Okay, I am on an almond flour kick. And with that- I have a confession. I am not a fan of sliced almonds. I don’t know why. I like whole almonds but I will pass on sliced almonds. So, you can imagine my surprise (and delight) to find that I like ground up almonds! I have found thus far that almond encrusted chicken is delicious as are almond-encrusted paneed pork chops. I went ahead and completed the circle- I did some veggies.
I have to let y’all in on a quirk of mine. I have anxiety about cooking any other meat besides red meat. In my mind, I am okay eating red meat that is not 100% fully cooked. However, I am not okay eating chicken or pork that is not 100% cooked so therefore, I will cook the ever living hell out chicken or pork. (Yes, I know that in these modern times pork need only be cooked ‘medium’ or more. You can eat your meat however you want- I want my chicken and pork fully cooked.)
Anyway, because I tend to cook meats to that leathery- shoe sole- car tire state, Bub cooks most of our meats. I usually do all the prep work but, Bub does the cooking. It was Bub who paneed the almond encrusted pork chops. One pork chop made it through a flip without loosing its crust, one did not. It was when the crust fell off one of the pork chops that Bub asked me if I had used an egg wash to get the almond flour to stick… uh, no I had not. But, it was at that moment a light bulb popped over my head.
And when my friend Alece Pugh from The Motivated Mama was explaining to me how to make homemade almond flour- she had my full attention when she described chicken nuggets made with almond flour but she sealed the deal with veggies. So, the other day I decided to bake some almond flour encrusted veggies but, I decided to use an almond milk/egg wash to help the almond flour stick to the veggies.
So, I chopped up a squash, some mushrooms and some broccoli equaling about 3 cups total and placed them in a Tupperware container. Next, I mixed one egg and 1/2 cup of almond milk together and poured it over the chopped veggies, put the lid on the Tupperware and shook it. I took the top back off the Tupperware and added about 1/2 cup of almond flour, replaced the lid and shook it again.
I spread the veggies on a greased and tin foil lined cookie sheet and baked them on 350 for 20 minutes. I took them out of the oven, stirred them around and cooked them for 10 minutes more.
The Result: something truly fantastic! Because of the wash, the almond flour stuck beautifully. And because of the almond flour the roasted veggies have this added nutty flavor that is really tasty! I had trouble stopping eating this stuff- it was so good and so much better for me than fried veggies. I am looking forward to using this same technique with other vegetables. (Cauliflower, you are in my sights!)
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