Pintesting in the Kitchen - Eggplant Caviar

Making the adjustment to having gestational diabetes isn't easy. Still in the stage where all I knew was that I had to eat and that I had to be even more mindful of what I was putting into my body I really had no choice about trudging forward and trying to make this work.

Today's pintest comes to us via this pin and the information found here - in French.

Ingredients you're going to need:
3-4 small eggplants - I chose to just use 1 large one

 3 tablespoons tahini / tahini / tahina (or sesame paste)

1 clove of garlic
Juice of one lemon
1 dash of olive oil
1 c. in s. of Labane or buttermilk
1/2 c. to c. ground cumin
salt
 
Description 

Preheat oven to 200 °.

Wash and prick the eggplants all over with a fork 

and place them on a baking sheet.  

Bake 20-25 minutes, turning halfway through cooking. By the time my 25 minutes was up, because I used a large eggplant the center wasn't cooked as well as I was going to need. I cut it open, removed a few seeds, and put it back in for another 12 minutes and 30 seconds. 

I was getting nowhere really fast and my headache and hunger was only getting much more intense. I flipped the eggplant over, turned the heat up to 300, and set my timer for 15 minutes and 30 seconds. I removed as many seeds as I could 

and hacked up the insides 

and put it all back into the oven for another 15 minutes.

Let cool, peel by holding the stem and remove the seeds. Keep only the flesh. Yes yes it is a bit tedious but the result is much better without grains!

Then mix together the flesh of the eggplant with garlic, tahini, lemon juice, cumin, Labane (or in my case buttermilk), a drizzle of olive oil and salt.

Stay far, far, far away from this time consuming recipe. Nothing about this was worth it for me.The taste was no good and I just about wish I could get that time back.

Saturday Snack - Corn, Black Bean, and Avocado Salsa

Lunchtime for me and nap time for the little lamb. I needed something quick, nutritious, and delicious.

What you will need:
Corn
Black Beans
Green Pepper
Avocado
Cilantro
Cumin
Coriander
Lime
Salt
Pepper
Olive Oil

It's always best if you can have fresh ingredients but I need to work with what we have. And what we had was canned corn and canned beans.

As usual I didn't do any specific measuring. I just started putting forkfulls of corn and black beans into a bowl until I thought they had a nice mixture.

Then I sprinkled it with a bit of coriander, cumin, and cilantro.

Drizzle a little olive oil and a very healthy squeeze of lime. This really is a dish better with lime than lemon I must say.

 Add as much or little avocado as you like. I used about 1/4 of an avocado. At this point the bowl I was mixing this all in was getting really full.

Now for some green pepper (red pepper would also be great but I didn't have any)

Cut it up into bite sized pieces.

I didn't think this was looking too appetizing in the new bowl. I decided to finish up anyway by adding a bit of salt and pepper.

 If you're still adjusting to a new diet, having your food look appetizing is even more important. I'd rather wash these three bowls then stare forlornly into a bowl of unappetizing looking food. Switching bowls worked.

And the dish was really yummy too! I enjoyed it so much I had seconds but without the avocado because I was feeling stingy before grocery day.

Still good, but better with avocado ;p

Pintresting Results - Home-made Shampoo

The shampoo when left alone, separated. I'm calling this one a fail for now

Pintesting - Coconut Shampoo

After digging through our house for toxic chemicals I found myself without a chemical free, ecologically friendly shampoo.

Today's pin-test comes from the information found here that I obtained via this pin. I recommend you read the entire post before you begin mixing anything.

My biggest dilemma about following through on this pin with the ingredients I had was that Thai Kitchen's canned coconut milk is known to have BPA in the lining of the can.

How much good am I doing myself or the environment by making and using this shampoo? I decided that I would go ahead (this time) and try it out using what felt was a pretty questionable ingredient.

1 can of Thai Kitchen's coconut milk contains 5 serving sizes of 1/3 cup. This recipe calls for 1/4 cups of coconut milk. This all means that 1 can of Thai Kitchen's coconut milk contains 6.5 "servings" available for use in this recipe.

If you are planning to use the entire can the recipe would be:
2 C. Castile soap
11 Tsp. Castile soap
1 Can Coconut milk
3 1/3 C. Vegetable Oil or Olive Oil

I was interested in how I might like this shampoo if I used coconut oil in addition to the coconut milk but I still wanted to try the original. If you, like me, want to split this into two mixtures your recipe would be:
1 C. Castile soap
4 Tbsp. Castile soap
1/2 Can (or 3 1/4 C.) Coconut milk
1 C. Coconut Oil
10 Tbsp. Coconut Oil

You have my husband to thank for all of this math.

What I ended up doing:
1 Can coconut Milk
2 C Olive oil
3 C Castile soap

The result smelled like enough coconut that I didn't feel like I missed out by not using the coconut oil. The mixture was a bit more sloshy than I anticipated, so maybe I should have used that coconut oil anyway?

I finally used the shampoo a few days later. In the shower the shampoo no longer smelled as coconutty as it previously had and smelled much more like olive oil. I worried that the shampoo may have had a tad too much oil but in the end I think it all worked out just fine.

The mix was still a bit watery but nothing problematic and it bubbled up just fine.

Is this one worth a try? It sure is!