More Gluten-Free Chinese Food

I'm still getting recipes from the folks who attended this year's Celiac Support Group pot luck dinner. I realize I just did a big thing on Chinese foods, but someone submitted this recipe for GF sweet and sour chicken, so I thought I'd add it to the posts:

Sweet & Sour Chicken:

2-20 oz cans pineapple tidbits, drained (reserve juice)

1 1/2 cups brown sugar

1 cup apple cider vinegar

1/4 cup Tamari sauce

1/2 cup cornstarch

1 cup chopped green pepper

1/2 cup chopped maraschino cherries

Bring pineapple juice to a boil.  Add brown sugar, vinegar and soy sauce. Mix cornstarch with cold water, add to pot, stirring until thick. Add cooked, chopped chicken pieces (pork or beef can be used as substitutes). Add pineapple tidbits. When boiling, turn heat down to low. Add peppers and cherries just before serving; they bleach out fast.

If you don't have enough liquid, add some pineapple juice or orange juice.  Serve over Rice.

The sauce makes 1/2 gallon. This is a great recipe to use with meatballs as well.

There was also a fabulous spicy Thai noodle dish at our potluck. Here’s the link to the website they used for that recipe. However, the chef substituted regular noodles for GF noodles and soy sauce for Tamari sauce. 

Finally, I've been faithfully posting recipes and GF food tips for about a year now, but it looks like my book will soon be published. I need to focus on its promotion for a while. Since this site gets very few visitors, I'm putting it on the back burner, so to speak. However, I do use this site as a sort of recipe storage zone for myself. So I may check in periodically.

But don't be surprised if my posts become less frequent for a while.

Meanwhile, remember to visit my educational blog, English Emporium for details about my book's publication. Thanks!

Gluten-Free Chicken Lasagna You'll Never Forget

Our local celiac support group has an annual potluck every summer. We just had ours last week, and this chicken lasagna dish was, by far, my favorite casserole there.

A lady named Kirsten brought this dish. She's one of the best chefs this side of the Pecos. Her family runs a GF store in Boise, and this is a link to their web page.

Anyway, here's the GF chicken lasagna you'll never forget:

Chicken Lasagna Recipe

1 cooked, boned chicken, diced

1 (8oz.) pkg. cream cheese

2 cans or 3 cups gf cream of condensed chicken soup

2/3 cup milk

1 pt. sour cream

1 tsp. salt

1 tsp. poultry seasoning

1 (10 oz.) pkg. gf lasagna noodles cooked al dente

1/2 lb. shredded Mozzarella

bread crumbs (ample)- or chex cereal blended finely

 

Combine chicken, cream cheese, cream of chicken soup, milk, sour cream, salt, and poultry seasoning in a saucepan and stir over low-medium heat until well blended and cream cheese is melted. Pour a small amount of this sauce in the bottom of a 9x13 pan. Layer with noodles, sauce, and cheese- repeat until all noodles, sauce, and cheese are gone. Hopefully cheese is your last layer- sprinkle with the bread crumbs and bake @350 30-45 minutes.

Growing Your Own Bean Sprouts for GF Chinese Food Recipes

Since my GF menu website is all about recipes kids can eat, I think it might be fun for a summer project, to show kids how to grow their own bean sprouts.

As I said in an earlier posting, I was taking a nutrition course at my local junior college, and this is one of the things they taught us: how to grow your own sprouts.

For this project, I'm using Great Northern Beans (see the picture), but it's possible to grow your own bean sprouts using lentils, kidney beans, black beans, or whatever kind of legumes you prefer. They do have slightly different flavors, but all bean sprouts are fantastically nutritious! And for our celiac kids, that's exactly what we need, right?

So here's how you start your bean sprouts:

1. Pour 1/4 cup of beans into the bottom of a mason jar. Cover these with water--maybe 1/2 cup of water or so. Let them sit in a window (in sunlight) for about 6 hours. 
2. Drain the water. They should be slightly damp, but they should no longer be submerged in water.
3. For the next few days, at the same time every day, rinse the beans with water and drain. It's not necessary to keep them in a window anymore.
4. When the sprouts reach a fair length, you can eat them--bean and all--and bean sprouts are especially good in Chinese stir fries, egg foo young, and sweet and sour dishes. (See my earlier postings for those gluten-free Chinese food recipes.) Sprouts are also great in salads.

If you'd like to see a video of how to grow your own sprouts, here's one that's fun and easy to follow.

Gluten-Free Egg Foo Young Gravy Recipe

Last week I posted my egg foo young recipe; this week I'm posting the gravy recipe. It's thinner than most gravies like you might use on mashed potatoes, but you can thicken it up with more corn starch. I don't like it with too much corn starch, though, as extra corn starch can give it a starchy flavor. So here's what I recommend:

This little bit of gravy is enough for two patties.

Ingredients for Egg Foo Young Gravy:

Ingredients for sauce:

1/4 tsp. Tamari sauce

1 ½ Tbsp. corn starch

a little less than ¼ cup cold water

1/3 cup beef or chicken broth (read labels)

dash of garlic

Directions for Egg Foo Young Gravy:

1. Heat up your broth in the microwave for 30 seconds (this step reduces the cook time on the stove).
2. Add Tamari sauce and dash of garlic to the broth, to taste. You want to make sure it is salty, but not icky-too-salty.
3. Pour broth mixture into a fry pan. Let it come to a boil while you do the next step.
4. Add corn starch to water. (The water should be cold.) Stir these together until the corn starch stops clumping. 
5. Once the broth is boiling, stir in the corn starch with a wire whisk. Stir continuously until it thickens. 
6. When the gravy is thick, pour it over your egg patty (see last week's recipe).

Serves 2 (Because you have to make the patties individually, but the gravy can be made for both patties, if you're cooking for two.)

See how it's thinner than a gravy you might serve w/ potatoes?

As I said last week, I'm preparing to grow bean sprouts. My next posting will let you know the steps in growing your own, home-grown bean sprouts for Chinese food dishes.

Gluten-Free Egg Foo Young Recipe

I love egg foo young, but anytime I've tried to buy it in a Chinese food restaurant, it's got gluten in it. So here's my recipe for egg foo young, minus the gluten...

Ingredients for egg patty:
1 mushroom, chopped up into little pieces
1/4 celery stalk, chopped into little pieces
2 Tbsp. bean sprouts or cabbage
2 eggs
1 strip of bacon, sliced into tiny pieces (optional, if you want to go vegetarian, though it's not vegan)
1/4 tsp. minced ginger (dried is okay, but fresh is better)
1/2 tsp. Tamari sauce (GF soy sauce)
1 Tbsp. olive oil

Directions:
1. Mix all ingredients in a 2 cup mixing bowl. It's going to look like a lot of veggies and not very much egg, but that's okay. Set this mixture aside.
2. Heat the oil in a non-stick fry pan, on medium heat. Important: don't get the burner too hot, as that will scorch one side of your egg patty.
3. Once warm, add egg mixture and cook with a lid over it until solid on the bottom.
4. Use a flat spatula to flip the egg mixture and cook it on the other side until light brown.

Serves 1

Next week I'll post the directions for the sauce that tastes so yummy on top!

The week after that, I'm planning to show you how to make your own bean sprouts. I just recently learned this in a nutrition class I took at our local junior college. It's quite easy (or so they tell me). So watch for that post.

Gluten-Free Sweet and Sour Sauce (GF)

I've been looking for a decent GF sweet and sour sauce recipe for a while, when I ran across this one through a fellow teacher. (Thank you Mrs. Howard!)

Ingredients:
1/2 cup sugar
2 Tbsp. corn starch
4 Tbsp. apple cider vinegar
1/4 cup ketchup
2 tsp. soy sauce (we use Tamari sauce--other brands are not GF)
20 oz. can pineapple

Directions:
Drain syrup off of a 20 oz. can of chunk pineapple. Add water to syrup to make 1 cup liquid. add all other ingredients. Cook on medium-low heat until mixture thickens. Stir constantly to avoid sticking.

This can be used over barbecued chicken as a baster. You can drizzle it over friend meats and veggies to make a rice topper. Whatever you prefer.

Gluten-Free Chinese Food Recipes

Kids love to go out for Chinese food, but for gluten-free kids, this is always a challenge. Our nearest PF Chang's Restaurant is 100+ miles away from where we live. So I've had to learn how to cook Chinese food from scratch for my family. During the next month or so, I plan to share my recipes. Some are quite easy to make; others are a little harder.

I'm also going to show you how to grow your own bean sprouts, at the end of this month. Growing your own sprouts can be done indoors any time of the year, but right now, if your kids are home from school for the summer months, this little indoor gardening project will give them something to keep them occupied. Watch for that post at the end of July.

What makes Chinese food especially fun, though? It's those wonderful cardboard boxes. Here's a pattern for a Chinese food box, and I'm going to show step-by-step instructions, so your kids can make their own Chinese food boxes to put their Chinese food into:

1. Trace this pattern or print it onto card stock paper. (Incidentally, that pattern comes from this website, called Stay Beautiful. They show a more crafty use for the box pattern (less food-related).
2. Use a pair of scissors or craft knife to cut out the pattern and score along all of the dark lines.
3. Bend the side flaps outward, as you see in this image:

4. Staple side flaps to one another, like you see in this image:

5. Once all side flaps are stapled, it will probably be quite small, as you can see in this image, but it might hold a child-sized helping of Chinese food:

6. You can have your kids decorate their Chinese food boxes with Chinese lettering or put their names on their boxes, or color them with crayons. The whole business just makes eating Chinese food that much more fun!

And how cool would this be in someone's lunchbox? I'm always looking for fun ways to spice up my daughter's school lunches. This project is ideal!

GF and Dairy-Free Hawaiian Smores

Sorry it took so long to get this one posted. My intentions were good, but I've been busy. Anyway, the pictures are of the Hawaiian s'mores my family made while camping. And hey, I'm posting this just in time for fourth of July grilling...

Ingredients:
4 bananas
1 bag of carob chips (or chocolate chips, if your family has no problem with milk)
1 bag of mini marshmallows
aluminum foil

The instructions are at the bottom of the page, because I couldn't figure out how to make the images set evenly with the instructions. Sorry!

Instructions:
1. Do not peel the banana. Leave it inside the peel for the most part, peeling back only a small section of the banana peel (see first picture).
2. Where the banana's insides are exposed (where you've lifted back one slice of banana peel), cut the banana right down the middle.
3. Stuff the banana with a carob chip at the tip, followed by a marshmallow, then another carob chip, then another marshmallow, and so on, until the banana is stuffed with chips and marshmallows. (See the second picture.) If you're using chocolate chips, just substitute the carob chips in this step for chocolate chips.
4. Replace the strip of banana peel that you peeled back, so that the banana looks sort of chubby but back to its old self.
5. Wrap the banana in aluminum foil.
6. Set the banana in hot coals, like in a fireplace or campfire (see third picture). I suppose you could cook it on the barbecue or in an oven.
7. Check the banana after a few minutes to see if the carob chips and marshmallows have melted. If not, put it back in the hot coals. If so, take it out! It's ready to eat! Carob chips take longer to melt than chocolate chips, I've noticed, so cook times vary according to ingredients and the heat from the fire.

Serves 4

Classic S'Mores Gluten-free Recipe

Everybody knows S'mores are the ticket to campfire fun. With the camping season upon us, I thought I'd let you know what my family does for S'mores.

The trick is to find a good substitute for traditional graham crackers. We use S'moreables from Kinnikinnick. Here's the recipe, for those of you who don't know how to make S'mores.

Ingredients:

1. marshmallows (we use Kraft, but other brands are GF too, just check labels)
2. S'moreables graham style crackers
3. Hershey's milk chocolate

Directions:

1. Break a S'moreable graham cracker in half at the "seam."
2. Break a Hershey bar into its rectangular pieces, also where you'll find a seam. Set two pieces of Hershey's milk chocolate candy bar on one piece of S'moreable graham cracker.
3. Toast one marshmallow on the end of a stick, by setting it near (but not too close to) the coals of a dwindling campfire. Children should be supervised for this, of course.
4. When the marshmallow is golden brown and chewy inside, set it between two even halves of a S'moreable graham style cracker. 
5. Wait until the Hershey's chocolate melts before eating.

Remember to put your campfires out! Smokey the Bear will appreciate it.

Next week I'll post a recipe for GF Hawaiian S'mores.

Gluten-Free and Dairy-Free "Jamba Juice" or Fruit Smoothie Recipe Kids Will Love

Image: iClipart

Yesterday I wanted to take my kids to Jamba Juice, and you'll never guess what they said. "No thanks. We like your smoothies better." Can you believe that? Crazy, huh?

So here's what I put in my fruit smoothies:

INGREDIENTS:
1 cup fruit juice
3/4 cup frozen fruit of your choice
3/4 cup gluten-free, dairy-free yogurt
1 tbsp. granola

DIRECTIONS:
1. Put the fruit juice in the bottom of your blender. It's important to put this in first, as it helps crush the fruit if you go with juice at the bottom.
2. Plop the frozen fruit in next. If you're adding a banana, this is the time to include it.
3. Mix the juice and fruit together on medium-to-high speed in a blender, until they're no longer lumpy. If you need to add more juice, do so. You want it to be about the consistency of creamy potato soup or thin gravy before adding the yogurt.
4. Stop the blender to check for lumps. You can check for lumps by dipping a long spoon into the blender. If you find lumps, put the lid back on your blender and mix some more. I usually mix for about 50-60 seconds, but some blenders take longer, some take less time.
5. Once you've got a creamy mixture of juice and fruit, add the yogurt, put the lid back on it, and mix again. As before, if it's too thick, add a little more juice. You don't want your blender to short out because it's trying to mix something that's just too thick. But the final product needs to be about as thick as a milkshake (maybe not quite that thick).
6. Garnish with the granola on top.

RECOMMENDATIONS:

Fruit Juices

• Lemonade is my favorite fruit juice to use in smoothies, because it adds a tangy flavor.
• My kids love strawberry-guava juice in their smoothies, because it's sweet.
• My husband prefers apple juice in his smoothie, because it is sort of neutral and allows you to absorb the flavor of the fruit.

Frozen Fruits

• Strawberries taste good in smoothies, but they don't crush easily.
• It's easy to find a "smoothie blend" of frozen fruits, which usually includes mango and pineapple.
• Mango by itself is one of my favorite smoothie flavors, because it crushes easily and tastes delicious in a smoothie.
• Add banana to any flavor of smoothie. It thickens the fluid, though, so reduce the other solid ingredients by a little bit, if you're planning to add banana.
• Too many blackberries in a smoothie can make it have a gritty, seedy texture. So it's best to mix blackberries with other kinds of berries, like blueberries and strawberries.

Gluten-free, Dairy-free Yogurts

• My favorite gluten-free, dairy-free yogurt is Whole Soy & Company plain. I don't use the unsweetened, because my kids don't like it as much; but if I were making smoothies for myself, I'd go with the unsweetened because it's healthier. And really, there's plenty of sugar in the fruit.
• If you can't have soy, there are other brands of dairy-free yogurts made from coconut or almond.
• It's also possible to use flavored yogurts, not just plain yogurt. Strawberry yogurt goes great in both a strawberry smoothie and many other flavors of smoothie. For a tangy smoothie, use lemon or lime-flavored yogurts.

Granola

• EnjoyLife is my new favorite brand of granola. Their strawberry mix goes great on top of smoothies! YUM!
• Other celiacs have told me they don't trust Quaker's granola or oats. It's got cross-contamination issues at the factory.
• It's possible to make your own granola, or just top your smoothie with Bob's Redmill's certified GF oats.
• Another of my favorite brands of GF granola is made by Bakery on Main, but some of their granolas have nuts in them and I'm allergic to some nuts.

Gluten Free Pizza Topings

Look, I'm not gonna lie to you. I'm a working mom. I don't have time to bake a from-scratch GF pizza crust every time I want to make gluten-free pizza. I buy Udi's GF pizza crusts and keep them in my freezer until I'm ready for one of those dinners where you don't have to think very hard.

Here are the things I put on our pizzas, in various combinations:

• Ragu pizza sauce
• Hormel Canadian bacon
• Hormel pepperoni slices (look on the label; you'll see it says GF)
• canned pineapples
• canned sliced olives
• red onions
• tomatoes
• peppers
• yellow onions
• mushrooms
• mozzarella cheese

Now I'm dairy-free, so I have to make our pizza half mozzarella and half SoySations lactose-free and gluten-free cheese substitute. Be warned, though, dairy-free people: SoySations Mozzarella Shreds contain casein, so they're not truly dairy-free. I seem to do okay with it though.

I suppose you already knew all those veggies were GF, but I remember that it took me a while to learn which pizza meats and tomato sauces are GF. So I posted this easy-to-make GF pizza plan, in the hope that I might be able to help out those who are just starting out on the gluten-free diet.

GF Quesadilla Recipe and Variations

One of my daughter's favorite gluten-free lunches is a simple quesadilla, made from Don Pancho's gluten-free wraps and simple cheddar cheese.

For anyone who doesn't know what a quesadilla is, it's a Mexican form of a toasted cheese sandwich. Instead of using bread, most folks use flour tortillas. We must eat gluten-free, however, so we use Don Pancho's gluten-free wraps for our quesadilla's "bread". Slice some cheese, slap it in-between two GF wraps, fry the whole thing in hot oil in a skillet, and voila! You've got quesadilla.

There are some yummy variations on quesadillas though, and I think I should mention these:

• melted cheddar cheese and refried beans inside the quesadilla
• melted pepper jack cheese and avocado in your quesadilla
• chicken, cilantro, peppers, and cheese quesadilla (see picture)
• a quesadilla with jalepeno peppers melted into the cheese (not for the wee little tykes)
• plain old cheese quesadilla dipped in guacamole and/or sour cream and/or salsa
• melted cheese blended with left-over hamburger in your quesadilla
• and my favorite: a combination of some of the above... cheese, hamburger, cilantro, beans, and guacamole quesadilla

Can you think of yummy quesadilla variations that I didn't mention here? Your comments are welcome.

GF Chicken Broccoli Casserole Recipe

I had to look back through old postings to realize this one had never been posted. I couldn't believe it. This is my "ol' stand-by" at home. If I'm too tired to cook anything special, I make this casserole dish and everyone just loves it.

Again, the recipe is my mother-in-law's, with just a few GF adaptations.

Ingredients:

• 3 chicken breasts (frozen ones are fine, but read labels to make sure it's GF)
• Pacific Natural Foods' GF condensed cream of chicken soup
• 1/8 tsp. curry powder
• dash of garlic (to taste)
• 1 small package of frozen broccoli
• 3/4 cup grated sharp cheddar cheese

Directions:
1. Boil chicken until cooked clear through. Set the broth aside for another recipe. (I usually freeze it like ice cubes. That way I can add it to soups and gravies a week or more later without it spoiling.)
2. Let chicken cool, then cut it into cubes.
3. In a mixing bowl, mix together garlic, curry powder, and GF cream of chicken soup. Fold in cubed chicken and cheese.
4. Coat the inside of a small casserole dish with cooking spray. Place the entire package of broccoli in the bottom of the casserole dish. Top with chicken/cheese/soup mixture.
5. Bake in a 375 degree F oven for 30 minutes (or until bubbly).

There are times when the broccoli leaves my casserole too moist. Try not to let too much ice get into the casserole dish with the frozen broccoli, or you may have the same problem.

Gluten-Free Teriyaki Marinade (I Use This for Deer Steaks and Wild Game)

Yes, my husband is the great white hunter. But what do you do with all that deer meat in the freezer? Teriyaki is the answer to your gamey-tasting meat. Saturate it in teriyaki sauce, and nobody will ever know it was venison.

Here's my mother-in-law's fantastic teriyaki marinade recipe, with a GF twist:

Ingredients:
1/2 cup Tamari GF soy sauce
1 clove garlic, minced
2 T. brown sugar
1/2 tsp. ground ginger
2 T. Worcestershire sauce
1 T. freshly squeezed lemon juice

Directions:
Combine all ingredients and mix well. If you want to use this stuff for something other than venison, it might be just as good on chicken, pork, or beef. We use it with all kinds of wild game though--deer, elk, goat, and even bear--and it takes the wild flavor out of the game meat.

I usually marinade the meat in the teriyaki in the fridge for 5-8 hours, then my husband barbecues the meat on the barbecue outside. It goes great with a side of plain white rice and some stir-fried veggies.

Easy Gluten-Free Cinnamon Pull-Aparts

I'm pretty sure I read this one online, but I've made it so many times now, that I can just recite the recipe from memory.

Ingredients:
1 package of GF bread mix
1 cube of butter (margarine is OK if you're dairy free like me, but butter is best)
1/4 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup white sugar
1 1/2 tsp. cinnamon

Directions:
1. Prepare bread mix, following directions on the package, but don't let the bread dough rise and don't put it in the oven yet.
2. Set up a series of bowls in your work space:

• bowl #1 = lukewarm water
• bowl #2 = bread dough
• bowl #3 = melted butter or margarine
• bowl #4 = sugars and cinnamon thoroughly mixed together

3. Have your bread pan close by. It needs to be sprayed with cooking spray, just like it would be for regular bread.
4. Dip your hands in the lukewarm water. By covering your hands in water, you'll find it easier to handle the bread dough without getting all sticky.
5. Scoop out a palm-sized hunk of GF bread dough and roll it in a ball. If you're having trouble making it into a ball because it's sticking, get your hands wetter.
6. Drop the dough ball in the butter or margarine. Make sure butter covers the whole ball.
7. Drop the dough ball into the sugar-cinnamon mix. This time you only want a light coating. Don't let it get too lumpy from excess water and butter.
8. Place the dough ball into the greased bread pan. Repeat steps 4-8 until all the bread dough is in the bread pan.
9. It's possible to use a bunt cake pan for this instead of a bread pan. In fact, I usually find my bread pan can't hold all the pull-aparts, so sometimes I make two bread pans of pull-aparts from one box of bread mix.
10. Allow this bread to rise, just as you would if it were a normal loaf of bread. Bake it in the oven for the same amount of time that it says on the bread mix's package--well, give or take five or ten minutes--check it toward the end. If I use a smaller loaf (like I split the dough in half) then it usually takes a few minutes less than it says on the package. I use the temperature that's listed on the package for this.

Give it a try. You'll LOVE this one!

Gluten Free Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipe

Recently a fellow GF-mom asked me for my GF chocolate chip cookie recipe. (How flattering, right?) Well this is my favorite one. It was given to me by a good friend. I don't know if she ran across it online or saw it in a magazine or what, but she wrote it down on a 3x5 card and handed it to me--and I'm SO glad she did, because we love it!

Ingredients:
2 eggs
1/2 cup margarine or butter
1 cup light brown sugar
1 tsp. vanilla extract
1 box Jell-o vanilla instant pudding mix (don't add anything to it--just the powdery stuff is what you want)
1 cup white rice flour
1/2 cup potato starch four
12 oz. bag of GF chocolate chips
pecans or walnuts, if you like

Directions:
Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. Leave your butter or margarine out until soft. Mix butter or margarine with sugar and vanilla pudding mix. Add eggs. Mix flours separately. Then add the flours to the wet ingredients. Mix thoroughly with a stand mixer. Hand-stir in the chocolate chips and nuts. Drop cookies by rounded teaspoon-fuls onto a parchment-covered cookie sheet. Bake for 9-10 minutes.

As with all GF cookies, let them sit for a while before you remove them from the cookie sheet, because otherwise they'll crumble. Most GF cookies are fragile when they're warm. It has something to do with the nature of rice flour, I think.

Quick and Easy GF Breakfast Ideas

I don't know about you, but this time of year, I feel like a cab driver in New York City. I taxi my kids to piano lessons, choir concerts, 4-H, a friend's overnight party, church, youth group meetings, and the play the'll be performing in after school.

So we find ourselves getting up too late to eat a good breakfast sometimes. That's okay. As long as we eat something--even just a grab-n-go meal--it's better than nothing. They say breakfast is the most important meal of the day, right?

So what does an experienced GF mom feed her kids for grab-n-go breakfast? Here are a few ideas:

Van's toaster waffles. You can find them in the frozen foods section of your health food aisle, but read the labels; some of their products are wholesome but not GF!

Peanut butter on toast with an apple. This covers three of the four food groups--protein is in the peanut butter--and kids love it.

Open a can of GF pears and serve it over cottage cheese. With cinnamon toast, this also covers three food groups. My daughter loves this one! (I've heard that some canned fruits can have gluten in them, but I've never had this experience myself. However, as always, read labels.)

Boiled eggs and OJ. Let's face it, they travel well, they're high in protein, and they only take 12 minutes to cook hard-boiled. Once you get to your destination and start munching down the eggs, though, you've got to have the orange juice to wash it down.

Egg sandwich. We just had this one for breakfast this morning. We fried a single egg (over hard), and slipped a slice of ham in there between two slices of toast. It's also possible to eat it with cheese. I like lettuce on mine, but my daughter doesn't.

Microwaved hot cereal. I realize kids don't like Quinoa flakes. There are other options though. Uncle Ben's now has a cream of rice that is labeled GF. You can also cook corn meal mush from your own corn flour, just like Grandma used to make.

Gluten-free cereal. And if you're dairy-free, I've recently discovered how much I like hemp milk. It doesn't have the bland flavor that soy milk has. But it doesn't exactly taste like dairy milk either. It has its own flavor, but it goes wonderfully with cereals. I'm definitely a fan!

GF cereal bars. Did you know that Fruity Pebbles cereal bars are labeled GF? Yeah! And you can buy them in a regular grocery store, usually in the cereal aisle.

Yogurt or Gogurts. Yoplait is now labeling their yogurts and Gogurts (the tubes of yogurt) with GF labels. It's a quick source of fruit, dairy, and protein.

Well that's it for today's post. I hope you got something useful out of that...

GF and Dairy Free Birthday Cake

We recently had two birthdays in my family. Since I'm both dairy-free and gluten-free, I adapted a recipe I found elsewhere on the Internet to make this birthday cake edible for me. Everyone in the family loved it!

You know how birthday cakes will sometimes sit around for a week before they get eaten? Well not this one. I think it took about 24 hours and that cake was GONE like the wind!

So here it is:

Ingredients:
1 c. white rice flour
1/2 c. potato starch flour
3/4 c. tapioca flour
1 tsp. salt
1 tsp. baking soda
3 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. xanthan gum
4 eggs
1 1/4 c. white sugar
2/3 c. mayonnaise
1 c. soy milk
2 tsp. gluten-free vanilla extract

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease and rice flour two 3-inch round cake pans.
2. Mix the white rice flour, tapioca flour, salt, baking soda, baking powder, and xanthan gum together and set these aside.
3. Mix the eggs, sugar, and mayo in a mixer until they get fluffy (like meringue). Then add milk, vanilla, and flour mixture.
4. Spread the batter into the pans you greased and floured.
5. Bake cakes at 350 degrees F for 25 minutes. Use the standard "toothpick test" to decide if they're done. Higher altitudes usually require longer baking times.

I like to stick my cakes in the freezer before frosting them. At the very least, refrigerate them. They hold together better that way. (It prevents them from crumbling as much when you're frosting them.)

Betty Crocker now labels their frostings GF when they're gluten free, but if you're dairy free too (like me), then you need to watch out for dairy ingredients in frostings.

What about cake toppers and decorations? Check out party stores for cake toppers that are inedible (to avoid gluten). I've found a lot of the cake toppers at our party store come from outside the country, and therefore, they don't have to conform to our labeling requirements here in the US. I made the little flowers you see in this picture, using a simple cookie-decorating frosting press. I've provided a link to that tool on Amazon, so you know what to look for in your stores. They're usually found in the area of your grocery store where you can buy aluminum pie pans and measuring cups.

But what about toys and other plastic cake toppers for little children's cakes? I once went to a bakery and asked if I could purchase toy-like cake toppers from them, explaining that our family had food allergies and couldn't order their cakes anyway. Under the circumstances, they were very nice about selling us just the cake toppers. I hope you have just as much luck!

Spanish Potatoes (a Gluten-Free and Dairy-Free Casserole Recipe)

Whenever my husband goes steelhead fishing (or hunting), I feel safe to experiment in the kitchen. Today's casserole dish is an experiment of mine that turned out pretty good (although the girls said it was too spicy). I call it "Spanish Potatoes" for lack of a better name. Here's how you make it:

Ingredients:

• 5 medium-sized potatoes
• 3 cloves of garlic (fresh, peeled)
• 1 tbsp. finely chopped cilantro
• 1 1/4 cup chopped cabbage
• scant 1/4 cup diced onions
• 1/2 can (3.5 oz.) La Victoria mild diced green chilis
• 1/2 cup Pacific Foods hemp milk
• salt and pepper

Directions:
1. Peel the potatoes. Quarter them. Boil them with the 3 cloves of garlic until soft (30 min. or so).
2. Drain potatoes and garlic with a colander. Mash potatoes and garlic. Add hemp milk until they form a sort of mashed-potatoes consistency. The garlic should mash right in with the potatoes.
3. Add cilantro, onions, chilis, and cabbage. Salt and pepper to taste.
4. Bake in a 375-degree (F) oven for 20-25 minutes, or until cabbage is al dente.

If you're not worried about cooking dairy free, substitute the hemp milk for regular milk or a milk/sour cream mix. In the last 5 minutes of baking time, sprinkle cheddar cheese over the top. It will look pretty and taste good too. It's possible to garnish with a sprig of cilantro. If you broil it for the last 30 seconds, you may get the spuds to have a crunchy, golden-brown top, but I'm not very good at that.

I served this week's casserole recipe with last week's chicken breast recipe.

Easy Gluten-Free Chicken Breast Recipe

It's hard to find a chicken breast recipe that I like, but this one is simple and quick. It takes no preparation. Just prep it in minutes, pop it in the oven, and wait for it to cook.

When buying frozen chicken breasts, as always, read the labels. Some frozen or packaged chicken is treated with broth which may not be gluten-free. So be wary of that.

Anyway, here's my easy-cheesy-lemon-squeezy recipe for chicken breasts:

Ingredients:

• frozen chicken breasts (careful not to cook too many at once--four is about right for a family of four)
• olive oil
• garlic powder
• onion powder
• salt
• California seasoning blend (mine is Kroger brand--but McCormick has a number of GF seasonings)

Directions:
1. Preheat your oven to 375 degrees (F). Use a basting brush to coat the bottom of a casserole dish with olive oil.
2. Place the breasts in the casserole dish. Don't pile them on top of one another, as it takes longer for them to cook thoroughly that way. Instead, just line them up side by side.
3. Baste each chicken breast with a coating of olive oil on top.
4. Sprinkle all seasonings on top, going easy on the garlic.
5. Bake for one hour or until all pinkness is gone from the meat.
6. Garnish with a slice of lemon.

This chicken recipe goes great with my "Spanish Potatoes", which I'll post next week. Corn is also a yummy side dish. You can also see I had a glass of strawberry lemonade with this dinner. (It was posted last week.)

Strawberry Lemonade Recipe--Gluten-Free and Great Fun for Kids!

This is so simple, I can't believe I'm even bothering to post it. But I've had people ask me, "How do you make that?" So here I am, showing everyone how easy it is.

INGREDIENTS:
1 pkg. frozen strawberries
1 pkg. gluten-free frozen lemonade concentrate
water

DIRECTIONS:
Read the ingredients list on your frozen concentrated lemonade to make sure it's truly gluten-free, but honestly, I have yet to discover a brand that isn't. Again (like I said in last week's post) though, give people a chance to contaminate your food and voila! It happens at the snap of your granny's leathery fingers.

Once you've determined that the lemonade is fine, just mix it according to the package directions and plop about four or five strawberries in there with it. Let it sit for 20 minutes until the strawberries start to thaw.

Put some ice in your glass before you pour the strawberry lemonade into your glass, so it's nice and chilled.

That's it. Simple as can be!

Perfect Potato Salad--Gluten-free and Dairy-free

I know, I know. It's kind of a stupid title, because really, most potato salad is gluten-free and dairy free. But believe it or not, people can screw this up. The main problem is with the GF status. How do you screw that up? Using mayonnaise that has been contaminated with gluten-bread crumbs.

See, every time your grandmother comes to visit and she dips her knife in the mayo to spread it on her regular bread, then she dips it again, little bread crumbs end up in the mayo.

So whenever we go to someone's house for a big dinner, we bring our own potato salad. That way we can be sure the mayo is completely crumb-free. We also use a squeeze bottle of mayo at our house, to prevent double-dip contaminations.

I don't even know how you can manage to screw up a potato salad with dairy, but give people an opportunity to contaminate your food, and they'll manage to do it every time! ;)

Anyway, here's the potato salad recipe I use:

INGREDIENTS:
5-7 medium potatoes (I tend to lean toward 7 unless the spuds are huge)
1/4 cup chopped onions
1/2 cup chopped celery--more if you like it crunchy

2 hard-boiled eggs, diced into small pieces
1 scant tsp. salt
1/8 tsp. pepper
dash of celery salt (to taste)
1/4 cup Italian salad dressing (we use Kraft Zesty Italian)
1/2 cup mayo

Boil clean potatoes on the stove for 35 minutes after the water reaches the boiling point. Once they've chilled in the fridge for a couple of hours, skin them and dice them up into small cubes. I usually add the onions, celery, and eggs at this time.

In a seperate bowl, I mix the remaining ingredients. Taste this dressing to see how much celery salt you need. It's a tough call sometimes, but less is usually better than more.

Add the dressing mix to the bowl of spuds. Mix thoroughly. Chill for at least two hours in a covered dish before serving.

I think you'll really like this recipe. It's truly fantastic!

Dairy-free and Gluten-free Coleslaw Recipe

I love cole slaw with fried chicken or hot wings, and it's relatively easy to make, even gluten-free and dairy-free. Here's what it takes:

INGREDIENTS:
1/2 head green cabbage, minced
1/4 cup minced white onion
1 celery stalk, minced
2 tablespoons minced green pepper
2/3 cup mayonnaise
1/3 cup white sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon ground black pepper
1/3 cup soymilk mixed with 1 tablespoon lemon juice (to make "buttermilk")
1 capful of apple cider vinegar
2-3 tablespoons lemon juice (to taste)
1 teaspoon celery salt

Take the first four ingredients and mix them together in a bowl. Then put all other ingredients in a seperate bowl and mix them together to form the dressing. Finally, combine the vegetables with the dressing and chill for at least an hour. I find it's tastiest the next day though, because it allows the dressing to really seep into the veggies. YUM!

Creamy Jello Knox Blocks -- A fun, easy, GF dessert!

Again, this is one of my mother-in-law's recipes. My whole family loves it--even the folks who aren't on a GF diet.

INGREDIENTS:
1 six-ounce pkg. of Jello
1 three-ounce pkg. of Jello (same flavor)
2 pkgs. Knox unflavored gelatin (this is found in the baking aisle, near the Jello, but usually on a top shelf or away from all the other Jello products)
1 cup cream for whipping (not the same as whipped cream--this is thick cream that comes in a milk carton and says, "whipping cream" on it)
water

DIRECTIONS:
In a large, heatproof bowl, mix unflavored gelatin with Jello. Add 3 cups boiling water and stir until gelatin is completely dissolved (two minutes). Stir in whipping cream.

Pour the whole mixture into a 13x9 inch pan and chill until firm--about four hours. The cream will rise, chilling to form layers. To serve, cut it into squares or rectangles of desired shapes. Makes about 20-30 squares. (They go fast though--my kids LOVE these.)

If you're not allergic to strawberries, I recommend it for your first try. Everyone seems to like that flavor best. Our second favorite flavor of Jello for this recipe is orange. But you really can use it with any flavor of Jello.

Gluten Free Tartar Sauce Recipe--Great with GF Fish Sticks!

My mother-in-law makes the most incredible tartar sauce. She doesn't exactly use measurements for the spaces--she mostly goes by taste, but I'll try to duplicate the recipe here for you. I use Kraft mayo for my GF recipe, but I'm sure there are plenty of other GF brands. For dill pickles, I use Vlassic, but again, there are lots of GF brands. Just read labels and be aware that pickles use vinegar. If the jar says "vinegar" it's probably distilled vinegar, which some celiacs can tolerate but some can't. The distilling process supposedly lowers the gluten in the vinegar, but it doesn't completely eliminate it. So if you're a very sensitive celiac, I recommend buying pickles at your local health food store--ones that are made with cider vinegar, not distilled. Okay, so here's the recipe:

INGREDIENTS:
1 cup Kraft GF  Mayonnaise
1/4 cup finely diced dill pickles
1 tbsp. pickle juice (from the jar)
1/4 cup very finely chopped onions
dash of garlic
dash of onion powder
salt and pepper to taste--more salt than pepper
1 tsp. dill
1 tsp. fresh-squeezed lemon juice

DIRECTIONS:
Mix all ingredients. Sample. If it needs a little more salt, a little more dill, an extra pickle or more onion, add whatever is needed to make it taste just right. (That's how my mother-in-law does it. Sorry I can't be more specific!)

Now, what can you do about the fish sticks? Yes, there are fantastic fish sticks out there, that are gluten-free. My highest recommendation is for Clear Springs gluten-free fish sticks, but they don't seem to have their information available online yet. My husband brought some home though, and they taste FANTASTIC. So if you can get your hands on these, they're better than Ians (which is another company that makes GF fish sticks).

One other possibility is to fry up your own. There's a fabulous GF product out there called "Choice Batter" which claims it's a low oil-absorbing recipe, and I believe them. Whenever my husband goes fishing and comes home with some fresh perch or trout, we use this breading to make home-fried fish, and YUM! It's good stuff! Click the link to see it online.

A Gluten-Free and Dairy-Free Version of Ben & Jerry's Chubby Hubby Ice Cream

Since I've become gluten-free and dairy-free, I really got to where I missed my Ben & Jerry's. My favorite Ben & Jerry's ice cream was Chubby Hubby, and I can't find anything to substitute for it.

So I've come up with my own version. Here's what it takes to make it:

INGREDIENTS:
Purely Decadent "So Delicious" Chocolate Peanut Butter Swirl Non-Dairy Dessert from Turtle Mountain
Glutino Pretzels
Peanut M&Ms

DIRECTIONS:
You've got to let the chocolate peanut butter swirl "ice cream" sit out for a little bit, because it's way too hard to eat otherwise. Then use a fork to spork out bits of non-dairy dessert (i.e. "ice cream") into a small bowl. Crack pretzels in halves or quarters and toss in a few M&M's. Hide in your office/sewing room and devour this little beauty!

Lord, I think I'm going to have to go to the store after this posting, because my mouth is just watering like crazy while I write this...

Please note, though: M&Ms are not truly dairy-free, but they don't usually upset my stomach. If you really can't have any lactose at all, substitute for peanuts. I'm also guessing that Glutino pretzels may contain butter, so substitute for the other brands (I think EnerG might be dairy-free--check first).

Gluten-Free Gorp (Trail Mix) Recipe: a Great After-School Snack!

Sometimes they call it GORP--which is probably an acronym for something, but I don't have the foggiest idea what it stands for. (If you know, please leave a comment to that effect. Thanks!) Anyway, it's a great after-school snack, and it's super easy to make:

INGREDIENTS:
1 cup Rice Chex cereal
1 cup Corn Chex cereal
1 cup GF pretzels (Glutino are our favorites)
1/2 cup M&M's
1/2 cup peanuts (without the shell--and as always, check labels)
1/2 cup cashews (same thing)
1/2 cup dates (same)
1/2 cup raisins (same)
1/2 cup banana chips (same)
1 small pkg. Corn Nuts

DIRECTIONS:
Simple... Mix it all up and store it in a monster-sized Tupperware or cookie jar. Kids can scoop a bunch into a bowl after school and snack on healthy goodies. My kids love this kind of stuff as an after school snack. It's also great in school lunches.

One tip though: keep it sealed tight. If your cookie jar's lid doesn't screw on tightly, use a Tupperware or Rubbermaid storage container that seals well. This stuff spoils easily if it's left open to the air.

Gluten-Free Frito Chili Pie: an Easy Casserole Dish for Working Moms

Want something you can whip up in 30 minutes, right after work? Try this easy recipe for Frito Chili Pie. When you buy the canned chili, make sure it says gluten-free right on the label, because Hormel does make some chilis that aren't GF.

INGREDIENTS:
2 cans of Hormel GF Chili with Beans
1 cup of fritos (or two to three handfuls)
1/2 cup grated cheddar or Mex Mix cheese
cooking spray

DIRECTIONS:
Spray the bottom of your 8-in. casserole dish with cooking spray. Open the first can of chili and spread it at the bottom of the casserole dish. Crush the Fritos after measuring them. You want to lightly coat the chili with Fritos, so if you don't have quite enough after one cup, go ahead and grab another handful or so, until you've got a thin layer of Fritos in the middle of the dish.

Sprinkle the cheddar cheese on top of this. Open the second can of chili and spread it over the top.

Heat your oven to 400 degrees F. and cook the casserole uncovered for 30 to 40 minutes. It's done when the chili starts to bubble pretty good around the edges.

Serve it with side dishes of extra Fritos, chopped onions (for those who like them), and a little chopped cilantro. YUM!

How easy is that?

What's the Difference Between Gluten-Free Flours?

Gluten-free flours are tricky to work with. It's just not as simple as working with wheat flour or all-purpose wheat flour.

When I first started baking and cooking gluten free, about six years ago, I made the classic mistakes. I tried to bake cookies with rice flour, and they came out tasting like Chinese fortune cookies. I tried to make cream gravy with buckwheat flour, and it came out looking like mud. Etc...

I wished I could've found a website that gave me the low-down on the various flours. Because there are lots of gluten-free flours, but they all do different things. So I'm here to offer that information to you, as I've spent the last six years making lots of GF blunders. Therefore, I can tell you what NOT to do...

Rice Flour: This flour is the crux of most gluten-free baking. Most recipes will call for at least some rice flour, so keep a fair amount of it in your house. It's the filler for almost all GF flour mixtures. But the trick is this: don't single it out. Rice flour doesn't work well on its own. Instead, you've got to mix it with other things, so your baking doesn't come out too crunchy with hard, crusty exteriors.

Tapioca Flour: This stuff has a really sweet flavor to it. When you add it to rice flour, it sweetens the general flavor of whatever you're baking. But don't go overboard. Too much tapioca flour makes baked goods taste too sweet, the way adding saccharine makes stuff taste too sweet if you cook for a diabetic.

Sorghum Four: This flour adds an earthy, nutty flavor to baked goods. It's kind of like the GF version of rye, but on a milder scale. Some celiacs say that adding sorghum flour is like making the bread or baked goods taste healthier, like a seven-grain bread or a whole-grain bread might taste. I like it in my gingerbread cookies and cakes, because it provides that heavier taste that goes great in a gingerbread, but I don't like it in my sandwich bread, because I'm not a big fan of whole wheat's flavor. I do, however, find that sorghum goes okay in pancakes for some reason. So experiment with it.

Potato Starch Flour: This is a great thickener, and I also like to use this to flour a cutting board before I make cookies or roll out my pie crust. A lot of recipes call for this flour, because, like rice flour, it offers a good solid basis. When mixed with rice flour, it makes the perfect filler for most baking recipes. I keep a large staple of potato starch flour in my kitchen.

Potato Flour: This kind of flour is not to be mistaken for potato starch flour. It has more of a beige color, when compared to potato starch flour, but more importantly, it acts very differently. It's got a pastiness that other flours don't have. So, used in small amounts, it can help keep your cakes and breads from being too crumbly. But you don't need much of this stuff to do the trick. Its ability to make baked goods congeal reminds me a little of the way xanthan gum works in recipes--like an egg substitute, but not quite that firm. I mix potato flour into my super fluffy GF flour mix, and I also find it can be helpful in thickening soups, when you mix it with other flours.

Corn Starch: Yes, this is actually a flour. Before I went GF, I thought of this as an ingredient like baking powder or baking soda, but corn starch is actually a flour that can be added to many baked goods to help keep them fluffy. Again, see my super fluffy GF flour mix recipe, to see how you can really fluff up your cornbread and other baked goods using corn starch in pretty big amounts.

Other Flours: There are many other flours you can buy, like garbonzo bean flour, fava bean flour, almond flour, and coconut flour that are all GF, but the ones above are the ones I keep in my kitchen at all times. I also use a lot of super-fine-ground corn meal, and it is possible to buy gluten-free oats now, as well, if your stomach can tolerate them. But I just wanted to give you a quick study of what each of the most basic gluten-free flours acts like in a recipe. I do hope this description helps you get familiar with your gluten-free flours.

Gluten-Free Egg McMuffin

A special treat for my little girl is GF egg McMuffins. What? You can make that gluten-free? Yes, you can. A company called Food for Life makes yummy GF English muffins now. (Check out the link for details.) With this product, it's possible to make McDonalds'-style egg McMuffins right in your own home! YUM!

If you don't have access to Food for Life products, you can certainly try to immitate the same thing with simple toast--just use your GF bread and cut it into circles and toast it. Heck, it might work.

INGREDIENTS:
GF ham (i.e. Buddig, Hormel, etc.)
1 egg
1 slice cheese
English muffin (GF) sliced in half and toasted
1 tsp. cider vinegar
water
cooking spray

DIRECTIONS:
I don't own a double-boiler, so I can't poach my eggs properly. So this is how I poach them: I spray a nonstick pan with cooking spray, put a cup of water in it, add the cider vinegar, and boil. Once boiling, I add my egg. Use a spatula to "scoot" the egg across the bottom, so it doesn't stick. Boil it for ten minutes, 'till the yolk is pretty much hard--be careful not to boil it dry. (I don't like runny eggs, but if you do, cook it for less time.) In the last two minutes of boil time, add the ham to the water. It doesn't need to cook very long, just one or two minutes. Then remove it from the water with tongs. Use a slotted spoon to lift the egg out of the pan, once cooked. Rest the wet egg on a paper towel and dry it off some. Pat the ham dry too. Salt and pepper the egg.

Make sure you time it about right, so that your English muffins are hot and toasted when the egg is done cooking. You may choose to butter your English muffins, but it's not absolutely necessary.

Layer the ingredients like this:

Bread on bottom and top
Egg/slice of cheese/ham in the middle

Wrap the bottom half of your egg McMuffin in a paper towel, and that way you won't lose any bits of egg out the bottom. It can be a little drippy too, so this prevents a mess.

Basic Gluten-Free Gravy Recipe

There are several ways to make gluten-free gravy. For today's post, I'll go with the simplest method. It requires no pre-prep of any kind, other than soaking the corn starch in water for a while.

My list of ingredients includes instant broth, like a powdered broth that you can add water to and microwave. You can't trust the normal bullion cubes that you might buy in the regular grocery store. Instead, you might have to go to a health-food store or other GF supplier to get your powdered broth. Glutino makes good broth, but it comes from outside the US, so it can be a little spendy. There's another brand called Vogue that's not as expensive but doesn't taste quite as good (because it doesn't have any meat--it's vegan).

There's no reason why you can't use broth that you made a long time ago--you know, where you put leftover meat in a boiling pan and just let it simmer all day until you've got broth. Then you can freeze that broth in ice cube trays to last for a super-long time in the freezer. But I'm trying to make this recipe simple, so working moms can come home after a long day's work and just whip up a quick gravy. But yeah, you can use real broth instead of instant.

INGREDIENTS:
instant broth
corn starch
water

DIRECTIONS:
Take two tablespoons of corn starch and soak it in a quarter cup of water. Use a fork to continually whisk up the corn starch mixture. That way it won't form a clump.

In a saucepan, put one cup of prepared instant broth (follow the directions on your instant broth label) and make sure the broth is well-mixed before you turn on the heat. Simmer this on medium-high until it reaches boiling point.

Add the corn starch mixture and continually whisk the gravy nonstop. Season with salt and pepper (and if you like other seasonings, like garlic or onion powder, those too), to taste. Be wary of using too much salt. A lot of instant broths already contain quite a bit of salt, so keep sampling your gravy as you season it, to make sure it's not too salty.

When the gravy reaches the appropriate thickness, remove from burner and serve. If it's not getting thick enough for you, add another tablespoon of watered-down cornstarch, but make sure it's not clumpy when you add it.

Gluten-Free Meatloaf Recipe

One of my children is 11 years old, and she's wanting to learn how to cook. So a couple of nights ago, I let her make a simple meatloaf, and this is the recipe we used:

INGREDIENTS:
11/2 lbs. hamburger
2 tbsp. finely chopped onions
1 tbstp. fresh parsley, chopped
2 cloves garlic
dash of salt
dash of pepper (we used fresh ground pepper)
2 tsp. Worchestershire sauce (Lee and Perrins is GF)
1 slice of dried GF bread
1 egg

DIRECTIONS:
There are a couple of ways to crumble up your dried GF bread slice. First, you can put it in a plastic Ziplock bag and roll over it with a rolling pin. Or a second choice is to put it in a food processor and let electricity do the work for you.

Once you've crushed the bread into crumbs, mince the garlic with a garlic press, beat your egg, and mix all of these ingredients together in a bowl. Then use a fork to press the well-mixed burger mixture into a bread pan (3x9 inches or whatever those are). Bake the loaf in a 400 degrees F. oven for 45 minutes to an hour (or until a meat thermometer registers 170 degrees. Drain the fat off of the meatloaf before you serve it, for a healthier meal.

Personally, I like to add vegetables like celery and peppers and mushrooms to my meatloaf, but that makes my kids gag! So I've found, the simpler I keep my meatloaf, the more the kids like it.

They like it even more if you make gravy to go with it. I'll post my very basic gravy recipe next week. To make a platter that looks pretty, slice the meatloaf, splay it out like you would a hand of cards, and drizzle gravy over the top. A sprig of parsley can make it look nice too. The only problem with the decorative platter, though, is that it allows the meat to get cool. So there's that to think about.

How to Make Gluten-Free Garlic Toast and Gluten-Regular Toast at the Same Time

This Image: iClipart

When you first start cooking gluten-free, you make a lot of cross-contamination mistakes. You walk around giving your GF kid the guilty eyes, because she's sick and you're responsible. So before you try any more recipes, wipe that guilty look off your face. It's not your fault. You've got to go through a learning curve before you reach perfection, and after six years of cooking GF, even I'm not perfect. So live and learn, but don't wallow in guilt over it.

Today's GF instructions are for something you'd think is simple, but really, it's not. There are a lot of cross-contamination issues when we cook GF, and making garlic toast is a biggie. So here are the instrucitons for making gluten-free garlic toast simultaneously with your regular garlic toast, all on the same cookie sheet:

Guten-Free Garlic Toast AND Regular Garlic Toast Recipe

Here's what you need:

• cube of butter or uncontaminated margarine
• garlic powder (fresh garlic is okay, as far as I'm concerned, but my kids complain it's too strong)
• 3-4 slices of GF bread, whatever fits on your cookie sheet
• 3-4 slices of regular bread, same deal
• 1 pastry brush labeled GF
• 1 pastry brush that's strictly for your gluten-containing ingredients
• aluminum foil
• cookie sheet

Instructions:

1. Lay the cookie sheet on a table or counter. Measure the aluminum foil to 3-4 inches LONGER than the cookie sheet actually is.
2. Place the aluminum foil on the cookie sheet, but fold it in the middle. (See illustration.)
3. Melt 1/2 cube of butter (I chop it up into little pieces and microwave it in a measuring cup) and mix with a good dash or two of garlic powder. Use your GF pastry brush to mix it. I stick my finger in to taste it, making sure it's got a solid garlic flavor, but it's not overwhelming.
4. Use the GF pastry brush to spread melted butter on both sides of your aluminum foil. (The gluten-side has not yet been contaminated, so it's not going to matter if you touch the GF pastry brush to that side, at this point.)
5. Place only the GF breads on one half of the aluminum foil. Use the GF pastry brush to spread butter on each of these pieces of bread. If you have any extra butter, flip the bread over and spread extra butter on the back. The more buttery the bread, the yummier!
6. To avoid contamination, discard all GF items in the kitchen sink or dishwasher while you work with the gluten-contaminated side of the aluminum-foil-covered cookie sheet.
7. Place gluten-containing breads on the empty half of the aluminum foil, being careful not to accidentally drip crumbs on the GF side.--Cross-contamination can happen easily, so don't touch the GF side with your hands, don't carry gluten-containing breads over the top of the GF side, etc...
8. Melt the other half of the butter. (Again, I chop it into bits and microwave it.) Sprinkle a couple dashes of garlic powder in this and mix it with the pastry brush that is NOT for GF items. -- You must keep this pastry brush separate at all times, even when this recipe is over and done. Pastry brushes easily store bits of gluten between the bristles, so once it has been used on gluten-containing breads, it will forever be contaminated.
9. Brush the butter onto your gluten-containing bread slices now. Extra butter should be discarded, not stored, because it has been thoroughly contaminated with gluten.
10. Place the cookie sheet in a 400 degree F oven for a very brief time--usually 5 minutes or less. Just keep checking it. You want the garlic bread to turn golden brown but not black. I usually flip my garlic toast over once--doing the gluten-free pieces first to avoid contaminating them. Tongs will help you do this safely, but don't use them again to serve the bread unless you clean them thoroughly.

Variations:
It's possible to sprinkle your garlic bread with any of the following before toasting:

• dried parmesan cheese (the kind that comes in a can)
• dried parsley flakes
• grated mazarella cheese