Gothic Granola

"Muffin courier."  That's what I want my next job to be.  The muffins will be so deliciously valuable that I'll have to handcuff my Harry Potter lunchbox to my wrist.  As far as I know, this “breakfast dessert” does not kick back. 

Dear ones, I'm taking a Sabbath, as in *the* Sabbath, according to these principles at Sabbath Manifesto.org .  The only thing I'm not getting behind on this list is the "drink wine" part, and the bread I might eat will of course be vegan and gluten-free.  Longer postage will resume next week. Q P.S. Sabbath puts me in the mood for challah .

As Julia Cameron wrote in The Artist’s Way, paraphrasing another artist, when you’re out of the studio for three days, by that third day, you’ll do anything to get back to your art and nobody better stand in your way. I came home from my first week of work on Friday (a yearlong fellowship) and made muffinz. Zucchini muffins.

Zucchini…and tahini.  Oh yesh.  Last year I made a zucchini-tahini cornbread for breakfast.  I mentioned making tahinopita before, and it was a quickbread version .  This is my yeasted tahinopita variation.

For lack of a better term, I’m calling this next dish a seed butter.  Since I used mammoth zucchini and summer squash for the cake and pie, I scraped out the seeds because they would have added too much volume.  The internets didn’t have much in the way of a recipe for roasted  summer  squash seeds.  I sautéed the innards of a giant squash and a giant zucchini in the same pan as I used to saute the zukes for the Z-pie.  Then I Vitamixed them (“to Vitamix” has become a verb in my world, much like “to Google” something is a verb).

Since I made my cake and rushed to my cousin’s graduation party, I left it in the pan and frosted it at her house.  It received good reviews from high school seniors!

What do you do with a big zucchini What do you do with a big zucchini What do you do with a big zucchini Fresh from grandma’s garden? Bake it in a pie until it’s tender Bake it in a cake for sweet-tooth splendor Whirl it into mush in a high-speed blender Holy cats, I’m starving! Plentiful, prodigious zucchini, meet pie, cake, and pasta sauce or soup base. Zucchini Pie Modified from my grandmother’s recipe Makes one 9-inch pie Note: Crust and filling can both be assembled separately the night before baking. Crust: 1 1/2 cup walnuts 1/4 cup brown rice flour or sticky rice flour 1/2 cup cornmeal 2 tablespoons coconut oil, solid Filling: 1 teaspoon olive oil 1 large onion 1 medium zucchini 1 medium summer squash 12.3 ounces silken tofu (firm) 1 small clove garlic 7 leaves fresh basil (or 2 tablespoons of vegan pesto) 1 ½ teaspoons dry or wet mustard 1 ½ teaspoons apple cider or white wine vinegar Preheat oven to 375 degre...

On Tuesday, one of my bestest buds from high school invited me to a Fourth of July party in D.C. and she requested that I bring “some food or drink to placate the gods of freedom and democracy.”  However, I couldn’t use the stove since the gas burners have electric starters.  As with  this episode last year , I took the Metro to my brother’s apartment in order to sleep and make cereal bars.

When I arrived in Alexandria on Monday to cat-sit for my aunt and uncle, I arrived to a hot house and freaked-out cats: no power since Friday’s storms. The apple crisp recipe below is modified from Jon and Robin Robertson’s Vegan Unplugged: A Pantry Cuisine Cookbook and Survival Guide. I purchased the book in March and was saving it to read for a special occasion. Well, cat-sitting without power was special enough! On Tuesday, one of my bestest buds from high school invited me to a Fourth of July party in D.C. and she requested that I bring “some food or drink to placate the gods of freedom and democracy.”  However, I couldn’t use the stove since the gas burners have electric starters.  As with this episode last year , I took the Metro to my brother’s apartment in order to sleep and make cereal bars. Brown Rice Peanut Butter Cereal Bars Modified from Alicia Silverstone, “Crispy Brown Rice Squares,” in The Kind Diet: A Simple Guide to Feeling Great, Losing Weight,...