

As this dish is free of wheat, gluten (choose GF soy sauce or Bragg’s), sugar, dairy, eggs, fish and peanuts, I have submitted it for Gluten Free Fridays, Cybele Pascal’s Allergy Friendly Friday and Diet, Dessert and Dogs’ Wellness Weekend. Substitute more sunflower seeds for the cashews to enjoy the dish nut-free.

As this is one of my favourite dishes ever, it is also my submission for Healthy Vegan Fridays, week 3, The Way’s virtual Vegetarian Potluck and Meatless Mondays. Check out the link below to learn more about the weekly blog parties and find inspiration for healthy recipes!

Hi, friends! I’ve been post-less for a week, having been on holidays, soaking up some sun and family time at a cottage in Muskoka. It was a wonderful time. We brought our own food with us, but there wasn’t room to bring my favourite food equipment like juicer, food processor and dehydrator, so I made as much food as I could ahead of time, like raw granola, and packed it with us.

I’ve only had my dehydrator for a few months so I’m still amazed at the variety of healthy food I can easily make with it and the taste quality. I’m enjoying making raw crackers in my dehydrator lately. Here’s my favourite so far: nacho crackers!

The idea came from my nacho kale chips recipe, which I selected as my entry for the first Healthy Vegan Fridays blog party this week. Every week there will be a new list of delicious recipes featuring whole ingredients to peruse, so now I know where to head the next I’m looking for inspiration. Check it out!

I also loved these crackers enough to send them to my vegan food swap partner Gabby @ The Veggie Nook this month. Hope she likes them as much as I do! I used to love store-bought crackers, now I can’t believe I ate all that sodium, sugar and preservatives, thinking they were a “healthy” snack. These nacho crackers are about as healthy as you can get, plus they are raw, sugar-free and gluten-free.

Raw Nacho Crackers
2/3 cup raw nuts (I used a mix of Brazil nuts and almonds)
1/3 cup raw sunflower seeds
1 cup ground flax
1 cup chopped celery
1 cup chopped red pepper
1/3 cup sun-dried tomatoes
1/2 cup nutritional yeast
1 tsp Spicy Herbamare seasoning
1 tsp agave syrup
1/2 tsp cayenne pepper
1/2 tsp cumin
1/2 tsp garlic powder
1/4 tsp black pepper

Soak the nuts and seeds in 2 cups of filtered water for at least an hour and preferably several hours. Empty the nuts and seeds including the soaking water into a food processor and combine. Add the celery, red pepper and sun-dried tomatoes and combine again. Mix the nutritional yeast, Herbamare and spices together in a separate bowl, then add the spice mixture and combine again until uniformly mixed. Note: to be truly raw, you will want to choose sun or dehydrator-dried tomatoes and raw spices where possible.

Pour onto Paraflexx sheets and smooth out with a spatula so they are uniformly thin, like giant crepes. Dehydrate at 105 degrees for several hours, until crispy. After about five hours, when they are starting to firm up, flip them by placing another Paraflexx sheet and tray on top of the crackers, flipping upside down, peeling off the top sheet and returning them to the dehydrator on the new tray. You can either pull the crackers out when they are nearly done but not crisp and slice them into rectangles with a knife and return to the dehydrator to finish crisping up, or wait until they are as firm and dry as you like and break them into small pieces, like the ones shown in my photos.

They were great on their own and awesome topped with Tofutti cream cheese and cucumber and olive slices and a dash of black pepper! A perfect summer appetizer.