Gluten Freendly

I've been...

2011-08-09T15:08:00.000-05:00

I looked up and realized that it has been a year (a year!) since my last post. And quite a year it's been.

I think I got burned out from starting a new blog while writing my thesis and finishing my grad program. And then once I had free time, all I wanted to do was be lazy. Which I am excellent at being, by the way.

But over the past year, I've done more than be lazy. I've spent time with my husband - he finished his grad program in December and we finally had evenings to spend together again, even if just in front of the TV. I've been acclimating to a new job. I've traveled all over the place, spent time with friends (old and new), visited my family more often, and picked up reading for fun again (after reading for school for years, I avoided books for quite some time).

I've been helping my sister get ready to marry the love of her life in October. I've been wrapping my brain around the idea that one of my best friends has a terminal illness and thereby making it my mission to do nothing but have fun with her and let her know how much I love her.

I got a tattoo.

I've slowed down and realized that being involved in a million things and not being home for dinner 4 out of 5 nights a week isn't what makes me happy. I've focused on what DOES make me happy.

And last but certainly not least...I've been growing a baby. For the past 18 weeks to be exact. No easy task, I must say. But in 22 short weeks, we'll have a baby girl. And the way I spend my time for years to come will drastically change.

Looking forward, I'm getting back to blogging again. I enjoy the release of writing. I enjoy learning to take pictures that make my posts more visually appealing. And I enjoy the idea that I might be helping someone along the way. So I'll be posting again - but probably not as frequently as I once did. Quality over quantity is what I want to strive for.

I'm excited to see what this brings...and I hope you'll join me for the ride.

Until next time -
Kelly

Caprese

2010-08-03T10:00:00.004-05:00

Heirloom tomatoes are so pretty. Seriously, have you ever seen a prettier tomato?

Sadly for this particular tomato (but joyously for me), it soon became this:

(Yes, that's dried basil. I did not plan well. Don't judge me.)

I have a serious addiction to Caprese in all forms - salads, stacks, pizzas, pastas, you name it. If it's on a menu, I'll order it. If I have the stuff to make it, I'll make it. If tomatoes are in season...well, you get the idea.

Speaking of tomatoes in season...

My mother has a green thumb. Oddly, I inherited a black thumb from who-knows-where and I can't keep a plant (or a fish, for that matter) alive even if I try really, really hard.

So, my green-thumbed mother decided to grow a garden this year. In one of the hottest summers in Texas in a long time.

It's thriving. Over-producing, even.

I think she's come to visit us simply to pawn off produce. Which I have no problem with.

She's grown cucumbers, jalepenos, beautiful red tomatoes, and the most delicious green tiger tomatoes in the history of the world.

So what did I do when she dumped the fruits of her labor off on me?

I'm telling you - OB. SESS. ION. Add in the love and sunshine from a homegrown tomato and there's no comparison.

A better summer meal than what is shown above does not exist. Period.

Unless you plan well enough to have fresh basil around.

My Big Fat Italian-Food-Filled Weekend

2010-08-01T20:55:00.001-05:00

Weekends are heavenly.

This weekend consisted mostly of a reading marathon.

{Pause to push glasses up on nose.}

After weeks of not being able to get into The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, I got finally got sucked into the story and couldn't put it down. Couple that with multiple glasses of wine, afternoon naps, an action movie at an air-conditioned theatre (holy crap it's hot), and a short trip to the pool, and you have one lazy, relaxing weekend.

Saturday night we engaged in one of our most favorite pastimes - eating pizza. Luckily, there's a great local-ish place about 10 minutes from our house that has gluten-free pizza is BYOB...AND we just happened to have a previously purchased Groupon for. Score!

We each got a pizza, not because we each needed a whole pizza, but because I'm stingy and like to have leftovers to eat later. Hey - it's not very often I get gluten-free pizza made FOR me! My pizza was topped with pesto, artichoke hearts, roasted chicken, tomatoes and mushrooms.

Yeah. It was good.

I pretty much had to go straight to bed when we got home. I ate entirely too much of it. I don't care - it was worth it.

This morning, after a cup of coffee and a small breakfast, The Hubby and I went to the grocery store to beat the crowds (and the heat). There is nothing I love more than looking into my refrigerator after a trip to the grocery store (especially during the summer) and seeing a drawer full of fresh produce and protein.

Fresh shrimp was on sale, as were cherry tomatoes, so we decided on a light pasta dish for dinner tonight. As an extra special treat, The Hubby cooked while I attempted to keep our kitchen cool with this:

No, I'm not being dramatic. Yes, it was (is) that hot.

Did I mention it was 108º today?

Onward.

Shrimp pan-seared with olive oil and garlic (and salt & pepper).

Pan-seared shrimp removed from pan. Hot pan de-glazed with white wine.

Addition of burst cherry tomatoes, salt & pepper, more wine, butter, and more olive oil.

Shrimp added back in to pan sauce, then tossed with freshly cooked pasta.

Fresh basil added at the end.

Hear that? I hear angels singing.

I think I could eat pizza and pasta for every meal. It's so easy to make both healthy and still satisfying in a way that nothing else is.

Add some wine...and you have heaven.

-K

Such is life.

2010-07-27T21:16:00.000-05:00

Hello friends. Freends, if you will. Ha! Get it?

Hmm. Okay. Nevermind.

I have to be honest. I just haven't felt like blogging lately. I know you've missed me. Right?

Right?

...Bueller? ...Bueller?

I've had a lot on my mind. Nothing major - just stuff that makes me gravitate toward laying on the couch with a glass of wine (after a day at work, mind you) rather than flex my creative muscles and sit down and write or play with my camera. A funk/lazy period, if you will.

But now I'm at the point where I've missed this. You. The escape. The fun. All that jazz.

I'm currently sprawled on the couch with my laptop in...well...my lap. Imagine that. Out of the corner of my eye I can see Toby, my precious 6-year-old striped/spotted brown fat tabby cat, also sprawled, but across the living room rug, in an attempt to cool off from the heat. Or to relax. Whatever. His little brother, Hobbes, a grey tuxedo tabby, is pacing the floor waiting for The Hubby to get home from class. This seemingly unimportant stuff makes me happy.

It's the little things. Write that down.

Pretty soon The Hubby will walk in the door, thankful to have missed the thunderstorm that just passed through. For the past month, I've seen him for only about an hour (sometimes two) each day. Funny how life just gets in the way of seeing those we love. I miss him - but I'm so proud of him. Plus, this week is the last week of summer school, and I get him back. We already have a date set for the weekend to go get gluten-free pizza. How great is that?

These past weeks I've had to improvise when it comes to dinners during the week. If I'm not cooking for both of us, chances are I'm not cooking at all. Luckily, I've had dinners with friends planned and meetings that have run late enough to justify eating Cheetos for dinner. What? You don't do that? Liar.

Tonight was a little different, seeing as how we actually have fresh produce and other yummy stuff in our refrigerator. I whipped up a plate of leftover cheeses from "wine and cheese night" over the weekend - Camembert and Havarti with dill to be exact - plus hummus and baby carrots (so easy!), and a few slices of salami. Not a huge dinner, but plenty of food - all washed down with Chardonnay and a chick flick.

Sidenote: In case you happen to be considering it, I do not recommend watching "My Sister's Keeper" at home alone on a rainy night with a glass of wine. Holy cow that movie is sad!

In a few minutes, I'm going to have a night cap of the gluten-free ice cream sandwich variety. Look for a review on these bad boys later on. De-lish.

After that, I'm headed to bed for a little reading and an early snooze-fest. We (as in myself and The Hubbster) acted much younger than we actually are last night, and I've been paying for it all day long. Almost falling asleep in big marketing meetings = not cool.

I promise to be a better blogger - with pictures and everything! - soon.

K

Breakfast in a Pinch

2010-07-08T16:30:00.000-05:00

A couple of weekends ago, my parents came to visit. I love it when they visit us; I love having them stay in our home, regardless of the stress of guests.

The parentals don't come visit terribly often, but when they do, we almost always have something fun planned. This time, we had matinee tickets to see the musical Wicked. My parents had never been to see a big Broadway-style musical, so we were all really excited. (Side note: If you haven't seen Wicked, you HAVE to go see it. It's spectacular.)

After the show, we celebrated a belated Father's Day at Texas de Brazil, which I review here. In short: awesome meal.

The next morning I was craving breakfast (and coffee, of course) at home, mainly so we wouldn't have to battle the Sunday brunch crowds. Having totally missed the boat on any type of planning (typical), I rummaged through our pantry and refrigerator and was able to make this:

My original goal was a frittata, but after realizing we didn't have the right pan in the right size, I ended up with a crustless quiche. Kind of the same thing, right?

Here's what I did:

6 eggs, beaten

4 red potatoes, peeled and sliced thin

1 tomato (mine was fresh from my Mom's garden - yum)

1/4 onion, chopped

1 tablespoon worshester sauce

Butter (I used 2 big pats, but this part is really up to you)

Salt and pepper

Garlic powder

Put the sliced potatoes, butter, worshester sauce, salt and pepper in a microwave safe bowl. Heat covered on high for 3-4 minutes, or until potatoes are just barely fork tender, checking every minute or so.

Lay cooked potatoes out in a single layer in the pie dish of your choice.

Meanwhile, saute your onion until just translucent and slightly browned.

Mix eggs, tomato, onion, and seasonings to taste, then pour over layer of potatoes.

Bake for 30-40 minutes or until egg is firm and cooked through.

Easy! So many good things about this:

You can use whatever mix-ins you have available/leftover/about to go bad/etc.
You can whip it up and put it in the oven and visit with your guests or do whatever else it is that you need to be doing.
It looks really pretty when you take it out of the oven, even though you didn't work that hard. Score!
It is naturally gluten-free. :)

Isn't it fun learning to improvise with your food?

Happy 4th of July!

2010-07-04T17:29:00.001-05:00

Strawberry Blueberry Honey Oat Muffins

Aren't I festive?

I love leisurely waking up in the morning without an alarm clock and having breakfast at home. While it might not seem luxurious, keep in mind that during the work week I'm usually inhaling a Larabar on my way to work and washing it down with water from a plastic tumbler.

Weekends are different. For instance: this morning, I woke up a couple of hours before The Hubby, made myself a pot of coffee, and retreated to our bright and airy sunroom to read my freshly downloaded Emily Giffin novel on my new Kindle.

The house was quiet and still cool before the heat of the day set in. My book sucked me in immediately, and before I knew it, I had been there two hours. My hunger (and now functioning husband) got me off the couch and in the kitchen...where these muffins were living.

I made these yesterday, fully intending to enjoy them today. Fresh, ripe red strawberries and beautiful blueberries, baked into a healthy muffin.

---

Strawberry Blueberry Honey Oat Muffins
adapted from AllRecipes.com

1 1/3 cups gluten-free flour blend (I used Gluten Free Pantry's all-purpose flour)
1 cup rolled oats (I used Bob's Red Mill gluten-free oats)
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup honey
1 cup milk
1 egg, beaten
3 tablespoons applesauce
1 cup chopped fresh strawberries
1 cup fresh blueberries

Preheat oven to 425 F.

Combine all ingredients except fruit and stir until well blended. Fold in berries. Spoon mixture into prepared muffin cups (either greased or using liners) and bake 25-30 minutes or until golden brown.

---

Now here's my confession about this recipe. They browned up beautifully (as you can see in the pic) - however, much to my chagrin, they did not cook all the way through. I didn't realize this until I had two on my plate and tried to take the wrappers off. I suggest that the temperature be lowered to 350-375 in order to allow the muffins to cook completely through and THEN brown.

Not being one to be deterred from eating, I ripped the fully-cooked muffin tops off and ate those...and they were fabulous. Not too sweet, a little punch of tartness here and there from the fresh berries. I will most definitely be making this recipe again.

I'm telling you about this, as always, to let you know that disasters when cooking/baking gluten-free are totally normal! You just have to go with the flow. I plan on slicing my next muffin in half and sliding it in the toaster oven for a few minutes to finish it off. I've done that before with previous disasters, and it's worked really well.

It's all about learning, right?

Happy 4th!
Kelly

P.S. At The Hubby's request, I also made cupcakes today from a mix I hadn't used before. Stay tuned for details and a review!

UPDATE: Check out this recipe and other healthy, gluten-free recipes at Simply Sugar & Gluten Free's Slightly Indulgent Tuesday.

Texas de Brazil

2010-07-03T22:23:00.000-05:00

What better way to celebrate a belated Father's Day than taking your Dad to a place that serves unlimited amounts of meat on swords?

Yeah, that's what I thought too.

Actually, The Hubby thought of the idea, having the advantage of being a carnivore-on-steroids male with the ability to read my Dad like a book.

Anyway.

As I might have mentioned before, I grew up in small town Texas. Just in case this isn't common knowledge, I'll take it upon myself to inform you that restaurants with names like churrascaria don't really exist in that part of the world.

So we approached the subject with my Dad delicately.

"So, Dad. Check this out. We're taking you to dinner tomorrow night for a late Father's Day."

"Oh, cool!" (My Dad is, without a shadow of a doubt, the cutest man alive, and incredibly animated...so yes, he did actually say 'cool!')

"We figured you wanted steak of some sort. We made reservations at two places, so you have a choice. Would you rather go to a cozy, dark, manly steakhouse..."

"Oooh!"

"....oooor...a place that serves you 14 different kinds of meat (insert clarification that this would indeed involve various kinds of steak) on swords?"

"Uhhhh. Yeah. That one." (Said in a similar tone to...'duh, you idiot, which one do you think I want?')

Our reservation was the following night at 7:00...and it went off without a hitch. After sitting down, our waitress took our drink orders, explained the process, and shortly thereafter sent us on our way to the salad bar. Before that, however, I was able to capture her attention long enough to ask about their gluten-free options. She didn't hesitate at all, and said that she would check with the chef and be right back.

A few minutes later, she said that the chef was ready to meet with me to walk me around the salad bar and discuss all of my options. I know a lot of people have one-on-one time with restaurant chefs due to their diet, but this was a first for me. A very appreciated first, and one that will take us back to that restaurant.

If you haven't been to Texas de Brazil...it has the biggest salad bar I've ever seen. They claim it has 50-60 items, but I wouldn't be surprised if it had more. It's enormous. Indescribable, really. The unbelievably nice and patient chef (this was prime-time Saturday night and he was walking me around bowls of lettuce and salad dressing - how cool is that?) gave me a tour of the salad bar, pointing out things I could eat and things I couldn't, and answered all of my questions about things I had read online before coming in. Very impressive.

I ended up with an enormous salad, in case you were wondering. Gluten-free mecca.

Turns out, all 14 meats that they serve are naturally gluten-free. In fact, I was able to eat most everything except:

Mashed potatoes (both on the salad bar and served family-style at the table)
Cheese bread on the table (some reviews I read before visiting said it was gluten-free and made with yucca flour; the chef said it was not)
Any hot items on the salad bar (including pasta and potato salads, soups)
All salad dressings except the Brazillian vinaigrette (plus hundreds - no kidding - of oils and vinegars to choose from)
Croutons, breads, etc (obviously)
Plus a few additional items that were noticeably off-limits, like breaded and/or marinated items

I had PLENTY to eat. Leafy lettuces, beautiful tomatoes, colorful corn salsa, boiled eggs, a variety of gourmet cheeses, smoked salmon, shrimp salad, gorgeous olives of all shape and size...I could go on and on. The Hubby and I are already talking about going back JUST for the salad bar. It's that good.

And that doesn't even take into account all of the meat: various cuts and preparations of beef, lamb, pork, and chicken, pieces sliced at your table off of giant hunks carried on swords by Gauchos. All juicy and delicious. Flip your "button: to green and the meat magically appears. Turn it to red when you need a breather. Brilliant.

We had a great time, and I felt completely confident in everything I was eating. My Dad absolutely LOVED it, and my Mom did too. I highly recommend it - especially if you're celebrating something. It's a fun, different night out.

Texas de Brazil currently has restaurants in eight states, as well as Trinidad and Aruba in the Caribbean. More are on the way. Check it out at www.texasdebrazil.com. You won't be sorry.

Pizza! Pizza! - Part 1

2010-06-30T13:43:00.001-05:00

We've been trying out a TON of gluten-free pizza lately - I'm excited to share it all with you! More posts to come...

Thank goodness for Twitter.

Without it, I would have never found out that my absolute favorite pre-Celiac pizza chain was working on a gluten-free pizza.

It also would have taken me MUCH longer to figure out that the store five seconds from my house had started serving it.

I can't even begin to describe to you how happy this makes me.

In an attempt to explain, let me give you a little history on my love for Mellow Mushroom. The Hubby and I bought our house in 2007 and had to completely re-learn our surroundings. The first thing you find when you move? A grocery store. One one of our first drives between our house and the nearest grocery store (Albertson's, which is now a shiny new super-awesome Kroger that sells Kinnickinnick among tons of other gluten-free goodies), we noticed this funky-looking place called Mellow Mushroom, and the name of the place rang a bell - some guys at work had raved about the pizza, and the name (unsurprisingly) stuck with me.

We went once not long after that and fell in love with it. The best pizza I've EVER had. Beautifully hand-tossed, perfectly chewy, browned to perfection crust with every topping you can imagine available. Great beer selection, laid-back vibe. Our kind of place.

Fast forward a few months into early 2008. The Hubby and I, after much anticipation, started the dreaded but necessary process of remodeling our kitchen. This meant a new routine of microwaveable meals, take out, and eating out at restaurants...and because of its proximity to our house, we ended up visiting Mellow Mushroom at least once a week for several months.

Ironically enough, it was during one of these visits that I finally decided to see a specialist about my stomach troubles that had been rapidly increasing in frequency. I got halfway through my first piece of pizza before literally doubling over with the worst stomach pain I've ever felt. Come to find out, they put EXTRA gluten in their pizza crust (no I'm not kidding) to make it taste as good as it does. That was the last time we went for pizza at Mellow Mushroom.

Until now.

The Hubby follows our local Mellow Mushroom on Twitter. One Saturday afternoon a few weeks ago, he saw their announcement that they were (finally!) serving gluten-free pizza, and we were waiting for a table there a few hours later.

Here's where the cool stuff starts. I asked for a drink menu while we were waiting at the bar, and noticed that gluten-free beverages were labeled as such. I treated myself to a Strongbow cider - and it was awesome. First time I'd tried one, and I definitely had a second one to wash down my pizza.

Once we were seated, I mentioned right away to our server that I would need to order gluten-free and asked if there was a separate menu. She sat down in the booth beside me and showed me this:

It's a blurry iPhone picture (sorry!), but it's a listing of the ingredients of their gluten-free pizza crust (bean flour, rice flour, tapioca flour and starch, xantham gum, salt, yeast, egg, cider vinegar, sugar, canola oil, and calcium-something-or-other that I'm assuming is a preservative or binder), as well as all of the toppings that they have that are gluten-free. See that "Certified Gluten-Free" bit in the lower right-hand corner? Sweet.

So...I ordered my Strongbow along with my very own pizza (only comes in one size like most of the gluten-free pizzas I've had...good excuse to get one all to myself) topped with mozzarella, ricotta, tomato, and spinach.

Sorry - this picture was a total afterthought. I had downed an entire piece and was reaching for a second before The Hubby reminded me that you guys might want to see what it looked like.

I have to say, the experience was great. The staff is well-trained and take cross-contamination issues seriously. After ordering ricotta for my pizza, our server came to double-check that I had indeed seen it on the list of approved ingredients, as the cooks wanted to verify. The best part? The pizza was GOOD. Not the best gluten-free pizza I've ever had, but (hear me out!) definitely not anywhere near being bad, and we will absolutely be going back...soon.

The crust was different than any I've had - the outer crust (my favorite part) was light and airy with a good crunchy outside and chewy interior...things that you don't find often in gluten-free breads. I'm convinced it was the tapioca flour that made the difference.

My usual routine is to eat around half of my pizza, then take the rest home for later. This pizza was awesome reheated in the toaster oven. I'm excited to see if the pizza improves as the cooks get used to this whole gluten-free thing.

I was so excited about our whole experience that I sent an email to their corporate office thanking them as soon as we got home. This is the response that I got back from the "Ambassador of Fun" from our local store:

Dear Kelly,

We are so glad you enjoyed your Gluten-Free experience with us! We just recently started offering Gluten-Free pizza and it's great to already receive such positive feed back. We want you to enjoy yourself to the fullest (literally!) each and every time you come in to Mellow Mushroom. We understand that it can be very difficult for someone with Celiac Disease to sit down at a restaurant and eat a pizza with confidence, it is a pleasure, a priority, and a great compliment for us. Thank you so much for taking the time to e-mail us and please let me know the next time you come in to dine at Mellow Mushroom!

Another nugget of interest: our server told us that it had taken Mellow Mushroom longer than expected to offer gluten-free pizza because the first few recipes they came up with tasted like cardboard and did not hold up to their standards. I'm glad they took their time!

Mellow Mushroom currently has stores in the following states:

Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, Ohio, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, and Virginia.

Product Review: Gluten Free Pantry Chocolate Chip Cookie & Cake Mix

2010-06-21T17:18:00.000-05:00

Remember how I mentioned in a previous post that the awesome folks at Gluten Free Pantry sent me a box full of goodies to try out? Well, now that I finally have some free time on my hands, I'm finally getting a chance to go through it all. First was the pizza crust, now the good stuff - cake! Specifically chocolate chip cookie & cake mix.

As was the case with the french bread & pizza crust mix, the instructions were easy to understand and very few extra ingredients were needed. I opted to make the cake version of the mix, which called for:

Box o' mix (duh)
5 tbsp softened, unsalted butter
2 eggs + 1 egg white (I used three eggs because, well...I'm lazy. And I hate seperating eggs. So sue me.)
1 cup sour cream
2 tsp vanilla

As I mentioned in my little preview of this baking extravaganza (at my house this is as extravagant as it gets these days), I decided to be different and use half of the batter to make cupcakes and half to experiment with cake balls. See how trendy I am?

First up: cupcakes.

Ta da!

Please excuse the lack of a cupcake tin that would potentially differentiate this from a muffin. In typical fashion, I was half-distracted and totally forgot.

Isn't it pretty? It baked up perfectly in the time it recommended on the box (not the case for pretty much everything else I bake) and popped right out of the pan looking all brown and glamourous. I decided to try out Cherrybrook Kitchen Vanilla Frosting on this one...which ended up being more of a glaze once I got it on there. Looks pretty, but didn't taste the way I wanted it to.

At The Hubby's request, I topped the rest of them with Betty Crocker chocolate frosting right out of the can. It made him very happy.

Between the two of us, we decided that the cake tasted like a chocolate chip cookie (understandable, right?) and had a fluffy, almost spongey consistency. The addition of the sour cream was a great touch - it seems to hide the gluten-free taste that a lot of mixes and flours have and it added another layer of richness. Yum.

I cooked the other half of the batter in an 8x8 brownie pan at the same temperature for my very first experiment with cake balls.

If you haven't had a cake ball, you HAVE TO TRY ONE. The Hubby and I first heard of them several years ago at one of our cake tastings for our wedding (pre-gluten-free days). I'm convinced that's how our "cake lady" lured us into choosing her to make our cake for the big day. It's like a truffle...but cake...but brownie-like...but better...covered in candy coating. Oh. My. God.

And if you've never made them before, the process is slightly time consuming but incredibly easy. People will think you slaved...and really, that's what it's all about here at Gluten Freendly. :)

Anyway, The Pioneer Woman has great little tutorials here and here. I got the basics from her instructions and pictures and went to town.

Well helloooo.

I can't even describe to you how great these turned out, but I CAN tell you that my small batch made around 30 of these bad boys and we had them annihilated in less than a week.

I used just plain old vanilla icing (again, Betty Crocker - gluten-free baby!). Oddly (and awesomely), the chocolate chips melted while I was mixing in the icing, resulting in a more chocolate-looking cake than chocolate chip. It was perfect, though!

I'm finishing up another batch of these tonight, this time using Betty Crocker's gluten-free Devil's Food cake mix and a mixture of leftover chocolate and vanilla icing. Don't worry - I'll share pictures and let you know how those turn out.

I have eaten lots of fruit and veggies today just so I can oink out on cake balls when I get them finished. Pathetic? Yep. Do I care? Nope.

So, product review short story? Awesome. Try this mix.

You Know What's Gluten Free? Being lazy.

2010-06-16T22:36:00.002-05:00

Being lazy is pretty much my favorite thing.

Sounds ridiculous and remarkably unproductive in comparison to a lot of people's hobbies, interests, and time-fillers, but it makes me happy. Especially because for the past month I've been experiencing a freedom I didn't have for the three years that I was in grad school. There's nothing hanging over my head except the pile of laundry that will be there tomorrow, the fact that I desperately need to clean out our closets, and the random piles of things that need to be put away. No deadlines (other than work-related and self-imposed deadlines), no meetings to rush to after work, and no major stresses to deal with (like, say, writing a thesis). It has been wonderful to say the least.

Only having my full-time job as a serious time commitment allows me to walk unhurriedly through Target (or any other place of my choosing) after work and still get home in plenty of time to have a glass of wine and make dinner with The Hubby.

On nights when The Hubby is in class, I can lounge on the couch, eat (gluten-free) macaroni and cheese as a main course, and catch up on my "girly" shows that I'm forced to watch by myself, like So You Think You Can Dance (SO good this season so far), Grey's Anatomy, and Private Practice.

Instead of sleepless nights and research, my weekends are now filled with sleeping in, leisurely breakfasts with The Hubby, pool time, naps, and catching up on the endless list of movies we want to see.

I am so thankful for these lazy days. I will never take them for granted again.

I have a list of productive things that I want to do soon in addition to chores: learning to use my new DSLR camera and spending lots of time practicing, organizing the house, cleaning out the garage, hanging pictures in our bedroom...the list goes on and on and on.

Eventually, I'll be motivated to do those things and enjoy the process.

But for now, I'm going to stick with being lazy.

The First Thing I Cooked

2010-06-15T18:13:00.000-05:00

Late last week, Shauna from Gluten Free Girl and the Chef started the discussion (on Twitter) about a community project for Monday, June 14 (Yes, I realize today is Tuesday, June 15. I couldn't get it done yesterday and really wanted to participate!) challenging whoever was interested to describe the first food we ever cooked and how it made us feel.

I'm big on nostalgia. So much so that I was just looking through my junior high yearbook this morning (true story). This challenge immediately called my name.

Here's the thing: I have two pivotal cooking firsts. And because I like to be different (not difficult, as The Hubby has been known to describe me), I decided to write about both of them.

Ironically (given my now-gluten-free dietary situation), the very first thing I cooked on my own was a full batch of chocolate chip cookies, using the classic Nestle Toll House recipe that is still found on the back of every memory-inducing, crinkling yellow bag of chips. For years I had quietly taken my seat at the breakfast bar while curiously observing my Mom making everything from cookies to Christmas dinner, but for whatever reason (which quite possibly could have been my mother's exhaustion and/or her lack of will to argue my insistence) it was time for me to learn the ways of the kitchen.

I don't remember how old I was, but I know I still needed our pink folding stepladder to reach the ingredients in the pantry (always at the top, the same place I keep the baking stuff to this day) and the spot on the counter always used for prep. Mom cautiously took my seat at the bar while I assumed her role in the kitchen, armed with an electric hand mixer from the early 70s, a big shiny metal mixing bowl, a spatula, a cookie sheet, all my ingredients, and a soup spoon (for testing my dough to make sure it wasn't poisonous for the rest of the family, of course).

Mom let me do most everything completely by myself. She showed me how to preheat the oven, but everything else I did by myself. Even dealing with the oven. (Dangerous for a child? Maybe. But I remember her saying some form of "If you're old enough to cook, you're old enough to get used to the oven.")

I remember feeling incredibly independent while putting each ingredient into the bowl. Even more so when my little brother and sister marched in to find out what I was doing, only to be told that they weren't allowed to help but could sit next to her in the remaining bar stools and watch.

I remember turning purple with embarrassment after learning the valuable lesson about having the beaters down in the bowl before turning them on, not turning them on and then putting them in the bowl.

I remember falling in love with the sound of chocolate chips being poured into a metal bowl. Feeling proud as I put big scoops of dough on the cookie sheet, one by one. Feeling scared as I opened the hot oven and slid the cookies inside, and again when I carefully reached in and took them out. Feeling anxious and excited as I watched the balls of dough puff up and brown perfectly, just as I'd known they would do.

And then feeling disappointed when my cookies weren't perfect once they'd cooled.

A roller coaster of feelings, all from making some cookies.

That didn't stop me from falling in love with baking. I baked cookies, breads, and muffins for my family and friends consistently through school, then baked cookie bars and cakes and all kinds of goodies for my college roommates. It was soothing - both the process of preparing and baking and the act of consuming something straight out of the oven that I made myself.

Then came the Celiac diagnosis.

An entirely new food-related roller coaster of emotion followed. At first, relief that someone finally found what had been making me ill for years. Then came panic. As soon as the realization came that I wouldn't be able to bake (or cook) some of my favorite recipes, I felt as if the floor had dropped out from underneath me. For a while, I ate nothing but frozen gluten-free meals, salads, and sandwiches on horrifically bad rice bread, terrified to start over.

And then I got sick of eating cardboard-flavored bread and burning my hands on microwave meals.

I remember going to Central Market for the millionth time, only this time looking for gluten-free bread mix (playing it safe and easy) rather than frozen loaves. I remember feeling completely and utterly overwhelmed staring at the numerous mixes, trying to decide which one I wanted to take a chance on. Feeling excited once I made my purchase (Bob's Red Mill Hearty Whole Grain Bread Mix) and feeling thrilled when I pulled out the bread machine we registered for and finding out that it had a gluten-free cycle. Feeling exhilarated as the bread baked, and as I took the loaf out of the machine to find that it looked, smelled, and tasted like real bread. A feeling of hope.

That feeling still carries me through gluten-free baking experiments that turn out inedible and the frustration of undercooked pasta and entirely-too-crumbly-to-the-point-of-dissolving muffins. To keep trying new things until I figure out what I like the best and what works the best for me. It's what gets me through non-food-related frustrations. It's what made me start this blog.

Life lessons through cooking. A novel idea. I like it.

You Know What's Gluten-Free? FRIENDS.

2010-06-09T11:05:00.001-05:00

I had what one might call an awkward childhood/adolescence, filled with (but absolutely not limited to) the following:

Being entirely too obnoxious precocious.
Being the fat kid.
Being the precocious fat kid.
Having issues with being the fat kid, not eating, then being the super-skinny weird girl that didn't eat.
Being born with incredibly thin hair that my mother permed, thus resembling a poodle during my formative years.
Having two front teeth the size of chiclets (literally), plus an all-kinds-of-jacked-up-grill that required close to four years in braces.
Getting those braces (and matching HEADGEAR) on -- and for -- my birthday. No I'm not kidding.
After getting rid of the braces, being tormented by hellacious acne.
Being the skinny girl with the enormous feet. Yes, it looked like I had skis attached to my ankles.

What that boils down to is being made fun of relentlessly, taking it personally (now it's hilarious, of course), and having very few friends.

But, the friends I did have were fiercely loyal and supportive.

You can imagine that my small social circle made going off to college and meeting people difficult. So I drank a lot to put myself at ease (that's a whole other story) and made some friends. Which ended up being a small circle again.

Then I graduated, got married, and moved to a place where I knew no one. I got involved with the community, and made yet another small circle of friends.

These small circles from all walks of life thus far are filled with some of the best friends a girl could ask for. I consider myself lucky to have many acquaintances (that I love spending time with) and a (large) handful of really great friends.

Last night I met up with a couple of my girlfriends to catch up over a glass of wine (I'm seeing a theme here...). One of them just had a baby, and of course I jumped at the opportunity to see her as soon as said she needed to get out of the house. The three of us ended up spending two hours talking about the "joys" of new motherhood, recent promotions and job stresses, and anything else that happened to come up. I love that.

One of my college roommate's (and best friend's) birthday is on Sunday, and I'm absolutely thrilled to get to see her and another great friend over brunch and hours of girl time and nonsense.

In the next few months, I'm going to Vegas with friends, the Bahamas with friends, and tons of happy hours and summer get-togethers with friends.

Most importantly, I'm married to my best-best-best friend. He makes me happy EVERY day. We have already had adventures (and mis-adventures), and we will continue to have them for the rest of our life together. With him, LIFE is an adventure.

So, what is the point of all this?

First, to express gratitude. I am so very thankful for my friends. They support me, encourage me, and keep me going.

Second, and relevant to this blog (see - there's a point!), is the friendly reminder that there are so many more important and meaningful things in life that don't revolve around having a "different" diet. Yes, eating at restaurants is awkward, having people over is awkward, going to people's houses is awkward, and life in general is a little awkward. BUT...having great people and friends in your life makes that not matter. They make it fun. And they make it MUCH easier to laugh when the gluten-free bread you try to bake ends up disgusting.

Without my friends and Hubby, going gluten-free would have been so much harder. I am so incredibly lucky.

And now, I have NEW friends - YOU!

Kelly

Weekend Warrior

2010-06-07T15:05:00.002-05:00

It has been SO amazing to have two weekends in a row where The Hubby and I had absolutely no commitments. Don't get me wrong, I love seeing friends and and going places and doing fun things, but there's just something so sweet about laying around guilt-free. The past three years I was in school, so there was always a looming guilt cloud hovering above my head every time I wanted to be lazy. There were always articles to be read, papers to write, research to be done, and homework to finish. Even between semesters, I was constantly aware that I should probably be doing something productive like cleaning out closets (still needs to be done, but it will be there tomorrow) while I had the time before school started up again. No more! Doing whatever the hell I want to is so incredibly freeing.

This weekend, The Hubby and I perfected the art of doing nothing...except in the food department.

Friday night, we tried out a new local chain of pizza cafes, Palio's Pizza. Apparently these have been around for a few years, but the one in our area recently opened. It's literally 5 minutes from our house, and they offer gluten-free pizza! One of my friends visited there last week and told me about it immediately, probably because they have this sign all over their restaurant:

The place itself is nothing fancy; it's sandwiched between Starbucks and a yogurt cafe in a generic-looking shopping center, and I probably would have driven right past it had it not come recommended. Inside, you order at a counter, take a number, and wait for your pizza to be delivered to your table. (Side note: one great thing about being gluten-free while The Hubby isn't: I usually get my very own pizza. Yesssss.) It's also BYOB, which is an added bonus! The pizza is cheaper than the gluten-free pizzas at national chains (Uno and Boston's), and they don't charge extra for the special crust. It was crispy and chewy, full of flavor, and absolutely delicious. Mine was the "Classic" - roasted chicken, garlic, tomato, basil, and mozzarella. I refuse to take pictures of my food while sitting in a restaurant, but I took a quick pic with my phone yesterday afternoon as I was about to devour the leftovers.

See? Amazing. I can't wait to go back.

After annihilating my leftover pizza and watching some college baseball with The Hubby, I decided to bake. As I mentioned in this previous post, Gluten Free Pantry sent me some awesome samples, and I wanted to try the Chocolate Chip Cookie and Cake Mix next. Feeling a little snazzy, I decided to make both cupcakes and cake balls out of the mix. Yum yum yum. I'll post details about both in a future post, a review of the product in general. Until then, here's a little sneak peek (shown iced with a little bit of Cherrybrook Kitchen Allergy-Free Vanilla Frosting):

Sunday morning, The Hubby and I both woke up with nasty colds. I hate it when we're both sick at the same time. It took me a while to get up and moving, but after a cup of coffee I decided I was going to make myself an omelet. Sounds innocent enough...except for the fact that the last time I tried to make an omelet it ended up as a scramble. I had some leftover (cooked) gluten-free chicken sausage from Memorial Day weekend that I chopped up and threw in...

...as well as some pre-shredded cheddar cheese and half of a tomato that happened to be living in my fridge. The end result was enormous (I had so much 'stuff' I wanted to put in it that I used three eggs), but surprisingly tasty!

Sidenote: Please disregard the darkness of this picture. I promise the outside wasn't burned. I just bought a new camera (finally splurged on the DSLR) and the two of us (as in me and the camera) are having issues. I'm taking a class next weekend, so hopefully picture quality will improve!

On another note, I may or may not have eaten a total of four cake balls yesterday.

All in all, a great, lazy weekend (other than the colds).

Until next time,

Kelly

You know what's gluten-free? WINE.

2010-06-02T13:00:00.004-05:00

Welcome to the first of weekly posts about the randomness that is my life. Wondering what in the world I'm talking about? Check this out.

It's Wednesday (okay, technically it's actually Tuesday, but I'm posting this on Wednesday...and I'm just so excited...so cut me some slack, okay?)...and you know what's gluten-free? WINE.

Currently enjoying: Ecco Domani Pinot Grigio
(Bad picture - sorry!)

I've always loved wine. I first discovered it in college...granted, it was in a box and very pink, but it was wine nonetheless. Since then, I've learned a lot about wine, and continue to learn with every bottle I buy and every glass I order - which is always a challenge and so much fun!

Here's the amazing thing though: since going gluten-free, my palate has gotten remarkably stronger. I can taste little intricacies of wine that I never thought I would be able to taste. I can differentiate the characteristics that make me like a wine and what makes me dislike a wine. Before, I could just tell I didn't like the taste. Now, I can delineate exactly why and then choose a better variety for my taste. One of the many unexpected benefits of a gluten-free diet!

My personal goal when trying new wine is always to find great, inexpensive bottles that I would be proud to serve to guests. Some are complete misses and taste like cough syrup...but others are surprising, and that's a big part of what makes it fun.

I love pairing food and wine - even with my limited knowledge. I love enjoying a glass with The Hubby after work. I love having girl talk over a couple of glasses of wine. And I love finding a good bottle under $20 to add to the rotation at home.

I will leave you with a wine suggestion. Take it or leave it. I absolutely LOVE Kim Crawford Sauvignon Blanc in the summer. It's a light, fruity, refreshing wine with tons of citrus (mostly grapefruit) notes, and you can pick up a bottle at Target (or a similar grocery store) for about $15. I've found it as cheap as $10. It's wonderful!

Cheers!
Kelly

New! - You Know What's Gluten Free?

2010-05-31T17:47:00.000-05:00

A lot of times, beginning and/or maintaining a gluten-free diet becomes all-consuming. For me, the transition was brutal. I LOVE to eat - and constantly learning how many foods contain gluten still gets me down sometimes. To me, food is: comfort, fun, memories, love, laughter, adventure, excitement, experience, respect, travel, knowledge, celebration...among many other things. When you are forced to completely re-learn everything you thought you knew about something that is connected to so many emotions, it can easily become frustrating.

One thing that helped me through all the frustration (and still does) was stopping every once in a while to reflect on other aspects of my life that make me happy. Food or not. Even the little things. Especially the little things.

Allowing myself this reflection is exactly the nudge I continue to need to make myself try that disastrous muffin recipe again, re-work a family recipe a different way, or try a different kind of boxed macaroni and cheese (my weakness) in hopes of finding the perfect one - rather than getting frustrated and giving up.

So...I'm happy to announce a new part of my blog: a series of weekly posts - each focusing on my random reflections. Stay tuned for "You Know What's Gluten-Free?" - every Wednesday, starting this week!

Kelly

Product Review: Gluten Free Pantry French Bread & Pizza Mix

2010-05-20T15:52:00.000-05:00

About a month ago (maybe a smidge longer...the past few months have whizzed right by), I was contacted by a representative of Glutino/Ian's Foods/Gluten Free Pantry about whether or not I had any interest in receiving and reviewing a few of their products. I didn't even have to think about it! I'm always interested in trying new things in my search for easy, delicious, gluten-free staples.

I received a glorious package with the following inside:

Gluten Free Pantry French Bread and Pizza Mix
Gluten Free Pantry Chocolate Chip Cookie and Cake Mix
Glutino Breakfast Bars in Strawberry and Cherry
Ian's Gluten-Free Animal Cookies

The Hubby and I decided to try the French Bread and Pizza Mix first. We've tried several times to make gluten-free pizza at home, either with a mix or a pre-made frozen crust, all with mediocre results. Either the crust was too dry, didn't cook correctly, or just plain tasted like cardboard and/or glue. However, with this mix, THIS is what we ended up with:

That is beauty if I've ever seen it.

The last dough we tried required rolling out...and it was REALLY FREAKING HARD.

However, the Gluten-Free Pantry mix created dough that did not have to be rolled out and was spreadable - especially after we (and by "we" I mean The Hubby because I had no brain function left after my thesis...and he's awesome) figured out that if greasing a spatula or other spreading utensil made smearing the dough onto the pizza pan more like working with a thick icing rather than dough. The mix makes enough for two large round pizzas - we used half and froze the rest. (I'll update later with how it turns out after freezing.)

With this mix, you just throw your stuff on and bake! No pre-baking required...although we decided that we might try that next time to see if that changes the consistency at all.

We chose turkey sausage, tomato, and onion. YUM! The outer crust baked up nicely, browned, and was just crispy enough, while the crust under the "stuff" was chewy. The flavor? The most reminiscent of a gluten-filled pizza dough that I've made at home yet! Even better? It tastes like "real" pizza when cold (rather than a mouth full of cotton balls and sawdust like other crusts I've tried) and reheats beautifully in the toaster oven.

Uhh...anyone craving pizza?

Kelly

Easy Gluten-Free Vacation

2010-05-12T22:08:00.000-05:00

I'm baaaaaaaaaack.

I want to take a quick second to apologize for having disappeared for several weeks. I was in the midst of the busiest time of the year at work and the final hoop-jumping to complete my thesis process. However, work has slowed down (a little), I finally finished that beast of a paper - and I'm graduating on Saturday! It's a very happy time for me right now.

To celebrate my impending graduation, The Hubby and I took a fabulous vacation: a 7-night Southern Caribbean cruise! We visited Barbados, St. Lucia, Antigua, St. Maarten, and St. Croix (pictured). Heaven! We're already planning our next cruise.

We chose the Royal Caribbean line for several reasons, one being that it's the favorite of The Hubby's cruise-enthusiast parents. The other reason? You can opt for gluten-free meals when you book your cruise.

I did have to inform our dinner waiter on the first night (you have the same one every night, for those of you that haven't cruised before) that I was on a gluten-free diet, but that's all I had to do. The wait staff was informed and took it very seriously. In fact, each night after dinner I was presented with the following night's menu so I could make my choices beforehand, allowing the cooks to alter and prepare my meal separately. I felt like royalty.

Unfortunately, I don't have pictures of any of the meals - I couldn't bring myself to pull out my camera and take pictures of my food while seated with a tableful of strangers. Plus, we were having a good time! I will say, though, that the food was excellent - we were even served lobster on the second-to-last night. Awesome.

Now, granted, I realize that dinner is not the only meal of the day. Fortunately, eating is a major part of cruising. I didn't believe this when The Hubby told me (this was my first cruise, but not his) but I kid you not, there's food available any time, day or night. The main café onboard was our favorite - it consisted of a huge buffet with tons of options, and the dining area was flanked by huge windows as well as a large outdoor dining area overlooking the ocean. I have to say, it was an amazing way to have breakfast every morning.

Speaking of breakfast, this is what I ate pretty much every morning:

Watermelon, cantaloupe, pineapple, grapes, a hard-boiled egg, grilled tomato, and smoked salmon enjoyed with cream cheese so I could pretend I was eating bagels and lox. YUM.

Lunch usually involved more fruit and either a big salad from the salad bar, some sort of deconstructed sandwich-like creation of meats and cheeses, or a random assortment of things I could eat. Not a big meal, but always followed by another visit to the buffet a few hours later for a snack.

I was a little nervous about the food situation before the trip since I had never cruised before; I even packed an emergency stash of Larabars so I'd have something to eat. I only ended up eating one of them the whole time.

All in all, the trip was a huge success. Each of the ports were beautiful, the food was wonderful, and I SO enjoyed being away from work, email, my phone, etc and focusing on my sweet Hubby for a week.

I'll leave you with this - my favorite picture from the whole trip (taken by The Hubby himself):

Maho Beach in St. Maarten

Until next time -
Kelly

Bisquick!

2010-04-25T21:28:00.000-05:00

Okay people. I realize that I have been MIA. Trust me, I would much rather be blogging than doing what I've been doing the past few weeks (Thesis writing for life! I love working late!), but it just hasn't worked out that way. However, because I love you, I'm making a point to write a quick note telling you about some awesome news that I learned yesterday.

General Mills is introducing a gluten-free Bisquick this summer!

I cannot even begin to tell you how happy this makes me. Bisquick was a staple at my house growing up...from pancakes on a regular weekend to sausage balls at Christmas. I am thrilled! Plus, General Mills has done a fantastic job of not only transitioning a ton of their products to gluten-free, but also making their products readily available and clearly labeled. They make it so much easier for me to go grocery shopping without having to go to a specialty store.

Anyway, that's the scoop. For all of you Hamburger Helper fans, they are also introducing a gluten-free line of those.

Hope all is well. I'll be back soon!
Kelly

Eggs Benedict

2010-04-05T11:06:00.000-05:00

Yesterday, The Hubby and I opted to make Easter brunch at home. We slept in, got up slowly, had some coffee (okay I did, The Hubby hates it), and then got to work on our Eggs Benedict. After seeing a recipe for a smoked salmon and spinach strata, we compromised and had a smoked salmon and spinach benedict with skillet potatoes on the side.

Oh my goodness. I can't even begin to tell you have fabulous and rich this was.

The best part is that it is so simple! Time consuming, yes, but simple ingredients. All we used for the entire dish was:

Eggs
Butter
Red potatoes
Smoked salmon (purchased pre-smoked and ready-to-eat)
Fresh spinach
Onion
Lemon juice
Garlic
Salt
Pepper
Paprika
Sugar
Vinegar (for poaching the eggs)

I've never poached an egg in my life, so The Hubby handled that, along with the hollandaise.

He used Alton Brown's hollandaise recipe and it turned out great!

I worked on the skillet potatoes and wilted the spinach.

I had never made skillet potatoes like this before, but let me tell you, it was super easy! Here's what I did:

Cut as many potatoes as you need into small chunks. I used about 4 small/medium red potatoes for the two of us.
Melt one tablespoon of butter in a skillet, then add potatoes and toss/stir to coat them all with the melted butter.
Add salt/pepper/other seasoning of choice. I also added a little bit of chopped up onion.
Cover and let cook on medium heat for 10 minutes or until potatoes are softened from the steam.
Uncover and let cook an additional 10 minutes or until potatoes are browned.

Ridiculously easy and the perfect accompaniment to the benedict. The spinach was easy, too...I just put a little olive oil in a skillet on medium heat, added about 3-4 cups of fresh spinach (it shrinks waaaay down), salt, pepper, and garlic, and stir it around occasionally while it wilts.

I think I got the easier end of the deal. For a lot of the time I sipped my coffee while watching The Hubby get a major workout from whisking hollandaise for half an hour.

After it was all said and done, I had my benedict without any bread -- the spinach, salmon and potatoes was plenty rich -- and he had his over a non-GF english muffin. I have to say, it was a success...and a lot of fun. I really enjoyed spending the time with him and watching him cook. We need to do it more often!

Kelly

Jellybeans!

2010-04-03T23:17:00.000-05:00

Tomorrow is Easter Sunday...and regardless of your religious views, it's impossible to miss the mass amounts of candy in prime view at every grocery store, pharmacy, gas station, and...well...pretty much everywhere. I grew up celebrating Easter, mostly for the Easter Bunny the Easter egg hunts. And the candy. Lots of it.

We weren't allowed to have much sugar growing up (I'm still bitter that I wasn't allowed to have Fruity Pebbles at any point during my childhood...unless I was visiting my super-cool aunt...but that's another story), but in the months between Christmas and Easter, Mom was a little more flexible. Especially between Valentine's and Easter. ESPECIALLY Easter. I can't remember any other point in my life where either of my parents handed me a giant basket full of sugar (read: I didn't have to go beg for it at the neighbors' houses like at Halloween) to enjoy with no consequences.

That being said, I've found that people are very touchy about their Easter candy of choice. Some people, for example, are passionate about their Peeps. I, personally, have only ever enjoyed Peeps while watching them triple in size in the microwave. Others are crazy about the Cadbury eggs. Ick. Something about a runny, sugary inside that looks like a raw egg just isn't appetizing to me. Easter candy, to me, is Reese's Peanut Butter Eggs--which now I have to double-check...some of the eggs have wheat flour, some don't---and Starburst Jelly Beans.

I only crave these once a year - and as you might have guessed, that once a year is now. I scoured the Super Target yesterday for these and managed to snag the last bag that was buried under the "other" jellybeans. You can imagine my excitement and near inability to wait until I got home to open the bag. I even contemplated buying the plastic Easter eggs to fill with these and put in the "Easter basket" I put together for The Hubby, but decided against it because that was just more between me and the beans.

The best part?

Yeaaaaaah! While these might be made of all kinds of sugary crap, they are gluten-free and I love them! It's the tiny victories, right?

Hope you're having a wonderful, if not festive, weekend! Looking forward to our homemade Easter brunch tomorrow morning...more on that later.

Kelly

Short Hiatus

2010-03-26T12:55:00.000-05:00

I have been horrible about blogging lately. Sorry!

I am in the throes of finishing my thesis (finally!), and found out a couple of days ago that my deadline was much sooner (okay just by about a week, but a week makes a huge difference!) than I was thinking. I'm now scrambling to get things done in the free time that I have, and dealing with the occasional (and increasingly frequent) panic attack (or three).

Needless to say, I'm not doing a whole lot of cooking, quality or otherwise (poor Hubby), so there's not a lot to blog about in that department, and my entire life is thesis, so I'll spare you. I'll be back soon! Give me a couple of weeks.

See you soon!
Kelly

Carrot Cake

2010-03-21T21:28:00.000-05:00

Nothing says springtime to me quite like carrot cake. About this time every year I crave it...and I finally made one this year. The last one I made was pre-GF days!

Obviously, I'm all about easy. I was cruising around Albertson's a couple of days ago looking for cupcake liners (which, by the way, they didn't have and it totally burst my cupcake-craving bubble), and noticed a brand-spanking-new display of all gluten-free baking mixes, flours, and snacks. Yes! At the bottom of the display were a couple of Simply Organic mixes that I hadn't seen anywhere before. Seeing as how I was planning to bake up a carrot cake from scratch, I opted for the unbelievably easy Carrot Cake Mix instead. Lazy? Yep. That's how I roll.

I was almost doubly lazy and started to buy a can of the ever-delicious Betty Crocker icing (I might have kept it in the mini-fridge and eaten it straight out of the can in college...but I'm not confessing), especially since they just announced recently that their icings were gluten-free, but after reading the ingredient list and seeing all the chemicals and corn syrup, I opted to make cream cheese icing from scratch. SO glad I did.

Here's the finished product:

This cake was DELICIOUS. In fact, my brother and his best friend came to visit over the weekend and I served it to them without telling them it was gluten-free and they loved it. They didn't believe it when I told them. The cake is super moist, and the icing is divinely rich.

I followed the instructions on the cake mix box exactly (even down to the cooking time), except for one thing: instead of using a cup of shredded carrots, I used a cup of carrot baby food. It's much easier than grating the carrots (no chance of grating a finger), and the cleanup is a cinch. Plus, it adds a little more moisture to the cake, and there are no carrot lumps.

I made the icing from the Cream Cheese Icing recipe in my absolute favorite cookbook, The Better Homes and Gardens New Cook Book. I've had a copy of this cookbook in my possession as long as I can remember. It's such a good staple cookbook. Anyway, here's the recipe (for one cake or 12 cupcakes):

4 oz cream cheese (half a package), softened (I used low-fat and it turned out great)
1/4 cup butter, softened
2 teaspoons vanilla
3 cups powdered sugar

Beat together (on medium speed) the cream cheese, butter, and vanilla until combined and creamy. Slowly add in the powdered sugar a little bit at a time while beating, and continue until it gets to spreading consistency. Make sure fully combined.

After that, I just scooped out the icing and placed spoonfuls onto the top of the (cooled) cake, then spread it around. So easy...but it tastes like you worked all day!

I made this cake on Friday night...and it's now Sunday night and there's one piece left. I think it was a hit.

Kelly

Spring!

2010-03-21T20:16:00.000-05:00

Spring is finally officially here. I don't know why, but this winter has seemed forever long. The amazing snow day that we had a month or so ago was a day I'll never forget, but it's time for some warm Texas weather. There are so many exciting things happening this spring and summer...I just can't wait.

We had our last cold spell over the weekend, so I decided to fit in one last cozy pot roast for good measure. The last time I made pot roast, I was pretty dissatisfied with how it turned out, but this time it was perfect.

This is one of my favorite comfort foods. My grandmother made it, my mom made it, and now I'm trying to perfect it. They did theirs on the oven; I'm trying to get mine just right in the crock pot. Here's what I do:

1 chuck roast, big enough for your family (ours was about 4 pounds)
5 large red potatoes, quartered
1/2 to full small bag baby carrots (depending on what we ahve)
1/2 to full onion (again, depending on what we have - but we like a whole onion in ours), sliced
1 can gluten-free cream of mushroom/chicken/celery soup
salt and pepper to taste

Layer the quartered potatoes in the bottom of the slow cooker, followed by the carrots, then the onions. Season the vegetables. Season the meat with salt and pepper, then place on top of the vegetables with the fattiest side up. Pour the cream soup over the roast, then top with a couple of slices of onion if desired. Cook on low for 7 hours.

That's it! Easiest thing ever, especially when you cut up the potatoes and onions the night before. We usually have a side salad with it for some extra veggies.

No matter what I do, I can't get it to taste like my mom's or grandmother's...but then again, I can't do it with any recipe. What's up with that?

Kelly

Gratin Potatoes

2010-03-18T21:59:00.000-05:00

I don't know about you, but I try to be as frugal as possible at the grocery store while still getting fresh, flavorful ingredients. I shop the sales and use coupons. I've been this way as long as I can remember, probably from helping my mom shop for the groceries for our family of five on a budget. Turns out, it's a good skill to have in order to offset the gluten-free splurging.

This week I did our grocery shopping at Target, one of my all-time favorite places. I even managed to stay focused and kept myself in the food aisles instead of the shoes, clothes, or home goods. Impressive. While wondering through the produce section gathering my weekly installment of fruit (bananas, grapes, tomatoes, and avocado this week), I noticed that they had a five pound bag of red potatoes on sale. Score! I decided to try a new recipe with them - Gratin Potatoes. I found a great recipe in the Williams-Sonoma Bride and Groom Cookbook that we received as a wedding gift - and it was a hit! I split the recipe in half since it's just The Hubby and me, and I made a couple of small modifications. Here's what I did:

4-5 large red potatoes, sliced thin (about 1/8 inch thick)
1/2 cup heavy cream
3/4 cup half-and-half (I used fat-free)
1 teaspoon chopped garlic (in the jar - good stuff)
Salt and pepper to taste
1/2 cup to 1 cup shredded cheddar cheese (goes on top, so use as much as you like!)

Preheat the oven to 400°. After slicing the potatoes (I left the skin on, but that part is up to you), add the slices and all of the ingredients except the shredded cheese to a large saucepan.

Bring the mixture up to a boil, then take it down to a simmer for 10-12 minutes. The sauce will start to thicken and the potatoes will soften slightly. Transfer the mixture to a greased 8x8 square casserole dish, making sure the slices are semi-layered and evenly distributed. Top with the shredded cheese and bake for 15 minutes. When ready, sauce and cheese will be bubbly and potatoes will be tender.

I plan on attempting to make it a little prettier next time...but otherwise, that's it! The whole process took about 30 minutes. While the potatoes were baking I was able to make a yummy salad...

...and cook a couple of chicken breasts, which were also on sale at Target this week. I ended up with a great meal that only took half an hour!

I have to tell you, this recipe was fantastic, and The Hubby thought so too. It was a nice change-up to our weeknight meals. I'm trying to do better about incorporating new recipes and dishes into our routine.

Now I'm working on dessert. More on that later.

Kelly

Frozen Waffles - new find!

2010-03-17T17:45:00.000-05:00

If you haven't picked up on it from previous posts, I LOVE Central Market. For those of you who don't live in Texas, Central Market is a chain of gourmet grocery stores that is similar to Whole Foods or Trader Joes. I grew up in a small town and was therefore oblivious to the fact that Central Market even existed until I was in college. They offer a fantastic variety of high-quality food, and while I usually go there for my gluten-free loot, I try not to do everyday shopping there. It's a little on the pricy side. Or at least it gets that way when you walk past a display of the most beautiful food you've ever seen and decide to buy 12 of whatever was displayed...at $8 a piece. Not that I would do that, mind you.

Anyway, I went to Central Market last week to pick up some gluten-free goodies since I had almost completely run out of everything (well, everything not frozen) I had purchased during my last GF extravaganza. Gluten-free stuff in the basket, check. Yummy coffee, check. I'm walking through the frozen foods aisle, and I find these:

Sweet!

In the past I've always purchased Van's Gluten-Free Waffles because they are really versatile - they're more savory than sweet, so they do well as a substitute for toast in the mornings (especially good smothered with peanut butter and banana slices...mmm). I've also used them for sandwiches in a pinch. I always have them available - I have some in my freezer right now. (Van's also has a blueberry waffle...I've just never tried it.)

The odd thing about these is that you have to thaw them out for a few minutes before you toast them. Never done that before, but hey, why not? So, I waited impatiently as my breakfast thawed and my coffee brewed... a whole new level of impatience. Hungry and caffeine-deprived? Not fun. Then popped out breakfasty goodness.

YUM. Like a lot of gluten-free things, these didn't get super brown (except on the edges), but they DID develop a great crunch. The center was really creamy (but not underdone-tasting by any stretch of the imagination), and the waffles had the perfect bit of sweetness. As suggested right on the box, I drizzled honey over them - something I've never done before with a waffle - and it was a fabulous breakfast. Writing this is making me want some right now.

I'll have to give the Van's blueberry waffles a try to see how those compare - but the Central Market waffles have definitely won me over!

Kelly

Where did this week go?

2010-03-12T22:06:00.001-06:00

Seriously. This week has flown by. Not that that's a bad thing - I've been looking forward to the weekend the whole week, and now it's here!

It's been a good day. I finally dragged my lazy ass out of bed and made it to the gym for the first time in about three months. It wasn't nearly as painful as I was expecting it to be; in fact, it was downright pleasant. I'm looking forward to getting back into the groove of regular cardio and light weights. And not a moment too soon - the pool at my gym opens in two weeks, people!

Since it's Friday, my post-workout day at the office started out with this:

A tall non-fat chai latte from Starbucks. Mmm. I treat myself every Friday (as long as I'm not running super late for work), and it really makes my day. The little things, right?

The day got even better when The Hubby called to say he was taking me to lunch at my favorite sushi spot.

Don't worry - I didn't have any of that gluten-y soy sauce in the back of the picture, I just liked it in the photo. Something to note, though, this particular Japanese restaurant keeps gluten-free Tamari on hand. Perfect.

That beautiful piece of heaven is called a "Dan Dan Roll" - crab, smoked salmon, cream cheese and mango, wrapped with seaweed and rice (duh) and topped with five different types of sashimi (alternating across, some with avocado instead of fish), then topped with chili mayo. Mmmm. One of my favorite things on the menu. I think I could eat this at every meal, every day, forever.

Of course, after my nice lunch I got back to work to a massive pile of emails. Sigh. Onward!

After finishing up the rest of the work day, I headed to the mall for a little retail therapy. Relevant? No. But enjoyable nonetheless.

The Hubby and I went for Mexican food when I got home, and I have to say, my sangria-swirl-margarita, chips and queso, and tortilla soup went down rather nicely. In fact, it's beginning to induce a bit of drowsiness. Before you judge me for going to bed early on a Friday night, I will tell you that I'm getting up earlier tomorrow than I do on a normal work day, so an early bedtime is an added bonus, if not a necessity. So there. I'm just being responsible.

As thrilled as you must be by my culinary adventures this week, I have to tell you that in the near future I'm going to have MUCH more time to cook, experiment, learn, and report...and I can't wait.

Until then - happy weekend!
Kelly

Catching up

2010-03-08T13:38:00.000-06:00

Last week just got away from me! Work is starting to get hectic as we move into our busy time of the year, and my thesis deadline was today, so I've been working on that as well, and I helped throw a baby shower on Saturday, so that took up a big chunk of the day. Also trying like hell to spend any time I can with The Hubby - our schedules are so different with various commitments that we're like ships passing in the night these days. I miss our newlywed days when we came home from work, cooked dinner together, enjoyed a glass (or three) of wine, and retreated to the living room to watch TV and chat the rest of the evening. I'm definitely looking forward to returning to some version of that in the near future, if only a couple of nights a week.

Last weekend I went to Central Market for a few things, and ended up getting some great goodies. I'm pretty bad about not eating breakfast - at least not regularly - but while I was there I was craving cereal, so I ended up buying a box of Nature's Path Organic Mesa Sunrise cereal. I tried this cereal once before after reading about it somewhere, but when I tried it the first time it tasted too "health food-y" to me. This time I liked it MUCH better.

Mmm. Once it warms up outside I'll eat cereal a lot more often - it's one of my favorite things, especially with some sort of fruit in it.

I also picked up some freshly-made garlic chicken sausage while I was there. I've been wanting to try chicken sausage for some time, but never bought it because I wasn't sure how The Hubby would respond to it. He was all for it! You guys know I love my easy pasta, so I cooked it up, sliced it, and put it over spaghetti with Classico's Four Cheese Marinara, shredded parm, and goat cheese crumbles - it was tasty and so easy!

With spring (finally) on its way, the weather here has been inconsistent at best. Early last week it was cold and rainy, while later on in the week it was an absolutely beautiful and sunny 65 degrees. The Hubby has been craving chili, so early in the week while it was cold and rainy I got the treat of him cooking dinner! I'm not a huge chili fan and I definitely never crave it, but I do enjoy it when it's around.

I do like a lot of sour cream and cheese to offset the spiciness of the chili - plus I like the added creaminess...and hello - cheese is my favorite.

One night (I don't remember which one; I can barely remember my name these days) we had leftovers because I was feeling lazy. We had a leftover chicken breast from a meal the week before, so I built myself a chicken burger.

That monster of a sandwich is on an Ener-G Foods gluten-free english muffin, one of my favorite store-bought gluten-free baked goods. Cut this thing in half and pop it in the toaster, and it comes out amazingly soft and delicious. The flavor actually reminds me a lot of a sourdough roll, without the over-the-top chewiness. Anyway, on the sandwich is the chicken breast, a slice of havarti, dill pickle sandwich slices, a huge hunk of tomato, salt, pepper, and yellow mustard. Yes, plain yellow mustard. I love the combination of tomato, pickle, and yellow mustard. Call me crazy - The Hubby does. Top off the meal with some baked Alexia waffle fries, and...yum!

Finally, on Saturday I was one of six co-hostesses for a friend's baby shower. I was in charge of bringing cookies, and since I'm the only one that eats gluten-free, I opted to have a local bakery make them. They turned out precious!

And, after taking a big whiff of The Hubby's cookie that I saved for him and listening to him describe said cookie, I've decided that I'm going to attempt to make gluten-free sugar cookies. Should be interesing....

Hope your Mondays are going well and that your week is off to a good start!

Kelly

Banana Bread II

2010-03-03T21:34:00.001-06:00

Round 2 of banana bread experimenting. Done, of course, instead of working on the last chapter of my thesis. Productive? No. Fun and relaxing? Absolutely.

I should probably be more specific in my interpretation of banana bread this go-round. How about low-fat, high-fiber apple banana oat muffins? Yum.

I was looking around on one of my favorite recipe sites, allrecipes.com, for a cupcake recipe to convert to gluten-free. I came across a couple of banana cupcake, apple banana cupcake, and banana oat cupcake recipes and it dawned on me that I had never thought to use these ingredients together. It also dawned on me that I could make my own low-fat recipe (adapted from compiling a few of the ones I saw) and it would be a super healthy breakfast. The best part is that everything in these muffins is stuff you probably already have.

1 cup mashed banana (I used two bananas)
1/2 to 1 apple, peeled, cored, and chopped
1/2 cup applesauce
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup honey
2 eggs
1 & 1/2 cups gluten-free flour blend (I used Pamela's GF baking mix)
1 cup gluten-free oats
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon cinnamon

Preheat oven to 350. Combine banana, applesauce, brown sugar, honey, eggs, and chopped apple. Slowly fold in dry ingredients until just moistened. Bake in greased muffin pan for 18-20 minutes or until toothpick inserted into center comes out clean and tops are golden brown. (Note, this recipe should probably make about 18 small muffins, but I used my pan that makes bakery-sized muffins and I made six huge ones. These had to bake about 30 minutes, and they probably could have used a little more than that.)

Ta da!

I definitely ate one of these for dessert. And will be eating another one in about 12 hours when I have breakfast. De-lish.

You can really taste the apple in these. Part of me really likes the chunks of apple, and the other part of me thinks I should have cut them up a little smaller. Oh well - at least I know I'm eating fruit in my baked goods! The banana doesn't come through as much, but there's definitely a hint of it in the background. The muffins came out very moist, and they are pretty dense - definitely a hearty breakfast...at least compared to my usual on-the-go type breakfast, if I get to eat it. This is like a portable bowl of oatmeal with apples and bananas and a touch of cinnamon. It's going to go fabulously with my coffee.

Off to work on school stuff. Good night!
Kelly

Product Review: Betty Crocker Chocolate Chip Cookies

2010-03-02T20:44:00.000-06:00

Last weekend I went on a baking spree. It felt so good to be back in the kitchen, doing what I love most. I've been baking chocolate chip cookies as long as I can remember, starting with sitting on the counter helping my mom, then standing on a step-stool hand-beating the eggs and butter and sugar together because I wasn't old enough to use the hand mixer (Mom helped put them in the oven), then making them for all my friends and even earning a (good) reputation amongst my roommates and best friends for my chocolate chip cookie bars.

After getting over the initial shock of my diagnosis and the idea that my beloved baking days were over, I attempted to make chocolate chip cookies by simply substituting regular flour with the first gluten-free all purpose baking mix I ever bought, Arrowhead Mills. It was a disaster. I even cried. (Sound familiar?)

So, I took a hiatus from baking...at all. I'm starting to get back into it and am really enjoying it! I decided to take another shot at making cookies, this time with a mix. I've been very pleased with Betty Crocker's gluten-free cake and brownie mixes, so I decided to give the cookie mix a go. This resulted in mixed feelings.

First of all, the mix is really easy. Dump the contents of the box in a bowl and add butter, an egg, and vanilla. Done. Except, it was incredibly crumbly. There is even a very clear warning right in the directions: this batter will be crumbly. Don't take it lightly - Betty's not kidding.

Not to be deterred, I remembered that all batters and doughs are weird with gluten-free ingredients, so I got out my trusty (and not used for years) cookie dough scoop and went to town. I smooshed (only technical terms on this blog - ha) the dough into the scoop by pushing it (with much more force than I personally think should have been necessary) up against the side of the bowl while scooping, and that worked okay, although the dough separated again once I released it onto the baking sheet. I left them pretty much alone for the first batch, which resulted in very sad looking cookies that I refused to take a picture of.

For the next batch I repeated the above, but after putting the dough on the cookie sheet, I smooshed all together into tighter scoops with my fingers. MUCH better!

Still a little flat for my taste, but that one in the middle is pretty! I let them cool and did the best to restrain myself, but of course I had to go for a hot cookie. Pretty tasty! Only problem - it completely dissolved in my hand. This mix resulted in very fragile cookies for the most part - not my favorite. If you like thin, crispy, fragile cookies, this is the mix for you! (Don't think that stopped me from finishing these off last night, though. While the texture isn't my favorite for a cookie, the flavor was fantastic.)

That being said, I ended up with some pretty good looking ones. Makes me want a cookie. And if you give a Kelly a cookie...

Sorry. I tend to be a little random.

On a related note, several weeks ago (long forgotten until now) I made chocolate chip cookie bars from a bag of Pamela's cookie mix. These turned out great! Not that I should be surprised...everything I make with Pamela's anything turns out the way it's supposed to. Here's a pic to get your mouth watering:

You're welcome.

Kelly

Facelift

2010-03-01T22:17:00.000-06:00

Gluten Freendly has a new look! HUGE thanks to The Hubby for lending his mad skills. Hope you like it!

Banana Bread I

2010-03-01T16:17:00.001-06:00

I've been on a banana kick lately. Which means that inevitably I'm going to have at least two over-ripe bananas sitting in my refrigerator...and probably on multiple occasions. Which means that I'm going to have to use those over-ripe bananas to keep from feeling guilty about getting rid of perfectly good produce. This is where banana bread comes in. I love the stuff, and I always have all of the ingredients on hand (except for the bananas, of course). About a week ago I made my first batch in months. I used Pamela's gluten-free baking mix and the recipe found on her site. I'm pretty sure I've made this recipe before, but it turned out differently this time.

Pamela's Banana Bread (www.pamelasproducts.com)

4 tablespoons butter, melted
1/2 cup sugar or honey
2 eggs, beaten
1 cup banana, mashed
1-3/4 cups Pamela's Baking & Pancake Mix
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 cup nuts (optional)

Beat together butter, sugar or honey, eggs and banana. Add remaining ingredients and mix together. Pour into a large greased loaf pan. Bake in a preheated 350° oven for 1 hour, or until an inserted toothpick comes out clean.

The dough ended up pretty thick, which wasn't surprising, and made enough for one small loaf.

You can kinda see in the pic - I left the bananas kinda chunky for this batch. No particular reason, just felt like it at the time.

Baked it for about an hour and ten minutes (I've found that cooking gluten-free usually takes longer than it says it's going to), and it turned out like this:

I baked this at about 9:00 PM and had eaten a big dinner, so I had to let it sit there and cool completely without snagging a piece. Brutal. The next morning I sliced up a couple of pieces to have with my coffee (one of my favorite parts of my weekend - my morning coffee at home) and it was yummy.

Sometimes I like just heating up my breakfast breads in the microwave, but this time I stuck it in the toaster oven and it got that beautiful brown crust on it. Mmmm. Slathered it with butter and I was in heaven.

What was interesting about this batch of bread was that it was very dense. I don't remember it being that way before. Not necessarily a bad thing, just different. Once I toasted it up, though, it was almost like a banana bagel - crispy on the outer edges and chewy in the middle. The Hubby wasn't a big fan (he said it tasted gluten-free, which I don't think it did at all), but I thought it was great. I am going to try to make a lighter version, though, just not sure how quite yet.

I see banana bread in my future (again)...there ARE bananas in my fridge...

Kelly

Long time no see!

2010-03-01T14:53:00.000-06:00

Well hello there. It's been a while. Nice to see you. What have you been up to?

I have been MIA for over a week now. Sorry! I caught a nasty 24-hour(ish) stomach bug and couldn't eat for almost two days, and then food wasn't appealing at all for a while, so as you can imagine, that made thinking and writing about food incredibly difficult. I'm baaaaaaaaack.

I was diagnosed with Celiac two years ago..and last week was the first time that I've been sick enough to need bland food since then. As you might be thinking...chicken noodle soup, dry toast, and saltines pose quite the problem to a gluten-free eater such as myself, and since you're reading this, probably you, too. The nurse at my doctor's office told me to basically eat a "bread diet" for a few days....uh, what? Luckily I had a loaf of Udi's gluten-free whole grain bread in the freezer (I usually don't keep bread around but had picked some up randomly during my GF shopping spree), but when The Hubby offered to go to the store to pick up the necessities - ginger ale, sprite, soup, etc - I had no idea what to tell him. Being the amazingly talented Googler that he is, he found that Progressive Chicken and Wild Rice soup was gluten-free. Score!

I'm not a huge fan of canned soups, but this one was pretty good and definitely served its purpose. It's also really nice to know that in case of emergencies, this soup is gluten-free. I've also heard that their mushroom soup is gluten-free and can be used easily in place of cream of mushroom soup in casseroles and whatever else you need it for. I'll have to try that soon - I love casseroles and miss them dearly. Side note/rant: stupid Campbell's and their gluteny soups. ALL of them have wheat flour in them. WHY?! Ugh.

So, for the majority of the week I lived on canned soup because it's all I could stomach. Toward the end of the week I was tired of eating starches, so I made two ginormous salads at two different salad bars. Mmm.

Are you still awake? Yes, I realize my week was boring. But I'm back to my old self! And, I actually get to go home before 9:00 PM every night this week, so dinner at home is something I'm really looking forward to.

Kelly

Girls Night at PF Chang's

2010-02-19T16:49:00.001-06:00

A couple of girlfriends and I meet up for dinner roughly once a month to catch up, drink wine, and usually (although not lately since one of them is pregnant and I have to work on my thesis every night these days) drink more wine. It's definitely a night that I look forward to! Last night we went to PF Chang's - somewhere that I don't go to nearly enough considering how seriously they take their gluten-free menu.

It's quite impressive - the gluten-free items are served on a different style of plate than items from the "regular" menu to differentiate it for the servers, and they bring you gluten-free soy sauce. What's also nice is that they have the gluten-free menu printed right on the back of their usual menu, so you don't have to go through all the annoying explanations and get the puzzled looks from the server - it's all right there, and the waitstaff and cooks have all been extensively trained. It's wonderful. About as friendly as you can get as far as eating out on a gluten-free diet.

Anytime I order from PF Chang's, I usually go for something that comes with their brown rice. I LOVE the way they cook their brown rice - it's really fluffy with the best bite to it. I've tried to duplicate it at home, but I just can't do it. Even with my fancy-schmancy rice cooker. Last night I was starving when I got there, so I went for their Singapore Street Noodles - a giant dish of rice noodles with shrimp, chicken, and vegetables, all in gluten free sauce. I have to say - I wasn't terribly impressed with the dish. I thought it was really dry and kind of bland - which is rare for them, so I'm hoping it was just an off evening. The noodles were good - they reminded me of the angel hair pasta that I miss so much - very thin and tender. However, there wasn't enough sauce (at least for me), and the chicken was dried out. The shrimp was good, though! I doused the noodles with a healthy dose of (gluten-free!) soy sauce and it was much better. Don't worry - I ate the entire thing. I felt like a cow when I walked out of there, but I didn't care. Regardless of it being a little dry, noodles are such a comfort food, and with the soy sauce addition, it was pretty good.

The presentation was pretty - but I didn't take a picture because for some reason I was embarrassed to. Oh yeah, and I was so hungry that I kinda forgot when the food got to the table. Oops.

I definitely think I'll give this dish another try - it has such potential, and everything I've ever had from PF Chang's I've absolutely loved, so it has to be a fluke, right?

Anyway, it's Friday afternoon and pretty much time for me to call it a day. At least a work day - I plan to do some work on the ol' thesis tonight. A rockin' Friday night if I do say so myself. ;)

Happy weekend!
Kelly

Sprinkles' GF Cupcakes

2010-02-16T20:57:00.001-06:00

About two weeks ago I found out that Sprinkles was going to start offering a gluten free cupcake. Hello! Then I found out that the one flavor they were going to offer was red velvet, introducing it around Valentine's Day. Brilliant! Considering that they charge $3.25 per cupcake or $36 per dozen, Valentine's Day was the perfect way to get The Hubby to go for it. So, after getting him over the initial shock of paying a small fortune for a baked goods, we ordered a dozen online (6 for me, 6 for him) to be picked up the day before Valentine's.

Sprinkles came to my area after I was already gluten free, so I can honestly say that I've never even seen one of these stores. When we got there to pick up our order, there was a huge line out the door! Apparently it's always like that, especially on the weekends since it's located in a trendy shopping center. Luckily, we got to completely skip the line to get our already boxed cupcakes! I was pretty proud of myself for having the foresight to order ahead of time. And don't worry, I mentioned that to The Hubby a couple of times. :)

One thing that is VERY important to take note of, especially for those who are more sensitive to gluten than I am: Sprinkles does NOT bake their gluten free cupcakes in a separate kitchen, so cross-contamination is an issue for those who have severe reactions to tiny amounts of gluten. The cupcakes are baked in a lining, so that reduces the risk for cross-contamination, but of course there is always the mixers, bowls, icing thingys, etc. I think, though, that if the demand is high enough, a separate kitchen might happen in the future, as they are aware of the issue. There was a hand-written note on my order reminding whoever was working to make me aware of the situation, which I found comforting. As I've mentioned before, cross-contamination is rarely an issue for me, so I wasn't concerned.

Now, onto what I thought about them...

As you can see, I could not restrain myself. I opened the box to find six perfectly iced, awesome smelling red velvet cupcakes with cute little "G"s on the top, and I had to try one immediately. This was in the car, driving away from the bakery. Crumbs were flying...it wasn't pretty. I have no willpower.

Once I got the remaining cupcakes safely home, I was able to take a closer look at them. So pretty! Iced perfectly thick. The aroma was to die for. One thing: while the "G" is very cute and a nice touch since all of their cupcakes have unique tops, do not try to eat it. I'm sure it's technically edible, but I nearly broke a tooth and when The Hubby tried it, he thought for a split second that it might be plastic. Haha.

See the thick icing? Yum. This cupcake was exactly the way I remember gluten filled cupcakes being. It was moist, rich, light and fluffy, and the icing was phenomenal. I, for one, am a huge cream cheese fan...and adding sugar to it to make icing? Yes, please.

I may have eaten two in one day. Within about three hours of each other.

Since then, I've successfully restrained myself. Yesterday I only had one after our wine and cheese festivities. I haven't had one yet today. I think I deserve a pat on the back.

Since I've never had a Sprinkles cupcake, I don't have anything to compare this to. All I know is that these cupcakes are making me very happy. However, The Hubby ordered one red velvet gluten-filled cupcake, and he sampled one of mine (aren't I generous?) right after tasting his. He said that the texture of the gluten free version was a little grainier than the gluten filled one, and that there was a slight flavor in the gluten free one that made it different. I personally think that a lot of gluten free items have an earthier flavor that their gluten-y counterparts, and after I mentioned that to him he nodded in (slight) agreement. He also said that now that he is seasoned in his exposure to gluten free food that he would have been able to tell that mine was gluten free had he has tasted it first. That being said, since I haven't had "regular" baked goods in almost two years, I didn't taste the things that he did and decided on my own that these cupcakes are pure heaven.

There's a local bakery in town that also does gluten free cupcakes for the exact same price. I can't wait to try those in the near future and compare! I also am really looking forward to attempting some cupcakes of my own. I can't wait until I have more free time to devote to new recipes! Only three months until then.

Happy cupcake-ing!

Kelly

Valentine's Day

2010-02-15T16:12:00.002-06:00

Valentine's Day -- or weekend, rather -- was a huge success (at least in my eyes) this year. On Saturday, The Hubby and I ran errands together, which I always enjoy (not sure he does sometimes) - especially when one of the errands is purchasing furniture at Ikea. :) Sunday we celebrated Valentine's day by going to a late brunch and stuffing ourselves silly while listing to a fabulous jazz band. The rest of the afternoon was spent catching up on schoolwork (The Hubby) and running errands (me) - typical Sunday activities. Later in the evening, we watched the Olympics in our PJs, sipped on a yummy Cabernet, and snacked on 3 different cheeses (camembert, aged Irish cheddar, and dill havarti from top to bottom) and some summer sausage and prosciutto.

It was a fantastic way to end the day and spend time with the love of my life.

The leftovers will almost definitely be dinner for me tonight.

Kelly

Gluten Free Manners

2010-02-13T23:01:00.001-06:00

I used to think Twitter was the dumbest thing out there. Who on earth would want to be constantly updated about the snooze-fest of my daily life? Even better, why would I want to share the mind-numbing details? I've learned (thanks in no small part to The Hubby) that it's such a great resource (and also that my life is nowhere near boring)! Without it, I wouldn't have found this great article:

http://celiac-disease.com/what-are-gluten-free-manners/

I think Ms. James makes several excellent points in her article. I'll let you read to decide what you think.

My main takeaway was this: all of us celiacs and/or gluten free eaters have different "rules" that we live by. What works for one person might make another sick, and what makes one person sick might be completely okay for the next person. The most important thing is that we continue to keep the valuable information flowing without judging others for their food lifestyles, focusing on what works for our individual health instead of others'.

...and I'm stepping off of my super-sweet soapbox now.

On a random note, we've been watching the Olympics all night. Why is it so hard to tear your eyes from the TV when it's that time of year?

Happy Saturday!
Kelly

PS. If you want to follow ME on Twitter (and you know you do)... http://twitter.com/glutenfreendly

Snow Days = Cozy Eats

2010-02-12T21:19:00.003-06:00

It's been a crazy week. To top it off, I woke up on Thursday morning to an inch of snow.

Considering the blizzards going on in other parts of the country, that might not seem like a big deal to you. However, I live in Texas, and have my entire life. Any time I've ever seen snow (other than a few ski trips in high school and college), it's been incredibly brief, usually mixed with rain or sleet, and it never "sticks" long enough to truly enjoy it. All of that has changed! It snowed for 24 hours yesterday -- we got a FOOT of snow. A record-breaking 12.6 inches to be exact. The best part is that we weren't supposed to get anywhere near that much, but the conditions were just right for a beautiful winter wonderland. This is what it ended up looking like:

I still can't believe it.

The best part about this whole thing is that because Texas is not set up to deal with this kind of weather event, I was snowed in. No work (at least in the office) for the past two days! Instead, I opened the curtains and found a seat with my laptop facing the window, and worked in my sweatpants, no makeup, and a ponytail. Glorious. And I get Monday off! And it's Valentine's weekend. AND I get to go to Ikea AND pick up my (pre-ordered for the big weekend) gluten free red velvet cupcakes from Sprinkles tomorrow! Needless to say, I'm a happy girl.

Finally. I've been a little grumpy (okay maybe a lot grumpy) for a few weeks now. Brutal. Lots of stress with school (almost done!), work (busy season...ugh), and personal stuff. But I'm better now. But that's beside the point.

I am very quirky. In fact, I'm starting to wonder if The Hubby thinks I'm neurotic. One of my quirks: I am obsessed with weather. OB-SESSED. To the point where I think in my previous life I might have been a storm chaser. I sit in my office with all the lights off except for a dim lamp when there's a storm going on outside. I plan my meals based on weather. I have four weather apps on my iPhone. And I have a crush on the local weather guy. Okay, not a crush, but I think he's pretty awesome and I follow him on Twitter. Much to my delight, this week started out cold and rainy with more of the same in the forecast, so all of my dinners this week have been super cozy. (Plus I was actually at home for dinner every night this week - a first in months - bonus!)

Monday, I put a pot roast in the crock pot so it would be ready when I got home. I had to change up my family recipe a little based on what I had in the pantry, so it turned out a little drier than usual, but it sure was pretty.

Tuesday, I cooked one of my favorite (and definitely one of the easiest) meals - pasta and a vodka sauce with sausage. Before you get all impressed, here are my ingredients:

That's right. Easy. Super easy. As in my unborn children will eat this often and like it because it takes all of 20 minutes to put together, and that includes boiling the water. And it's CHEAP, with ingredients that are all readily available at most grocery stores. I got all of my ingredients at Super Target - even the pasta.

This stuff is all natural, really tasty....and it says gluten free right on the jar!

Cook and drain the pasta, brown and drain the sausage (and put it back in the pan), deglaze the pan with the sauce, season to taste, then put over the pasta of your choice. I like to add shredded parmesan cheese and some goat cheese crumbles for creaminess. So yummy. So cozy.

On Wednesdays, The Hubby has class, so I'm usually on my own for dinner. Which means that quite often I have some form of macaroni and cheese. A lot of it. This time, I made Annie's Gluten Free Rice Macaroni and Cheese. I'm a cheese fanatic, so I added shredded cheddar and...Cheez Whiz. Yes, you read that right. I'm a grown woman who loves Cheez Whiz.

It was cheezy, gooey, warm, cozy (theme?) deliciousness. I ate the whole batch. While watching last week's Grey's Anatomy and Private Practice. Bliss.

I don't think there's anything better than macaroni and cheese. I don't care what anyone says.

Anyway, even though I had a lot to catch up on, I feel like I'm rambling...so I'm going to get back to my school stuff. On a Friday night. Jealous?

On another note, I read something a few minutes ago that said that currently there is snow on the ground in 49 states - all but Hawaii. 49 states!

Kelly

Pancakes!

2010-02-08T20:51:00.002-06:00

I mentioned in a previous post that I had been craving pancakes for a while. Well, The Hubby came through for me and made me some heavenly apple-cinnamon pancakes for breakfast yesterday. It was a team effort - I made the batter and he actually cooked them. I've tried to make pancakes several times over the course of my life, and have failed miserably every single time. I think it's the flipping - anything that requires any sort of coordination usually ends in disaster when I come close to it. Anyway...I used Pamela's Gluten Free Baking and Pancake Mix (it has never let me down) and a variation of the pancake recipe found on her site. Here's what I used (makes about 6 pancakes):

-1 cup Pamela's Baking and Pancake Mix
-1 large egg
-3/4 cup water
-1 tablespoon oil (I used vegetable)
-1 grated granny smith apple (I literally just used a cheese grater - it was messy, and I'm not sure if that was technically the correct tool for this, but it worked)
-1/4 cup brown sugar
-1 teaspoon cinnamon
-1 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice (I always forget I don't have nutmeg but I have this - it was perfect)
-1 teaspoon vanilla

The initial batter was pretty thick, but we tried it out anyway with one test cake. It didn't cook quite right, but I must say, it was still pretty delicious.

It was a little raw in the middle (you can really see it in the bite on the right) from the batter being too thick to really spread out at all, so we added a little bit more water. It was still thicker than "normal" pancake mix, but as I've learned, gluten free batters and doughs are the exact opposite in consistency as their gluten-filled counterparts (batters are usually thick and doughs are often thin and runny), so I wasn't concerned. You can get an idea of the thickness of the batter right after The Hubby got the next round on the griddle:

At this point I was satisfied with how everything was going, so I grabbed my coffee mug (full of "Cookiedoodle" hazelnut cinnamon coffee with vanilla sugar-free creamer....yummy) and let The Hubby do his thing. I walked back in a few minutes later to this beautiful sight:

Wow! I was pretty excited at this point, and promptly began salivating at the idea of tasting these perfectly browned pieces of amazingness. Drum roll please...

Ta da! I was not disappointed. They tasted just as good as they looked. Dense but still fluffy, sweet but not too sweet, a little bit of tart here and there from the fresh apple, the warm flavors of cinnamon and vanilla and touches of clove, ginger, and nutmeg from the pumpkin pie spice...and a little bit of a crust formed on each side...perfect! There were two left over (I had completely forgotten that The Hubby doesn't even like pancakes that much, so he only had one. Bad wife.), so I had one for breakfast this morning. I tasted it cold (I used to LOVE cold pancakes right out of the fridge when we had leftovers when I was growing up) and it was still delicious. I ended up zapping it in the microwave for about 20 seconds and ate it dry - and it was the perfect quick breakfast for a busy morning. I have one more left...mmmm.

I can't tell you how exciting it was that these pancakes turned out so well. I've had many an inedible gluten free adventure, but this one was just delightful. :)

Craving pancakes yet?
Kelly

A quick hello - and a fun tip

2010-02-06T21:44:00.004-06:00

I just realized that it has been almost a week since my last post. Okay, so it's only technically been 4 days, but it seems like it's been a week! I'm really getting in to a hectic time trying to meet deadlines for my thesis - but I am going to do my best to post regularly.

That being said, this post is just to check in and say hello before I get back to the grind on the ginormous paper from hell. However, I do have a fun tip that I recently learned when it comes to gluten free cooking. We eat a TON of pasta at our house - I'm talking at least once a week - and we've tried many of the different kinds of rice, corn and quinoa pastas, all of which have been tasty. (I'll talk more about my favorites later.) One problem though: the spaghetti/fettucini/angel hair style pastas that I crave stick together while they cook and you have to stir them constantly. It might be common sense to more seasoned cooks, but I've found that if you add a drizzle of olive oil to the water before you add the pasta, it coats the pasta just enough to keep it from all sticking together, then the residual oil washes off when you drain and rinse the cooked pasta. Easy! Took me almost two years to figure that one out, so I'm now sharing with you. :)

Have a happy Saturday - and if I don't have a chance to post, enjoy the Super Bowl (and the parties that go with it)!

Kelly

Plan-D Flourless Muffins

2010-02-02T12:23:00.004-06:00

While at Sprouts Farmers Market on Saturday, I stumbled upon a gluten free first for me - Plan-D Apple Cinnamon Flourless Muffins. I've seen the gluten free muffins from Udi's and Whole Foods, but these were different. Flourless! I've found that gluten free bread items tend to be a little heavy for me, especially for breakfast, but these were fabulous. They were a good size - about the same size of a muffin you'd bake at home - and the texture was dense and crumbly on the top (in a good way) from the main starchy ingredient, oat bran. It wasn't as apple-y as it was cinnamon-y, which I liked, and it went wonderfully with my vanilla hazelnut coffee. Here's the best part - they were baked just perfectly! The very center was the tiniest bit underdone (which is how I love my baked goods) and chewy, and - I kid you not - reminded me of the very center of a dense cinnamon roll. YUM!

I probably won't get to have these very often unless Central Market starts carrying them (the closest Whole Foods is 25 minutes away; Sprouts is 40 minutes from my house), so I'm really enjoying them as a special treat. Can't wait until breakfast!

Speaking of breakfast, I have been desperately craving pancakes lately. I haven't had them in almost two years (since before my diagnosis) and they just sound so yummy. Any recommendations for a good mix? I'm thinking of trying Pamela's, since everything else of hers is so tasty.

Until next time,
Kelly

GF Jackpot!

2010-02-01T10:41:00.009-06:00

This weekend was really nice. Had dinner with friends on Friday night (Mexican food - one of my favorites. Had a delicious tortilla soup. Mmm.), lunch with a girlfriend on Saturday, a little shopping, some quality at-home quiet time, got some work done for school, book perusing at Half-Price Books, and dinner and wine with The Hubby on Sunday. On top of all of that goodness, I made my very first visit to Sprouts Farmers Market (the closest one is 45 minutes from me, so I've never been) and came home with TONS of gluten free (and very friendly) wonderfulness! Here's what I brought home:

-2 Amy's rice crust full-size pizzas, one cheese and one spinach
-2 Glutino single-serve pizzas, one cheese and one spinach and feta
-1 Amy's frozen rice macaroni and cheese (a staple at my house)
-1 Glutino frozen macaroni and cheese (never had this one before - I'm excited to try it)
-1 box of Annie's Rice Pasta and Cheddar macaroni and cheese (are we seeing a pattern here?)
-1 box of Kinnickinnick animal crackers
-2 frozen GlutenFreeda vegetarian bean and cheese burritos (never had these before, but I'm pumped about these too)
-1 Glutino Pad Thai with chicken meal
-1 package Ener-G english muffins
-1 loaf of Udi's whole grain sandwich bread
-1 package Food for Life Whole Grain Brown Rice Tortillas
-1 box of Mary's Gone Crackers, onion flavor
-1 package Tinkyada brown rice & spinach spaghetti
-1 package Plan-D flourless apple cinnamon muffins
-1 frozen Organic Bistro Chicken Citron meal
-1 frozen Organic Bistro Sockeye Salmon Cake meal
-2 SoyJoy bars (never had them and want to try)
-6 different flavors of Lärabars - PB&J, PB cookie, cinnamon roll, chocolate coconut, pecan pie, and coconut cream pie (never had these either!)
-2 Think Thin bars - one brownie crunch, one chocolate fudge

A couple of extras that are naturally gluten free:
-1 lb of amazing "Cookiedoodle" coffee - roasted with cinnamon and hazelnut - sooo good
-1 package of dill havarti - one of my very favorite cheeses
-1 summer sausage - for the hubby, because I'm just that nice

I told you it was a jackpot! I now have enough gluten free groceries to last me quite a while. The best part is that all of the stuff listed above is just for me - it doesn't include the grocery run I did on Sunday for meals for both of us for the week and all of the great produce I got. :)

Kelly

TGIF

2010-01-29T16:49:00.004-06:00

It has been an insane couple of weeks. Work is crazy, the pressure is on to finish my thesis for grad school, and my personal life and commitments - while lots of fun - are hectic as the new year is getting started. The nice thing is that as of today, I think things are slowing down enough to let me breathe some. It's a cold, rainy friday, and I was able to work from home today and take it easy. I haven't gotten out of my sweatpants, and I was able to squeeze in a nap to compensate for last night's fitful sleep. It's been a nice day.

One of the best things about working from home is the pace. I don't have to rush to get out of bed in the morning because I only have to walk a few steps to my computer. I can make a pot of coffee and enjoy it in my house, rather than at a desk with glaring fluorescent lighting. Same with my lunch. And an added bonus: Since The Hubby works from home every day, I get to see him, too.

Lunch today was another one of those "what-am-I-going-to-eat-since-I-haven't-gone-grocery-shopping" kind of meals. The end result wasn't terribly pretty, but it was tasty. I made a caesar salad out of romaine, caesar dressing (duh), parmesan cheese, sunflower seeds, chickpeas, a can of tuna, half an avocado that I had leftover from another day's lunch, and some salt and pepper.

Like I said, not terribly pretty (or pretty at all for that matter), but it tasted awesome. Rich, salty, crunchy, chewy, creamy, crisp...and packed full of protein and other good for me things. I must say, I was pretty impressed with what I threw together. Of course now I have to remember to replace the can of chickpeas for future emergencies. We'll see how that goes.

Tonight we're headed to a birthday dinner for one of our new friends. Luckily, the birthday boy chose mexican food (not surprising considering the majority of the population loves it here and we have lots of yummy choices), which makes my dining experience much easier. We're really looking forward to it.

Happy Friday!
Kelly

You would think...

2010-01-27T16:59:00.003-06:00

...that after 2 years of maintaining a gluten free diet that I would learn not to assume.

I have gotten better about it, but every so often I catch myself forgetting to read labels before I buy something at the grocery store or assuming that a certain food doesn't contain gluten. I get comfortable and forget that I have to be careful.

Case in point - pie. My department at work does birthday pie instead of birthday cake, which I originally thought was awesome, considering I assumed I could just eat the filling of the pie, avoid the crust, and be fine. Which has worked in the past with cheesecake and other delicious deserts contained by a shell of gluten. (See - this is where my gluten line is fuzzy where others' are very black and white. Please don't hate me or judge me because I still eat pie out of a gluten-y shell and consider that okay for the most part.) Anyway, yesterday was birthday pie day for one of my beloved coworkers, complete with both chocolate cream pie and coconut cream pie to choose from. YUM! Being one to always find an excuse for eating something bad for me, I opted for the choice that was clearly the healthy option - coconut (hello, it's a fruit!) - and had my way with the absolutely to-die-for filling and perfect whipped cream topping. I even had a second piece today from the leftovers. Then it dawned on me that I ought to find out if the filling has gluten in it - and after lots of google searching and frustration, found out that I basically have a 50/50 chance of one of the ingredients being wheat flour...or cornstarch. Fingers crossed for cornstarch. I have a call into the bakery (who of course thing I'm nuts) and will hopefully find out tomorrow.

Ugh. I hate that I do this sometimes. I feel like there is still so much to learn! It's really hard to completely change your lifestyle after 25 years of living it one way. Maybe by the time I'm 50 I'll have all this figured out. At least it doesn't make me super sick - although that doesn't mean it's not doing damage or causing me a sweet rash on my elbows (more on that later).

Hope your luck is better than mine today!
Kelly

Amateur! Oh and I cooked...

2010-01-26T12:48:00.004-06:00

So far, I'm loving this blog. Problem is, I'm a newbie. Amateur. Wannabe. I think of these great posts and then I forget to take pictures of what I'm posting about or even forget to post at all. There's a chance I should have thought about how horrible my memory is before attempting to document anything. :)

Anyway, last night I cooked for the first time in...well, I honestly have no idea when the last time I cooked was. The Hubby and I have been so busy (and on different nights, no less) that it just hasn't been worth it. So, last night I made pork tenderloin, white rice, and caesar salad. Sounds boring, but I jazzed it up. I coated the pork tenderloin (a Hormel tenderloin, to be specific - and it said "gluten free" right on the package!) in an organic dijon mustard that I had picked up a while back for another recipe - really globbed it on - with some salt and pepper, then baked it for about 40 minutes and let it rest for 5. It turned out perfect and had a really good, tangy flavor. The Hubby won't eat brown rice - as much as I try to convince him to - so he cooked up a batch of white rice in our rice cooker, which is my new favorite appliance. Easy! The caesar was just romaine lettuce, parmesan cheese, sunflower seeds, and a few chopped raw walnuts thrown in for a good crunch, tossed in Cardini's caesar dressing. Delish! The whole meal took very minimal prep and was super easy to clean up - it was about as friendly as you can get! I wish I had remembered to take a picture of it - I was pretty proud of myself once I plated it up. Oh well.

I promise I'll get better at this.
Kelly

Breakfast On The Go

2010-01-25T10:34:00.006-06:00

I'm not a huge breakfast person - unless I don't have to go to work and can eat a big brunch - but this morning I was starving! The Hubby and I have both been incredibly busy with work, school, and social events over the past week, so we haven't gone to the grocery store in at least that long. After digging around in the refrigerator and pantry, I finally found this:

Yum! I put a few handfuls of this glorious stuff in a ziploc bag and headed off to work, eating it on the drive. General Mills came out with their new re-worked Chex recipes mid 2009, and I love it. I was a HUGE cereal person before being diagnosed with Celiac Disease, and was immediately turned off of a lot of the gluten free cereal options because they taste like styrofoam. The Chex cereals taste exactly like "real" cereal. Mmmm. Plus, it's at every grocery store, so I can find it without having to make a trip to a specialty store. I still want to try out some of the Chex Mix recipes on their website. Maybe Super Bowl sunday? :)

Have a great day - even though it's Monday!
Kelly

Clarification

2010-01-22T11:02:00.004-06:00

After my last post, I got to thinking about how I haven't explained with any specifics my eating habits/situation. Yes, I have Celiac Disease, and yes, I have to maintain a gluten free diet, but those things mean different things for different people. I am fortunate in the fact that I am not as sick as some if I accidentally ingest gluten. I know there are Celiacs out there that get very, very ill if they accidentally ingest even a breadcrumb, or they encounter the slightest cross-contamination...and I feel for you. I can't imagine what that must be like.

That being said, my gluten free diet isn't as strict. I still eat things that "may have been processed in a facility that also processes wheat" and I eat oats. Heresy? Maybe. But I feel great and it works for me. I plan to post things that make me (and my tummy) happy, and hopefully they will work for others, including the ones following super-sensitive diets. Just please know I'm not trying to offend or come across lackadaisical in my treatment of the gluten-free lifestyle. :)

I love food! I love learning about food, eating food, cooking food, baking food, looking at food, watching food on tv (Food Network is my favorite) and talking about food. Mmm. On to that.

Kelly

I love Udi's!

2010-01-20T16:05:00.002-06:00

If you're gluten free (or even if you're not) and you haven't tried anything made by Udi's...get on it. They have awesome products like bread, pizza crusts, muffins, cinnamon rolls, and granola. Yum. This morning I had their "Au Naturel" version (my favorite) mixed with some strawberry yogurt (Activia light to be exact). Doesn't seem like much but it is the perfect breakfast for me..and the granola is such a treat. It says "wheat free" right on the bag! Also - when I was looking on their website, I noticed that they also have a specifically gluten free version using certified gluten free oats, so I'll be checking that one out the next time I head to the grocery store. Everything I've had of theirs is delicious, so I'm looking forward to it!

So far, all I've used this granola for is mixing with my yogurt, but I'm determined to figure out other ways to use it since it's just so yummy.

This week has been crazy. Not exactly the best time to start a blog...oh well! I'm trying to figure out what I have in the fridge at home to have for dinner tonight. I'm on my own - tonight is The Hubby's class night.

Until later,
Kelly

Oh. My. Deliciousness.

2010-01-19T11:30:00.005-06:00

I love Starbucks. I treat myself every Friday with some sort of beverage that would make me pack on the pounds if I had it every day. It's a glorious way to end the week. This morning I stopped by to get a chai latte for myself and for my boss, who is in town from Minnesota and I only see about once a year. I figured if I was getting it for someone else, I could go on a day that is not a Friday. And yes, I'm still going on Friday. Anyway, I heard that Starbucks had introduced some snacks that were gluten free, and they had them displayed right by the door...so of course I got some to sample. I tried the Sahale Snacks Pomegranate Cashews...and wow! They are a fantastic snack, and completely gluten free! They are a great combination of salty and sweet, chewy and crunchy...and they are all natural. Yum.

I looked on their website and noticed that they also have PB&J Almonds. Can't wait to try those!

It's a good thing I picked those up...my stomach was growling by 10:30. :)

Back to work...
Kelly

Why I Gave Up Gluten

2010-01-18T16:59:00.003-06:00

The first thing that most people say when I tell them I eat gluten free (and after I explain what that means) is "Why?!" Well, the short answer is that I was diagnosed with Celiac disease in April of 2008 and immediately began my restricted diet. The long answer is...

I've had issues with food for a very long time. I remember my turning point very clearly: I was eleven years old, talking on the phone to my "boyfriend" (which sounds hilarious now) when somehow we started talking about our weights. (Maybe he had just had a physical or something? I have no idea why we would be talking about that.) He told me is - and as soon as I heard the number that was lower than mine (I was eleven, and a very mature eleven at that) I did what almost every female alive has done at least once...I lied about my weight. Right after that, my know-it-all self decided that it was time to go on a diet, because no girl weighs more than her boyfriend. (Did I mention I was eleven and clueless?) So that day, I started eating less. We're talking switching from mayonnaise to mustard because of the calories and eating nothing but Snackwell's products because they were "low fat". And I started to feel good. Really good. Lighter. More energetic. More confident. I didn't feel sick after meals anymore.

That trend continued off and on throughout high school. My mom cooked relatively healthy and always balanced meals that I picked at, and I was known to eat a sleeve of Saltine crackers for lunch and wash it down with a diet coke...mostly because I thought that eating big meals is what made my stomach hurt.

Then I went off to college, where my flexible meal ticket got me Chick-fil-A and pizza rolls (oh, heavenly pizza rolls) whenever I wanted, and I took full advantage. After a semester of gorging myself and feeling like crap, I went back to the dieting and felt better.

About halfway through college I started eating "normally". More well-balanced meals, more vegetables, more small meals every day rather than three big ones. My stomach started hurting again after every meal, and I finally got talked into going to a doctor - several different ones, actually, including a specialist after I graduated - who (all) told me that it was "stress". I was told multiple times to relax, get massages, slow down, do whatever it takes, but "your stomach must be where you're carrying your stress." Hmm. Okay. I was also told to eat more fiber...and I ate - you guessed it - lots of whole wheat.

Fast forward a few years...I was a newlywed and I loved to cook dinner with my new Hubby. He started noticing me complaining after most every meal we ate together that my stomach hurt. He started talking to me about it, and we got into all the fun little details about bowel movements and all the lovely, romantic stuff that comes with stomach issues...and he made me go to the doctor. Again. Another specialist. Ugh.

This one was different. He sat down with me and listened. To everything. Even the stuff I felt crazy for telling him. Then he ordered an endoscopy to check out my insides. (Yes, I had to ask what that was.) I was terrified. I cried before they put me out and they had to go get Hubby out of the waiting room. Ha. Anyway, he found it. The thing that had been bothering me for longer than I'll ever know (related to my eating disorder issues? I'm starting to think so.). I cut out gluten as soon as I found out, and I'm a new woman!

However, this self-proclaimed "new woman" was a WRECK for about the first six months of being gluten free. I went into withdrawals (did I mention that I'd been eating lots of wheat and other fibrous grains trying to clean out the ol' system?), then I panicked when I wanted my usual sandwich for lunch. I attempted to eat a slice from a loaf of frozen gluten free bread - and I almost cried. It tasted like cardboard. I thought my life was over...and then I got creative. :)

More soon. Have to go meet with my thesis committee chair. Wheeee.
Kelly

Hello!

2010-01-17T16:38:00.000-06:00

Welcome to my new blog, Gluten Freendly!

I'm new to this whole blogging thing, but am really looking forward to putting my thoughts and information out there - and I hope it is helpful. Starting a blog came about just a few days ago when The Hubby and I were trying to figure out what we wanted to do for dinner. He really wanted to go see a movie (he's a big movie buff), but since I'd been at work all day I wanted to fit in a meal as well. We were chatting back and forth on gmail trying to figure it out, and after looking online at the local Movie Tavern's menu, I told him that particular place wasn't an option because they didn't have anything I could eat. He responded with, "yeah, they aren't very gluten free-ndly...ha!" Now, The Hubby is one of those that looooves to combine words and finds himself hilarious when he does so (and I usually roll my eyes and laugh at him) - but I immediately knew that this time it was pretty perfect.

What I've noticed about being gluten free is that eating, cooking and baking can be complicated and incredibly unfriendly - if you let it. Don't get me wrong - there are some really great recipes out there that taste exactly like "regular" food, it's just not my style to keep six different kinds of flour in the house since there's no telling how often I'll actually have time to use it before it goes bad. I tend to lean towards food that is easy and fast...emphasis on the easy. For instance, Semi-Homemade Cooking with Sandra Lee is more my speed. I grew up on comfort food like macaroni and cheese, fried chicken, corn dogs, and homemade lasagna (don't worry, there were vegetables mixed in there, too) - and it has been my goal since becoming gluten free to find replacement options that don't taste like cardboard to satisfy my comfort food cravings. My hope for this blog is that I help other newly-minted gluten free dieters make the transition without feeling absolutely helpless like I did...and to provide information to those who need it or who are just interested. I've learned a lot in the past year and a half, and I keep learning on a daily basis - and I want to share it with you!

That being said, I want to make it clear that I am only gluten free. I realize that a lot of gluten free diets are also casein free, dairy free, soy free, nut free or even more restricted, and I wish I could provide information on all types of restricted diets - but I hope the information I can provide will help, even if just a little. :)

Looking forward to it!

Kelly