GF Taco Salad

This is a big kid pleaser. We made it for Steele's birthday dinner and it was a total hit!

2lbs Ground Beef
2 packets GF Taco Mix (read the backs, I think Old El Paso is a good one)
8oz bag of Mexican cheese mix
2 bags of salad or a head of iceberg lettuce
One large GF mild salsa or two small ones.
One bag of Doritos or Tortilla Chips
2 chopped tomatoes or one can of diced tomatoes(optional)
1 chopped medium onion (optional)
sour cream (optional)

Brown ground beef, drain and add taco mix as per directions on packet.
Shred lettuce and put in bowl. Add shredded cheese.
Add other veggies if desired. Toss salad.
Once the meat has simmered down, take it off the heat and add the salsa and stir.
Let the meat cool. It can be warm-ish, but if you put it in while hot, it'll wreck your lettuce.
Crunch up the tortilla chips and add to salad mixture. Stir.
Once meat has cooled enough , add it to the salad mixture and stir.

Throw it in some bowls, maybe hit it with a blob of sour cream and get down!

If you must serve dinner at different times then keep the salad, chips and meat separate until ready to serve.

GF Meal Plans

This is a quick and dirty of our menu system.

For most meals, when eating gluten free there is a dizzying array of things you can have.
Others...well.... it's expensive or time consuming to turn a gluten food into a non-gluten variant.

In my head, I generally know what we have on hand in the pantry and fridge.
From this, I choose how many of what Steele can have offered to him.

For example: We have rice cakes out the wazoo, no muffins and 3 eggs.
Ok, he can have rice cake cereal every other day, eggs tomorrow and I'll make muffins on wednesday.

Standard Breakfast Options :
GF Oatmeal
Rice Cake Cereal
Breakfast Muffins
Eggs with Cheese
Stuffed Omelet
Grits or cheese grits

Standard Lunch Options:
Hummus and chips, with fruit on the side.
Peanut butter & jelly rice cake, GF potato chips and some dried fruit.
GF Bread Sandwich - usually a deli meat or bologna option, corn chips and a pickle.
Cheddar cheese rice cake with deli meat & cheese, applesauce and Lays stacks.
Beanie Weenies and fruit.
Chef Salad - I like apple chunks and raisins in this one. I'll hide any amount of fruits and veggies in a salad.
Tuna Salad rolled into a lettuce leaf.
Ants on a log, chips, fruit.

Standard Dinner Options:
Pork Chops, garlic mashed potatoes, glazed carrots.
Chicken Nuggets, french fries, broccoli with cheese.
Pork roast with onions, fried cabbage and rice.
Meatloaf, brussels sprouts and parsley potatoes.
Mad Salad - three different types of lettuce, veggies (carrots, tomatoes, onions, yellow squash, radishes, cucumbers, fresh mushrooms, snow peas....pick a few!), shredded cheese, soy bacon bits, almond slivers, apple chunks, raisins and some form of meat. (Rotisserie turkey breast, ham, chicken breast, beef or pork slivers) With a modified raspberry vinaigrette we call "Pink stuff"... it's just GF Raspberry Vinaigrette and GF Ranch Dressing mixed together.
Taco Salad - see recipe
Fruit Salad
Fajitas on Corn Tortillas
Tamale Pie - this is in the cornbread recipe here.
Baked Chicken, baked sweet potatoes and coleslaw.


See? It's not stuff too far out of the ordinary.

GF Chicken Nuggets Recipe

My kids are pretty spoiled when it comes to food. I've never been one for the overprocessed quasi-meat-like substances.

Big example. Prefab chicken nuggets. Yukkkkkk!

Here's how we do it around this house.

GF Chicken Breast Nuggets

3lbs Boneless Skinless Chicken Breast
1c Zesty Italian Dressing
1c GF Flour Mix or 1/3c Brown Rice Flour + 1/3c Corn Starch + 1/3c Tapioca Flour
1t Seasoning Salt
1t Lemon Pepper
1t Baking Powder (to help with browning)
1/2t Garlic Powder
1/2t Onion Powder
1/2t Cumin

3c Oil and pot and slotted spoon or Cookie sheet, spray grease and spatula.

Cut chicken into bite sized pieces. Throw into a closed container with the Italian Dressing and shake to coat. Let sit in the fridge for at least a half hour. Mine usually sits from noon until 4pm. It's ok.

Put GF Flour and spices in a ziplock bag. Shake to mix.

Fried Chicken Version:
Put about 3 cups of oil (I love the peanut oil when I'm getting expensive and frisky) in a medium sized pot and put on medium heat. You'll know the oil is ready when a few drops of water flicked into the pot pop in the oil.

Toss some chicken a piece at a time into the flour bag and shake when you've got 15 in.
Gently transfer the chicken pieces into the hot oil, a piece at a time, shaking the loose flour off and into the bag. Cook for 4 to 6 minutes per batch.

Be sure to check your chicken! Take the largest piece out, put it on paper bag or paper towels to drain. Cut into it...is it pink? If it is, leave the chicken in for 2 more minutes and check it again.
I check every batch, always the largest chunk just to be certain it's cooked thoroughly.

Cook more than 15 at a time if your pot permits, mine doesn't. You don't want the chicken crowded in there.

If you're not into deep frying things, that's cool too. We usually do ours in the oven, but fried chicken is a special treat.

Baked Chicken Version:
Preheat the oven to 375.
Spray grease on a cookie sheet.
Toss some chicken a piece at a time into the flour bag and shake when you've got 15 in.
Transfer the chicken pieces onto the cookie sheet, a piece at a time, shaking the loose flour off and into the bag. Continue until all chicken is coated.
Spray grease on the chicken itself when you've gotten them all onto the sheet.
Bake for 20 minutes.
Find three large pieces of chicken from different parts of the pan.
Cut into them, does the juice run clear? Are they pink?
Pop em back in the oven if you have any doubts. Raw chicken is BAD.

Serve with a side of french fries and some fresh fruit or broccoli and cheese. Happy kids.

Our wheatless lil man.

This is a photo of the Nestle Bar cake-subsitute from last year. Steele chose a Cowboy Duck theme for his 6th birthday party.

GF BBQ Sauce

I'm a fan of the tomato based bbq sauces that run more towards the sweet than the tangy or the spicy.

This one is tangy and a little spicy and if you're not into tomato based sauce you can cut the tomato sauce halfway or none at all.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I put a million things in it.

Get out a medium sized pot.
Throw in:
1c Water
24oz Bottle Catsup
1/2 med Onion (minced)
1/3c Dark Brown Sugar
1/3c Honey or Molasses
1T Raisins
1T Yellow Mustard
1T Minced Garlic
1t Lemon Juice or Lime Juice
1t Black Pepper
1/2t Seasoning Salt
1/2t Cayenne Pepper
1/2t Chili Powder
1/2t Ginger Powder
1/2t Cumin
1/4t Onion Powder
1/4t Garlic Powder

Simmer on low-med for about 30 minutes, stirring often but not constantly.
Watch for the onions to turn clear. Once that happens, the simmering is to cook it down to almost your desired thickness.

Let the sauce cool for about 20 minutes and pour it into a food processor and puree.

Pour it into a bottle and go daddy go.

Notes:
Once you've made this and tasted it, if there's anything you want...add.
More spicy? Add cayenne.
More tangy? Add lemon.
More sweet? Add brown sugar.
Just needs something? Add adobo criollo or garlic powder.

Enjoy!

GF Meatloaf

We make a pretty mean meatloaf around here. Good enough for sandwiches, not that there's usually any left.

Since I'm making a gluten and a gluten free meatloaf, I set it up as a double cook.
Do everything that doesn't have gluten, make the GF version and start it cooking then make the gluten version and cook that after. I'll make this one as if we all were going to eat GF tonight.

**Cheapskate alert**
I wait until there's a sale on chuck roast or sirloin tip and it's like $2 a pound, then have the grocery store grind it for me. They'll do it, you just have to ask the Meat Man. When I get home, I weigh it out into parcels and ziplock n freeze it. Good quality freshly ground beef for less than standard decent ground beef prices. Darn tootin!

3lbs Ground Beef
3 Eggs
3t Minced Garlic
2t Onion Powder
2t Cumin
2t Seasoning Salt
1t Pepper
1c GF Bread Crumbs (see Bread ideas for recipe) or 3/4c Oat Bran

Toss everything except the bread crumbs or oat bran into a bowl.
Mush between your fingers until well mixed.
Add bread crumbs or oat bran until your meat starts to toughen up.
You'll feel it. It will start to get harder to mush. Not too hard, though.

Toss in a pan and bake at 350 for 45mins.

The oat bran will make your meatloaf springy but it's still tasty.

Gluten Free Cookie Batter Recipe

Here's a basic cookie batter that does pretty well.
I like being able to add whatever to make cookies different from time to time.

2c GF Flour Mix - Sweet or Standard
2t Baking Powder
3/4c Sugar or Brown Sugar
1/2t Salt
1/4t Xanthan Gum
2 Eggs
2/3c Oil
2t Vanilla or your favorite flavoring

Oven to 400

In a large bowl, whisk dry ingredients until combined.
In a smaller bowl, whisk wet ingredients until combined.
Add wet ingredients to well in dry ingredients, mix until combined.

Spoon onto greased cookie sheet and bake for 9 minutes.

Additions:
Folks, it's cookies. Add what you like: chips, nuts, dried fruit, coconut, lemon rind, cinnamon....

GF Bread Odd Ends - Ideas

Here's the thing. We use a bread machine. Not a fancy gluten free one. Just one I got from a freecycle site and scrubbed the heck out of. When Steele's bread is done, it's a large short square that's a little too big to slice horizontal for sandwiches. I usually cut two edges down so it fits his bologna or is the same size as 'normal' bread.

Then I end up with all these bread strips and being the cheapest person on the planet I have to find some way to utilize them, even if it means a feed the ducks run.

One way:
Save the strips and freeze them. Thaw and toss on foil and broil until brownish and dry, then throw in the food processor and make bread crumbs for his meatloaf.

Another way:
Save the strips and freeze them. Thaw and butter lightly. Slice sticks into cubes then roll in italian spices and a little bit of adobo. Toss on some foil and broil until brownish and dry. Voila, you now have croutons.

Another way:
Save the strips and freeze them until you have enough to make bread pudding. (see recipe)

If you haven't used your strips in two weeks... here duckie, duckie, duckie....

GF Stupid Cheap Cereal Recipe

After reading the word "malt" or "wheat" on every cereal box on that aisle in Wal-Mart, I decided something had to be done. I took a trip to the whole foods store and looked at their cereals. I was aghast at the prices of cereal. Dude, it's just cereal. It's not made out of silver, it doesn't come in a gilded box. Dang!

It was time to put on the old thinking hat, while holding firmly onto my wallet.

Buy some rice cakes. They've gotten better than they were in the 80's, I swear.
They have them in many flavors and they're readily available. (I still read the backs, tho.)

Single serving Cereal:
1.5 rice cakes crumbled into small bits. (I like the apple cinnamon or peanut butter)
Add something to make it fun for a kid.
Examples: Mini marshmallows, a squirt of chocolate syup or strawberry syrup, raisins, dried fruit bits, slivered almonds or pecan bits...

Add your milk. Tah-Dah!

One screaming heck of a lot cheaper than GF cereal and no messy baking dishes to have to deal with.

GF Rant

Lots of things are just naturally gluten free.
Marinated chicken, pork chops, corn on the cob, baked potatoes....
Most of that stuff is standard recipe crap. It's the other stuff that bites ya.

Since our son was diagnosed his ability to eat baked goods has suffered the most.
YOU try having a little boy who's not allowed to eat cake and cookies and Happy Meals and see how 'normal' takes a screeching backseat to 'why is gluten in rice-freaking-crispies?!?!'

To add insult to injury Gluten Free foods are expensive! Example: Kraft Mac& Cheese $1.29/box vs. Pastato GF Mac and Cheese $2.89/box. Cheap ass cereal $1.00/box vs. GF Cereal $4.50/box.

Our large family (read: tribe) would be living in a cardboard box if we had to all eat gluten free all the time. Gas prices are skyrocketing which drives up food prices. Yay, more penny pinching.

I'm thrifty by nature. My man still laughs about our discount 3 legged hamster. Yeah, that's what I said. Her name is Stumpy Lou and we love her to death, thank you very much. Steele loves chicken legs, so that's how I get around on the cheap if I make a gluten menu. I keep a box of GF pasta for when we do Spaghetti. I buy him 2 slices of ham or deli meat or deli cheese.

I even made lil man his own reversible chef hat and apron so he can get involved with his own personal cooking.

I'll post my standard GF recipes here, but my emphasis is on the stuff you can't just run to the store and grab off the shelf, like bread, cookies, muffins.... and the stupid cheap ways around this whole wheat intolerance issue.

Take a breath and see what you can do. Meal plans really are the most cost efficent way to handle it. Find your "oh shit" subsitute (like his chicken legs) and you're halfway there.

GF Birthday Chocolate Cupcakes

Before Steele was diagnosed with a wheat allergy, we'd been making his birthday cakes in a rubber duck 3d pan. He digs the ducks, man.

The first year we tried a GF Cake mix. We ended up with half a duck that was hard as a rock on the edges, gooey in the middle and frightening enough to be in a Wes Craven movie. Steele's cake that year was a large nestle bar with candles stuck to it with frosting dots.

This year I decided to try my hand at cupcakes.

Did you know Pillsbury frosting is gluten free? Not the strawberry, so I hear. Check your lists, be certain. Corporations change recipes faster than my boys change socks. GIGO. The Gluten Fairies ARE after you.

But I digress. I went out hunting my fav GF sites and found a recipe that ROCKED!
This recipe was stolen from http://glutenfreemommy.com/

GIGANTIC DANCING THANKS FOR THE RECIPE!!!!

1 1/4c GF Flour Mix - Sweet (you can use standard too)
3/4t Xanthan Gum
2/3c Cocoa Powder
1 1/2t Baking Soda
1/4t Salt
1 1/2c Sugar
1 1/3c Buttermilk
1/2c Unsalted Butter (1 stick) @ room temp
1 1/2t Vanilla
2 Eggs @ room temperature

Preheat oven to 350

Wisk together all the dry ingredients.

In stand mixer:
Cream butter and sugar together. Beat until fluffy.
Add eggs one @ a time, beating well between.
Add vanilla. Beat some more.
Alternate buttermilk and dry mix, adding slowly and beating well between additions.

This will make a thick creamy batter.

Spoon into cupcake liners 2/3 full. Bake 17 minutes.

These were amazing. They tasted like normal cupcakes, but richer.
My lot ate the whole pile of cupcakes and Steele got to feel like a normal kid.
I'm pretty sure this is what I'm going to make the next time he has to bring a snack to school.

GF Bread Pizza

Steele has pizza parties at school. It's just a fact of life around here. I have to be ready in a day or two to make him a pizza. We have 5 kids. Time to deal with pizza dough isn't always easy to find.

1 top or bottom slice of GF Breadmachine bread.
2T Spaghetti Sauce
1/2t Minced Garlic
Adobo Criollo con Pimienta (Spanish Garlic salt with pepper)
Italian Spice Mix
Cheese
Favorite Pizza toppings.

Spread Spaghetti sauce onto bread (while thinking of what dinner to make with the rest of the can)
Sprinkle italian spices, minced garlic, adobo onto sauce. Add parmesan cheese to the sauce layer if desired.
Top with chopped onion, mushrooms, green pepper, pineapple.. whatever veggies make you smile.
Add some cheese. Not a lot...not yet...
Add meat layer: two slices deli ham torn up, pepperoni slices, some sausage. Again, whatever meat makes you happy.
Add another cheese layer.

Bake at 350 on a greased piece of tin foil on a cookie sheet until the edges get brown and the cheese is all melty and nice.

The last time I made this for Steele, I had to stand over it with a butcher knife and attack cat until the pizza cooled enough to be put away for his lunch or he wouldn't have had a lunch the next day.

No, I'm really not kidding.

GF Breakfast Muffins

This makes nine cupcake sized muffins.
I give Steele 3 at a time for breakfast.

1/4c Nut Flour or Coconut Flour (or regular bagged coconut ground in a food processor)
1/4c Tapioca Flour or Banana Flour
1/4c Sweet Rice Flour
1/8c Sweet Potato Flour or Oat Bran or Soy Flour
1t Baking Powder
1/2t Xanthan Gum
1/8c Brown Sugar
1T Sugar
1/2t Salt

Pour all dry ingredients into a mixer and combine.
Or use a large bowl and whisk by hand.

1/4c Jelly (I'm all about the apricot preserves right now)
2T Melted butter
1 Egg
3oz Milk (or Soy Milk)
1t vanilla or your favorite extract... black walnut, almond, orange

Mix all wet ingredients in a small bowl until combined.
Add to dry and mix well.

Fill cupcake liners or grease muffin tin.
Bake at 350 for 18 minutes.

Additions:
Dried any fruit: raisins, cranberries, chopped orange essence prune bits, blueberries.
One small mashed banana (add 2 minutes to the bake cycle)
Chopped nuts
Chocolate chips
A dash of cinnamon or nutmeg or both.

This is also a great fast breakfast.
If you mix the dry ingredients and put em into a ziplock bag or three, you can dump the bag right into the mixer and throw in the wet while your oven is heating up. If you want to just put it in a canister, it's 2c + 2T dry mix per batch.

GF Hummus

When I'm not into making bread or out of supplies, this is what I make for Steele's lunches. He eats in on tortilla chips and digs it bigtime.

1 can Garbanzo beans
1 1/2t Lemon juice
1t minced Garlic
1/4t salt
2T Olive juice
10 olives
1 cup Tahini (Sesame Seed Paste, I find mine at Publix)

Dump beans and the juice from the can, lemon juice, garlic, salt, olives and juice into
a pan and simmer until garbonzos are soft.

Let this sit for about 10 minutes.
Toss into food processor or use heavy duty mixer stick. (The thunder stick, I love ours!) Puree.
When your bean base has become smooth add the tahini and puree again.
Tahini thickens when put into hot stuff, so this will thick up on you.
Taste it. More salt? More garlic? More lemon? More tahini?

Steele likes it when it's about the same consistency as peanut butter, maybe a little thinner. The thickness is dependent on the amount of liquid in the bean base and the amount of tahini you use.

I've tried it without the green olives because our other children profess an undue hatred of green olives. However, they don't like the hummus as much unless I sneak olives into it. Once it's pureed they'll never know. Unless you get busted.

Optional additions:
Sun dried tomatoes
Fresh basil and rosemary (if you're into the herb-y thing)

GF Bread - big thanks to Mary Frances!

I nabbed this recipe from www.glutenfreecookingschool.com
Ok, so I modified it slightly.... but it's like 98% her recipe.
We use it in our bread machine and it comes out fine.
My big gripe, GF bread is heavy. Not light and airy like
breads made with wheat. I have to cut the slices kind of thin
or Steele's sandwich feels like it weighs more than he does.

1T Yeast
1T Sugar
1.5c Water at 100 degrees (a bit warmer than your finger)

Put yeast and sugar in a small bowl, stir gently.
Add water to this, stir gently again.
Let it sit while you do everything else.

2.5c GF Flour Mix Standard
2t Xanthan Gum
1t Salt
1/4c Dry Milk Powder

Whisk the dry stuff in a large bowl to combine.

2 Eggs
1.5T Oil
1t Cider Vinegar

Beat the wet ingredients very very well.

Make a well in your dry bowl and add the egg mix, then the yeast mix and stir.
If you get a mildly lumpy goo like substance, you're on the right track.
Remember: yeast is alive, so be gentle with it and try to get the large lumps down
to smallish lumps while making sure there's no hidden pockets of flour stuck to the
bottom of your bowl.

Scrape goo into bread machine pan, hit start and wait.

Yay! Bread that doesn't taste like sand.

GF Peanut Butter Cookies

A chum brought some cookies over for our kids, forgetting that Steele was GF.
We whipped these cookies up and made a young boy happy again.

1c Peanut Butter
1c Sugar or 1/2c Sugar & 1/2c Brown Sugar
1 Egg.

Beat the egg. Throw in the peanut butter and sugar.
Mix thoroughly. Spoon onto a greased cookie sheet.
Flatten dough with a greased glass or your hands.

Bake at 350 for 8 mins.

GF Flour Mix Sweet

This is the flour mix I use for sweet baked goods, like muffins or cupcakes.

1/3c Maseca (Corn Flour)
1/3c Nut Flour or Coconut Flour
(You can get regular coconut and shred it to death in a food processor)
1/3c Brown Rice Whole Grain Flour
1/3c Potato Starch (NOT Potato Flour)
1/3c Amaranth Flour or Banana Flour
2/3c Sweet Rice Flour
2/3c Corn Starch

I have a large tupperware container that I throw the ingredients in and then shake the
bejeebers out of. My son likes that part best!

GF Flour Mix Standard

This is the flour mix I use for baked non sweet goods, such as bread and pizza dough.

1/3c Maseca (Corn flour)
1/3c Soy Flour
1/3c Potato Starch (NOT Potato Flour)
2/3c Tapioca Flour
2/3c Brown Rice Whole Grain Flour
2/3c Corn Starch

If you're anti-soy, you can switch it for another GF Flour like amaranth, millet or teff.

Extra thanks to glutenfreecookingschool.com for this one.