Awesome Autumn Desserts From Our Past - non-dairy, non-egg, low fat recipes - Recipe

Cool autumn days often send me retreating to the kitchen to recreate comfort desserts from the past. Memories of my grandmother's kitchen linger in my mind, and I can almost taste her sweet-tart apple pie. A frugal cook, she used sweetened, seasonal, or dried fruits and often combined them with what was on hand--leftover rice, bread, or cookies. She grew up on a Kansas farm with a tradition of farm cooking--using simple ingredients to create delicious comfort foods.

These days I'm challenged to recreate the same flavors without dairy or eggs and with a much lower fat content. This usually means being more creative in the kitchen. When trying to alter a traditional recipe, I make small changes at first. Replacing the cow's milk is as easy as substituting plain or vanilla soy or rice milk. To get a buttermilk flavor, add 1/2 to 1 Tablespoon lemon juice or rice vinegar to your soy or rice milk and let the mixture sit five minutes before using. Eggs are next in line to be replaced. An excellent egg-replacer for cakes, quick breads, and biscuits is a flaxseed egg-replacer. Like eggs, this mixture gives a bit of a lift as well as a binding quality. (You can buy flax seeds at any natural foods store. Keep them in the refrigerator or freezer until you are ready to use them to preserve their natural oils.) For every egg to replace, measure 1 Tablespoon flax seeds. Grind them in a spice mill (or use a clean coffee grinder) until they resemble a coarse meal. Then, using a hand blender or standing blender, whip them with three Tablespoons water until the mixture is thick and foamy. (A hand blender works best, as it can easily blend small quantities.) Add this mixture when the recipe directs you to add eggs. I have successfully replaced up to three eggs in baked goods.

Along with eggs, fat is sometimes a tricky ingredient to tinker with. Fat contributes flavor as well as texture in your desserts. Hard fats like butter and shortening make a pie crust flaky and give a fine, smooth crumb to biscuits and cookies. If a recipe calls for butter, I first try halving the amount called for and substituting soy margarine. If the first revision works well, the second time around I may try canola oil or half oil and half margarine. If you take all the fat out at once you may end up with a dry cake or rock-hard biscotti. However, if you prefer to cut all the fat out, try one of the commercial fat replacers on the market such as Wonderslim, which is made from pureed prunes. You can find Wonderslim in the baking section of natural foods stores. Another consideration when reducing the fat is making sure to enhance the flavor of your dessert with sweet spices such as cinnamon, nutmeg, or cardamom, or adding a bit more vanilla or maple syrup.

Ideas for the recipes below came from various regional church recipe publications (available at yard or tag sales), Wagon Wheel Kitchens: Food on the Oregon Trail by Jacqueline Williams, and, of course, my grandmother's kitchen. So, what are you waiting for? Start cooking, and while you're at it, bring a bit of nostalgia into your kitchen.

SOUR CHERRY AND APPLESAUCE BROWN BETTY

(Serves 8)

There are numerous versions of Apple Brown Betty, each having a slightly different character, depending on additions, alterations, and regional inflections. Crumbs used are often bread crumbs combined with butter, but sometimes crushed cookies or graham cracker crumbs are used. In this recipe, I've found that graham cracker crumbs are a nice complement to the sour cherries. If you can't find dried sour cherries, use dried cranberries or dried sweet cherries.

One 24-ounce jar unsweetened applesauce
1/2 cup dried sour cherries
1/2 cup sugar (vegan granulated sweetener(*))
1 teaspoon cardamom (or use 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon and 1/2 teaspoon
  nutmeg)
2 medium-sized apples or pears, peeled, cored, and finely chopped
1 Tablespoon lemon juice
12 medium graham cracker squares,
  crushed into fairly uniform crumbs (about
  1 1/4 cups)
1 Tablespoon soy margarine, melted
  (optional)

(*) Note: Some cane sugar is processed through bone char filters.
See <www.vrg.org/journal/vj97mar/973sugar.htm> for further
information, or send a SASE and a request for a copy of this article
to VRG, PO Box 1463, Baltimore, MD 21203.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Blend the applesauce, dried cherries, sweetener, and cardamom. Set aside. In another bowl combine the apples or pears and lemon juice.

In a 2-quart casserole, spread 1/3 of the graham cracker crumbs, 1/2 of the applesauce mixture, and 1/2 of the apples or pears and lemon juice blend. Repeat layers. You will have 1/3 of the graham crackers left. Combine this with 1 Tablespoon melted soy margarine for a browned and crispier topping, if desired. Sprinkle the last of the graham cracker crumbs over the top and press down lightly. Bake at 350 degrees for 35 minutes.

Total calories per serving: 193   Fat: 3 grams
Carbohydrates: 43 grams           Protein: 1 gram
Sodium: 107 milligrams            Fiber: 2 grams