Renate's "Better than Tuna"

I've been looking forward to making Renate's "Better than Tuna" recipe at home!

Recipe given as follows:

Renate's "Better Than Tuna"

3 cups hulled sunflower seeds (soaked 4 to 8 hours, rinsed)
1/2 cup water
1/4 cup lemon juice
3 squirts of Braggs Amino Acid or kelp to taste

1. Process in food processor until thick and creamy.
2. Put pate into large bowl.

Add:
1 cup diced celery
1/2 cup diced white onions

This is trial #1....
I found organic raw hulled sunflower seeds at Earth Origins.  Whole Foods was all out!
I soaked them all night...  again a long night as it was only second night sleeping in my own bed.  I'm still getting caught up on sleep from the 3 weeks of less than ideal sleep at HHI...
So, by the time I slept for 10ish hours, made wheatgrass juice, made green juices, and finally got around to making lunch... the sunflower seeds probably soaked for a good 15 hours...  Not sure whether or not that's a problem...  went for it anyways!


Better Than Tuna ingredients

The 3 cups of sunflower seeds I had put into distilled water to soak were now at a volume of 4+ cups.

I'm still a little confused by the recipe...  I'm not sure if the 3 cups of hulled sunflower seeds (soaked 4 to 8 hours, rinsed) means 3 cups prior to soaking or 3 cups after soaking... 
I suppose I should have assumed the later but, I didn't want to waste all the seeds I had soaked.
So, I made the recipe assuming 3 cups prior to soaking...
For the water, I used distilled water.
For the lemon juice, I squeezed 1.5 lemons to get 1/4 cup lemon juice.


sunflower pate in bowl with celery and onion

For spices... I find it a little sketchy the first time around when a recipe says, "to taste."  Usually I like some kind of starting point and then I can go from there...  So, since my blood pressure is still an issue and I'm trying to be no to low salt, what I decided to do was cut back on the Braggs to 1/2 teaspoon.  In 1/2 teaspoon of Braggs there are 160 milligrams of sodium.  And I used 1 teaspoon of kelp powder.  I ordered the kelp powder from Maine Coast Sea Vegetables.
I put all these ingredients into my brand new food processor and blended until thick and somewhat creamy...  At this point I was really thinking that the 3 cups of sunflower seeds should be the measurement after soaking...
But, it looked okay.  I then put the blend into a big bowl, added the diced celery and sweet onions (rather than white), and mixed with my hands.
Served on a lettuce leaf with a salad topped with a tablespoon of hemp oil.
I admit, this isn't quite the HHI meal, since there are no sprouts...  I'm working on it...
Definitely also need to work on the flavoring since this batch was a bit bland.
Notes to self for next trial of this recipe are as follows:
3 cups sunflower seeds means 3 cups sunflower seeds AFTER soaking.  So, I'm only going to soak maybe 2 cups of sunflower seeds to get closer to the 3 cups after soaking.  I'll also try to soak for shorter period of time.
I may just start with these changes to the sunflower seeds and see how the flavors are when mixed with 3 cups soaked sunflower seeds rather than mixed with 3 cups pre-soaked (4+ cups after soaking) sunflower seeds.
If that doesn't make sense and you have a question, feel free to ask a question in the comments to this blog post.