Summer Pt. 3

This is the last update so far this summer, I promise.  While at the store buying blueberries for the muffins in the last post, I happened upon a new product I wanted to try.  I haven't had a cinnamon roll in who-knows-how-long, and there, sitting in front of me, was a boxed cinnamon roll mix.  I had to have it.  So, I made an impulse purchase.  The brand is chebe, and I found it on the shelf in the gluten free section of Giant. The box is pictured to the right.  It was a simple mix, the only things needed were 3 T. oil, 2 T. milk, and 2 eggs. Also, 2 T. soft butter, 1/4 c. brown sugar, and 2 t. cinnamon were needed for the filling.

I followed the directions on the back of the box, and it was really simple.  Put the oil, milk, eggs, and powdered mix into a bowl and mix together.  I started with a whisk and finished with my hands. The dough should be elastic but sticky. I then put 2 pieces of parchment paper out and rolled the dough between them; I didn't want to have to clean the counters. Roll it into a rectangle, about 11in by 8 in. Spread 1 T. butter over the dough with a butter knife (seen left). Mix the other T. butter, the brown sugar, and the cinnamon with a fork until combined and crumbly.  Sprinkle the cinnamon mixture over the top of the rolled out dough.  Then, taking the dough from the long side, roll it into a log. Cut the log into 1 inch pieces, and put into a greased muffin tin.  Bake at 375 for 15-18 minutes, until light brown in color. Immediately remove from the muffin tin and turn over onto a plate, sticky side up.

The cinnamon rolls were really good, but semi labor intensive.  The dough was sticking to the parchment and didn't roll very easily.  I wish they had peel and bake cinnamon rolls.  Also, I would recommend putting the cut rolls into a cake pan, and baking like that so they all soak up all the buttery goodness.  Also, there was no glaze to spread over the top, which was mildly disappointing. Overall, not something I would do again, but worth it for the one time.

Summer Pt. 2

As you can see from my previous post, I made lemon pound cake.  The next project I took on was blueberry muffins. I somehow decided I was CRAVING muffins like none other, and I haven't had a good one in a while.  Sure, Udi's makes a decent muffin, but there is something amazing about a muffin right out of the oven, right after you baked it yourself.  ATK's "The How Can It Be Gluten Free Cookbook" just so happens to have a gluten free blueberry muffin recipe in it.  I used it, with a few tweaks here and there.  Here is the original recipe:

Ingredients
11 oz. ATK GF Flour
1 T. baking powder
1/2 t. salt
1/4 t. cinnamon
1/4 t. xantham gum
5 1/4 oz. sugar
8 T. butter, melted
1/2 c. plain whole-milk yogurt
3 eggs
1 t. vanilla
7.5 oz. blueberries
2 T. turbinado sugar


Recipe
Preheat the oven to 375 and grease a muffin tin. I used cupcake liners to have an easier clean up.  Next, start with a large bowl. Whisk together flour, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, and xantham gum.  In another bowl, whisk together sugar, butter, yogurt, eggs, and vanilla until well combined. Make sure you get all the way to the bottom of the bowl so the sugar doesn't settle.  Using a rubber spatula, fold the liquid into the dry ingredients until fully combined and there are no lumps.  Dump in the blueberries and mix until combined. Do this gently so the blueberries don't break and bleed into the batter.  Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and let sit for 30 minutes. After 30 minutes is up, spoon the batter into the muffin cups and bake for 15-20 minutes.  Halfway through the 15-20, turn the muffin tin around in the oven so you can bake evenly.  A toothpick should come out clean when inserted into the middle of the muffin.

I changed a few things in the recipe. To start, I didn't have yogurt, so I used 1/2 cup sour cream.  Also, I added the zest of one lemon to the recipe before I added the blueberries. I really like the combination of blueberries and lemon, so I figured this would be good.  I didn't have any turbinado sugar, so I just didn't use it.  Instead, I made a quick glaze of 1/4 cup powdered sugar and about 2 t. lemon juice and spooned it on top of the muffins.  It added the sweetness of the sugar without having to search for the big crystal sugar.  Another variation that could work is to use raspberries instead of blueberries.  I almost did this, but I went to the store specifically to buy blueberries, so I figured I would use them.

As for letting the batter sit, according to ATK, letting it sit for 30 minutes makes it not grainy.  When I ate the muffin, it was perfect.  It had the right amount of sweetness and tangy, with the blueberries bursting when I bit into it. The crumb was small enough and moist enough that it was the absolute perfect consistency. I wouldn't use muffin cups next time, though, because the bottom of the muffin stuck to it.  Otherwise, I would definitely make this recipe again. It really hit the spot!

Summer

Since it is summer, I have decided to bake everything I can get my hands on.  I had a lot of lemons, so I started by making a lemon pound cake.  I did a little research, and realized America's Test Kitchen has a recipe in their "How Can It Be Gluten Free Cookbook" which I so happen to have gotten from my mom (Thanks mom!).  The recipe is actually fairly simple, but you do need a food processor.
Ingredients
7 oz. ATK Gluten Free Flour Blend
1 t. baking powder
1/2 t. salt
1/4 t. xanthan gum
8 3/4 oz sugar
2 T lemon zest
1 T lemon juice (about 2 lemons)
4 large eggs
4 oz cream cheese
1.5 t vanilla
8 T butter, melted

2 oz powdered sugar
2 t. lemon juice

Recipe
Start by preheating your oven to 350.  Spray or butter and flour a loaf pan and set aside.  In a bowl, whisk flour, baking powder, salt, and xantham gum together. Set this aside. In the food processor, pulse sugar and zest together.  Add lemon juice, eggs, cream cheese, and vanilla and process until combined. Using the feed tube, add the melted butter while the processor is running.  Let it run about 30 seconds. Add the liquid mix to the flour mix and whisk together until smooth and combined.  Pour the batter into the pan and bake for 15 minutes. After 15 minutes, reduce the heat to 325 and bake for another 20 minutes. Turn the pan, and bake another 10-15 minutes, until golden and a toothpick comes out clean. Let sit for 10 minutes, then run a knife around the edge and turn out onto a cooling rack.  Let the cake cool completely, about 2 hours.

30 minutes before serving, whisk together the powdered sugar and lemon juice until smooth.  Spread evenly over the top of the cake and let sit 15 minutes, until hard and opaque.

I didn't have any cream cheese, so I decided to sub sour cream for cream cheese.  As far as I can tell, it worked the same as cream cheese would have, while also being a little bit healthier (or as healthy as a pound cake can be).  Also, I didn't wait to turn out the cake or to let it cool, so the glaze sort of melted into the cake and it broke apart a lot.  Overall, it tasted amazing and had a really smooth consistency.  It wasn't grainy, and had a dense, nice crumb to it.  I served it with some fresh raspberries. It could also be served with a simple raspberry sauce. Additionally, 1/4 cup poppy seeds can be added to the flour mixture for another variation on this awesome recipe.

Bagels!

I just got back from Southeast Asia, which, of course, means I had to bake ALL OF THE THINGS! Today I made a loaf of bread as well as bagels.  I have made bagels before, but never of the gluten free variety.  The recipe is as follows, originally here (it is the comment by AlwaysSomething):

2 packets active dry yeast
2 cups warm water
5 1/2 cups Cup4Cup all purpose GF flour (I use Namaste brand, which can be bought at Costco for fairly cheap)
3 TBSP sugar
2 Tsp salt
2 quarts boiling water

I added 2 eggs as well as an extra Tablespoon flour.

Start by combining the 2 Tbsp yeast with the 2 cups warm water and stir lightly.  Let sit until it starts to bubble and foam.  While that is blooming, put the flour, sugar, and salt in the bowl of a mixer.  I started using the dough hook for this. Put the mixer on low and mix the flour until a well forms. Add in the yeast mixture and start to beat on medium.  Add in the two eggs and mix until a ball forms. At this point, I switched from the dough hook to the paddle attachment. It combined the flour with the wet ingredients more easily.  If your dough is too sticky, add in the extra Tbsp flour.  I ended up adding the extra flour to my dough.  Cover the dough with plastic wrap and let sit in the bowl for 30-45 minutes. The dough should rise, but not significantly.

While the dough is rising, boil the 2 quarts water.  The original recipe calls to boil the 2 quarts water with 2 Tbsp. canola oil.  I didn't add the oil; I think it is to prevent the dough from sticking but it is optional.  As the water boils, prepare a baking sheet with parchment paper.  You can dust it with cornmeal if wanted. One of my sheets had cornmeal, the other didn't and the bagels all turned out fine.  After the 45 minutes, uncover the dough and start to form bagels.  Grab a hand-full of dough and roll it like a snake.  Put the two ends together. If needed, wet one end of the dough to help them stick together.  After you roll out all of the dough, poach the bagels.  Drop them into the boiling water and let them boil.  I did about 1 minute on each side, but it doesn't have to be very precise.  After the dough is poached, remove from the boiling water and let them drain a second.

Transfer them to the parchment and top with whatever you so choose.  I used a mixture of sesame seeds, poppy seeds, and minced garlic.  Because the dough just came from the water, the toppings will stick well.  You can also brush with egg for an egg bagel instead of using toppings.  Put the bagels into a 400 degree oven for 14 minutes.  I had two cookie sheets with bagels so I rotated the cookie sheets after 7 minutes. This means the upper rack moves to the bottom, and the bottom to the top.  In addition, rotate the sheets so the bagels in the back are in the front and the front are in the back.  I then baked an additional 3 minutes, switched the sheets again, and 3 more minutes until they were golden.  I baked them a total of 20 minutes with two rotations of the sheets. I was able to make 17 irregularly sized bagels about the size of a mini bagel.  If making full sized bagels, it should yield around 10...I'm guessing.

Once cooled, slice in half and schmear on whatever you choose. My favorite is to start with a little butter and then add some lox cream cheese and Muenster cheese.  You can also add fresh smoked salmon or smoked white fish, or any other bagel topping.

Enjoy!

Bread is going to be another post...eventually.

Oyster Mushrooms

So the oyster mushrooms.  They were a total impulse buy.  They looked super interesting and happened to be in season.  I decided to cook with Bryan because Brooks hates mushrooms. We ended up making an oyster cream sauce with chicken and pasta.  Bryan had already taken the chicken breasts out, so we just decided to use it. The chicken we simply sprayed with olive oil and sprinkled with salt and pepper. We baked the chicken at 350 degrees until the thermometer showed 165 internal temperature at the thickest part of the breasts.  The chicken we then sliced into strips, as you can see to the right.  The sauce was a bit more complicated.

I had only bought about half the mushrooms that we needed for the recipe, so I ran to the store and bought an additional thing of shiitake mushrooms.  When I say a "thing" of mushrooms, I mean the pre-packed, saran wrapped mushrooms that come in the blue boxes. Also, when I say recipe, I mean I totally made it up. I looked up about 10 different recipes and just got the general ingredients, then used my own estimations.  Here are the ingredients we used:

2 TBSP olive oil
5 Shallots, diced
3 cloves garlic, chopped
About 16 oz mushrooms, 8 oz oyster, 8 oz shiitake
2 cups white cooking wine
16 oz can low sodium chicken stock
2 cups heavy cream
1 lb pasta

Start by boiling the water and cooking the pasta to however you want.  I had some leftover gluten free pasta that I rejuvenated by microwaving it with a few tablespoons of water.  Gluten free pasta gets very hard and brittle when left over, so adding the water put some moisture back into it.  When your pasta is done, set it aside.  We kept ours in the microwave to keep it semi warm.  Start the sauce by heating the olive oil in a pot.  We used a pot big enough to hold the pasta and all the liquids.  When the oil is heated, add the shallots and garlic.  Cook until just tender.  We cooked them about 5 minutes over medium-high heat.  Add the mushrooms and cook until about halfway done.  (The doneness here is all dependent on how soft you want your mushrooms.  We cooked them 5 minutes and they were just barely softened. They will cook the rest of the way when the liquids are added.)  After your mushrooms are to your liking, add the white cooking wine.  Let this boil until it is almost completely evaporated.  We had about a tablespoon of liquid left in the bottom of the pot.  Make sure to stir the mushrooms and wine frequently so they don't start to stick to the bottom.  After the wine is evaporated, pour in the chicken stock.  We let this reduce by half.  That took almost 10 minutes.  After it was reduced, we added in the cream and let it boil until the desired thickness was reached.  The recipes we read said it would be thick enough when the back of the spoon was coated.  The finished sauce is pictured above and to the left.  It had a nice wine taste, without the alcohol content.  The mushrooms also made it super hearty and meaty feeling.  I could have easily eaten this as a meatless dish!

Bryan also had leftover sourdough bread that was getting stale.  He made it into garlic bread.  He melted 1.5 sticks of butter with 4 cloves of smashed garlic.  I made him add some parsley flakes for color.  He cut the bread in half and poured the butter over.  After sprinkling on parmesan cheese, the bread was baked for 7 minutes at 350 degrees, until the cheese was brown and delicious looking. The baked bread is pictured to the right! I ended up eating some of this bread, causing major joint and stomach pain the next day.

Bryan and I ended up plating our pasta over a bed of spinach.  This added some color as well as some nutritional values.  We put the spinach on the plate, put the pasta on top, added the chicken, and poured the sauce on top.  The chicken ended up being a bit over salted, while the sauce was under seasoned.  They balanced each other out well.  The raw spinach wilted just a bit, which created a great texture contrast.  We also added too much liquid, and ended up reducing it further to boil out some of the liquid.  I would recommend only adding 12 oz chicken stock and 1.5 cups of cream.  Overall, this was a fun experiment we did, and we essentially created our own recipes.  So cool!

Family

This weekend my brother and sister came to Maryland. It was the first time I saw them in months. I was so happy the entire weekend.  The morning they left, we met my aunt, uncle, and cousins at Union Market in DC.  It is a very upscale farmers marker in the middle of a run down town.  There are two parts: an outside market that changes weekly, and the indoor, more permanent part of the market.  We did a lap around the market before deciding on breakfast.  My sister, Mollye, and my aunt and cousin (let's call her R) went and got bagels and more Jewish-esque sandwiches.  My brother, Louis, my uncle, my cousin (we'll call him E), and I went to an Italian sandwich joint.  Mollye, Uncle and I also got some really good coffee.  They even put a design in my milk (shown right).  Anyway, sandwiches.  Mollye got a bagel with the most amazing smoked salmon I've ever had.  Aunt got a white fish sandwich that was super creamy but had the right amount of texture to make it not just mush.  R got plain cream cheese on a plain bagel, just as any normal 11 year old would do.  At the Italian place, Red Apron Butchery, I got a muffaletta sandwich.  It ended up being a panini, so I just took the bread off and ate the meat and olive giardiniera. E got an Italian beef sandwich. It was ok, but nothing compares to the Italian beef in Chicago.  Uncle got a meatloaf sandwich which was surprisingly good.  I took a few forks of the meatloaf.  Louis ended up getting porkstrami.  If you are curious, the description is here.

After we ate a ridiculous amount of food, we walked around more.  I ended up buying two Italian Sausages from Red Apron.  I also bought cilantro and some oyster mushrooms. I am holding one of the mushrooms in the photo to the left.  Louis bought some chamomile tea, and Mollye got a cupcake. The last thing I got was gelato.  I got chocolate and salted caramel. My mother should be so proud.

There were some really cool stands around the indoor market.  The cheese stand we saw was amazing looking.  We wanted to buy some, but when the cheapest cheese is $28 a pound, you pass it up.  There was also a really cool knife shop we spent some time in, as well as a spice stand.  The spice stand was cool, but could never compare to The Spice House, in Evanston.  I had a ton of fun walking around the market and seeing my family. I can't wait for my mom to visit in three weeks!

Random Dinner

First things first. I feel like a real adult. My friend Bryan and I bought a Costco membership yesterday. It makes me feel all grown up. It also makes me feel broke because it should be scientifically proven that at any trip to Costco, one must spend upwards of $100, which I did.  I bought sausages, mini tacos (corn tortillas make them GF), all of the cereal, and some random odds and ends that quickly added up.

After a week of meals being provided for you through band, cooking for yourself seems daunting all over again. I couldn't even think of any food to begin to make, so I stood looking in my fridge and started picking odds and ends. I had ground beef, rice, a little grated cheddar cheese, and some spinach. I browned the beef in a big skillet and seasoned it with Old Bay (look Ma! I'm a Real Marylander!).  I cooked the rice and just threw in about half a tablespoon of butter and a sprinkle of salt, just to give it some flavor. I put the spinach on the plate and topped it with the grated cheese, then put the rice and meat on top. Because I timed this so the rice and meat were still hot when going onto the spinach and cheese, the spinach wilted around the edges and the cheese melted.  It was perfection. The only thing I would do next time is add a bit more Old Bay. I was a bit light handed because it has so much salt, but I could barely taste it.

Butter Chicken

It's been over a month since my last post. Whoops! Sorry! Anyway, last week I went to TJ's (that's the fancy way of saying Trader Joe's) and bought a frozen butter chicken dish. I was inspired. For dinner tonight, I am going to make my own butter chicken. I have been looking up recipes all day, and have come to a conclusion. Butter chicken uses a LOT of spices. When I say a lot, I mean a lot of random, very unusual spices. I was able to find Garam Masala in the store, but Tandoori Masala has been proving quite an issue.  I found one recipe that I like (here), but I am going to tweak it a bit, because I can't find this tandoori spice.

Here are the ingredients I used:

1 3/4 cup butter, divided
1 onion, minced
1 TBSP minced garlic
1 (15 oz) can of Tomato sauce
2 1/4 cups milk
2 tsp salt
1.5 pounds skinless, boneless chicken thighs

And here is the recipe I used:

To begin, I made the heavy cream the original recipe called for. I combined the milk and 3/4 cup of melted butter and stirred until combined. It seemed easier at the time.  I also found out I could do that from this website.  ***I did this buttermilk for this recipe. It came out way too oily.  In the end, use 3 cups of milk and 3 tbsp lemon juice.  LEAVE OUT THE 3/4 CUP BUTTER.  It became way too oily and fatty, to the point that I scraped the excess fat off the dish this morning.***

Next, I got the biggest non-stick pan I had and put a few tablespoons of butter in the pan with the onions. I stirred in the onion and garlic until the onion was softened, about 5 minutes.  After those were soft I added the rest of the butter, the tomato sauce, cream and spices.  This simmered about 10 minutes.  Finally, I added the chicken, which I had cubed.  I let that simmer for 25 minutes, until the chicken was done.  When this is simmering, you have to watch to make sure the cream does NOT boil.  This will make for a nasty, separated dish.

To make sure this meal was gluten free, I served it with jasmine rice. I put 1 cup rice with 1.5 cups water in a pot and brought it to a boil.  I then covered the pot and let it cook until there was no water left.  If you taste your rice and decided you would like it cooked longer, but already took it off the heat, cover it back up and let it sit for 10 minutes.  The steam in the pot will let the rice cook for a bit longer.  (That tip was brought to you by Patrick).

This dish can also be served with Naan, a traditional Indian flat bread.  They sell an excellent one at TJ's, in the frozen food section.  I recommend the garlic flavored, it is simply so much better.

UPDATE:

So I learned the hard way that making buttermilk isn's actually butter and milk. My mom and Patrick both told me I was stupid.  I have actually made REAL buttermilk before. For every cup of milk, you add one tbsp lemon juice or vinegar.  Because I used extra butter and less milk, the result was very oily.  I put it in the fridge last night, and when I took it out this morning I cracked off the excess fat. It had hardened on the top so I was able to just break it off and throw it away.  Also, when I reheat this today, I am going to add some lemon juice.  The recipe was just lacking something, and Patrick suggested lemons. Also, I bought chicken thighs for this. I thought they went well, and they soaked up the flavor of the sauce quite well. I am a bit disappointed I didn't actually measure how much chicken I put into the sauce, though, because I have almost twice as much sauce as I do chicken. It goes great over rice, though!

Peach Cobbler

Yesterday I went to Shoppers with Bryan and Jeanine. Jeanine is my little sister in TBS, and as of Saturday, it is official! She was initiated! Anyway, I digress.  At shoppers I saw some delicious looking peaches, so I bought 4 giant ones.  Later that night, my aunt posted this recipe on my wall.  It was MEANT TO BE! As I was reading, I realized I didn't have any of the King Arthur gf baking mix that was referenced in the recipe. So, naturally, I improvised.  Instead of using the baking mix, I used King Arthur gf flour and 1 tbsp baking powder.  Ultimately, I ended up using this recipe with the gf flour substitute.

The cobbler was AMAZING.  It was a nice golden brown on the top and the inside was sweet.  Where the sugar has caramelized around the edges gave a nice crunch to the soft peaches.  The lemon juice gave a hint of tartness after you ate the peaches.  In hindsight, I think a bit more salt would be appropriate, and some nutmeg.  This was just generally under seasoned.  Also, I wish I had some blueberries present to throw into the mix.  Blueberry peach cobbler just sounds so much better.

PS. Sorry for the descriptors used above. Last weeks episode of Next Food Network Star was about using actual descriptive words (not delicious and awesome) to describe a dish. I tried my hand at it above.

 PPS. Patrick is my lovely model in the photo to the left.

Chips

So I just had this brilliant idea. I LOVE terra chips.  They are chips made from different types of root vegetables.  There is more information at the link here! My only issue with terra chips is they are SO EXPENSIVE. I mean like $5 for a normal size bag. That is too much on a college kids budget. This is where my brilliant idea comes in. I was just informed there will be tasty foods at the farmers market this Wednesday, including beets and potatoes and other root vegetables. So, I am going to make my own chips. The most exciting part of all of this is chips are almost always gluten free when made simply from vegetables.  You have to be careful with things like Pringles where they use wheat stabilizers  but most are simply vegetable, oil, and fried.

The chips will be a combination of these vegetables: Kohlrabi, beets, potato, fennel, kale, squash, turnips, carrots, parsnips, and radishes.  I think I'm just going to see what I can get from the market Wednesday and go from there.  It should be fairly interesting to see what I can come up with, though.  Anyway, I am going to toss these with olive oil and bake until they crisp up. The recipes I have looked at say it depends on the vegetable, and to just watch them carefully.  You can find any of these recipes by googling "_________ chips", so beet chips, or carrot chips. Martha Stuart has a great one for beets here.

I will update you all on how these turn out after I have completed these, but I needed to jot my ideas down first!  Also, if any of my blog readers (all 4 of you) want to give me ideas, PLEASE DO!

Farmers Market Wednesday

So, in case any of you Terps have forgotten, there is a farmers market every Wednesday on UMD's campus.  It is magical and mystical.  Now that we are getting into the summer more there are more varieties and options for deliciousness.

One of the stands is called Sweet Treats.  She doesn't generally keep gluten free cupcakes around, but I have been talking to her and she said she would start bringing a few for me. I'm sure if you wanted them, you could just ask!

Also, I MOVED INTO MY APARTMENT! It is super exciting because I have a kitchen and my own room and it's lovely.  I am still working on the cleaning up process but it is getting there.  Last night, I did a total overhaul on the stove and refrigerator.  I took the coils and pans out of the stove and cleaned them so they turned from black back to silver.  The fridge had so much spilled $&*% in it.  That took me at least an hour to clean.  I will be doing the freezer tonight.

As for cooking, I have been doing a LOT of chicken.  Shoppers has REALLY cheap chicken that is actually really good.  It is the breast and rib meat, and it is super easy to cut the little bit of fat off.  I cut the breasts in half and but the two halves in to a ziplock bag and just stick them in the freezer.  When I get home at 3:00 I defrost the chicken and marinate it.

My general chicken recipe so far has been: chicken breast, throw whatever spices look good to me at the time, put in pan and saute until browned and cooked through.  I typically eat half a breast for dinner and half for lunch the next day.  I also saute two red peppers, one onion, and a pound of sliced button mushrooms together with about a tablespoon of olive oil.  Put the oil into the pan with the onions, those take the longest to cook.  Add the peppers when the onions are about half done, then the mushrooms when both the peppers and onions are about two minutes from being done.

Last night, I took my chicken and some peppers, mushrooms, and onions and put them in a pot with pasta sauce.  I cooked spaghetti then put the sauce mixture onto it.  A salad would have been good, but I Was feeling especially lazy.

This has been a rendition of brain dumping by Sophie, I hope you have enjoyed this mish-mosh of information. It's kind of like Chicken Mish Mosh soup.  Yum.

I promise, I actually AM gluten free...

...It's just that this bread this morning...it looked so good...

SO, I bought it. I know, I know.  "But Sophie...I thought you were gluten free and allergic to it or something?"  Well, I'm not allergic, I just feel better without it.  Sometimes, I like to indulge.  And since  today is FARMER'S MARKET WEDNESDAY (WHEEEEE!), I splurged. So I went to the farmer's market my awesome friend Patrick (his blog is linked here...he is my culinary chef friend that I do all geeky cooking things with.) This is where I saw the aforementioned loaf of bread, which is not gluten free, obviously.  I asked the woman working at the bread stand if she had sourdough, and sadly, she didn't.  But she did have something called Pain de Campagne.  The description I got from Wikipedia (GASP) said this is "French Sourdough".  It is very similar in taste, but the inside is a lot fluffier and the outside is a lot crunchier.  So basically, it is a million times better.  I wish I had gotten some form of dip to go with it, but the delicious dip that was being sold was 8$ for a really small container. Oh well.

Anyway, I also got some beautiful, locally grown apples, radishes, red kale, and spring onions.  The radishes, kale, and spring onions were on Patrick's list.  Because he had class until an hour into the opening of the market, I bought them for him so they wouldn't be gone by the time he got there.  The apples I get are always good, they are huge and super juicy, but not grainy or uncrisp (I did just make up a word). I am SUPER excited because the lady who works at the stand told me they are picking all of their berries in the next few weeks.  This means I get strawberries, raspberries, and blueberries, and not the yucky diner kind.  I am contemplating getting enough so I can crash Patrick's apartment and attempt to make a delicious gluten free berry pie...hmmmmmmm.

Additionally, I found out today that all of the vegetables that have a darker leaf (red kale, red lettuce, even red basil) all hold heat and cold better.  If you choose to cook these or chill them, they won't wilt as quickly. They stay a bit crisper and crunchier when put under temperature changes. The guy at that stand told me that!  (In case you couldn't tell, I like asking the people at the stands their life stories, and many, many questions.)

The last thing I found out is there is a gluten free stand at the market every time.  Unfortunately, she has little variety.  She does have a quiche I might try next week, but other than that it is standard cookies and brownies.  I am going to email the girl at ANOTHER pastry stand, though, because she said she makes gluten free cupcakes, but she doesn't bring them to sell because of the gluten free stand. Oh well. Today was a very productive shopping day, and I am thoroughly fulfilled, even though I do cheat at my gluten free-ness occasionally. I guess I'll never get to join the secret society. :D

Pho

Pho (Pronounced ph-oh!!!!, not ph-uh) is surprisingly amazing.  For those of you who don't know, pho is basically the Vietnamese version of chicken noodle soup.  They take a ball of rice noodles (gluten free!) and put your toppings of choice on top, and cover it with boiling broth.

Saturday night boyfriend took me to get pho at a place by my school called Pho D'lite. Boyfriend got the special, which is noodles with tripe, tendon, eye of round, fatty brisket, and flank meat (all cow meat if that was unclear).  It also had chives and spring onions with a boiling beef broth poured over.  I got the vegetarian pho, which was noodles with mushrooms, bok choy, and grilled tofu.  It comes with vegetable broth, but I wanted more flavor so I got chicken broth instead.  They brought bean sprouts, cilantro, jalapeños and lime on the side.  I squeezed some lime over the top of my soup and put a bunch of cilantro into the bowl.  It was the best soup I have ever eaten.  I'm sure if I go to different restaurants and try different versions of the same ingredients, I'll find something better, but for now this was excellent.

Also on the menu at this delicious place was shrimp pho, chicken pho, Thai dishes (Pad Thai, etc.) and some appetizers.  I attached the menu here! Sorry about the weird layout, I promise I didn't create it!

I hope I can go back to different pho restaurants soon, but for now, I am 100% satisfied with my choices in soups. :D

Sweet Potato...Something...

Sunday night we made a kind of Mexican Shepard's pie.  It was...interesting.  The recipe, which I actually am unsure if it is the exact same one we used, can be found here.  (We have a thing in my family where if a recipe is bad we just throw it away.  Well, my brother didn't really like it, so it got tossed.  I loved it...) It is basically a ground meat and tomato based dish with a sweet potato puree as a topper.  It was actually pretty good, although the sweet potatoes became a kind of mushy mess, similar to baby food from a jar.  My mom was being creative and played with a pastry bag (HEY! That's my job!) and did a fancy topper with the potatoes.  You don't have to do the same thing, you can just spread them on top.  Also, we left out the Worcestershire sauce by mistake, but I am not really sure if that had much of an affect.  Another change, if you use regular potatoes it might turn out with a sturdier topping to it.  The last change that was made was using 2T Gluten Free flour instead of the normal flour used.  When using a little flour for a thickener, you can just substitute your flour 1:1.  If doing something like baking, look up a ratio online.

Also, my mom and I finally surrendered.  We bought Xanthum gum.  When my mom was transferring it to another container, she spilled a bit.  I was playing around and put some on my finger.  BIG MISTAKE.  That stuff will stick with you for a LONG TIME.  I had to wipe it onto a towel before my hands were completely clean.  I will experiment with this soon and give an update :D

*Spring*~*Break*

I got home on Friday night for SPRING BREAK! It is SO great to be home again.  After being able to watch Maryland BEAT DUKE on the airplane home, and a slight delay due to the weather in Chicago,  I was so happy to see my brother Louis heading towards me in our beat up old car.

Anyway, that entire introductory paragraph was IRRELEPHANT! <Elephants are my favorite animal>  So my mom and I have been cooking dinner together for the past few nights.  The dish we tried was a kind of pulled lamb.  My mom and dad bought a baby lamb with my aunt and it was raised on a farm.  It was then killed and butchered for a delicious dinner. (That was kind of sadistic sounding, but go with it...)  We made a dry rub with fresh ground spices (it turned into more of a paste actually). Anyway, I was able to pull the lamb off the bone, and we had a delicious dinner of pulled lamb and roasted veggies, as well as as nice simple salad with Black Kale.  The recipe is here, but these are the changes we made:
1. Didn't use ancho chilies, instead used 1 T. medium-hot chili powder
2. Reduce the amount of salt used.  Use about 1/2-1 t instead of 1 T.  It was VERY salty.

It was so good.  On the side we served the harissa (the paste-like supposed dry rub, mentioned above), but it was insanely salty for this dish.  Reducing the amount of salt used will help this.

The vegetables are as follows:
1. Carrot
2. Sweet Potato
3. Potato
4. Onion
3. Salt & pepper
4. Olive Oil
5. Cumin
Coat the veggies in olive oil and sprinkle liberally with the salt and pepper, add the cumin as per your taste.  For us 1/2t pepper, 1/4t salt, and 1-2t of cumin.  Put all of this on a sheet pan and roast in the oven at 325 until fork tender.  This was about an hour, but make sure to keep an eye on these.  It could be more or less depending on the oven!

The yogurt dip on the side (listed with the lamb recipe above) complimented this dish so well.  I put it on everything (the salad, the veggies, the lamb. Literally, everything).  One note, I completely omitted the olive oil in the yogurt.  It ended up not needing it, and was going to create an excess of oil in the dish.  It was just as delicious without it.

Really Long Side Bar coming up:  Black Kale is AMAZING.  It is my new favorite vegetable.  Take your kale, and cut the dead, dry ends off.  Then cut it into strips about 1 inch thick.  I put the kale into a lettuce spinner to rinse it off.  Put the kale in your salad bowl and add a few dashes of olive oil (1T) and the juice of about 1/2 a lemon.  Add this to your kale and massage, yes I said massage, your kale.  Work in the olive oil and lemon juice and make sure you actually squeeze the kale leaves.  We then added arugula, spinach, and mixed greens as well as sliced almonds and dried cherries.  Also, you will need more olive oil and lemon juice.  Just how much is up to you, just enough to dress your salad as you would like.

The final thing we made was a garlic naan.  Trader Joe's has some excellent frozen naan, regular or garlic.  The purpose of the naan is to make a sandwich/roll up thing with the lamb and yogurt and some greens, if you so please.  Because I can't eat the bread I just kind of mixed the whole thing together and ate a delicious mish-mosh of yumminess.

For dessert, my mom bought me a cute gluten free cheesecake at our local supermarket.  I had some frozen mixed berries, so I stuck them in the microwave to make a syrup-y concoction that went well with the New York Style cake.

*~Restaurants~*

So last night was Boyfriend's birthday.  Sidebar: we went to a really cool lecture on guns and the lecturer brought in almost 50 different types of guns.

Anyway, after, he and I went to Noodles and Co for dinner.  I recently have found that they have an excellent option for us Gluten Free Terps.  If you order a dish and ask for the rice noodles, they will easily substitute it for you.  The list of their gluten free sauces can be found here!  It has the nutrition information, and if scrolling down to the bottom, it has the list of sauces.  (My personal favorite is the Pesto, I ask for no tomatoes (cooked tomatoes=gross)).

Tonight I am traveling to Outback Steakhouse with him and his parents for ANOTHER birthday meal (man, this boy needs a national holiday or something!)  That menu can be found here~It's a PDF.  I am curious to know if the french fries are not GF because they are fried in the same oil or if they are drenched in flour.  I'll let you know, I PROMISE!

I am loving exploring the many different restaurant options offered for us GF people.......

PS. I figured out that if you get GF bread in the back of the diner, you can take it to the chicken/burger line and have them use that as a bun. MIND BLOWN.

Valentine's Day

Valentine's day was almost a week ago now, but I felt it necessary to comment.  

For this super awesome holiday (totally serious by the way), my super awesome boyfriend got me a super awesome gift! He ordered Georgetown Cupcakes for me! The best part? They have gluten free ones! 

He simply ordered a dozen cupcakes off the website, but just clicked the "gluten free package" option. They got delivered to our desk in our dorm, and I have just eaten the last one today. 

The main point of this post: I simply do not understand how the goddesses at Georgetown Cupcake have created a gluten free cupcake that is as moist and delicious as the other ones! They have 6 of the normal flavors, simply in the gluten free variety.  The flavor was also exquisite, and I am shocked to tell you they are an excellent substitution to normal cupcakes.  I would like to ask them what type of flour they use, because it does not taste like almond or another substitution flour.  They taste like normal cupcakes.  (I wasn't always gluten free you know!)  The frosting (I know, already gluten free) is amazing, the cream cheese peanut butter is my favorite.

If you don't feel like having them delivered to your dorm, make sure you order ahead! They only make these cupcakes on special order, so they are not on display in the store.  Waiting in that line (about an hour to an hour and a half, depending on the time and day) would be pointless if they didn't have the cupcakes you can eat.

Any-who, go forth and order, they are excellent :D

My First Post! ~exciting~

So...here it goes. My first blog post. I blame Patrick. His blog can be found here!

Anyway, my goal is to do a Gluten Free Blog, and I just happen to be a Terp also!  I guess I'll start with some exciting news: UMD Dining services now offers Gluten Free Pasta at the pasta line! It is super delicious and actually not bad.

In addition, they have a whole slew of semi tasty substitutions for the gluten full items out on the floor. For example, there are semi-decent frozen muffins in the back for your general enjoyment. My favorite is the gluten free bread and tortillas.  You can grab a tortilla and just take it to the grill and they will grill up a rull tasty quesadilla (pronounced que-sa-dill-a) for you right there!

Anyway...that was just an experiment for a first post. More to come!