Month: April 2017

Carrot Cake Snowballs

Viviana's Kitchen

Like just about all of my great recipes, I found this one on Foodgawker and it looked so delicious and so easy, I said LET’S DO IT!

I’m not a huge fan of carrot cake – but to be honest, I’m not a huge fan of the vast majority of American desserts. I find that most of them taste like sugar on steroids rather than actual flavor. However, this one has that middle eastern twist and I can deal with that.

They involve pitted dates, but given that I live within 5 minutes of a middle eastern grocery store, I have something better – DATE PASTE. No need to get your blender sticky with dates.

This recipe also contains cashews – my new favorite nut, by the way. I only had salted cashews, so I rinsed them before I pulverized them in my Ninja blender. I also gave the oats a spin in there. If you’re using a package of date paste, I suggest doubling up on the other ingredients.

My altered recipe is below:

Ingredients

  • 4 carrots, grated
  • 13 oz date paste (1 package)
  • 1 1/2 cups unsalted cashews
  • 1 1/2 cups rolled oats
  • 1 tsp cardamom
  • 1 tbsp cinnamon
  • pinch of salt
  • zest from 1/2 orange and freshly squeeze juice from said orange
  • desiccated coconut for rolling

Directions

  1. Peel and wash your carrots. Grate your carrots.
  2. Rinse your cashews if they’re salted. Pop them in a blender 1/4 cup at a time and burst blend them until they’re between coarse and fine.
  3. Blend your oatmeal as well. You don’t want a fine powder, but you do want everything to be about the same size.
  4. In a large bowl, combine carrots, date paste, oats, spices, salt, zest of an orange, and the juice if your orange together. You can of course opt to do this in a blender, but why clean more than you need to? Use your hands to mix together well.
  5. In a separate bowl, add coconut. Form your snowballs into balls and roll around in coconut.
  6. Pop the fridge for at least 1 hour before serving, to firm up.

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Vegetarian Fettucine Alfredo

Viviana's Kitchen

It’s still Lent season, but this was not a Lent-friendly dish. However, it was a dish I made twice and one that had absolutely no leftovers, twice.

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Who knew fettucine alfredo was so easy to make? I mostly followed a video from Tasty on 4 ways to make fettucine and went with the second version in. But of course, I altered it.

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Here’s my version, a Vegetarian Fettucine Alfredo

Ingredients

  • 1 package fettucine pasta
  • 2 packages of baby bella mushrooms; or 1 pack of 4 portobellos, sliced
  • 2 medium onions, chopped
  • garlic cloves, minced (no number because I like a lot but some ppl only like a little)
  • half a bunch of spinach
  • 1 cup grape tomatoes
  • 1/4 cup chopped parsley
  • 2 cups heavy whipping cream
  • freshly grated parmesan cheese to taste
  • salt and pepper to taste
  • Olive or grapeseed oil

Directions

  1. Fill a large pot about 3/4 of the way up, add about 1 tbsp salt and bring to a boil. Add pasta and cook until you’re satisfied with how cooked it is. A lot of people like their pasta “al dente” aka firm to the bite. I don’t because I think that’s stupid and undercooked, so I like mine to cook a little longer but not so long that it starts disintegrating.
  2. Drain your pasta and set aside.
  3. With medium-high heat on, in the pot you used to boil your pasta, add about 2-3 tbsp of oil, chopped onions and garlic. Cook until they JUST start to get translucent, then add your tomatoes and sliced mushrooms. Add salt and pepper.
  4. Once the mushrooms start to shrink, about 3-4 minutes, add in your spinach. After your spinach is no longer crisp, add in your heavy whipping cream, simmer for about 2-3 minutes then add in parsley and stir.
  5. Turn off the heat and add in your pasta, mix together well. Season with salt and pepper as needed. Serve!

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Tasty video for those who like cooking visuals like me: