Recipes in Translation

On this rainy October day, gentle readers, I remain in bed even though it is well into the early afternoon hours. I decided to bring you a recipe that has a dual purpose. Though this recipe is a demonstration of the gastronomic translation that occurs in my kitchen, it is also meant to transport the reader to a Sunday morning that involves a kitchen flooded with sunlight and the scent of warm, baked goods.

Long before gluten-free products became fashionable and everyone was drinking soy, almond or rice milk, the family doctor diagnosed me as being allergic to a list of things longer than there is blog space. A proper allergic sort of person that no amount of Lactaid or whatnot would fix. In time, I grew out of most of the allergies save for the allergies to wheat and its closest family members, as well as most forms of dairy that come from a cow - the biggest offenders being milk and cheese.

My mother, being an enterprising lady, used the rice-based Tamil and Malaysian fusion cuisine to compensate for this as I grew up. She also experimented with corn and rice flour to bake delightful cookies for me. Aside from the disgusting childhood engagement I was compelled to have with powdered soy milk that left me completely unable to drink soy milk straight, this left me with a key philosophy. The world is a wide place with many culinary traditions that provide countless alternatives. One should not despair on account of allergies.

I have found that friends and acquaintances who were diagnosed with allergies much later in life are often frustrated by what seems to be the loss of options and the limitations of substitutions that are often quite expensive. I suspect they feel cheated. While I still hold to the notion that seeking gastronomic alternatives is often the better choice, coming up with substitutions isn't such a bad thing either. Here's a recipe I adapted from Martha Rose Shulman. We ate these warm from the oven, slathered in peach marmalade made during the last days of summer.

Quinoa Walnut Muffins

Grind your own quinoa flour in a spice mill, or in my favourite, the stone mortar. I used red quinoa for these moist, not too sweet muffins.

1/2 cup ground flaxseed meal
1/2 cup rice flour
1/2 cup quinoa flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 large or extra large eggs
1/4 cup maple syrup or agave nectar
3/4 cup Balkan style yoghurt (Works so well! Or use 3/4 cup soy milk.You won't taste soy milk in this.)
1/4 cup canola oil
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 cup cooked quinoa
1/2 cup chopped walnuts

1. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees with a rack in the middle. Plop cupcake papers into 12 muffin cups. Otherwise, grease the tin. Mix together flours, baking powder, baking soda and salt.

2. In a medium bowl, beat together the eggs, maple syrup or agave nectar, yoghurt/soy milk, canola oil and vanilla. Quickly whisk in the flour mixture, then fold in the cooked quinoa and walnuts. Combine well.

3. Spoon into muffin cups, filling each two-thirds full. Bake 20 to 25 minutes until lightly browned. Cool in the tins for 10 minutes, then remove from the mold and cool on a rack.

Yield: Twelve muffins. They keep well for two days. If you want to keep them longer, pop them in the fridge or freeze them. If you end up cooking too much quinoa, don't fret because it freezes really well. I like to freeze it in one cup measurements.

Special credit to my sister, Amanda, for bequeathing her unopened packet of ground flaxseed meal to me when she moved several time zones away.