gluten, wheat & dairy free: Cook book review

Since discovering the cream puff recipe in this book, I decided that I had to tell people about it! Now that I've worked my way through enough recipes that I feel like I've got a handle on exactly what kind of book it is, I have, after some fairly elementary research, come to understand that "gluten, wheat & dairy free: Over 70 delicious and nutritious recipes" by Love Food division of Parragon Books is no longer in print. Bugger. It is available for sale through numerous online sites, as a second hand book, and if you do happen to come across one in a bargain book section of your local book shop, it is worth a look.



I will say right off that, with a few notable exceptions, this is a very basic and, in some ways, bland recipe book. I think that out of the 7 recipes we purposely tried, 2 of them we will for sure do again as is, 4 of them we would modify before making again and the last one was actually just used as a guide, because by then we'd realized that the spices and flavours of the recipes as given are more mild than what we like.

The cream puffs and the chickpea fritters were the ones that we would repeat no questions asked. They were divine!! The best is that they allow for interpretations, like turning the cream puffs into eclairs and mixing up the fritters as a dinner thing or even adding to them with other spices or flavours (I'm thinking that some ham cooked Into the fritters would be lovely!) From there, though, well.... It's not that anything was bad, it's just that, well, they didn't taste like much. We made the Chicken Tacos (pg. 66) for dinner one night and while the corn meal on the outside of the chicken pieces added a nice crunch, we would definitely add cumin and/or corriander to it as well as adding some garlic to the grilled veggies and skipping their version of avocado cream and sticking with a more traditional guacamole. Also, sour "cream" and salsa were a must! The bonus on this one was that is was only 20 minutes from prep to table, so this is a good weeknight option.

 

 

 

The next meal we tried was the Seafood Tart (p.88) with the Strawberry Roll (p.138) for dessert. After reading the instructions for the crust, I didn't even try to follow. There was NO way you could have rolled that out, so I simply pressed it into the pan and did a blind bake (where you bake the crust with nothing but something to weight it down before you fill and bake the filling). I'll be using a different crust recipe should I ever make this again. The filling was tasty, but again pretty bland. Some tarragon, dill or fennel would have worked so well with seafood, and I will deinitely add some sould I do this again. This would be lovely in the summer as it's quite light, so I was glad we had some roasted potatoes and a tomato and tarragon salad to go with it.

 

The strawberry roll was yummy, very reminiscent of a short cake (though that might be because I refused to fill the roll with sweetened cream cheese and used a dairy free whipped cream instead) however there is again no way that this worked the way the book said it should have. I don't know if I overcooked it, though I went with the least amount of time, or if they just used some really good photoshopping, but while their's was white, mine was yellow, and it was more like a meringue than a sponge cake. We have decided to modify that to make the lady fingers for a tiramisu, but more on that later!

 

The last recipe was, as mentioned, used only as a guide. It was a peanut butter shrimp and noodle dish that, with the addition of some curry paste and more veggies and garlic, was really good. For dessert, we had their coconut panacota (think coconut jello!) with spiced pinapple, that with the addition of some rum will make a wonderful deconstructed Pina Colada! Perfect for summer barbeques! 

So there you have it. A couple of good recipes with a whole bunch more that need some fixing, but nothing horrible, so for someone who enjoys simple flavours or is looking for easy (I don't think Any of the recipes are more than a page long, and in a large type font to boot), this isn't a bad book. If you don't want to have to fart around adjusting things, well, at least it isn't in print any more I guess. Still, the cream puffs recipe makes this book worth it No Questions Asked!!!



Breakfast fritters!

You know when you get a new cookbook, there will be that one picture that has you going "I'm going to make that!"? Well, it only took me a year. Oops!  Turned out so well, that I am absolutely planning on having them again for breakfast this weekend!

My husband is not much of a breakfast person, so our compromise is that I don't force him to eat breakfast during the week but on the weekends, we tend to cook breakfasts and brunches. And since he's less fond of the sweets, like pancakes and waffles, we'll alternate with savoury. These were a great find! Chickpea fritters, with chives and green onions. Super tasty, and ridiculously easy to put together. Also, if you are a vegetarian that does eggs, these are wonderful option. I think the longest part was just chopping up all the green stuff. While they are at their best right when they are made, warming them up the next day they were only ho-hum, if you were to make these the morning of a lunch time picnic and kept them warm, they would be lovely!  You could absolutely do these as a "breakfast for dinner" thing too, as they are quite filling; just serve with ham and maybe some sauteed mushrooms or zucchini and you're set.

This comes from the "gluten, wheat & dairy free" cookbook from Love Food, though their web site doesn't seem to list it.

Chickpea Fritters
Serves 4
makes between 12 - 16 depending on size

• 1 cup GF flour
• 1 1/2 teaspoons GF baking powder 
• 1/8 teaspoon salt
• 1 egg, beaten
• 3/4 cup unsweetend milk substitute of your choice
• 2 1/2 cups thinly sliced scallions/green onions
• 1 2/3 cups rinsed and draied chickpeas
• 1/4 cup chopped cilantro
• oil, for fryin
• salt and pepper
• cilantro sprigs, to garnish

Sift the flour, baking powder, and salt into a mixing bowl and make a well in the center. Add the egg and milk and stir into the flour, then beat to make a smooth batter.

Stir in the scallions, chickpeas, and cilantro, then season well with salt and pepper.

Heat the oil in a large, heavy skillet (we used one of our cast iron pans) and add about 1/3 of a cup of the batter per fritter. Cook in batches for 4-5 minutes, turning once, until golden brown.

Serve the fritters stacked on warmed plates, garnished with cilantro sprigs. Might I also suggest having some DF sour cream and hot sauces too available too.

Enjoy!

Taking one for the team... Ugh.

Every now and again, I'll get reminded that there is a reason why I am gluten free. Namely, because it makes me sick as all get out. Those reminders, however, will often come because I'll have done something foolish, like think "One shot won't hurt me!" Ugh...

Case in point: a couple of weeks ago, a bunch of us hit up our local pub after we'd closed up shop on a Friday night. We ran into another of our coworkers who, being on vacation, was there with his girl. A couple of drinks later, he bought us all a round of shots. Sweet! Except that they were Jameson, which is an Irish Whiskey. Whiskey is made of wheat, and that would be why I don't drink it. *sigh* I know better! I should have handed it off or gotten something else, but, I did what I knew I shouldn't have. I drank it. I am so lucky that I just felt loggy and cranky because of a head- and gut ache for a couple of days after and wasn't bed ridden as can happen.

We often think that when we turn something down because it is offered, we'll offend people or look bad. Yes, that can happen, but I know (because of the people involved) that my coworker would not have had any issue! It was my ego that got in the way on that one, not his. Besides, I'm the one who felt sick after, so I have every right, and in fact an obligation to myself, to say No, thanks. We often forget that. We get so focused on being polite or helping others that we lose sight of our need to take care of ourselves too. It can be hard to remember that while your hostess might look a little hurt that you can't try one of her canapes now, she'd be a lot less impressed if you throw up all over her bathroom later!

Seasonal treats

Being woken up on a Saturday morning because a telephone company technician is hammering on the brick outside your bedroom window kinda sucks. Especially when the technician isn't there for something you want done; at least then you can deal with it. *sigh* Know what made it worse? We were out of coffee. This meant we did the only thing we could do: we went to the market! Being severly under caffeinated, we wisely sat down and had some of the Liquid Black Gold before making any decisions. I love hanging out at the market while people watching. Since I usually avoid being there on the weekends, particularly first thing in the morning as I don't like crowds, today was a good day to give it a go. It was still fairly chilly out, at least until you got into the sunshine, and now is prime Cabane a Sucre season, so it was just nicely populated. While I was snooping around, my husband, who was paying more attention than I was, noticed something else that is a seasonal delight: snow crab! From the begining of April until the middle of May, you can purchase live or freshly cooked snow crab from Rimouski at the Atwater Market from Capitaine Crabe, who's stall is right outside the north doors, closest to the pet food mart, Boufido. Having grown up on Vancouver Island, I truly enjoy fresh crab, but even there, snow crab is special! We probably would have gotten it anyways, but the fact that they were charging only $6.95/lb sealed the deal. We picked up 2 live ones, and the fixings for a celery root remoulade, and some GF beer (La Messagere Rousse to be precise) since I had a new recipe for baguette that I had been wanting to try out anyway.

 

 

Toss in some garlic butter and we were good!  We actually toyed with using this as our 100 Mile Dinner, as the celeriac and the crab fell into the local parameters. We certainly could have made up some mayonaise, but as the remoulade calls for sour cream and the baguette would require flours that the packages tell me are milled in the US, we decided to simply enjoy it as a seasonal dinner with local flair. Win!
 

The crab was fantastic, the remoulade is fast becoming one of our favourite salads and while the baguette recipe is good, I am not a fan of the flour mix for it. I got a new cookbook a while back, and I'm still trying it out, so I won't go into it too much, but well. We'll have to see. Still, it certainly made for a pretty picture! The recipe actually makes 2 loaves, so we will be having french toast for breakfast tomorrow I think. I really want to figure out how to make it taste the way I remember it! If I had to take a guess, it is most likely the sorghum flour I'm not liking. It has a weird aftertaste that I can't quite put a name to. Sorghum is a type of grass that is raised for it's millet like grain and as fodder plants. Makes me think of some of the bean flours I've tried. Regardless, I'm going to play around with it some more.

 

Having said that, I am not going to post up the baguette recipe today (as I had planned), but will give you the remoulade recipe instead! Warning: if you don't have a mandolin, go get one! This is not a recipe I would want to have to do by hand. If you haven't got a mandolin, you could always use a cheese grater, but as this is very like a coleslaw, having the celery root nicely match-sticked really is worth it. I think you can even find mandolins at the dollar store, so go get one. You'll wonder how you ever got on without it. This is from Diane Morgan's book Roots, which I also think you should go out and get, but I just really like root vegetables. And cookbooks. And food.

 

Celery Root Remoulade

• 1/2 cup mayonnaise
• 1/2 cup sour cream (I use Tofutti)
• 1 tablespoon whole grain mustard
• 1 tablespoon diced cornichons (gerkhins will work)
• 1 tablespoon diced* capers
• 1 tablespoon cider vinegar
• 1 tablespoon lemon juice
• salt and pepper to taste
• 1 large celery root, peeled and cut into match-stick sized slices
• 1 tablespoon chopped chives
• 1 tablespoon chopped flat leaf parsley
• 1 tablespoon chopped tarragon

*I do not bother dicing the capers. They are small enough!

Mix the mayonnaise, sour cream, mustard, cornichons, capers, vinegar and lemon juice in a medium bowl. Season with salt and pepper. Peel and grate the celery root, then add it along with the chives, parsley and tarragon to the mayonnaise mix. Mix well, cover and refridgerte for at least an hour before serving, though this can be made up to 2 days in advance, and gets better on the second day.

Enjoy!

Little Victories

Somedays we should get a medal for successfully getting out of bed. We should get promotions (and raises) if we manage to not kill anyone! I am very glad that today was a day off because I'm looking for anything and everything that I can claim as a win. The reason is fairly simple: Spring has arrived! What that means for me is that the pressure outside is changing and I have a migraine. It didn't help that I woke up convinced that there was a barefoot burgler in our apartment at about 5:45 this morning. Don't ask me why the imaginary burgler was barefoot, he just was. Needless to say, today has not been my most productive day.

Still, our application for our Community Sponsored Agriculture basket went out today (more on that later!), and I did the dishes. That's got to count for something. Plus our taxes are done, and I have found not one but 2 scrumptious flourless cake recipes that I am going to get to try out in the next few weeks (one is a chocolate and the other is a meringue-based). I think that even though I didn't do exactly what I had wanted to today, I'm still going to count this day a success.

Royal Mugshots, a.k.a. Queen Elizabeth Cake

I'm not entirely sure why, but last week I woke up and decided I wanted to make a Queen Elizabeth cake. That might not seem so out of place until I tell you that I've never had a Queen Elizabeth cake. All I knew was that it involved coconut on the top. Now I also know that dates are required, as are walnuts, though they could easily be left out, I suppose, or replaced with another nut (like a pecan or a hazelnut). I'm not sure if my version tastes the way it is supposed to, but it sure is tasty nonetheless. The cake is reminiscent of a spice cake (though there aren't any spices in it beyond vanilla and the walnuts!) and the topping, a boiled coconut and brown sugar frosting, is very like a toffee. Plus, start to finish, this only takes about 10 minutes which is always a bonus when it comes to unexpected cravings for sweets. Especially ones we've never had!

While searching the internet for ideas and recipes, I was able to find out a few things about this cake in a historical context. Firstly, no one is really sure why it is called a Queen Elizabeth cake. It does appear that the recipes started popping up around the time of the Second World War, and a number of stories imply that this recipe was supposed to be used for fundraising purposes, be it for the war effort or church parishes. One story went so far as to say that it was given this name because this was the only cake that the Queen would make herself. However, that leads into the second point I came away with which is that apparently a representative for the Queen has denied that the recipe is hers (I was unable to find that as an actual quote, and am unashamedly passing on the hearsay as I got it). I am now almost as confused as to the origin of this cake as I was to begin with, but that didn't keep me from making it.

I have modfied this to keep it simple and quick. It does take a little longer to put together than the regular Coffee Mug cake, but not by much as the cake (at least) can still all be made in the microwave. The two biggest difference here are that there is no cocoa powder which makes this cake a little lighter than previous versions, but right after Easter, I didn't think anyone would miss it; also this version does not have you put the cake under the broiler, either before or after the frosting has been added. If this offends any purists, my appologies and feel free to do so. The frosting is well worth the extra pot too, but don't take my word for it!

Queen Elizabeth Mug Cake
Serves 2

• 6-8 dates
• 3 tablespoons water
• 1/4 cup GF flour
• 4 tablespoons sugar
• 1 egg
• 2 tablespoons oil
• 3-4 walnut halves, chopped
• Dash of Vanilla and Salt
• 1/4 cup coconut flakes
• 3 tablespoons brown sugar
• 2 tablespoons DF butter
• 2 teaspoons DF cream or milk

For the cake, put the dates in your mug or bowl along with the water and microwave in 20 second intervals, until they turn to mush when stirred with a fork. *NOTE: You can choose to chop the dates first to make it easier to break them up in the hot water, but you don't have to.

Add the flour, sugar, egg, oil, walnut pieces, vanilla and salt; whisk to combine and then cook in the microwave for approximately 2 minutes, till cooked. It will come out looking moist, but don't over cook it. Carefully invert onto plate and allow to cool.

While your cake is cooling, put the coconut flakes, brown sugar, butter and cream into a pot on the stove over medium heat and allow to boil, stirring all the while. Allow it to boil for about 3 minutes being careful so that it doesn't burn, then remove from heat and pour over your cake.

This is delightfully sticky and sugary while still being fairly light. Enjoy!

 

Coming Up - April

I absolutely can not believe that it is April already. Partly because the temperature dropped tonight and we are back to bloody cold again, and they are even making noises about snow tomorrow. Boo. Oh well; all that means is that I can justify staying in and playing in my kitchen! At any rate, March went by so quickly my head is still spinning. I felt like I spent the whole month running from one project to the next without actually getting to spend any time on anything. Oddly enough, now that I'm not rushing, I'm not sure what I should be doing!

New Book!
 

I firmly believe in planning. I also like to think that I'm wise enough to accept that "Plans never last past the First Engagement" (I think I learned that from a Mercedes Lackey "Heralds of Valdemar" novel, and while she meant it in regards to battle plans, I think it just makes good sense!). So what does that mean for April? Community Sponsored Agriculture and farmers baskets (I am sooooo excited!); how easy it is to think "I'll be fine!" so as not to offend or appear rude, and what that really means; new recipes, books, products, shops and more! Plus, the next installement of the 100 Mile Dinner and finding out if my Thumb is more Green than Black.

Without going into it too far, here are some hints as to what's up. Enjoy!!