Natale Ghent

Yes, dear readers, I am alive. I know many of you have been wondering. But I assure you, I still breathe. Barely. It’s just…I’ve been insanely busy. No, no, not busy…I’ve been asked to participate in a test-flight to Mars…yes, that’s it… Okay, I have no excuse. My real problem is that my blog spot will no longer let me post photos with my blogs. Something to do with a glitch in the system. How can I be expected to get excited about a blog when there are no accompanying visuals? I just can’t. *sniff* Pity me!! Thank you. Okay, so…we just returned from the cabin. I brought my laptop because I was all gung-ho, convinced I could actually get some work done on our weekend away. Who was I kidding? No one. Not even myself. When we arrived at the cabin, I quickly realized I’d left my pen-drive on my desk. Hurray! I mean…Arrggh! Well, there was nothing to be done for it but read all weekend by the fire. I had no choice. I know most of you are fed up with the snow and ice and bitter cold. How could you not be? But believe me when I tell you that a warm cabin, some cognac and a good book can change the way you feel about winter – almost immediately. I felt benevolent as the flakes whirled outside my window. Back in the city. Where am I supposed to park my car?? And the house feels cold compared to the cabin. Find that hard to believe? Do the math: wood is free; gas is not. I have no problem throwing another log on the fire. It’s painless. But don’t let me catch you at the thermostat! You get the picture. So here I sit, blogging at 2 a.m.in my cold-ish office, no fire to lull me to sleep. I guess I have no choice but to post this and crawl off to bed… G’night. Don’t let the bedbugs bite and all that. I promise to be more prolific with the blogs in the future…yeah…

Shhhhh….don’t tell anyone…butternut squash makes amazing pie – as good, if not better, than pumpkin. That’s right. That squash kicking around in your kitchen has primo pie potential.

How did I come up with the idea to make pie out of squash? Well, my husband loves pie more than any other kind of dessert. He wanted pumpkin, but all I had was butternut squash. Not to be defeated, I baked the squash and went ahead as though baking a pumpkin pie. To my astonishment, the squash pie was phenomenal. Never satisfied with first attempts, I tweaked and adjusted the ingredients to create the best possible recipe. I’m not too shy to say that this recipe is great. In fact, this pie may very well be the best thing you’ve ever tasted – gluten-free or otherwise. Bold statement, I know. But don’t take my word for it. Bake one for yourself. And be sure to share with friends. Now, roll up your sleeves and repurpose that squash!

Superior Squash Pie with short crust (gluten-free)

One medium-sized butternut squash
1 cup of brown sugar
1 package of softened cream cheese
5-6 tsp pumpkin pie spice
1 tbl arrowroot flour
1/4 tsp salt

*fresh grated nutmeg (to be grated on top of the pie just before baking

Remove the stem of the squash and cut in half, cleaning the seeds from the center with a spoon. Place face down on a parchment-lined sheet and bake at 400 degrees until soft. It’s okay and even desirable if you forget about the squash and it gets a little blackened around the edges – this adds to the flavour! Remove from the oven when done and let cool to the touch then remove the skin.

Place the prepared squash in a food processor and process until smooth. Add the cream cheese and process again until creamy and smooth. Add sugar, pumpkin pie spice, salt and arrowroot flour and process on slow until blended, then medium-high until uniform. Set aside.

Short Crust

1 cup rice flour
1/2 cup sorghum flour
1/4 cup coconut flour
1/4 cup ground almond flour
1/8 cup sugar
1 tsp salt
1 cup of room temperature butter

Preheat oven to 325 degrees.

Place the dry ingredients in a deep bowl and blend together with a fork. Add the softened butter and cut in with a pastry cutter until the mix is course but uniform. Form into a ball and place on two floured sheets of wax paper overlapped in the middle to create one bigger sheet. Sprinkle some flour over the pastry and roll into an even sheet about 1/4 inch thick. Place pie plate at the edge of the wax paper and carefully lift the pastry with the wax paper and flip it into the pie plate. Remove the wax paper and flute the edge of the crust.

Add filling and smooth it into the crust. Finely grate some fresh nutmeg evenly over the top of the filling. Bake at 325 for 45 min – 1 hour. Pie is done when cracks appear in the filling. Cool on a wire rack, preferably overnight, covering the pie with a clean cotton tea towel. Enjoy plain or with a dollop of whipped cream.

Christie and Ashley, aka, The Book Junkies, recently reviewed Gravity. They gave it 5 out of 5. Thanks Christie! Here’s her review:

A couple of weeks ago I attended to Word on the Street Festival in Toronto. At this event I stopped by the Remarkable Reads Tent for the Youth Hour and I am so glad I did because it was there that I discovered Natale Ghent. The reading that Natale did was from Gravity Brings Me Down which is a self proclaimed story about self-discovery. The excerpt that she read was funny and grabbed your attention. It seemed like a good read so I picked up a copy there and then. Little did I know that I was about to get sucked into Sioux Smith’s world and that I would not want to leave.

Gravity Brings Me Down opens on an intense note with the main character, Sioux Smith, standing at the edge of a dam with questions about suicide running through her mind. Suddenly the police arrive willing her to step back from the edge and half the town of Sunnyview is watching. It is here that a confused elderly woman, who Sioux names Miss Marple, gives Sioux an out when she mistakes her for someone named Marie.
Miss Marple, a.k.a. Mabel gives Sioux an out, but instead of fading into the shadows the elderly woman comes front and center the same time Sioux is in this rut. Sioux is plagued by thoughts about the significance of life and about the nature of death.

When you look at Sioux’s life though, you really have to wonder how someone in her situation could become so engulfed in thoughts of death. Her family is a little out of the ordinary, but nothing too wild. Her parents are loving people, and her sister Peggy is okay minus some of her annoying mainstream qualities. What I came to realize though is that our lives often look different from the outside and that sometimes when we are in them we find it difficult to comprehend what is happening. That and, once you get a taste of Sioux’s high school life it is pretty obvious why she contemplates about the endless abyss.

Sioux’s high school is like the breeding ground for insanity. There are the usual cliques that we all know and hate, but they are even better – especially the jocks. Bif for example is this beefy athlete with some unidentified complex. The only character in the book that even remotely compares to the creature that is Bif would be Chocko. As a philosophy teacher Chocko is a pretty cool guy, but his extra-curricular activities make him creepy and psychotic. Then there are Tod and Steve who have an interest in Sioux. Tod is what authorities would call “a stalker” since he follows Sioux all over town on his moped. Steve on the other hand is a bonafide stud. He is also an athlete with a brain which like Sioux says is kind of a “turn on”. With all this insanity you might ask: “How does Sioux get through the school days?” Her best friend Sharon and the black sludge coffee from the Tip.

Despite the number of relationships that are written about in the book, it is the one between Sioux and Mabel that carries the most weight and the one that impacted me the most. These two characters are in two very different points in their lives and yet they manage to form this incredible friendship. Ghent’s description of Mabel’s apartment, and of her life, will break your heart. It will gnaw at that little place inside you that worries about dying alone. While Sioux and Mabel are at opposite ends of the spectrum, there is no denying that they need each other. Sometimes the only thing that they have is each other. For Sioux their relationship is about learning and for Mabel it’s about living, but even then they never take more from the other person than they need. I belive wholeheartedly that it is this relationship between Sioux and Mabel that sets Ghent’s book apart from other stories of self-discovery and puts her into a league of her own.

Gravity Brings Me Down never takes itself too seriously and it is Ghent’s writing style that allows for this. The humour that touches almost every page in the book balances the weight of the heavy issues that are tackled. This book is about many things: life, self-disocovery, and about finding friendship in the most unlikely of places. It is raw, honest, and beautifully written. I highly recommend this book, especially to anyone who has ever lost their way. It will put your life into perspective and will make you smile, even through your tears.

Christie

Holidays in our family require extreme creativity in the kitchen to accommodate all our food issues. I made two pumpkin pies to meet our needs, one with dairy, one without, both gluten free. I learned afterward that my nephew is now allergic to soy. I’ll have to be even more creative next year!

Dairy-free, gluten-free pumpkin pie:

Crust:

1 cup sorghum flour
1/2 cup rice flour
1/4 tsp salt
1/8 cup ground almond flour
3 tbl granulated sugar
1/8 cup coconut flour
1/2 tsp xanthan gum
1/4 cup vegetable shortening
ice water

Mix dry ingredients. Cut in shortening until the pastry resembles coarse meal. Add about 6 tbs ice water and mix with fork until the pastry holds together. Roll pastry on a couple sheets of overlapped wax paper until desired thickness. Place pie plate next to the sheet and carefully lift the rolled pastry on the wax paper and place it over the pie plate so that the pastry drapes evenly over the plate. Carefully remove the wax paper and fit the pastry into the plate. Flute the edges.

Filling:

2 cups cooked pureed pumpkin
1/2 cup firm smooth tofu or silken tofu
4 tbs arrowroot flour
1 cup dark brown sugar
pinch of salt
1 tsp xanthan gum
5 tsp pumpkin pie spice or more to taste

Place pumpkin and tofu in a food processor and process until smooth. Add remaining ingredients until smooth. Pour into prepared crust and smooth the top with a spatula. Bake at 325 degrees until done (approximately and hour). Cool on baking rack.

Gluten-free cream cheese pumpkin pie:

Crust:

1 cup sorghum flour
1/2 cup rice flour
1/4 tsp salt
1/8 cup ground almond flour
3 tbl granulated sugar
1/8 cup coconut flour
1/2 tsp xanthan gum
1/4 cup butter
ice water

See directions for pie crust above.

Filling:

2 cups cooked pumpkin
1/2 pound cream cheese softened
2 tbs arrowroot flour
1 cup dark brown sugar
pinch of salt
1 tsp xanthan gum
5 tsp pumpkin pie spice or more to taste

Place pumpkin and cream cheese in food processor and process until smooth. Add remaining ingredients and process until well blended. Pour into prepared pie plate, smoothing the top. Bake at 325 until done (about 35-40 minutes). Cool on baking rack.

This cute review of The Odds Get Even was posted in Off The Shelf, the Book Shelf’s monthly book and movie review. Thanks Jadyn!

The Odds Get Even
by Natale Ghent

This book was very entertaining and a book that you can’t put down. The book is about three kids, Boney, Itchy, and Squeak. They’re very odd. They have their own little treehouse and unfortunately, their own bullies, Larry Harry and the gang. They have an invention convention every year at school but Larry Harry and the gang always win, but not this time, they have the haunted mill on their side. They make an invention that picks up rays of ghosts, but will it really work?

How they get revenge on Larry Harry is that the ghost shows up when Larry least expects it…

I think it’s a fun interesting book and I think it’s nice to show a group of good friends, even though they’re odd. This book is for kids who enjoy event-after-event-after event kind of books and an ending that really make you think “wow, that was cool how they ended it.”

If you’re thinking I don’t really like books that jump right into event after event after event, don’t worry, there’s a lot of very suspenseful parts. Some of my favourite parts in this book are how the boys try to get back at Larry Harry by wearing one of their fathers’ Elvis costumes and making ghost sounds when they jump out of a tree and try to scare him, and how they have little telletubby communicators so they can talk to themselves when they’re up in their rooms. Have fun reading!

Jadyn, grade six, Sir Isaac Brock School

My mum grew up in Motherwell, Scotland. So we grew up watching On The Buses, Benny Hill and The Two Ronnies, and eating things that most other Canadian kids didn’t: like real English toffee (the kind with the little silver hammer), Scottish soda bread, Digestive cookies (with butter), powdery fruit candies, licorice All Sorts, and oatcakes.

While I loved most everything Mum brought home, oatcakes were not my favourite. They weren’t like oatmeal cookies; they were more like oat crackers, which hold very little appeal for kids.

After reading that oatmeal is good for people with blood sugar concerns and carbohydrate-reduced diets, I decided to revisit the oatcake and create something toothsome, gluten free and super tasty.

These oatcakes have big appeal and can actually help balance your blood sugar when made with agave or maple syrup. With a low GI (glycemic index) and low GL (glycemic load), and a nice percentage of protein, they’re excellent for all and sundry. And did I mention how yum they are?

Sweet Oatcakes:

Ingredients:

1/4 cup of agave or maple syrup OR 1/2 cup brown sugar if sugar isn’t a dietary concern

1 cup butter

2 1/2 cups organic rolled oats

1 tsp salt

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/4 cup coconut flour

1/4 cup almond flour

1/4 cup of rice flour

1/4 cup sorghum flour

1 tsp xanthan gum

1 tsp vanilla extract

1/2 cup of water

*optional* 1 scoop of protein powder. I use berry-flavoured Harmonized vegan protein powder – it makes the cakes taste like Pop Tarts!

Directions:

Heat oven to 350 degrees.

In a large bowl, mix together dry ingredients. Cut in the butter with a pastry cutter until the mixture resembles coarse meal. With a fork, stir in the vanilla extract and enough water so that the dough clings together enough to be worked. Divide into three portions. Roll out the dough 1/4 inch thick on a lightly floured surface and cut into rounds. Bake 1/2 an inch apart on parchment-lined baking sheets for 10 minutes or until lightly golden on the bottom. Cool.

*Note: If you live in an area of high humidity, store the cooled cakes in a tin with a couple tablespoons of baking soda on the bottom and a piece of paper towel over the soda to absorb moisture.

*For Savoury Cakes, use 2 tablespoons agave in place of the sugar, omit the vanilla extract and use 1/2 cup sorghum flour and 1/2 cup rice flour in place of the Sweet Oatcake flour mix. You can also add 1/4 – 1/2 cup flax seeds to the mix. Prepare and bake as directed.

We arrived at the cabin with couch in tow at midnight, Friday night. Having the use of a truck to carry said couch was an incredible luxury. We can thank our neighbour for his kindness and generosity on that one. The use of his truck for babysitting his cat. Sweet.

We’ve been talking about a couch for the cabin for over four years and finally made it a reality. How would we get it there? We were so excited about it that we just had to unwrap it and set it up right away, despite the time. After moving it here and there as we decided on the perfect spot, it was about 1:00 a.m. I was exhausted and had to climb into bed.

I was happily nestling in when Brian exclaimed, “You have to come and see this! There’s a huge moth on the backdoor window.”

I opened one eye and looked at him with suspicion, then thew the covers to one side. “This had better be worth it.”

Now, that was the tiredness speaking because I’m the first one to jump at the chance to see just about anything in nature. Brian assured me it would be worth my while.

And it was.

There, staring back at us, was the biggest, most beautiful luna moth. It was huge – easily the size of my hand – its lime-green wings and white body glowing ethereally in the light from Brian’s headlamp. I couldn’t believe my eyes.

The moth fluttered from the glass, making several furtive attempts to become one with the light, its wings tapping erratically against the window before it disappeared into the darkness and was gone.

Brian and I stood there awestruck, convinced we had been contacted by some mythical creature, determined to impart some message of great significance. And it did.

It told us that seeing a luna moth is a blessed thing and showed us how fragile and essential nature is, how delicately balanced the world must be to give birth to a creature so ephemeral, it only assumes its adult form for seven short days on this earth.

We felt like we’d witnessed a miracle in this nocturnal visitor, and truly we had. It reminded us that our efforts to live as respectfully and mindfully as possible on this magnificent planet are so important. That, more than anything, was the biggest gift of all.