Betty emailed to ask if I had some suggestions for using up excess almond meal. I love almonds, and anything made from almonds, and use them in a lot of my recipes.
I'm not sure why Betty has excess almond meal, perhaps she's making her own almond milk and can't throw out the meal that is left. I would struggle with throwing it out too.
My first thought was to use it in cakes and muffins. Betty's probably already doing that, but you can easily substitute up to half the flour in your regular recipes with almond meal. The more almond meal you use the denser and more moist the cake or muffin will be so keep that in mind - it doesn't go so well in a sponge, but in a chocolate cake or even a banana or carrot cake it is divine.
Add it to bread.
Add it to muesli for extra flavour, crunch and nutrition.
Sprinkle it over layers of filo pastry to make a delicious strudel.
Mix it into cream cheese with some finely chopped herbs, roll into balls and then into more almond meal for an appetizer.
Almond meal is also delicious in crumbles, sweet or savoury. I add it to my regular crumble recipe with the dry ingredients. It gives the crumble a delicious nutty flavour and a little delightfully unexpected crunch. Try it next time you make a fruit crumble.
Use it instead of breadcrumbs on au gratin dishes. Almond meals goes very well with cauliflower and broccoli. Use it to replace crumbs on top of casseroles and mornays.
It makes a nice change to breadcrumbs for chicken schnitzels and fish. Just dip the chicken or fish in some plain flour, then an egg wash, then the almond meal. Let the crumbed meat chill for half an hour before cooking - this gives the crumbs time to set and stops them falling off during the browning.
Process it until it becomes almond butter, then slather it on pancakes, scones or muffins and drizzle with a little honey - a truly delicious morning tea. Almond meal is just processed almonds, almond butter is almonds processed beyond the meal stage to the "butter" stage.
It also makes super delicious banana pancakes :)
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