Salad dressings

Salad is a favorite in our house... even my 5 year old can vacumn down a plate of salad in record time when he is hungry!! My picky eaters also like salad, but will only eat it with "Invisible Dressing" This is one of my most used recipes from my host mom in Germany... I honestly don't know what I would do without it!!

"Invisible Dressing"
3 tbsp oil
3 tbsp vinegar (I like Salata brand)
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp onion powder or 1 tbsp minced fresh onion (optional)
1/2 tsp garlic powder or 1 pip fresh garlic mashed (optional)
5-6 tbsp water (or to taste)

Shake the ingredients together well and pour over prepared salad. This makes a great dressing to use on any single raw vegetable or combination of vegetables.

We have many versions of salad that are appreciated, but some of our favorites include:
Nothing but lettuce and dressing
Cucumber and Carrots (shred both vegetables together and then pour dressing over)
Nothing but beets
Lettuce with red, orange and green peppers and Strawberries
Jicama slices
Boiled potatoes (boil and dice potatoes, and add dressing for a German version of potato salad)

Experiments

I stayed in Germany for a year when I was younger, lived there with a family as an exchange student. My host mother taught me a lot about cooking and inspired me to continue improve in the art. My own mother has a way of making food (vegetables especially) fun for the kids to eat.... carving faces into carrot and potato slices, etc That combined with being trained as a salad and desert artist at a local restaurant when I first started working has fired a passion for food that looks and tastes good. Food is meant to be enjoyed, both by its design and it's function. I first figured out I had food allergies when I was about 14 years old. At the time, the only goat's cheese we could buy was snowgoat from Europe which is brown and did nothing to alleviate my addiction to cow's milk cheeses. I was also limited in the different types of flour I could get. Rice flour on it's own I found out made a crumbly mess and chickpea flour made disgusting cookies. My earlier attempts left something to be desired and created a fear of experimenting with other flour. I gave up trying to avoid Wheat and Dairy products because it seemed too difficult and in the process I gained an extra 70 lbs. A couple of years ago I discovered Spelt flour which seemed easy enough to replace wheat, and it helped that I had a friend along side that could point me in the right direction when things didn't work the way I wanted them to. Watching her in her kitchen and talking to her about what was going on gave me the inspiration to continue to experiment to find what would work for me. Last year a trip to the Naturopath Doctor revealed that I was also allergic to Spelt flour. This revelation sent me back to the drawing board and down the road of experimenting with gluten free flours which at the time seemed a tedious and mysterious road I had done my best to avoid thus far. What I saw in cookbooks were recipes that called for far more ingredients than I was used to, and many different types of flour which were expensive and needed to be stored in the fridge. First off, I have 6 kids. I don't have time for more ingredients!!! I barely have time to bake let alone if it is going to take me twice as long to navigate through a complicated recipe!! Secondly, I have a budget!! More money for ingredients that I'm not sure I will like or use is just out of the question!!! Thirdly, there is NO EXTRA SPACE in my fridge!! Now, over time I have made room in my freezer for raw nuts and seeds and there are some bags of flour in my second fridge.... but by and large, I use my flour blend to replace All purpose flour in most recipes and I don't have to worry too much about having a lot of different types of flour available to use. I purchase a lot of basic groceries... fresh fruit and vegetables, meats, rice and rice pasta, flour and baking supplies, milk and yogurt. I have cut out all of the prepackaged snacks, almost all the cereal, and all the prepackaged meals that were costing me too much money anyways. We no longer order pizza, or any kind of takeout so we have saved a lot of money that way. When we need a quick meal, I will buy a whole roasted chicken from the grocery store and a bag of prechopped salad or we will make hamburgers and fries. In the beginning, the grocery bill was a bit out of hand as I was grappling to figure out how to feed everyone, but as time has worn on, things are getting easier to handle and the grocery budget is starting to line up again. I just wanted to encourage those of you who have just started out and are overwhelmed with the enormity of the job. It is worth it to keep working through it and it does get easier.... I hope that you will find the information on this blog useful. I would also love to know that you have been here so feel free to leave comments or click on the sidebar to follow this blog, that way you can be updated with the newest posts.

Oat Scones

1 1/2 cups All purpose Flour Blend
2 cups Rolled oats
1/4 cup Splenda
1 1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 cup Chia Gel
1/3 cup melted margarine
1/2 cup goat's milk
2 tbsp ground flax seed

Spoon onto cookie sheet and flatten slightly (they should be about 1/2 inch thick)
Bake at 450*F for 15 minutes until risen and slightly browned.

Biscuits and Jam for Breakfast

This has very quickly become an absolute favorite in this house...

Basic Biscuits (I always make at least double this recipe... but I know some of you aren't feeding as many lol)

2 cups All Purpose Flour Blend
1 1/2 tsp Baking soda
1 tsp sea salt

1/3 cup margarine (softened)

3/4 cup of milk (we use goat's milk or unsweetened coconut milk)
2 tbsp water

Mix the dough until all ingredients are moist (don't over mix)
Flatten dough onto a lightly floured surface until dough is about 1/2 inch thick.
Cut into rounds with a cookie cutter (I use a tupperware cup dipped in flour)
Bake on a cookie sheet at 450*F for 12-15 minutes.
Serve Warm with Jam

A word about Jam
Around here, I don't even think it's worth putting the jam into jars and storing it... we use it that fast. The kids eat jam with their yogurt (I always buy the yogurt plain and unsweetened), they like jam in their oatmeal, on toast, biscuits, muffins etc. Last night I even made yogurt popscicles with goat's milk yogurt and the left over jam skim from the batch I made yesterday.

I have not yet been able to find a true sugar free pectin (they all contain dextrose or other types of sugar) so I have opted (so far) to go with the type that requires you to add the sugar (as opposed to "sugar free" varieties. I haven't done too much research on this yet, so when I do, I may change my view.... but until then, this is what I am doing....

When using pectin from a box, I follow the recipes that are given, but I usually put in only 1/2 of the sweetener (I use Splenda instead of Sugar) This produces a jam that is sweet enough for our now modified taste buds. I say modified because it seems that since we went off of sugar, many of the previously sweet treats are so sweet that we don't enjoy them anymore. I am finding myself cutting down the amount of sucralose (Splenda) that I am using in a lot of recipes, simply because it is otherwise too sweet. And believe me.... I NEVER thought I would be saying that lol.

Strawberry Rhubarb Jam
measure 1/4 cup Lemon Juice, 2 cups strawberries (mine were thawed from frozen with nothing else added), and 2 cups of chopped fresh rhubarb, 1/2 tsp margarine, and 1 box of pectin (Certo) into a large pot and mix well. Bring mixture to a boil and add 3-4 cups of Spenda. Bring mixture to a rolling boil, remove from heat and allow to cool in the pot until a skim forms on the top of the mixture. Using a metal spoon, remove the skim from the top of the mixture and place in a separate container. The remaining mixture can then be placed into clean, warm canning jars and sealed or simply put into containers to freeze.

The skim can be used to make popsicles (as I indicated earlier in this post) or in Jam muffins (see previous post) or use up as you would regular jam. It is a bit more "foamy" that the rest of the jam so we usually try to mix it in something so it doesn't go to waste.

oooooo Carob powder :-)

In my wanderings of the grocery store today (blissfully without children) I stumbled upon Carob powder made by Bob's Red Mill. I've never seen this product before, but I'm not sure if that is because I am usually distracted by children trying to get my attention or if it is a new product at this particular grocery store... in any case I brought it home to try out. When I told my kids that I found chocolate powder that wasn't really chocolate powder and they were actually allowed to have it.... 2 of them were leaping for joy, and 2 others were skeptical at best.... well they told me they weren't going to try it and I wasn't going to make them. Fair enough....lol So the 2 eager ones got to try it first..... Chocolate milk..... and their enthusiasm after tasting it was so intense that the other two quickly got on board and drank their fill as well.... hoorah for treats :-)

Chocolate milk

1 cup goat's milk or unsweetened coconut milk
1 tbsp Carob powder (Bob's Red Mill)
1 tsp-1 tbsp Agave Nectar (to taste)

Carob Chip Cookies

1 cup unsweetened apple sauce
1 cup olive oil or coconut oil
2 cups Splenda
1 cup Chia Gel
2 tsp Vanilla
5 cups All Purpose Flour blend
1 cup Almond meal
1 1/2 tsp salt
2 tsp baking soda
2 cups Carob chips

Mix together wet ingredients and dry ingredients in separate bowls. All dry ingredients to wet ingredients and mix well. Spoon onto a cookie sheet and let bake for 15 min at 350*F.

This recipe makes a lot of cookies.... if you are a smaller family or you aren't as much of a cookie lover, you might want to consider cutting the measurements in half.

Jam muffins

2 cups All Purpose Flour blend
1 cup Rolled Oats
1/2 cup Spenda
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp salt

1/2 cup Chia Gel (mix 3 tbsp Chia Seed with 2 cups warm water and allow to stand 15 minutes or until it forms a gel)
1 cup goat's milk
1/4 cup olive oil
1/2 cup sugar free Jam (I use Smuckers brand or my own homemade version)

Mix all ingredients together and bake in muffin cups for 20 minutes at 375*F

Cinnamon Swirls

I stayed up last night making these so the kids could have them in their lunches today. At 11:30 I was finally on my way to bed, with warm cinnamon rolls cooling on the rack in the kitchen. I was looking forward to getting up in the morning and having a relatively quick and easy job packing the lunches for school and daycare.... And then, as seems relatively run of the mill in this family.... something happened. At 6am my boys woke up and started talking in their room instead of going downstairs. This of course woke the baby up, which they noticed, and so quickly left the room to go watch TV before they got into trouble. In their haste, they forgot to close the door to the bedroom causing the baby to start screaming at the top of his lungs. So much for sleeping another hour. Then after getting the baby settled and back to sleep, I got up to go start making breakfast and lunch, only to discover that while I was dealing with a hollering infant, the boys had inhaled nine of the twelve cinnamon buns. So much for easy.... I ended up having to make muffins this morning too.

Cinnamon Buns

3 cups All purpose Flour blend (see prior post)
4 tbsp Splenda
2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
1/2 cup margarine

1 1/2 cups goat milk yogurt

1 tbsp margine melted
cinnamon to sprinkle

Mix first 5 ingredients together in a large mixing bowl. Cut in margarine until it is the size of peas. Add yogurt in and mix gently, then turn onto a clean surface and knead the dough until it is mixed. Press the dough flat on parchment paper (to prevent sticking) in the shape of a large rectangle (approx 8" by 15") Spread with melted margarine and sprinkle with cinnamon. Roll the rectangle width wise and cut into 1" slices. Place on parchment paper and cook for 15 minutes at 400*F. Allow to cool on the baking sheet before removing.

Cinnamon Oatmeal Bread

3 cups All Purpose Flour Blend
1/2 cup rolled oats
1 tbsp molasses
1 tsp stevia
1 tsp salt
2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp ginger
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1/2 cup olive oil

Mix ingredients together and turn into greased bread pan. Use a spatula to push batter towards the edges of the bread pan so that the batter is lower in the middle of the pan than at the sides (this forms a loaf with a more flat top with less chances of cracking) Bake at 350*F for 90 minutes.

A Word about Bread

What is it that draws us towards this most basic ingredient to our everyday eating? Since the beginning of recorded history human beings have been mixing flour and oil to create dough that is cooked and eaten nearly every day. In modern Western life we have become so dependant upon it in our daily diets that it is often served in one way or another at every meal. Do we really need that much bread? Going gluten free is a great step to improving our health and weight, but we also need to remember that all grains, gluten free or not, cause our bodies to retain fluid. Our bodies really do not need to have more than 1-2 cups of grains total in a day. The rest of our diet should be rich in fruits, vegetables, legumes, dairy, soy, nuts, and seeds. For meat eaters this can also include small portions of meats. We are so far away from what was normal for our ancestors, it is no wonder we suffer so many more ailments than they did.

That being said, all of the rice bread alternatives that we have tried so far from the store were expensive cardboard and my children refused to eat them. Thus, I have embarked upon a quest to find a bread that my kids will eat. I long for the easy days of sandwiches in the school lunchboxes!!

Oatmeal Cookies

Gluten Free Flour gets expensive when you have 6 kids chowing down on it.... that's why I LOVE this cookie recipe!!! Not only does it taste good, but it also uses mostly oats so it is not as expensive to make as other recipes that use more flour. Make sure when you are shopping for oats that you get a gluten free variety. Oats are naturally gluten free; however, in the manufacturing process, they often are subjected to machinery that is also used to mill other types of non gluten free grains. This cross contamination of grains is problematic for people who are extremely sensitive to gluten (those suffering from celiac disease for instance) I get mine from an organic mill that sells them in bulk and uses manufacturing processes that prevent the contamination of the oats from other sources.

3 cups rolled oats
1 cup All Purpose Flour blend (see earlier post)
1 cup Splenda
2 tsp molasses
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp vanilla
1/2 cup olive oil
1/2 cup boiling water
1 tsp baking soda

Mix together the ingredients, form into 1 inch thick logs and refridgerate at least 1 hour. Slice into 1/2 inch thick slices and place on ungreased baking sheet. Bake at 375*F for 8-10 minutes. Leave to cool on baking sheet for 5 minutes before moving cookies to a cooling rack.