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Archives for October 2005

Mushrooms or Green Beans, Vinaigrette

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Steam 1 1/2 pounds of green beans, or slice a couple of 12 ounce packages of mushrooms (cleaned really, really well, because after all what is all that dirt on those mushrooms anyway?)

Make a dressing of:

2-3 large cloves of garlic, minced
6-8 fresh basil leaves, minced
1/4 cup olive oil
3 Tablespoons GF red wine vinegar
salt
pepper

Marinate the beans or mushrooms in this dressing. You can add roasted red pepper strips, diced red onion, fresh spinach leaves (add spinach just before serving). Enjoy!

If you are serving food to gluten-free friends, check carefully with the manufacturers, or on the reputable internet-based gluten free food lists, to make sure that all ingredients are gluten free. Or, ask your friends which brands are safe for them to eat.

Mango Salsa

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1 cup of diced ripe mango (try a champagne mango – they are yummy!)
1 cup diced ripe tomato
1/2 diced red onion
1/4 cup minced scallion
2 Tablespoons minced cilantro (use scissors for mincing – it’s quicker)
2 Tablespoons olive oil
1 Tablespoons lime juice
1 seeded jalapeno pepper, minced (careful – these are spicy!)
salt
freshly ground pepper

Prepare all the ingredients, mix, adjust the salt, pepper and sweetness, and serve.

If you are serving food to gluten-free friends, check carefully with the manufacturers, or on the reputable internet-based gluten free food lists, to make sure that all ingredients are gluten free. Or, ask your friends which brands are safe for them to eat.

Lemon Olive Oil Salad Dressing

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6 Tablespoons of olive oil (make sure it’s fresh!)
juice of one lemon
1 teaspoon of sugar
salt
freshly ground pepper
1 scallion (green onion), cleaned and minced (use all the white part and about 1/3 of the green part)
1 teaspoon of gluten free prepared mustard of your choice

Mix this all together with a whisk, and serve with Boston lettuce or red lettuce, or a mix of baby salad greens.

If you are serving food to gluten-free friends, check carefully with the manufacturers, or on the reputable internet-based gluten free food lists, to make sure that all ingredients are gluten free. Or, ask your friends which brands are safe for them to eat.

Honey Mustard Salad Dressing

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1/4 cup vegetable oil
4 teaspoons of your favorite honey
4 teaspoons of gluten free prepared dijon mustard
1 teaspoon of minced fresh chives, shallot or scallions
1 teaspoon grated fresh ginger
1 teaspoon minced fresh dill (you can mince a lot and store dill in the freezer)
1/4 teaspoon gluten free paprika
1 clove of garlic, grated or minced
3 Tablespoons gluten free red wine vinegar or cider vinegar
1 teaspoon of fresh lemon juice
salt and fresh pepper

Mix it all up, and serve with your salad!

If you are serving food to gluten-free friends, check carefully with the manufacturers, or on the reputable internet-based gluten free food lists, to make sure that all ingredients are gluten free. Or, ask your friends which brands are safe for them to eat.

Salad Dressings, in general

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When the gluten-free person makes that trip to the grocery store, they enter like a cart-horse with blinders on – seeing only the 25% of the product aisles that have gluten-free food in them. Naturally, we gravitate towards the produce section, where the vegetables are neatly sealed in gluten-free packages by their allmighty maker – not even the food industry could introduce a “solution” into a potato, or add a modified food starch to lettuce. So, we are always happy to see our colorful vegetable friends! A safe oasis of green, orange and red in a desert world of wheat.

The salad course is a favorite, so we collect a variety of healthy vegetables, but then we wander over to the dressing shelf and have to get out those reading glasses to see what creepy ingredients the manufacturers have added to the products. We are ready to present to you here, on the gluten-free Gf-Zing! website, a selection of salad dressing recipes that will make your vegetables sing!

Check the Salads and Dressings link in the menu on the left for some salad dressing recipes.

Banana Raisin Bread

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A friend at work gave Gf-Zing! an excellent recipe for banana bread – it is from the specific carbohydrate diet. It is truly a fine quick bread. We used half almond flour and half GF flour mixture, and some super ripe bananas, and added a teaspoon of GF vanilla and upped the salt to 1/2 teaspoon – just great! You can slice this bread quite thinly and it is indistinguishable from wheat-based bread, possibly a little better. This bread does not crumble into bits, and it is not dry like the Sahara desert either!

BANANA RAISIN BREAD
*Ingredients*

2 1/2 cups almond flour (we used half almond flour and half GF flour mix – see below)

2 mashed super-ripe bananas

1 Teaspoon GF vanilla

3 eggs

1/4 cup melted butter or margarine

1/4 cup honey

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon cider vinegar

1/2 – 3/4 cup raisins.

*Instructions*

Mash bananas and vanilla thoroughly with a potato masher. Add eggs and beat until
smooth and creamy. Add melted butter, honey, salt, baking soda and mix well. Add almond flour, GF flour and vinegar. Stir in raisins and mix well.

Grease a loaf pan, then line bottom of loaf pan with baking paper and grease again. Pour dough into pan. Bake 350 F. for about 50 to 55 mins until toothpick or knife comes out clean.

Cool for 10 minutes, more or less, in the pan, then transfer to a wire rack to cool.

Here’s the GF Flour mixture we used for part of the almond flour:

2 c brown rice flour
2 c white rice flour
1 1/2 c sweet rice flour
1 1/3 c tapioca starch or tapioca flour
2/3 c corn starch
1/2 c rice bran or rice polish
2 tsp xanthan gum

If you are serving food to gluten-free friends, check carefully with the manufacturers, or on the reputable internet-based gluten free food lists, to make sure that all ingredients are gluten free. Or, ask your friends which brands are safe for them to eat.

English Muffins

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Gluten Free by George English Muffins, the cinnamon and currant flavor,
appeared at the freezer section of the Whole Foods market recently,
and we had try them. “Hope” is one of the common threads of the
gluten-free lifestyle – always hoping that the latest gluten-free bread
product will not crumble at the slightest touch like a skeleton in a
vampire movie; always hoping that the croutons we make from the
gluten-free focaccia will not sit there on the cookie sheet in the oven
like little cubes of a dishwashing sponge that will never dry out;
always hoping that the cookie baker will have heeded the words of the
Elizabethan cooks who said “forget not the salt.;” hoping that maybe
this time the manufacturer will not have interpreted “gluten-free” to
mean “flavor-free.”

Well, that was long-winded, but we have to vent sometimes. Now for the good news:
this guy George, of Gluten Free by George, has cooked up a nice little
English muffin. We actually look forward to eating these for breakfast!
And, more good news, if you put them in the toaster, they actually
brown, and they become hot, unlike other, seemingly heat-resistant
gluten-free bread-like substances we have toasted before. Three cheers
for George!

A Gf-Zing! recommended product.

Note: Here at Gf-Zing! we do not verify the gluten-free status of any product. We rely on the manufacturers to declare the status of their products. It is up to the reader to check labels, and to verify that the products they consume are safe for them to use.

Shrimp with Amontillado and Garlic

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1 pound large raw shrimp, peeled and prepared
olive oil – about 1/4 cup
6-8 cloves of garlic, sliced thinly
1/4 cup flat leaf Italian parsley, chopped coarsely
1/2 teaspoon chili flakes, or 1/2 teaspoon GF vietnamese hot sauce with garlic
salt
pepper
juice of half a lemon
1/2 -3/4 cup good quality Amontillado sherry
1-2 Tablespoons butter or margarine
mangoes, peeled and sliced
Brown rice or GF bread

Heat up the oil in a large heavy pan over medium heat until hot. Add the prepared shrimp and cook them stirring until they are somewhat pink – a couple of minutes. Then add the garlic, hot peppers or hot pepper sauce, salt and pepper. Stir fry for another minute or two. Add the parsley and the lemon juice and sherry and saute until the shrimp are done. Then add 1-2 Tablespoons of fresh butter to “refresh the sauce” as the French say and stir-fry the sauce until all the materials are amalgamated. Serve with sliced mango on the side, a stir-fry of chinese cabbage, ginger, garlic and snow peas, and with brown rice or GF bread for a starch.

The sauce is excellent and very rich, so your guests will be full when they finish eating this dish.

If you are serving food to gluten-free friends, check carefully with the manufacturers, or on the reputable internet-based gluten free food lists, to make sure that all ingredients are gluten free. Or, ask your friends which brands are safe for them to eat.

Homemade Pork Breakfast Sausage

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Irish sausage gfzing.com 2011

2 egg whites (or 1 large egg)
1 Tablespoon of GF dijon-style prepared mustard or other GF mustard
1 pound of pork rib roast (boneless) or boneless country-style ribs
1/4 cup of GF bread crumbs (GF rolls, or GF bread of any kind will do – 2 end slices of Udi’s for example)
2 Tablespoons water
2 Tablespoons minced fresh sage
1 or 1.5 teaspoons of salt
1/4 teaspoon ground coriander
1/4 teaspoon fresh ground pepper (or more, to taste)

Put everything in the food processor and process until smooth. Make into patties of the size you prefer and fry in 2 Tablespoons of hot oil for 3-5 minutes on each side until cooked through. Use a non-stick pan.

These gluten free sausage patties are delicious and so much better than the store-bought sausage!

Note: if you don’t have fresh sage then use 1 Tablespoon of dried sage. If you want to use turkey or chicken in place of the pork, you can. Turkey or chicken sausage made this way is quite good, not too dry, due to the egg whites and mustard.

If you are serving food to gluten-free friends, check carefully with the manufacturers, or on the reputable internet-based gluten free food lists, to make sure that all ingredients are gluten free. Or, ask your friends which brands are safe for them to eat.

Roast Pork or Chicken with Garlic, Sage and Rosemary

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4 Tablespoons extra-virgine olive oil
6 cloves of garlic, minced or grated finely
1 Tablespoon minced fresh sage
2 Teaspoons minced fresh rosemary
salt and pepper
4 pounds pork rib roast (don’t use the center cut – it will have no flavor and be dry)

12 ounces or 1 pound of dry flageolet beans, cooked, or small white beans, canned
1 large onion, or 2 medium
butter
3 large Yukon gold potatoes
1 bay leaf
1/4 cup chopped fresh parsley
pepper

For the meat, mix the first 4 ingredients and the salt and pepper, and rub them on the pork (you can use a large roasting chicken if you prefer). Put the meat in a roasting pan.

If you are cooking pork, cover the pan with foil and roast for 2 hours at 375 degrees. If using a chicken, do not cover with foil but use a vertical chicken roaster (sort of like a chicken chimney).

Fry the chopped onion in 2 Tablespoons of butter until golden, then add the drained beans, and the potatoes. Set aside.

After one hour of cooking the roast, remove the foil (if you are doing the pork) and place the cooked beans and the potatoes (peeled and cut in half), the bay leaf and parsley in the bottom of a roaster under the pork or chicken. Add 1-2 cups of chicken stock or water to the pan. Give the beans and potatoes a good stir, then roast for another 1-2 hours, until everything is cooked to your liking. Check from time to time and give the beans a stir. Add more stock if they are getting too dry. Salt the beans and potatoes to taste (it is best to salt beans after cooking so they don’t become tough).

Remove the roast to a platter to slice it, and dish up the beans and potatoes into a bowl.

The drippings from the pork or chicken will season the beans and potatoes, relieving you of the disheartening task of making GF gravy. The beans will be so delicious you will wonder why you ever used to make gravy to begin with.

Notes: If you are not familiar with the fabulous flageolet beans of France, please see if you can obtain some. They can be pressure-cooked for 25 minutes and used in this recipe. If you don’t use a pressure cooker, then soak them over night and cook as you would cook dry kidney beans. If you don’t have access to flageolet beans, then use canned small white beans but it won’t be as delicious.

It is best to grow your own fresh herbs for fall and winter cooking, but if you don’t have fresh sage and rosemary then use half as much dry herbs. So, if the recipe calls for 1 Tablespoon of fresh sage, use 1 and a half teaspoons of dry sage.

Alice’s Buckwheat Blueberry Pancakes

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1/2 cup dark buckwheat flour – you can get it at a natural grocery store – and buckwheat is NOT wheat!
1/2 cup Namaste white vanilla cake mix (this might work with other gf cake mixes too)
2 teaspoons GF baking powder
2 teaspoons sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
4 Tablespoons melted butter or other butter-like GF product
2 large eggs
1 cup gluten free almond milk
frozen blueberries

Mix everything except the blueberries with a whisk. If you add the blueberries to the batter, the batter will turn purple. It is best to sprinkle the berries on the pancakes while the pancakes are cooking.

Heat a heavy pan to medium high, melt some butter in there and fry up some pancakes – sprinkle the frozen berries on top of the pancakes while the batter is still cooking. When the pancakes show bubbles that are popped on the top of the pancakes, they are ready to flip. These are a little more tricky to flip than a wheat pancake, so be dextrous and be patient – don’t try to flip too soon!!!! Cook the other side, then serve with grade B maple syrup in vast quantities!!!!

This is a tender, gluten-free pancake, without a strong buckwheat taste – We were actually hoping for a more buckwheat intensive experience – but it is a fine pancake which will satisfy even your non-GF friends. Because of the sugar in the cake mix and the recipe, the pancakes will brown nicely.

If you are serving food to gluten-free friends, check carefully with the manufacturers, or on the reputable internet-based gluten free food lists, to make sure that all ingredients are gluten free. Or, ask your friends which brands are safe for them to eat.

Chicken with Peas and Shitake Mushrooms

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4-6 slices of bacon
6-8 skinless, boneless chicken thighs
3/4 cup dried shitake mushrooms, soaked in boiling water for 30 minutes and drained
1 large onion, or 1 bunch of scallions, diced
3 cloves of garlic
2 -4 cups of chopped romaine lettuce (or other lettuce)
16 ounces of frozen peas
1/2 cup of GF broth, water or mushroom soaking liquid
2 teaspoons of GF ketchup
1/2 teaspoon sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon fresh ground black pepper
1 teaspoon fresh thyme leaves or 1/2 teaspoon dried
1/2 cup chopped flat-leaf parsley

Chop the bacon, saute it until crisp, drain away the grease and set the bacon aside. Fry the chicken in the same pan until golden, and put the chicken pieces into an oven-proof casserole. In the same pan where you fried the chicken, fry the onion until browned, then add the garlic, lettuce, peas, mushrooms, ketchup, sugar, salt, pepper, thyme and parsley. Add the broth or water, stir to get all the tasty bits of things that are stuck to the bottom of the pan mixed in with the vegetables, then put all of this material – the vegetables and the juices – on top of the chicken. Cover the casserole and bake for 25 minutes at 350.

This is very tasty served with jasmine rice. The recipe is based on one from Paula Peck in The Art of Good Cooking, which was published in 1961. The original recipe had much more fat, from chicken skin and a whole half a cup of butter which I have omitted here. Also, the original included soy sauce which is often not safe for the gluten-free community. I have updated the mushrooms to shitake mushrooms, but you could use regular button mushrooms without any diminution of flavor.

Pamela’s Amazing Wheat-Free Bread Mix

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More choices, and Better Toast!

The search for good gluten free bread continues! We are looking for a bread with flavor! Somehow, when bread is made without wheat, the resulting bread can be flavorless – no matter how much herb and spice is added. One of our associates calls it “the black hole of flavor” in that an infinite number of flavorings can be added in to a rice-based bread yielding absolutley no improvement in the flavor whatsoever! We are also always looking for gluten free breads with structural integrity and moisture.

Recently, gluten free-bread mix manufacturers have begun branching out from the old rice flour recipes, adding interesting new elements like sorghum and chicory root. The result is that we now have more choices and better toast! The latest entry into the gluten-free Bread arena is a new mix from Pamela’s, which the manufacturer describes as gluten-free.

Pamela’s new Amazing Wheat-Free Bread Mix makes a nicely flavored bread that is perfect for sopping up gravy! This bread has a sort of spongy quality – you can drag it around the plate and it actually absorbs gravy instead of falling apart. Try it with the Beef Stew braised with Chianti and Coffee (filed under Meat Recipes). Interestingly, you can also return to the loaf of bread a day or two after baking it and the loaf is still moist and attractive! You don’t need to relegate this one immediately to the cryogenics department for eternal frozen suspension. You can leave it on the table, wrapped up, and return to it later without worries. This is a miraculous development, for those of us familiar with the old bricks of frozen rice bread that crumble to dust when awoken from their frozen state.

How about toast? Pamela’s requires longer toasting than wheat bread would, yielding a browned piece of toast with a pleasant, homey flavor. The flavor is unique and slightly sweet – something to look forward to at breakfast!

We are looking forward to trying this product again, in particular the intriguing recipes for cinnamon bread and sweet bread that are on the side of the package. Also, especially interested in using it for french toast – it may be perfect for that!

A Gf-Zing! recommended product!

Note: Here at Gf-Zing! we do not verify the gluten-free status of any product. We rely on the manufacturers to declare the status of their products. It is up to the reader to check labels, and to verify that the products they consume are safe for them to use.

Beef Braised with Chianti and Coffee

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Beef Stew – Gluten free recipe!

2 pounds of beef chuck
olive oil
2 large Spanish onions
1-2 cloves of garlic
fresh oregano leaves and fresh rosemary
salt and pepper
Chianti
Black coffee
water

While your friends are adding flour to thicken the gravy, you will be reading a book with your feet up, waiting for a really tasty beef stew that contains no thickeners. To make a good stew, make sure to use high-quality stewing beef – the kind that will get tender with cooking! Beef chuck is the right cut. The meat must have some fat and connective tissue if you want a tender stew.

This recipe may sound unlikely, – braising beef in red wine and coffee – but it is just delicious. Serve it with braised potatoes and garlic.

First, brown 2 pounds of beef chuck, cut in large cubes – 1.5 inches – in 2 Tablespoons of good olive oil. Remove the browned beef cubes to a stew pot.

Next, chop up 2 large onions and brown them in the drippings in the pan – about 8 miutes on medium heat. Then add 1-2 cloves of garlic, minced, and 1/2 tablespoon EACH of minced fresh oregano leaves and fresh rosemary, and 1/2 teaspoon each of salt and frshly ground pepper. Deglaze the pan with 1 cup of Chianti (Italian red wine) , 1 cup of black coffee and 1 cup of water. Pour all of this mixture in with the beef. Put a top on the stew pot and cook over low heat for about 2 hours – you will want to be checking to make sure the stew does not burn, and adding extra water as needed. Keep checking from time to time.

When the meat is tender, (check by sticking a fork in it), take the top off and reduce the sauce to the amount you like – some people like a lot of sauce, some people don’t.

This recipe is based on one from Tastes of the Pacific Northwest by Fred Brack and Tina Bell, 1988.

Fiordifrutta – Lemon or Strawberry flavors

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Oh my! This organic fruit spread – Fiordifrutta – from www.rigoniusa.com is quite delicious. It has a very concentrated fruity flavor and is not too sweet – Fiordifrutta — just perfect for dressing up a drab gluten-free pound cake. The website claims that the product is made only of fruit, no corn syrup in there for anyone concerned about corn allergies. The lemon flavor product has pieces of lemon in it, spreads nicely, and has just a ton of flavor. Best of all, you don’t have to make it yourself. The strawberry flavor reminds us of homemade jam. There is a slight bitterness to these products which will be attractive to sophisticated adult palates.

This product is available for sale at Debra’s Natural Gourmet in Concord, Massachusetts.

We purchased a store-bought GF pound cake and spread the lemony treat on a slice, then served it with a cup of hot darjeeling tea – on pretty china. We felt like we were sitting down to some kind of nineteenth century tea in a novel. Felt like normal; actually, felt better than normal.

Lemon or Strawberry Fiordifrutta – A Gf Zing! recommended product!

Note: Here at Gf-Zing! we do not verify the gluten-free status of any product. We rely on the manufacturers to declare the status of their products. It is up to the reader to check labels, and to verify that the products they consume are safe for them to use.