Culinary Adventures with Camilla

Ingredients For the Cheese 1 C raw cashews, soaked overnight and drained juice of 1 lemon, approximately 1/3 C 1/3 C water 1 T organic coconut oil 1 t raw apple cider vinegar dash of salt For the Pesto 1  C fresh basil leaves, torn 2 garlic cloves 1/3 C raw pistachio nuts olive oil, as needed 1 t salt To assemble 1 to 2 T sliced tomatoes confit or sun-dried tomatoes To serve 1 T chopped hazelnuts vegan crackers Procedure In a blender, or food processor, blend all of the pesto ingredient together until you have a thick paste. Line a ramekin with plastic wrap. In a blender, or food processor, blend all of the cheese ingredients together until smooth. Spoon part of the mixture into the prepared ramekin. Spoon in a layer of pesto. Lay sliced tomatoes on top of the pesto. Top with remaining cheese. Refrigerate, or freeze, until set. Mine took several hours. To serve, invert the cheese onto a serving platter. T...

It's time for Group B's August 2015  Secret Recipe Club   reveal. This month I was assigned to  Oh! You Cook!   which is written by Dena. I love her description of herself: "Librarian by day, blogger by night, and author of The Everything Kosher Slowcooker Cookbook." And, though I am not kosher, I really love her tag line: "Proving 'kosher' and 'delicious' are not mutually exclusive." I don't have a slow cooker or I would have picked up a copy immediately. In case you want a copy, I'm including an affiliate link at the bottom of this post. I considered making her Israeli Beet Dip because I've been on the hunt to make a garbanzo bean-free hummus kinda dip. My little one is allergic to garbanzo beans and loves hummus. I thought about her Lion's Head Meatballs because that is a family favorite. Here's my Enthusiastic Kitchen Elf's version: Lion's Head Soup . I always chuckle at his caveat whenever we...

For my October-November  Cook the Books  project, I cooked up some Vegetarian Baked Beans . And while I liked them, my 11-year-old declared, "These are not at good as Nonna's." Okay, challenge accepted. I called my mom to ask for her recipe; she started to laugh. The next time I picked up the boys from her house, she showed me a can. Nice, Mom. I had gotten some dried, organic Blue Coco beans from  Coke Farms ,  in San Juan Bautista. And with the sun-dried tomato ketchup I received from Traina Foods * , I decided to develop a pork and beans recipe to beat the socks off of Bush's! The verdict, from said pork and beans snob: "These don't taste like Nonna's, still. But they are really, really tasty." I'll take that. A few notes about the ketchup... I am not a big ketchup fan. We rarely buy it. We make homemade ketchup , and even then, it lasts us a long, long time. But when Traina sent me two bottles of their ketchup to taste, test, a...

Antipasto means 'before the meal.' Inspired by Matt Armendariz's On a Stick!  antipasti skewers - and encouraged by my boys' hungry protests, "We're hungry!" and "When's dinner going to be ready?" - I whipped these up before I started on dinner. Usually antipasti are comprised of cured meats, olives, pickles, and more. I had some marinated artichokes, sun-dried tomato-stuffed olives, and cubes of day-old ciabatta bread. I threaded them onto cocktail sticks. Delicious!