Monday, September 28, 2009

Sweet Potato Shepherd's Pie, Cottage Pie, wait!

Sweet potato topped shepherds pie is gluten free and delicious
Sweet potato topped cottage pie. Gluten-free.


A certain individual living by the mesa has some news. Can you guess? We sold the house. We're moving lock, stock and barrel (in reality, more like Macs, books and UGGS) to Los Angeles, packing up the Honda Fit again to head West and start our new life as Los Angelenos.

I am almost too wired to write.

The quasi-plan is to rent a furnished place for a month. In mid October. Once we're out there, we'll begin our search in earnest for a longer lease- a space we can call our own, not too far from the ocean, I hope. A place with a workable kitchen. Windows. Light. Simple criteria.

As I sort through art books to sell (all the impressionist/landscape books I once mooned over- like a school girl- no longer tug at my attention) I am imagining the new again. I am fueled by the scent of possibility and change and consumed with the urge for going. Three and a half years in the desert have inked their big sky imprint upon me.

I feel as if I sport an invisible tattoo.

Time and distance will reveal the wisdom gained here (if any is to be found). Time and distance will temper the losses. No doubt memory itself will soften the sharp hungers of the everyday isolation and doubt.

Some readers have asked me, What lesson did you need to learn? implying that there is a silver lining to every prickly, dark experience and that if we only embrace The Lesson, we'll be free.

Well, I can answer that. 

READ MORE and get the recipe ...

Thursday, September 24, 2009

Karina's Gluten-Free Quinoa Breakfast Bars

Gluten free quinoa breakfast brownie bars
Gluten-free quinoa breakfast bars, Baby.

Quinoa Breakfast Bars!

We were treatless this week. Specifically, breakfast treatless. No Pear Polenta Muffins were hiding in the freezer. No Apple Cake with Cranberries. In fact, the only food items in the freezer were a solo bottle of organic vodka and a bag of frozen cranberries (does vodka count as food?). Which turned out to be a good thing. Because we had to bake. [Had to!] So we experimented (send smooches to Steve for initiating said experiment; if it were not for him, Dear Reader, you'd be looking at an archived recipe today).

As the breakfast treats were baking I started thinking (always dangerous). I started pondering (even more dangerous) why certain people believe they have things AFO. All Figured Out. And they'll tell you so, of course, spooning out advice in words that taste metallic. Like teeth fillings. They have all the neat little answers for you, judged and predigested, wrapped snug in tidy psychic ribbons.

If only life were that simple.

Don't get me wrong. I'm not yearning for simple
I'm not six years old.
I can handle complicated. I can chew for hours on ideas that are tough and wiggly and mysterious, and arrive at no final conclusion whatsoever. I can sleep on it and wake up with nothing but songs and dreams in my head that will color the day with glimpses of what might be possible. I don't need to hammer the challenging and mysterious into a mold I can easily grasp so I can feel more comfortable in the world, believing it is fixed. So I can stop asking questions. So I can say, I have the answer.

I am, in fact, okay hanging in the tension of opposites.

I don't need only good, only pretty, only nice, only light, only clean, only sweet, only happy. And isn't that a valuable thing? Because the last time I checked the world was a mash-up of good and bad, beautiful and ugly, gentle and cruel, luminous and dark and cool and filthy and calm and angry and laughable and profoundly, deeply sad. And often, really ironic.

So here's the thing.

The older I get, the more I learn, the less certain I am. Of anything. I don't have all the answers. I don't always know what is best or what is true. And what is right for me may not be right for you. And what may be right for me today may be wrong for me tomorrow.

But one thing I do know?

There are places on this earth where you feel you belong. And places you will always feel like a stranger. An outsider. A tourist. There are places and people and days that grind you down. And harden you. And there are places and people and days that soften you. Soften your heart. And you know what?

I want that.


READ MORE and get the recipe ...




Sunday, September 20, 2009

Chicken with Balsamic Peppers

Karina's gluten-free recipe for Italian pepper chicken
Balsamic chicken smothered in roasted peppers.


Peppers + Vinegar

When it comes to big change I'm brave. I jump in feet first. In my small and particular universe it's easier to pinch your nose and hurl yourself off the edge than it is to stand there and think about it. That kind of anticipation is excruciating. Give me five minutes to think about all the things that can go wrong and I'll start making lists. And never budge an inch.

So I've learned to develop a social reflex- a Hell yeah, let's do it reflex. And in almost every circumstance this reflex has served me well (and if by some slim chance you need a list of when it has worked for me and when it has not, I've got it, filed away in my pictorial little brain).

It's the small day to day changes that can set me spinning.

The blips in routine. The interruptions of flow. The tiny changes that evolve over time into articulate curves on a chart. See this dot? This is where we used to be. See this dot? This is where we are now.

I struggle so intently on orchestrating my string of moments into some semblance of coherent awareness that within each moment I live so completely I fail to see the bigger sprawling truth. The truth that often blindsides me. I wake up to it like a child from a nap, rubbing my eyes and trying to center my bearings. I look at my aging hands and think, Whose hands are these?

I open the door to the blinding bright desert and realize I am not Georgia O'Keeffe, the weathered austere heroine in the books I devoured. I am not madly in love with the emptiness and isolation here. It does not inspire me. It steals from me. Tiny pieces day after day. The desert gnaws at me. It will leave nothing but bleached white bones. And a hip with three titanium screws.

I am trying not to feel as if I've failed somehow. Failed the desert. Or rather, some Georgia O'Keeffe fueled romantic idea of the desert. But the brittle, honest truth is- the desert does not feed me.

Karina's three year course in desert living: F

It's a good thing I can cook.


READ MORE and get the recipe ...

Wednesday, September 16, 2009

Apple-Pear Multigrain Muffins

Whole grain gluten-free muffins with fall fruit.

Today I have new muffin recipe for your gluten-free repertoire- with apples and pears, and protein rich quinoa flakes. The texture is akin to an old fashioned oat muffin. It is also vegan (I made these without eggs) and dairy-free. I used a combo of several gluten-free whole grain flours because I like my flour mix to have a nutty, protein rich blend.



Tender, grainy gluten-free apple-pear muffins.

Apple-Pear Multigrain Muffins Recipe

I had a craving for an apple oats muffin- so I used quinoa flakes in this recipe. Quinoa flakes give muffins a bit of oatmeal-like texture and heft (as in my Quinoa Pecan Muffins).

Ingredients:

1/4 cup sorghum flour
1/4 cup GF millet flour or certified gluten-free oat flour
1/4 cup GF buckwheat flour
1/4 cup certified gluten-free cornmeal
1/4 cup quinoa flakes
1/2 cup tapioca starch or potato starch
1 tablespoon sweet rice flour or arrowroot starch
1 teaspoon xanthan gum
1 teaspoon sea salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon cinnamon or gluten-free Apple Pie Spice blend
1/4 teaspoon allspice or cardamom
1/2 cup organic light brown sugar
1/2 cup organic cane sugar
2 organic free range eggs, beaten, or egg replacer for two eggs (I used Ener-G Egg Replacer)
1/4 cup light olive oil or melted coconut oil
1 medium banana, mashed well (about 1/2 cup)
1/4 teaspoon light rice vinegar
2 teaspoons bourbon vanilla
1/3 cup apple juice
1 cup peeled diced apple
1 cup peeled diced pear

Instructions: Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Line a twelve cup muffin tin. In a clean separate bowl, whisk together the flours, cornmeal, quinoa flakes, starches and dry ingredients. Make a well in the center and add in eggs, oil, mashed banana, vinegar, vanilla and apple juice. Beat to combine and continue beating for a minute or two until the batter is smooth. Add in the apple and pear pieces and stir by hand to combine. Use an ice cream scoop or spoon to scoop and plop the batter into the muffin cups. The batter will reach the top of the cups- that's okay. Sprinkle with organic cane or turbinado sugar, if desired. Bake in the center of a preheated oven for about 20 to 25 minutes until the muffins are firm. Cool on a wire rack for five minutes, then turn out the muffins from the pan to keep them from getting soggy. Continue to cool on a wire rack. Wrap and bag for freezing- they reheat beautifully in the microwave (zap them only briefly). Makes one dozen delicious gluten-free muffins. 


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Recipe Source: glutenfreegoddess.blogspot.com

All images & content are copyright protected, all rights reserved. Please do not use our images or content without prior permission. Thank you. 

Karina

Monday, September 14, 2009

Make Your Own Ruby Applesauce with Cranberries

Start a new tradition- make your own ruby applesauce.

Make Your Own Applesauce


Apple season is upon us. Bring on the apple recipes. First up- a favorite New England pairing- apples and cranberries simmered to create a luscious slightly tart sauce, sweetened with organic raw agave. Make it as sweet or as tart as you prefer.

So start your own tradition.

This beautiful ruby red applesauce is a lovely side dish for so many fall recipes- from Turkey and Sweet Potato Enchiladas to classic Sweet Potato Latkes.


READ MORE and get the recipe ...

Thursday, September 10, 2009

My Best Gluten-Free Cookie Recipes

Karina's Gluten-Free Goddess Cookies Recipes
Gluten-Free Cookies. Made with love.


Here are my favorite (bestest) gluten-free cookie and cookie bar recipes on Gluten-Free Goddess®. Because a good cookie is no small thing. Especially when you have to live gluten-free. So bake up some homemade cookies- with love. 

My Best Gluten-Free Cookie Recipes
































Gluten-free biscotti...

Karina's Tips:
Preserve the fresh baked taste and texture of gluten-free cookies by wrapping in twos, or bagging in small bags,  then bagging the bags in a larger freezer bag, and freezing; preserve cookie bars by wrapping, bagging and freezing them.
Thaw for best taste.
Briefly- just briefly- warm gluten-free chocolate chip cookies in the microwave for a melty, fresh baked taste.



Wednesday, September 9, 2009

My Best Gluten-Free Cake + Cupcake Recipes





Here are my favorite gluten-free cake and cupcake recipes on Gluten-Free Goddess®- from a lovely, company worthy coconut layer cake, to cozy cinnamon crumbed coffee cake, from rich and fudgy flourless chocolate elegance to sassy orange vegan cupcakes.

My Best Gluten-Free Wheat-Free 

Cake + Cupcake Recipes
































Gluten-Free Goddess' Gluten-Free Wheat-Free Cake Baking Tips:

New to baking gluten-free wheat-free cakes and cupcakes? See my post Gluten-Free Cooking + Baking Tips for what to expect and how to problem solve.

Gluten-free vegan batter (without dairy and eggs) behaves differently than wheat batter. It is generally stickier, and thicker than standard batter.
Eggs are a boon to gluten-free baking. They add lift, moisture and lightness to heavy gluten-free flours.  If fat is a concern, use whisked egg whites instead of whole eggs, and an extra egg white.
Bake in the center of a pre-heated oven. If your cakes sink in the center you may be adding too much liquid to the batter, not baking it long enough, or your oven temperature may run a tad cool. Conversely, if the cake rises high and fast, then collapses, your oven may run hot.
For essential tips on baking gluten-free and dairy-free without eggs see my Vegan Baking Cheat Sheet, with trouble shooting strategies for baking success.