balentimes

Steve and I don't really celebrate holidays. Not that I don't think they are good ways for people to remember one another...we are just the type of people that never wait for those times to buy one another gifts (or for ourselves either). That said, we still usually get cards or tell one another "happy xxxxx-day" and occasionally go out to eat.

Last year for balentimes (i dunno why i started pronouncing it like that) I made steve a pop-up card

When closed it shows steve's face inside the heart and when it's opened I slide up for the kiss! It was so fun to make (I love making things) and he loves it and still has it sitting on his desk.

This year I made Conversation Hearts! I found the recipe somewhere online (I think it was linked from about.com, but I cannot remember)

Anyway, they are cute, fun and delicious!

Hope you had a great holiday weekend.

Also, I lost my voice on Tuesday. Today is day 4 without a voice. It's also day 3 of what has become my daily short video documenting what my voice sounds like. It only started because I thought it would be back the next day and then when it wasn't I decided it would be back the next (which is today) and yet it still isn't. So I'll just do a short little video each day until my voice returns. Am I a goofball? Yes. Do I like being a goofball? More than you could possibly know!
:)

Chocolate Chip Cookies

It's been a very long time since I've had a chocolate chip cookie. My sister, who also has problems with wheat, asked me if I had a good recipe the other day and realized that I hadn't come up with one yet.

Growing up we always baked from scratch and chocolate chip cookies were a staple in the house so I am a little surprised I haven't tried it yet.

Well, I made some this morning and they are good. They have satisfied my craving, but they aren't the perfect chocolate chip cookie. I know what changes I'll make next time and I'll post that recipe when I get it just right.

here kitty kitty

My cat, Calpurrnia (callie for short), is a hoot.



Not a gluten free post, but a really cute cat being really clever with her food robot.

hehehe

Girls Night In

I'm having the girls over tonight for games, wine and snacks. We don't get together nearly often enough so it's always nice when we do.

Tonight the girls are coming over after jazzercise class for which I've been banished from per my orthopedist (knee issues)...otherwise I'd be there first too. I always got hungry after working out, so I want to have various foods for snacking.

Tonights menu options:
cheese & crackers
Mini Quiche
Personal Chocolate Cheesecakes (recipe below)
Popovers with butter and/or strawberry jam (recipe coming soon)

Personal Chocolate Cheesecakes

Preheat oven to 350

Crust:
1 box Pamela's Dark Chocolate Chunk Cookies
1 Tbsp margarine

In food processor, process cookies until crumbs. Add in margarine and continue to pulse until fully combined.

Press into the bottoms and partially up the sides of 6 ramekins. Place ramekins on cookie sheet or inside large baking dish and bake crust for 7-8 minutes.

Filling:
1 package fat free cream cheese, softened
1 Tbsp margarine
1/3 cup sugar
1 tsp honey
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla
1 tsp tapioca starch
1/3 cup mini chocolate chips

In a medium bowl add cream cheese, margarine, sugar and honey and mix with electric mixer until fully combined and no lumps in cream cheese. Add egg, vanilla and tapioca starch and blend again till well mixed, approximately 90 seconds.

Spoon half the batter into a separate bowl.

In another small bowl add chocolate chips. Place in microwave on medium heat for 60 seconds. Stir. If not completely melted, set on medium and heat for another 20 seconds until melted. Always stir between meltings as chocolate doesn't change shape until stirred, so it's melted-ness is deceiving.

Pour chocolate into one of the cheesecake filling batter bowls. Stir until fully mixed in.

Spoon in the plain cheesecake mixture evenly into the ramekins. Top with the chocolate cheesecake mixture. Using a toothpick, swirl the two together.

Place ramekins into a large pyrex-type casserole dish. Fill halfway up the sides of the casserole with water. This is known as a water bath and is useful to keep cheesecakes baking slowly and help prevent the cracks that sometimes form during baking. (Never use a water bath if using springform pans. Springform pans are not watertight.)

Place on the center rack in the oven and bake for 30 minutes. Remove from oven, remove from casserole dish and set out to cool. When cool to the touch, place in refrigerator till time to serve so they are fully set.

Makes 6 personal cheesecakes



I'm still working on my popover recipe, so if it all goes as planned, I'll have some for tonight and I'll take pictures and post that recipe too.

it's a sad day for corn chips

I love Tostito's Bite Sized Gold corn chips. They are thick and great for hearty dips and/or for making nachos. They hold up well to melty cheesy goodness. They stay crispy. AND when you open the bag, the majority of the chips are NOT broken already because they aren't fragile like too many corn chips. They are my perfect corn chip. The only ones I buy. ever. period.

My last 3 trips to the grocery, they have been out of them. the 2nd time I couldn't find them I asked a lady about them and she looked in the back but said they didn't have any. She told me she'd ask the Frito Lay rep when he came by later that day, but the last time I was there, they were also out.

I emailed Frito Lay (which is headquartered about 3 miles from my house) about it. Mostly to let them know that they are the best chips in the whole wide world and I recommend them to everyone I meet and that now I cannot find them anywhere and this makes me very disappointed. (I use a lot of runon sentences when I'm passionate, evidently).

I received a very kind email today from Frito Lay letting me know that they have been discontinued due to slow sales. She also said she'd make sure the sales and marketing team get a copy of my email.

One person cannot cause a nationwide product to come back, but I sure wish it were possible. I really LOVE those chips and I am unhappy I'll never have them again. I do not want to find a new chip.

If you've ever had them and if you also love them, let Frito Lay know. They have a comments form on their website. I believe I sent mine in as a "product compliment"...because I DO love the chips so much.

Here's to hoping I get lucky and can get more of them.

Black Bean Enchiladas

I haven't been cooking. Oh I've been baking like crazy but I haven't been cooking and I kinda miss it. I think I've been getting caught up on not knowing what to make since becoming a vegetarian. Also, Steve and I have been going out to eat or eating something super easy at home like sammiches or wraps (Bread of Life makes a good Brown Rice tortilla).

However, over the last couple days I've been wanting to cook something and as I was laying down last night I remembered how I used to make these really great sour cream chicken enchiladas...and I thought of ways to adapt it so that I can eat home made enchiladas again, quick and easy. This makes several trays of enchilada's. I ended up freezing half and cooking half now.

Fast and Simple Black Bean Enchiladas

Preheat oven to 350

corn tortillas
1 can black beans
1 can Original RoTel
1 can corn and peppers (whole kernel corn with red and green bell peppers)
1 box Mori-Nu Silken Firm Tofu (finely diced)
1 can Enchilada Sauce (read the labels and find one that is GF) I chose a basic Red sauce.
1 can vegetarian refried beans
1 cup shredded cheese

Dice tofu and add to sauce pan. Drain black beans, and Corn and add to tofu. Pour in RoTel (undrained). Stir gently to mix.

Now stir in 1/2 can Enchilada Sauce and 1/2 can refried beans. Stir gently until sauce and beans have mixed and heat until warm.

Spray Pam lightly into large glass casserole dish. Spoon some of the tofu mix into center of one tortilla and sprinkle a little cheese on. Roll up tortilla and place seam side down into casserole dish. Repeat till dish is full...This makes a lot of filling and I ended up with 2 large dishes full...one to freeze and one to eat now! :)

Drizzle the rest of the enchilada sauce over top of the enchiladas and cook for 20 minutes. Remove from oven and sprinkle tops with remaining cheese and cook until cheese melts (5-10 mins).


I also made my enchiladas with handmade corn tortillas. It takes a few minutes longer than buying them pre-made but they taste really awesome.

pre-made GF brownie impression

no recipe today, but I did want to comment on the Kinnikinnick Brownie.

It's delicious.

I can buy it at my local Kroger, which is awesome. I was a little skeptical at first, but I took it from the freezer and let the tray set on the counter for an hour or so and then they were soft enough to cut.

They were still cool. The texture was good, and the flavor is tremendous. It's chocolatey, it's a little cakey, but still fudgey too. I warmed one up in the microwave for just a few seconds and it was fudgier. I won't say it was better tasting, because it seemed the same to me, but if you specifically like fudgey brownies, then heating a little is the way to go. I liked both ways. Hubby likes them both ways too.

One thing I did notice is that if you let them thaw out completely, the top gets a little flakey and separates from the rest of the brownie. If you only let it thaw enough to soften, it's much easier to cut and the top stays put...Also, store them in a zip lock (or other air tight container) and they'll last a week in the refrigerator.

The brownies were so good, and their website has so many GF products, that I might make an order. I might even try their bread...I've not had sliced bread in roughly 2 years. I might get back in the habit of having yummy sammiches.

It's NYE 2008

Out with the old and in with the new. It's the last day of 2008.

Thinking back, this year has been pretty good. I've been gluten free for almost 2 years now, but the first year had a lot of cheating...it was so hard to break some of my food habits, but there's been no cheating this year.

I can remember 2 times when I know I ingested gluten, but it was definitely unintentional and I can remember hundreds of times I wished I could just snatch up one of those delicious cookies from the grocers bakery, but I was strong and didn't cheat.

I had been walking a road to vegetarianism for a long time and had been constantly decreasing the amount of meat in my diet to the point where I just decided it was time to make the switch. I've been meat free for 7 months. I found that switch much easier than the GF diet change.

Tonight is a New Years Eve party at my friends house and I will bring something. Of course wine. I have a bottle of Cab that we'll bring.

My aunt once told me of this super easy recipe for tartlette crusts that I think I remember and should make for an excellent mini quiche crusts so I'm giving it a try.

Mini Quiches!
Preheat overn to 350.

Crust
1 part margarine (1/2 cup)
1 part cream cheese (1/2 cup)
2 parts flour (1 cup your favorite Gluten Free flour that contains Xanthan Gum)
(I used 1/3 cup Arrowroot Flour, 1/3 cup corn flour, 1/3 cup Brown Rice flour, plus 1 tsp Xanthan Gum)

Soften margarine and cream cheese and mix thoroughly. Stir in the flour and cream together. Roll into 24 balls and press into bottoms and sides of mini muffin cups.

Filling
6 eggs
3/4 cup milk
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp pepper
1/4 cup grated colby jack cheese

Sprinkle cheese into bottoms of mini crusts.

Beat eggs, milk, salt and pepper with mixer for 1 minute. Pour into crusts.

Bake at 350 for 20 minutes.

I ended up with a little extra dough and filling so I pressed the dough into a large muffin cup and filled with the remaining cheese and eggs and baked it separately.

The crust is just perfect for these little quiches and would probably make for an excellent "full size" quiche crust too!

This was my first time making quiche and my first time making pie crust. I'm calling this a complete success.

EDIT: edited to add in all the pictures from the NYE Party at my friends house. See pics at my flickr set here.

visiting old friends!

Tomorrow Steve and I are going to visit some friends I grew up with...I've, quite literally, known them my whole life but its been years since I've seen them.

I'm happy to be going to visit.

Since it's the holiday weekend, and I don't have any gifts, I made mini cupcakes to bring and share together.

I wanted to use up the last of the pumpkin puree I had and thought the cupcakes would be a nice treat. I didn't have a recipe, so I made up my own.

I started by mixing my own flour, and made about enough for 2 batches (i'll definitely be making this again, so I'm glad I have so much flour!!)

GF spiced flour mixture
1/2 cup Brown Rice flour
1/4 cup Quinoa flour
3/4 cup minus 1Tbspn Sweet Rice flour
2/3 cup Corn flour
3 Tbspn Tapioca starch
1 1/2 Tbspn Xanthan Gum
dash salt
1/4 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp ground nutmeg
1/4 tsp ground cloves

Pumpkin Cupcakes
Preheat oven to 350
1/2 cup shortening
1 cup sugar
1 cup pumpkin
3 eggs
1/4 cup oil
1/2 cup water
1 Tbspn vanilla extract
1 1/2 cup flour mix

Cream shortening, sugar and pumpkin. Beat eggs separately and add into mixture. Mix in oil, water and vanilla. While mixing, add in flour blend.

Drop by spoonfuls into mini muffin pans. Bake for 12-15 minutes.

As far as my first really-all-my-own-recipe-not-adapted-or-anything, I'm pretty pleased with how they turned out. They are moist, light, and have good airpockets (like good bread) but are light on the pumpkin flavor. Also because I ran out of sweet rice flour, I used a little more corn flour and they are slightly reminiscent of sweet cornbread because of it, I think. All in all, though, I'm still pleased. They are good. The texture is good and the flavor is light.

I'll serve them with cream cheese frosting.

Pumpkin Cheesecake

Always bring at least one thing you can eat.

The highlight of the meal was the pumpkin cheesecake. Even my dad enjoyed it (he doesn't like pumpkin). The recipe is gluten free and delicious.



Crust
1/2 cup Gluten Free Ginger Snap crumbs
1 1/2 cup Arrowroot Animal Cracker crumbs
1/4 cup melted butter
1/4 cup sugar

Use food processor to 'crumb' the cookies and mix with sugar and butter. Press into bottom and partially up the sides of springform (or straight sided cake pan). Bake in preheated 350 oven for 7-8 minutes. Set aside.

Filling
1 package Fat Free Philadelphia Cream Cheese - softened
1 package Neufchatel cheese - softened
1/8 cup granulated sugar
2/3 cup brown sugar
1 Tbsn Tapioca Starch
1 Tbsn vanilla extract
3 eggs
1 1/2 cup pumpkin puree (Libby's canned pumpkin)
3/8 tsp ground cinnamon
3/8 tsp ground nutmeg
3/8 tsp ground cloves

Stir sugars, spices and tapioca starch together. Cream cheese with sugar mixture. Add in vanilla and eggs. Mix until fully incorporated. Spoon in pumpkin and mix until just blended.

Pour into crust and bake at 350 for 30 minutes. Turn down oven to 340 and continue to bake for additional 20 minutes.