Pumpkin French Toast and Skinnygirl Sangria - Brunch Day Ozzified

Made an Ozzified and simplified version of Carla Hall’s Pumpkin French Toast with the Apple Cider Syrup and washed it down with an Ozzified version of Daphne’s cocktail for brunch on Sunday.  Both were great hits and far less calories than the ones shown on The Chew last Friday.

If it seems odd that I was able to Ozzify something Daphne Oz made, it isn’t. I made only a couple of tweaks but saved a huge amount of calories. Organic blueberries, organic peach chunks, organic strawberries, organic grapes, and melon chunks (they’re peeled so organic is unnecessary, IMHO) were frozen in some fruit juice for half of the guests & the rest were frozen in Crystal Light for the people who were calorie counting. Daphne had used peach puree with sugar – my fruit cubes had no added sugar and maintained their inulin-rich fiber because they weren’t pureed.

I used sparkling mineral water because it has extra calcium – a bonus we learned on today’s The Chew because calcium when consumed with inulin is great for your bones. I also used Bethenny Frankel’s SkinnyGirl White Sangria for the alcohol – it only has 26.4 calories per ounce which is lower than most other sangrias. Some drank it with the sparking water and some drank it with only the sangria.

It came as no surprise that Carla’s Pumpkin French Toast and Apple Cider Syrup was in need of a major Ozzification to be served in my home.  

I simplified & Ozzified making the syrup by 

• reducing organic apple cider with blue agave nectar and a little cornstarch
• Using Omega 3 buttery spread instead of butter 

Spicing pecans looked like too much bother, so all I did was throw in some rough chopped walnuts (I didn’t have any pecans) into the syrup just before it was finished reducing. Not only was it easier, but it saved a lot of calories as well.

I made the pumpkin mixture the night before and soaked the bread in it overnight as Carla suggested, but I used 

• vanilla coconut milk instead of milk
• vanilla soy creamer instead of cream
• whole grain bread instead of challah
• nonstick spray instead of butter for the griddle 
• omitted the sugar and vanilla because there was already sugar and vanilla in the coconut milk and soy creamer. 

Even with all these Ozzifications, the bread souffled into a light and delicious treat tasting just like Carla said it would - like a pumpkin doughnut. 

Pomegranate Sunset Recipe Re-Do from Oct. 13th's The Chew

Clinton Kelly made drinks inspired by all of his co-hosts except Carla – what gives??? I’d have made a lemonade drink with a good bourbon from Carla’s home state of Tennessee. Oh well.

Daphne’s drink was a Pomegranate Sunset. I Ozzified it by making a syrup using agave nectar in place of the white sugar – 1 part agave to 2 parts pomegranate juice.

As usual, I made a few changes:

• I didn’t have any regular vodka, but had some vanilla vodka in the freezer, so I used that instead. 
• I used sparkling mineral water in place of seltzer water because that is what I had on hand, 
• Since I still had nearly a full jug of organic apple cider left from last week’s Apple Pie Yogurt dessert, I used it in place of the orange juice.
• I used a cinnamon stick and a quick grind of nutmeg as garnish rather than go buy mint which probably wouldn’t have gone very well with apple cider anyway.

The final product was tasty enough, but had way more calories and sugar than my usual cocktails. I’d rather have a mojito or a Skinny Girl margarita, especially since it’s still in the 90s here in Arizona.

Drunken Purple Cow, a Recipe Redo from The Chew, October 10, 2011

The redo today is not much of an Ozzification since grape juice also has resveratrol, but using the leftover syrup I Ozzified from Mario Batali’s September 29^th’s segment (Peaches in Primativo) is easier than reducing grapes and soooo much more fun! 

The syrup was Ozzified by using agave syrup in place of the sugar. It also was made using a more easily found red wine (Malbec) & since both the online recipe & Mario’s demonstration omitted the clove, the leftover syrup doesn’t have it either. While the clove would’ve enhanced the syrup on the peaches had the recipe appeared then as it does now on the website, it would’ve made for a nasty Purple Cow.  Happy accident for me - I was able to use the syrup in a totally different way today to make a grown-up Purple Cow.

Of course, I went a couple of steps further and Ozzified the remaining ingredients from Clinton Kelly’s Purple Cow as well.  I used sherbet instead of ice cream & ice-cold, sparkling Pellegrino instead of seltzer water. Sherbet has less fat and calories than ice cream and Pellegrino is rich with minerals like calcium not found in seltzer water.

The steps are the same as they were on today’s The Chew:

• Put a generous amount of the leftover Red Wine syrup at the bottom of a tall glass – about one ounce.
• Put in a scoop of sherbet.  If you decide to use sherbet instead of ice cream, be sure it is sherbet & not sorbet. Sorbet doesn’t have milk and will not foam up the way ice cream and sherbet will.
• Pour in the sparkling mineral water. To mix it all together without it effervescing all over the place, take an iced tea or other long handled spoon & rapidly move it up and down while pouring in the water, much the way Clinton did on his segment.

The result is a very foamy, very sweet, bubbly mauve drink. Drink immediately or the whole thing collapses when the foam deflates. The Purple Cow grows up - Salud!

Daphne Oz's Apple Pie Yogurt Sundae & other desserts from Oct. 7, 2011's The Chew

 Daphne does Dessert – healthy, easy, what is there to tweak??? Not much, except the recipes Daphne Oz told us were on the website weren’t all there.  The herbed air-popped popcorn one was there, but it said to use “3 oz popcorn kernels, approxately  12 cups”. 

What 3 oz looks like in a 1/2 cup measure

Original Recipe from Website

The spelling of approximately wasn’t the only glaring error – 3 oz of popcorn kernels is just shy of one half cup. I am assuming the techie in charge of the website meant to type “3 oz popcorn kernels, approximately ½ cup”

Daphne had two more desserts, a Banana Bon Bon that was pretty straightforward – sliced bananas drizzled with 75% cacao dark chocolate melted in the microwave until glossy. Leaving it’s recipe off the website isn’t going to keep anyone from making it, but her third yummy treat, her “Apple Pie Yogurt” needs a bit more of a road map.

Since I was finally able to find organic apple cider made from USA apples, I made it for dessert tonight. It took some trial and error as the amounts given on air were hit or miss. 

Here’s my best attempt:

"Apple Pie" Sauce:

• 1 apple, peeled, cored and chopped into big chunks 
• 1 cup organic apple cider from US apples
• ¼ tsp Cinnamon
• Fresh-grated nutmeg – about ½ of the nut
• ¼ tsp fresh grated ginger

Yogurt:

• 1 6 oz carton of lowfat yogurt – I used Tillamook Vanilla Bean because it is absolutely yummy & is from cows never fed artificial hormones like rBST.

Simmer the sauce ingredients together until the apples break down and the cider is mostly absorbed, about 20 minutes on medium heat. Essentially, I made my grandmother’s unsweetened chunky applesauce, which means in a pinch I can buy chunky applesauce, spice it up & use it instead as the “apple pie” part of this sundae. (If you want your sauce to be more like syrup & less like applesauce, add a couple of teaspoons of cornstarch to the cider – it will have that clear, syrupy consistency, the apples will remain intact for the most part, & it’ll take a lot less time).

Let cool a bit, then alternately layer with a low-fat yogurt, then top with some fresh, rough-chopped walnuts.

This dessert was beyond SCRUMPTIOUS!!!! It barely fit into an IKEA beer glass so it was substantial – so substantial that I could only eat half. The rest is in the fridge - & I’m hoping it’s as good cold tomorrow as it was tonight while it was warm. Hey Mario, I might even add psyllium husks for extra crunch.

If you’re anything like me, I have to know the nutritional info for the entire recipe in case the little devil on my shoulder convinces me to eat the whole thing. Happily, the whole recipe comes in @ 416 – which while over ¼ of my daily allotment of 1600 calories, is also a lot less than if I’d eaten what it tastes like - a huge slice of sour cream apple pie – and it’s a drop in the bucket when it comes to comparing fat content - a whopping 23 fewer grams! Since I only ate 1/3, my total calorie count was under 140 for a dessert that felt and tasted truly decadent.

Calorie breakdown by ingredient:

• Apple (27 grams or 4.5 oz of peeled chunks): 60
• Apple Cider – 1 cup Zeigler’s: 120
• Yogurt, 6 oz Tillamook Lowfat Vanilla Bean: 210
• Walnuts: 2 halves, chopped: 26

Total fat: 2 grams from yogurt, 2.6 from walnuts

*switching to a non-fat plain yogurt will drop the calories significantly – though I think I’m gonna stick with it the way I made it, tasting out of control!

Ozzifying Mario Batali’s Peaches in Primitivo Syrup - A Recipe Re-do from The Chew, September 29, 2011

This recipe was pretty simple, requiring only four ingredients, well @ first anyway. You can see Mario Batali's original, pre-Ozzified recipe here:

At first glance, there wasn't much to modify in this recipe. Peaches and red wine are both already very healthful ingredients. I did end up changing everything, however.

Modified:

• Red Wine - Mario used Primitivo, an Italian wine not easily found out here in the hinterland, so I used an inexpensive Malbec in it's place
• Peaches – Not really a change on my part - the recipe said to peel them, but the picture showed the peels on. I followed the recipe & peeled them, though it would’ve been fine to use them unpeeled since the peaches I had on hand were organic. 

Swapped:

• 86ed the white sugar & used agave syrup instead. I was able to use less of it since it was already reduced.
• Didn’t use a clove because neither Mario’s on-air segment nor the recipe when it first was posted on The Chew website made any mention of it. Now all of a sudden it mentions you might want one – I concur. The syrup’s flavor profile would’ve been enhanced had a clove been simmered in the reduction.

Kept:

Fresh ground black pepper

This was already a delicious and healthier alternative to a processed, high fat, high fructose dessert. Ozzifying it by substituting agave sweetener for white sugar makes it even better.