Choco-Coconut Cookies

I must be on a roll, or all good things come in threes, as I have another delightful cookie recipe for you to try. They are grain free, refined sugar free and dairy free.  I am not sure but they just might be my favorite ones yet.

I should start at the beginning of this story.

 I love to have friends over, dinner, tea or just a visit.  Some very good friends of ours came for dinner last night.  Everything was perfect, the steaks, a new salad we tried from joy the baker, and herb roasted potatoes.  Our friends brought the desert.  This is usually a trick for me as there are so many things I can't eat and desert just doesn't work unless I make it myself.  Now I must say I didn't say no to these cookies.  The lonely cookies that survived the night did not survive my daughter the next day.  So I just had to make some more tonight.  There are some of you out there needing to make something new as well.  I hope you enjoy them as much as I do.

2 Tbsp melted coconut oil
2Tbsp maple syrup
2 eggs
2Tbsp cocoa
1 cup shredded coconut
1/4 cup sliced almonds
1/4 cup chocolate chips
Pinch of baking soda

Heat oven to 350 degrees.

Mix oil, maple syrup and eggs.  Mix in coconut, cocoa, and baking soda.  Fold in chocolate chips and almonds.  Drop by teaspoon onto parchment lined baking sheet.  Bake for 20 min.  Cool on parchment until cool.  Enjoy. We did.

I would put more photos on but for some reason the blog is conspiring against me and I can't get more photos on for some reason.  Trust me they are good.  I used a fine flake coconut but they are better with a larger flake coconut.

Chocolate love

It might just be love at first taste, maybe even just the thought gives my heart a little flutter. You see I have always loved chocolate.  Like my father before me, though I suspect it is not a mutual adoration. I am still in denial. This is my story and I think I will tell it this way... One bright beautiful afternoon my good friend Charly came over to get a little help with her knitting.  Her very good idea, no wait great idea to bake as well was a welcome addition.  We made Brownie Cookies.  I don't know where she got the recipe from, but I changed a few things for the second batch.  Yes I made two batches in one day.  Here is the second variation as I think we all preferred them, I must admit they were both so good though that I will have to make more very soon.

Brownie Cookies: Grain-free, Sugar-free
4 eggs
1/3 cup unsweetened apple sauce
1/2 cup fat (softened butter, ghee, coconut oil)
1/2 cup honey
1/2 teaspoon real salt
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 tablespoon organic coffee (like, already made to drink. Not coffee grounds.)
4 tablespoons cocoa powder
1/2 cup cacao nibs ( I didn't have any for the second batch and they were good without)
1/2 cup coconut flour
Instructions

Beat the eggs. A LOT. My new trick is using an immersion  blender for this. When you’re baking without baking soda, you want to make sure you fluff up the eggs as much as you can.

Then, use the blender to mix in the applesauce  til it’s smoothly blended with the eggs.
Add in the fat, honey, salt, vanilla, coffee (I learned recently that coffee brings out the flavor of chocolate really nicely, and if you just use a little, it doesn’t taste like coffee), cocoa powder, and cacao nibs. Blend until it’s smooth.

Then, slowly mix in the coconut flour, allowing it to “settle” in the mixture as you go. You may need more or less than 1/2 a cup. But for this recipe, I was aiming for more of a batter-like consistency than a dough-like one, since all my attempts at coconut flour cookies have shown me that they do not rise, spread, or otherwise change shape in the oven hardly at all. I don’t want ball-shaped cookies. I want flatter, cookie-shaped cookies. So I make the “dough” thinner for cookies like this.

Bake at 350 degrees for about 20 minutes. Check the bottoms to see if they’ve turned a little darker in color. Hard to see from the top since everything is brown!

Well here I sit staring at a blank page, or my version of that.  I wonder why on earth I started a blog, what was I thinking?  Where do I want to go with it.  In the past, random gym people encouraged me to write about my clients and life at the gym. It seemed like a breech of their privacy even if I changed their names. I don't know that my daily life is all that exciting.  Not to mention I would rather knit or bake or quilt or read or almost anything than write.  It is a toss up to clean the bathrooms or write on my blog.  You get what I am saying?  Although I see the need to improve myself, or shall we say do something's I might rather not. Hmmm my grandmother is most likely not impressed with my grammar.  You see if I try to self analyze, I have tried to please those around me all my life. I am a pleaser.  Not always a good thing.  I remember a good friend telling me an eon ago that I needed to love myself before anyone else could love me. Wise words, but very hard for me. I was always trying to please too many people.  We can start with my sister.  I have adored her forever.  I remember a time when I would do anything for her.  I am now maybe a little more reasonable. I still love her unreservedly but can now live my own life. You see I went to visit her yesterday and make some wooden blocks with her. It was a very nostalgic moment for me.  I used to go to her place a few times a week when my kids were little, if we lived in the same city.  When she lived in Vancouver we were there so often, if you asked my youngest Simonne where we lived she would say "Bancouber" in her cute little voice.  My she was adorable.  Kind of like the poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow about the little girl with a curl in the middle of her forehead. When she was good, she was very, very good, but when she was bad...  Yup that is Simonne still.  I was really going to tell you all about how I had gone to my sister Cheri's house yesterday and what fun we had. I came home telling Brian I need to go more often, as I feel the need to organize my house better.  I wish I was nearly as neat and organized as Cheri is. Oh my house is clean, but nowhere as nicely put together as my sisters is.  I seem to be going in ten directions at once. I might try to think I have one project on the go at any given time, sadly that is not the truth.

I laugh as I read over what I have written. I must confess I have told myself I can not edit myself to excessively or I would never post anything.

So back to my sister, I love her house, her style, and her blog.  Don't get me wrong I am not jealous at all. I don't want to be her.  I want to be me, you see I have learned to love myself.  I might actually be better at a few things than I thought I was. I love to sew, bake, knitting is a newly reclaimed love. I am actually playing with the thought of learning to spin my own wool.  Ok one day after I organize my house better.  I just have to take time out to play with my adorable grand kids. I can't seem to get enough of them, they are so cute. I just hope that in some way I can make their world a better place.

As I find myself rambling. I feel the need to go knit, as my grain free coconut lemon blueberry biscotti finishes baking.

Fingerless Gloves for Charly

Soooo, I wasn't sure exactly what I wanted to use my blog for, maybe part journal and part helping others with health and nutrition. Well, today I want to share what I am excited about at the moment. I very much tend to do my creating in spurts. I love making things, It satisfies something deep inside me. Today my time was spent making fingerless gloves for a very good friend of mine.  I have been trying out various patterns I have found free online, and put the patterns into my head swirled them around and used the parts I liked best to create my own pattern. I feel like Dumbledore, secretly I wish I was magical.  Here is my newest works of art.

I need to back up a few weeks and mention that my daughter Gabby has been wanting to learn to knit, oh for a few years now.  I did not really take her seriously. Mostly because I didn't remember how to knit. I arranged to have an old family friend teach her. I sat in on the visit/lesson.  Ok I felt like I was all thumbs. As it turns out I knit continental not English style. I have spent the last month refining my knitting skills. I have made various fingerless gloves, scarves and socks. Not all of it has turned out as I envisioned them. Alas that is the story of my life.  I will have to look at all my chicken scratches and figure out how to write the pattern down so that you can understand what I did, but that must wait for another day, as I work early tomorrow and must get some shut eye.

Ok here we go I think I have it figured out or at least the time to figure out how to write the pattern for anyone to understand how I made these.

I used Colinette Cadenza 100% DK Merino wool, my needle size was 4mm and I used dpn's as this is knit in the round. The gauge is 22sts x 28 rows = 4 inches. I used almost one whole skein.

Cast on 36 stitches and then distribute evenly between three dpn's, joining in the round making sure to not twist your stitches.

K2 P2 for two inches.  On next round increase 4 stitches evenly (40) stitches now.  Knit two more rows.

Thumb increase: knit 18 stitches, increase one stitch by knitting in the front and back of next stitch, Knit 2 then knit in the front and back (increase) of next stitch, knit 18 stitches. Knit 3 rows.

Second increase: knit 18 stitches, knit in the front and back of next stitch, knit 4 stitches, knit in the front and back of the next stitch, knit 18 stitches.  Knit 3 rows.

Third increase: knit 18 stitches, knit in the front and back of next stitch, knit 6 stitches, knit in the 
front and back of the next stitch, knit 18 stitches.  Knit 3 rows.

Fourth increase: knit 18 stitches, knit in the front and back of next stitch, knit 8 stitches, knit in the front and back of the next stitch, knit 18 stitches.  Knit 3 rows.

Fifth increase: knit 18 stitches, knit in the front and back of next stitch, knit 10 stitches, knit in the front and back of the next stitch, knit 18 stitches.  Knit 2 rows.  Knit 18 stitches, put the next 14 stitches on a stitch holder, cast on 4 stitches using backward loop cast on and continue knitting to end of round on dpn's.  knit 10 rounds.  Knit 4 rounds in K2P2 then bind off all stitches in pattern. 

Thumb: place the 14 stitches from holder onto two dpn's, with a third dpn pick up 6 stitches across the top of the thumb opening.  Knit one round.  On first dpn k2tog then knit until there are two stitches left on second dpn, ssk (this decreases two stitches on second round of thumb) repeat for the next 2 rounds, you should have 12 stitches left. Evenly distribute those stitches onto your three dpn's. knit one round.  Knit four rounds of k2p2 ribbing and bind off loosely in pattern.

Hi, my name is Shannon, I also go by Shaz.  Once upon a time my best friend also was named Shannon, to avoid confusion our friends and coworkers asked us to go by our nicknames.  While living in Australia with my cousins.  My cousin Cindy started calling me Shaz.  She explained that they would drop the last part of a name and add a Z.  I admit that I thought it pretty cool to have a nickname all my own.

I think I started this blog because I wanted to share my story, or part of it.  I have been helped by reading other blogs in the past and found out there are other people out there that have gone through some of the same digestive or stomach problems that I have experienced.  It is a good way to share recipes and ideas.  I have a few favorite places when I might be looking for a new recipe, or one that has been already adapted to the ingredients that I can eat.

When I was little my father used to sing to us.  He was an amazing vocalist.  One favorite song he sang to me was about a doll having a pain in her sawdust.  My sister reminded me of this and... my blog was named.  I have suffered most of my life with stomach pain.  I didn't always realize it as such.  I was just a picky eater, because food made me feel sick.  I remember eating my mothers famous fried chicken and wanting to die, ok maybe just sink into the couch as I tried to will away the pain.  I hate throwing up, hate it!!  It was just easier to not eat, that way there was no pain.  I still eat things that cause me pain, as I can't pin down exactly what it was that caused the pain.  If I eat the most boring diet then I seem to be fine.  It's not the seasonings that are a problem, so I don't have to eat dull food, its seems to be the variety.  I do really good when I am dieting down for a show, higher protein, lower carb, tons of veggies but no sugar of any type.  I tend to get fairly restricted in variety just being lazy I think.  I know it is not healthy so I try to eat more variety, then the pain starts.  It is rather ironic that I feel best when I eat strict and as soon as I add in anything that I think tastes good (usually a treat) then I start to feel sick again.  Funny how most people think I am lucky that so many things make me feel sick.  That way I stay fairly lean year round. I don't feel so lucky when a simple birthday cake becomes such an event.

I have started eating grain free about 9 months ago, that was great for a space of time, then I just had no energy left and was struggling with fatigue.  I added back oatmeal a couple of times a week.  Funny as when I was a child it was a major battle to get me to eat oatmeal.  I love my oatmeal now, but try to limit it to a few times a week.  That is the only grain that I allow myself, or that my naturopath agrees I can have on a limited basis.

Life is a journey and this is my battle.  It could be worse.  I sometimes wish I could have a temper tantrum, but only if it would actually get me what I wanted, which it wouldn't.  I am trying to work on being positive, my glass is half full, and I can enjoy what I have.  I have an amazing family, four wonderful kids that I love immensely.  I have the most beautiful one year old grandson, who constantly makes me smile, his love is genuine.  He looks in so many ways just like his father did at that same age.  There is another grand-baby on the way, we are so looking forward to seeing her, and I will admit spoiling her as well.  I have two wonderful daughter-in-laws, I love them both.  My sister and brothers are all dear to me, I am constantly thinking of stories from when we were kids and how much fun we had, how we all love each other.  My parents were always the center of our family, my father had a short battle with cancer that took him from us way too young.  I will always feel the gap his passing has left.  He was much beloved by his family.  He was not a jovial man, but his depth of love for us all was endless.  My mother has been a constant friend and cheerleader through the ups and downs of life.  I never wished for anyone different.  All of this is capped off with having an amazing boyfriend Brian, and how he helps me in every way.  Even when I don't want help.  I hope that we can all enjoy our journeys together helping support and encourage others along the way.

How do you do this???

How can writing a simple blog make me feel like a kid in school writing an essay.  Just so you know that was one thing sure to make me want to pull out a book and escape into another world.  I have a few favorite blogs, the authors are witty, smart and funny.  All things that I wish I was.  I understand my strengths and weaknesses.  There are moments in time that I feel I am all of those things, but mostly I feel very mundane.  Writing is not my forte.  Now if you want to talk nutrition, exercises at the gym, or almost anything that is along those lines I can talk forever.  Sadly none of those topics are funny or witty. I am determined to do this, partly because I want to share some of my experiences with you out there, partly to help others that might be going through experiences similar to mine.

I am excited and a little nervous about this new thing called a blog.  I read my sisters blog and love hearing what she has to say (I also admit to getting excited whenever she mentions me)  I hope to be able to share a little bit of my life with any who might want to read.  I have been a personal trainer for years, 5 officially, a few more than that unofficially.  I love the gym, used to call myself a gym rat.  I have moved on from that, and can now love being at home with my family, cooking, knitting in front of the fire and spending time with Brian and our two new puppies.