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Salads and Dressings

Homemade Seasoned Rice Vinegar

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Gfzing.com is once again bringing you the DIY recipe you have been looking for – how to make your own seasoned rice vinegar – the kind of vinegar that is used to make sushi.

The proportions for making Japanese seasoned rice vinegar are as follows – as described in the interesting Japanese cookbook Japanese Cooking for the American Table (by Karen Green, 1986, ISBN 0-87477-376-8).

Mix:

  • 4 TB rice vinegar
  • 2 TB sugar
  • 1 1/2 teaspoons salt

That’s it!  In any recipe that calls for seasoned rice vinegar you can use this mixture.  If you include your own homemade vinegar, even better! You can be sure that your seasoned rice vinegar is gluten free!

 

Potato Salad with Eggs and Carrots

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Potato Salad with Eggs and CarrotsA tasty gluten free potato salad with hard-boiled eggs, carrots and onion.  The cooking is done in the microwave to cut down on the heat in the kitchen.

This is based on the potato salad shown at this webpage: http://www.sachikocooking.com/english/en0106prt.htm, altered to use less mayonnaise and much less sugar.

  • 3 red bliss potatoes – if they are about the size of a tennis ball, the three potatoes together will weigh about a pound.
  • 3 large carrots, grated on the large holes of a box grater
  • 1 cup very thinly sliced onion
  • 1/2 teaspoon table salt
  • 2 eggs
  • 1/4 cup coarsely chopped flat-leaf parsley

 

Sauce:

  • 1/4 cup gluten free mayonnaise
  • 1 teaspoon gluten free ballpark mustard
  • 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground pepper
  • 1/2-1 teaspoon sugar
  • 1 teaspoon fresh lime juice

 

Mix the shredded carrots, sliced onion and salt thoroughly and set aside.  Let this rest while you do all the other preparation, so that the salt can draw water out of these veggies.

Clean the potatoes, pierce each one and remove the eyes, microwave them using the potato setting on your microwave.  Set aside to cool, then peel and chop.

“Hard-boil” the eggs in the microwave, adding 1 teaspoon water per egg.  We use a device called a “Micro Egg” for cooking eggs in the microwave.  With this device, it took slightly longer than 1 minute at 100 power to cook the two eggs in one Micro Egg. Set the eggs aside to cool, then dice.

Squeeze the water out of the salted carrot/onion mixture by putting these salted veggies  in a kitchen towel and squeezing firmly.

Put the squeezed carrots and onion in a bowl. Add the chopped cooked potatoes, diced eggs, parsley.  Mix the sauce ingredients in a separate bowl, then fold the sauce in to the carrot-onion-potato-egg-parsley.  Adjust the flavors, chill and serve.

 

 

Salmon with Curry Dry Rub and Dressed Vegetables

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This outstanding gluten free recipe is revised from one which appeared in Bon Appetit magazine nearly a decade ago.  There are 3 components:  the rice, the vegetables and dressing, and the salmon.

Prepare the Rice first:

Fry 1 Tablespoon homemade ghee or butter, then add:

  • 1 cup rinsed basmati or long grain rice

Stir fry for a minute or so, so that all the grains of rice are coated with the ghee or butter

Add:

  • 1 cup water
  • 2/3 cup coconut milk
  • 3/4 teaspoon salt

Bring to a boil, turn down the heat, cover and cook until the rice is done. Season with pepper.  Set aside, covered, to stay warm.

Prepare the vegetables :

Fry the following aromatics in 1 Tablespoon toasted sesame oil for one minute:

  • 2 teaspoons minced fresh ginger
  • 1 clove garlic, minced

Add sliced vegetables and stir fry for just a couple of minutes, then set aside:

  • 1 red bell pepper, sliced
  • Sliced shitake mushrooms, stems removed
  • 1 bunch of bok choy, sliced
  • Other options include carrots, scallions, celery, spinach, baby spinach, watercress, zucchini, bean sprouts with the ends removed etc.

Set the vegetables aside.

Make the dressing for the vegetables:

  • 6 Tablespoons rice vinegar or homemade cider vinegar
  • 3 Tablespoons gluten free soy sauce
  • 2 Tablespoons toasted sesame oil
  • 2-4 Tablespoons chopped fresh cilantro
  • 1 Tablespoon minced fresh ginger
  • 1 teaspoon sugar

Set the dressing aside.

Prepare the serving plates: You will need 4-6 dinner plates ready to go.

Prepare the fish:

Choose very fresh salmon fillets, with the evenest possible thickness for uniform cooking.  Instructions assume that there is a “skin” side, but if there is no skin side just proceed anyway.

Make a dry rub of  one teaspoon of each of the following spices:

  • gluten free chili powder
  • gluten free curry powder (make your own – that’s the best way)
  • gluten free ground cumin
  • gluten free ground coriander
  • gluten free mustard powder (difficult to find – if you can’t find gluten free, leave this out)
  • salt
  • sugar

Sprinkle each of 4-6 6-ounce salmon fillets (the flesh side of the fish, not the skin side) with a teaspoon or more of the spice mixture.  If you want to do something ahead, you could set the spiced fish aside, wrapped, in the refrigerator for 2-3 hours at this point, but we don’t bother – we proceed immediately with the cooking:

Heat a Tablespoon of vegetable oil in a non-stick pan over medium-high heat.  For 6 fillets, you might need 2 pans. When hot, add the salmon filets, skin side down, and fry for 3-4 minutes.  Flip the fish, spice side down now, and finish the cooking – another 3-4 minutes on this side. The fish should flake easily when done.

To Serve:

On each plate, arrange a serving of rice, a serving of vegetables, and a piece of salmon.  Drizzle the vegetables with a little of the dressing (a tablespoon or so).

Can be served with a rose wine, a dry red wine such as Tohu Pinot Noir from New Zealand, or a New England Hard Cider.  The dish is surprisingly well paired with a dry pinot noir, just for the record.

 

Thai Cucumber Salad Dressing

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Salad is the BFF (best friend forever) of seasoned gluten free eaters. Here is another simple, inexpensive gluten free dressing that can be used on many different kinds of fresh vegetable.  In this case, we used English cucumbers – those long, long cucumbers that are often sold mysteriously laminated but have the advantage of holding few seeds.

To make attractive edges on the cucumber, increase the fiber in the finished dish, and avoid peeling, we use a fork to deeply score a cucumber from end to end, on all sides.  Scoring the cucumber in this way breaks up the peel so the diner does not have to masticate like a herbivore.  Then we cut the cucumber in half lengthwise, then sliced it crosswise into moon shapes. If you use a standard American cucumber, after halving it remove the seeds by scooping them out with a spoon.

Put the cucumber slices (or grated carrot, daikon radish or whatever vegetable you want to lightly pickle) in to a glass bowl.  A fancy bowl is not required – any glass bowl will do.

Thai Cucumber Salad gfzing.com birdseyeview

Mix up the following dressing, pour it over the cucumber slices, stir and chill:

  • 1/2 cup cider vinegar (homemade is best)
  • 1/4 cup sugar
  • 1/4 water
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • 1 medium shallot, peeled and minced
  • 1 dried cayenne pepper, minced (or 1/4 – 1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes)
  • fresh ground black pepper (optional)

You can add more cucumbers to the leftover dressing and serve the same salad again the next day.

A note for the wheat-eater who is serving a gluten free diner: be cautious with the sugar container.  Sometimes a tired baker scoops up some flour from the flour container and then uses the same measuring cup to scoop up some sugar.  If that’s something you tend to do, use a fresh container of sugar to make this dressing for your gluten free friend.

Thai Cucumber Salad gfzing.com web

Lime and Agave Salad Dressing

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Here is a delicious gluten free dressing of agave nectar and lime juice, based on a “thai-style” dressing that can be found all over the internet.  (The standard “thai-style” dressing contains the now evil corn syrup, once sooooo trendy and now hiding shamefully in the back of many American cupboards, waiting to be used in pecan pie.)

Lime and Agave dressing from Gfzing.com

We had a bottle of agave nectar sitting on the shelf, and apart from wondering why that agave was not made in to tequila we hadn’t given it another thought.   As usual, we are entering the new year with a load of greens on our plates, hoping to reverse the effects of holiday indulgences.   The problem with all that salad?  It can be boring!  The only hope is an arsenal of interesting sauces to “dress” up the greens.  Here’s one:

  • 1/4 cup amber agave nectar or other sweetener or your choice
  • 1 1/2 tablespoons gluten free soy sauce (check the label)
  • 1 1/2 tablespoons fresh lime juice (about 1/2 of a large lime, or one whole small lime)
  • 1 tablespoon oil (not from olives)
  • 1/2 teaspoon dried basil (or 1 tablespoon snipped fresh basil
  • 1 tablespoon snipped fresh mint leaves
  • 1/4 teaspoon ground chili (cayenne or red pepper)
  • 1 tiny clove of garlic, peeled and grated or minced

Mix all ingredients together and serve with a salad of mixed greens, sliced boneless chicken seasoned and pan-fried, sweet cherry tomatoes, nuts etc.

Chianti goes well with this dressing.

Mare Salad (Italian Seafood Salad)

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This is a delicious Italian seafood salad with chickpeas. Divine!

  • 1/2 pound of fresh, small scallops, parboiled for a very short time – just until done – in a 50/50 mixture of white wine and
    water – use Cape or bay scallops if you can get them.  If using the large sea scallops you will have to slice them in halves or quarters.
  • 1 dozen pitted Kalamata olives, diced
  • 3 stalks celery, diced
  • 15 ounce can of chickpeas, drained, rinsed (peel the tough
    skins off, or cook from scratch instead of using canned)
  • 1 medium red onion, diced (be sure not to use too much – the red onions are pretty gigantic in the supermarket these days)
  • 2 Tb. flat italian parsley, diced
  • 2 Tb. olive oil
  • 2 Tablespoons red vinegar
  • 2 Tablespoons white vinegar
  • salt and pepper

Mix it together and let marinate overnight.

Notes:

  • You can add 1/2 pound sliced cooked squid. Only parboil the squid for 30 seconds or it will become tough and rubbery.
  • Do not use any “imitation seafood” or “seafood legs” or any of those fake crab products – they are often made with wheat.

Thanksgiving Recovery Salad

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After three days of recovery from the delicious Thanksgiving feast, we want a GF salad!  This one from www.gfzing.com has lots of vegetables and fruits, with a little cheese and nuts.

Thanksgiving Recovery Salad gfzing.com
Thanksgiving Recovery Salad from gfzing.com

A composed salad of the following ingredients fits the bill exactly:

  • 2 Roasted Pears (recipe is below)
  • 1/2 Avocado, peeled, pitted and sliced
  • 1/2 bunch Fennel, sliced or shaved
  • 2 ounces Goat Cheese or gluten free blue cheese, chunked (optional)
  • 2 TB sweetened dried cranberries or raisins (gluten free)
  • 1/3 cup Candied Nuts
  • 6 cups Salad Greens, washed
  • 1 Carrot, grated
  • 1 recipe Tangerine Dressing

Roasted Pears: wash 2 unripe (hard) Bartlett pears, remove the cores and cut them in to 8 pieces, stem-to-blossom end.  No need to peel them. In a small bowl, mix 1/4 cup pure Grade B maple syrup (or Grade A Dark Amber) and 1 TB minced fresh ginger (optional).  Combine the pear slices with this syrup mixture, then spread the pear slices on a foil or parchment paper-lined baking sheet.  Sprinkle with salt and pepper.  Bake at 500 degrees for 15 minutes.  Turn the slices over and bake an additional 5 minutes if desired.  You cannot use a silpat lined pan for this process because the oven temperature exceeds the heat tolerance of silpat.

Roasted Pears gfzing.com before baking
Roasted Pears before baking
Roasted Pears after baking
Roasted Pears after baking gfzing.com

Avocado: Peel, pit and slice 1 ripe avocado, then mix the slices with the juice of a lemon or tangerine.  The citric acid in the fruit juice will keep the avocado from turning brown.

Candied Nuts: Mix walnut meats, pecans or almonds with 2 TB granulated sugar.  Place in a small frying pan and fry over medium heat for about 5-10 minutes, stirring constantly, until the sugar melts and begins to caramelize, sticking to the nuts.  Remove the nuts from the pan at this point and place on a parchment paper-lined plate to cool.  Separate the nuts so they don’t form one big nut mass.

Assemble the salad – Gfzing.com recommends that the greens, fennel, grated carrot, and cranberries or raisins can be tossed with the dressing.  On each individual salad plate, gently arrange the avocado slices, pear slices, candied nuts and optional cheese on top of the dressed greens.  Don’t try to toss avocado slices with the salad – disaster that way lies!

Homemade Spicy Tomato and Sweet Pepper Ketchup

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Making your own custom ketchup is easy-peezy!  At gfzing.com, we made a careful study of the available recipes for homemade ketchup, and concluded that the ingredients in most tomato ketchups are pretty much identical.  The spicy ketchup variant here is gluten free and can be served with fries, meatloaf, Shepherd’s Pie, hamburgers, hash browns, corned beef hash or any other dish that requires ketchup.

We tasted the typical store-bought ketchup which is very smooth, mostly sweet, with heavy tomato and celery seed notes – sort of like sweetened and thickened V8 juice! We also read Malcolm Gladwell’s interesting discussion of why there are so many mustards and only one ketchup.  Afterward reading that, we thought that we would not like a ketchup substitute, but we were wrong.  This ketchup is better than bottled ketchup!

Spicy Tomato and Red Pepper Ketchup
Homemade Ketchup has a rich color and complex flavors

We started with a Saveur recipe for homemade ketchup. We replaced half the tomatoes with sweet red peppers, added sweet potato and dates for sweetening and thickening, and switched out their brown sugar with some agave syrup and gluten free fruit jam, to reduce the amount of refined sugar in the recipe.  We changed the amount of spices, and upped the hot peppers.  The final ketchup has some chutney-like flavors.  It has more flavor than bottled ketchup, and far less refined sugar.  It provides dynamic tension for your meatloaf!

Ingredients:

14 0unces diced or petite cut canned tomatoes

3 long sweet red peppers, stemmed, seeded and sliced

1 cup water

1/2 of a large red onion, peeled and chopped

1 clove garlic, peeled and sliced

1 dried cayenne pepper, stemmed and sliced

2 Tablespoons agave nectar

1/3 cup cider vinegar (we make our own cider vinegar out of homemade New England apple cider, from local apples)

1/4 teaspoon celery seed

1/4 teaspoon dry mustard

1/4 teaspoon ground allspice

1/4 teaspoon ground ginger

1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper

1/8 teaspoon ground cloves

1/8 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1 1/2 teaspoons salt

2 Medjool dates, pitted and sliced

1 1/2 ounces of peeled sweet potato, chopped –  a piece of sweet potato about the size of an extra-large egg

2 Tablespoons plum jam

How big are the peppers
A dried cayenne pepper on the left, and a sweet red pepper on the right

The Steps:

Homemade Spicy Tomato and Sweet Pepper Ketchup before cooking
The ketchup before the cooking...

First, put all the ingredients in a saucepan and cook over medium heat for about 45 minutes, stirring occasionally,  until reduced by half.  The material will start to stick to the bottom of the pan.  Be careful that it does not burn.

When cooked, cool and then puree the mixture thoroughly in a blender or food processor.  Taste, and adjust the salt, sweet, and sour flavors as necessary. That’s it!  Serve warm or cold.  Store, covered,  in the refrigerator.  This is not a “preserve” since it has a low sugar content and low salt content.  It cannot be kept indefinitely.  Make sure all your ingredients, including spices, are gluten free.

Salad for two, with fried eggs

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We are all excited that the first food share has arrived from a local CSA – a local community agriculture program.  The first share of the year included beautiful red lettuce, spinach, radishes, white turnips, and bok choy.

For this salad, we chose to use what was in the cupboard to approximate a recipe from the Hamersley’s cookbook – Bistro Cooking at Home.  This is a great spring meal after a hard day’s work.  It makes you realize how a few simple things are all that are needed for a truly fine meal!

Make a whole red lettuce ready for a salad dressing (clean and tear the salad).  Fry a couple of slices of gluten-free bacon until crispy, then drain the fat and reserve the bacon and a tablespoon of the melted fat. Toast up some regular wheat bread for the wheatavores, and a couple of slices of Glutino bread for the celiacs.  Set out some butter, the bacon pieces, and a couple of glasses of Riserva Ducale Chianti, 2005.

Next, make the dressing:

Mix: 1 teaspoon gluten-free Dijon mustard

1/2 a medium shallot, chopped fine

1/2 a clove of garlic, minced

1/4 teaspoon dried thyme

salt

fresh pepper

1 Tablespoon red wine vinegar

1/2 a Tablespoon sherry wine vinegar (that’s 1 1/2 teaspoons)

1 Tablespoon reserved bacon fat

2 Tablespoons olive oil

Dress the lettuce, then fry 4 eggs, over easy, in the remaining bacon fat.  Season them with salt and pepper.  Serve the dressed salad with fried eggs, bacon pieces, toast and butter on the side, and a glass of chianti!

Make sure all your ingredients are gluten-free!

Mango Pineapple Salsa

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This one is for the Engineers who all converged on Boston for the Fourth!

This salsa requires grilled onions and pineapple, so it is suitable to make before you put your chicken on the grill for barbecue. Heat up your barbecue, and do the pineapple and onions first!

Obtain some gluten free soy sauce – this means reading the labels to make sure there are no wheat, barley or rye ingredients.

Make half inch thick slices from a large red onion and a peeled, cored pineapple. Put the onions and pineapple on a rack and grill them over hot coals for 3-5 minutes, or until they start to smell good and are lightly browned. Remove them from the grill and dice them.

Put the grilled, diced onion and pineapple in a bowl and add:

2 mangoes, peeled and diced

1 red bell pepper, seeded and diced

1/3 to 1/2 cup chopped fresh mint

1 to 2 Tablespoons grated fresh ginger

2 Tablespoons each of rice vinegar and gluten free soy sauce
Juice of one fresh orange

1 Tablespoon olive oil (to taste – you may need more)

1 Tablespoon sesame oil

A few dashes of Tabasco sauce

A small amount of salt

Fresh ground pepper

Watermelon Salad with Pine Nuts

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We had a salad like this at a restaurant recently. It is quite refreshing!

We developed the recipe here for the Gf-Zing! website, celebrating flavor in the gluten free world.

6 cups fresh arugula (enough for four people to have a good-sized salad – about 1 1/2 cups for each person)
6 cups of cubed chilled watermelon (very important that it be chilled!)

1/2 cup crumbled gluten free feta cheese

1/2 cup toasted pine nuts (toast them in the oven for 10-15 minutes until they start to brown)
2-3 Tablespoons minced fresh mint (you can use some fresh basil if you don’t have enough mint – the combination is good)

Mix all of the above and toss gently with a dressing made of 1 Tablespoon olive oil, 2 Tablespoons fresh lemon juice, 1/4-1/2 teaspoon sugar, 1 Tablespoon minced shallot, 3/4 teaspoon salt, 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground pepper. Serve immediately with toasts made from a Betty Hagman’s gf fat-free french bread, and some marinated goat cheese to spread on the toasts. Gf-Zing! does not verify the gluten free status of any product.

 

Creamy Tarragon Salad Dressing

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This dressing is excellent on Boston Lettuce, especially in the spring when the tarragon is just starting to sprout new shoots. The recipe was developed for the Gf-Zing! website, which celebrates flavor in the gluten free world.

Mix in a bowl:

1/3 cup gluten free mayonnaise
1 1/2 Tablespoons freshly squeezed lemon juice
1/3 cup olive oil
1/4-1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4-1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 Tablespoon snipped fresh chives
1 teaspoon snipped fresh tarragon (or more)
sugar to taste

For the sugar, only add this by 1/4 teaspoon amounts until the flavor of the dressing is balanced. If the lemon is not very sour, there will be no need for the sugar.

Set the dressing aside for 20 minutes or a half hour before serving – this will allow the chives and tarragon to flavor it up!

You can add coarsely grated carrots, steamed or roasted asparagus, chopped walnuts, raisins or diced hard-boiled eggs to this salad.

Chicken Salad, with Lemon Mayonnaise

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1 cooked chicken, removed from the bones and cut or torn into large chunks
1/2 cup gluten free mayonnaise
juice of 1/2 lemon
salt
freshly ground pepper
1/4 cup minced parsley
1/4 cup minced scallions or red onion
1 stalk of celery, chopped

Fold all the ingredients together in a bowl. Refrigerate until ready to serve. Adjust the seasonings, and add a very small pinch of sugar if you like.

If you prefer less onion, or don’t like bits of onion in your chicken salad, grate a little onion and let a few teaspoons of the juice go into the mixture.

Be sure to use gluten free mayonnaise – check the gluten free food lists on the internet or at your grocery store.

Sweet and Sour Salad Dressing

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1 cup sliced almonds
6 Tablespoons sugar
lettuce
2 whole scallions, chopped, or 1 Tablespoon fresh minced chives
Canned GF mandarin oranges, drained or fresh strawberries, sliced

Dressing:

1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1 Tablespoon minced Italian parsley
2 Tablespoons sugar
2 Tablespoons GF cider vinegar
1/2 teaspoon GF prepared ballpark style mustard
a dash of GF hot sauce

Prepare the nuts: Cook the almonds and the sugar in a non-stick pan over medium heat, stirring constantly until the sugar has melted and the nuts are browned. Take care that the nuts do not burn. Transfer the nuts to a ceramic plate to cool. These can be stored in an airtight container so you don’t eat them all before you serve the salad.

Mix the dressing ingredients up. The mustard will act as an emulsifier, causing the dressing to become one with itself and look very nice. Put the lettuce and green onions in a salad bowl, toss with the dressing and the oranges just before serving. Pass the nuts to sprinkle on top. Most recipes of this kind have half as many nuts, but here the nuts are doubled to allow for snacking.

Your GF guests will appreciate your asking which brand of mustard they are able to eat!

Creamy Garlic Salad Dressing

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3 Tablespoons minced fresh basil
1-3 medium cloves garlic
1 Tablespoon prepared Gluten Free mustard
1 Tablespoon honey
½ tsp salt
½ tsp freshly ground black pepper
4 Tablespoons fresh lemon juice
1/4 cup sunflower seeds (without the shells, obviously)
2 Tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

Put all ingredients in the blender and give it a whir! The original recipe was from Whole Foods Market and it included tofu. We left out the tofu, because, well, tofu in salad dressing? Go figure. The sunflower seeds give the dressing a nice creamy quality.

To serve food to gluten-free friends, check carefully with the manufacturers, or on the reputable internet-based gluten free food lists, making sure that all ingredients are gluten free. Or, ask your friends which brands are safe for them to eat. They will appreciate your concern!

Coleslaw

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A medium sized cabbage
2 carrots
1/2 cup of gluten free mayonnaise
Gluten-free seasoned rice vinegar to taste (you will need at least a half cup)
2-3 teaspoons of prepared gluten free mustard
freshly ground pepper

Clean the cabbage and shred using the food processor or a good knife and chopping board. Clean, peel and grate the carrots. Mix the cabbage and carrots with the mayo, seasoned rice vinegar (already has salt and sugar in it), mustard and pepper. If your guests like onion, you can grate a small onion and add this too!

This coleslaw will keep in the fridge for a day or two. After that, it begins to look disturbing and should be discarded.

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.

Tangerine Salad Dressing

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1/4 cup fresh tangerine, clementine or orange juice
1/4 cup gluten free rice vinegar
1 teaspoon gluten free dry mustard
1/4 teaspoon sugar
1/2 cup olive oil
salt
freshly ground pepper
gluten free cayenne pepper
Minced scallions, to taste – one or two

Use romaine lettuce for the salad, mix all the dressing ingredients and pour on the salad. Toss and serve. You can add more scallions if the guests are onion lovers!

If your friends are not eating oil, omit the oil. If they prefer not to have onions, omit the onions! This dressing is great made with citrus and seasoned rice vinegar, all by themselves.

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.

Corn Salad – Southwestern

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3-4 cups of cooked corn (you can use frozen or fresh)
1/2 cup diced red bell pepper
1 cup of cooked lima beans, edamame beans or other beans (or leave them out)
1/2 cup diced red onion
1 green bell pepper, diced
1 teaspoon of salt
1 teaspoon of gluten free red chile powder
1/4 cup gluten free cider vinegar
1/3 cup vegetable oil
freshly ground black pepper

Mix it all up, refrigerate it and let the flavors mix for a couple of hours. This simple corn salad is delicious, and very colorful! If you are making this for a gluten-free friend, make sure to use gluten free spices, and tell your friend that you took the trouble. There are some spice purveyors that promise to include all ingredients on their labels, but some of them don’t and this makes the GF community wary and nervous about the possibility of fillers that may have been added to the spices!

You can add tomatoes to this recipe, and you can add 1-2 minced jalapeno peppers if you want a little heat in 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.

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.