Vegan Month of Food 2018 Day 21: Scratch and Dent (Food, Not Me...)

Today our challenge is to make something using a reduced price item, you know... scratch and dent, clearance, whatever.

I'm lucky because sometimes the store where I work will give me things totally free that are barely out of date since they can no longer sell it legally. Before they do the giveaways, they pull close to expiring items and put them on the clearance shelf. This is not just helpful for my kitchen in general, but also makes it a lot easier to experiment with new recipes because you know.... new recipes usually take several tries (or more than several) to get them just right when it comes to baking. I just picked up a bag of reduced price organic rice flour. I also happened to have a bag of sorghum flour in my freezer that they had given me not too long ago. Both of these items would've been staples in my pantry while I had my bakery, but not since the storm. I was so happy with these items, major scores in my life. With them I made brownies. Actually I made them twice today, once in the morning before work with rice, the second, tonight, with sorghum. I thought the first batch was dry and gritty, but they ate them at the cafe anyway with gratitude. I fixed them in my opinion, and the cafe will be getting this little tray too. Need a tiny pick-me-up? Make this, it's not a big recipe. Scroll to the end for the recipe, it's actually not bad at all. The recipe also includes organic flax meal that was given to me for free by a friend who didn't want it (score!) and a dash of that $1 jar of Justin's peanut butter we spoke of yesterday. 

Bad lighting for a bad brownie.
Too dry, you can see the cracks.
Even the peanut butter was too dry (nearing the bottom of jar).

Better lighting for a better brownie!
Far better than first try.
Added a touch of non-GM safflower oil to the peanut butter.
Added some Fleur de sel.
Added some aquafaba to the batter.
Used chocolate soy milk instead of plain (evil genius).

These are good enough for a quick snack if you want a gluten free sweet. I don't recommend these for anything else, maybe it's just me but I've made better brownie recipes before. I like this though because you only need a 6" pan and well if you're sad you won't stuff your face with too much crap (or is that just me?) Here's the recipe with the changes I made for the second version. Use rice flour if that's what you have. Add enough aquafaba to make it smooth, and not overly sticky.

One Bowl Vegan Fudge Brownies (gluten free) - modified from www.thefitcookie.com

1/4 cup oil of choice (I used non-GM organic safflower)

1/4 non-dairy milk of choice (I used chocolate soy)

1 tsp organic vanilla

1/2 cup organic sugar

1/4 cup fine grind organic flax

1/4 cup (heaping) organic cocoa

1/2 cup sorghum flour (or rice)

1/4 tsp salt

1/4 cup organic chocolate chips (I omitted, this is budget week!)

a little bit of your $1 Justin's peanut butter, yum

1 little bit of Fleur de sel for sprinkling, if you want
Aquafaba

Preheat oven to 350 (325 for convection). Prepare 6" round (or square) baking pan by using veg spray and parchment, or however you normally do it. In a large bowl, whisk oil, non-dairy milk, vanilla, sugar and flax seed. Sift and whisk in cocoa and sea salt. Stir in the flour. Add a little aquafaba to smooth the batter, not too much. Add chocolate chips if using. Spread in pan. Add peanut butter and sprinkle w/Fleur de sel. Bake 20 minutes. Cool completely. 

I'm making an educated guess this small pan of brownies cost me no more than $1.75. You cannot even buy a cookie for that rate. Not bad!

xo