celiac disease

Spicy Baby Eggplant and Pasta Stew

This post is for my friend Diane, the queen of eggplants!  We have been friends for a couple of years and share garden space at the church garden.  She really knows how to grow eggplants, dozens on a single plant both years!

baby eggplants

This recipe is for dealing with those small eggplants you find yourself with when the frost strikes and all delicate plants die in the frosty fall air.  I pick them no matter how small and this is how we use them!  Yes, the eggplant recipe fest continues!

This stew is very suitable for the slow cooker although you could do it on the stove top, I used to cook them in a big pot and watch over it until the eggplants are tender but I really love being able to put it all in my crock pot and walk away for four hours.  No worries on burnt bottom of the pot syndrome when you use the slow cooker.

If you don’t have baby eggplants I think you could use Japanese eggplants cut into workable lengths.

I used to make it rather bland but I really enjoy this spicy version!

Spicy Baby Eggplants and Pasta Stew

Ingredients

7-12 small eggplants from tiny up to about six inches long

1-2 ounces hard parmesan cheese

1 32 oz can of tomato sauce

½ cup baby carrots

1 medium carrot diced

½ tsp smoked paprika

½ tsp. red pepper flakes (more or less to your personal taste)

½ tsp. sea salt

1 large garlic clove, smashed

½ cup oil cured black olives

1-2 tbsp. capers

Directions:

Cut the Parmesan cheese into tiny wedges.  Trim off the top cap of the eggplant.  Cut 3-4 slashes in the side of each eggplant going in the direction from the cap to the bottom.

Put a wedge of cheese into each deep slash.  I only put 2 slashes in tiny eggplants, 3 in bigger ones and 4 in the largest eggplants.  Put the eggplants into your slow cooker. Top with the chopped onion and carrots.  I cut my carrots in half as they were kinda large. Top with the herbs/spices. Pour the tomato sauce over it all. I used a quart of homemade tomato sauce out of my freezer. If you use a can of plain tomato sauce you might want to add 1 tsp. dried basil and same amount of oregano.  Top with the garlic, olives, and capers.  Cover and cook in your slow cooker on high for 4 hours.

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Cook gluten free ziti, enough for how many people you are serving, and drain it one minute before the package directions say it will be done. Put it back in the now empty pot and add the eggplant mixture out of your crock pot.  Cook a minute stirring it all around the pot.  This allows the ziti to soak up some of the sauce and get a great authentic flavor.

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Serve in a low wide soup bowl with a good grating of Parmesan cheese on top.  If you have some gluten free rolls or fresh bread – heaven with this stew!

I like this stew leftover for lunch served over a microwaved baked potato. I use a knife to coarsely chop up the baby eggplants before heating them and pouring over the hot potato.

Note I used olives with pits but if you can find them pitted, all the better! If you are an olive hater, leave them out but they really add to the flavor.  Add more salt if you leave them out.

Autumn Plum Tart, Perfectly Tasty!

There is a huge abundance of fruit in August and September.  Still lots of peaches, plums, grapes and nectarines and the early apples and pears are coming in.  What to bake?  Tough decision, still I love juicy ripe plums but seldom bake with them.  This is one of the only recipes I can make gluten free with blue plums; these are those oval small plums, sometimes called prune or Stanley plums that are only available for a few weeks in the early fall.  They are inexpensive, not too sweet and they get soft and purply delish in this simple tart.

purple plum

It is modeled after some German fruit tarts I had enjoyed in my wheat loving past life.  I think it replicates them quite well.

You will use my favorite cobbler mix as the crust base, which makes this recipe really simple.  I will put the mix recipe down at the end of this post.  I keep it in my freezer and one cup makes great cobbler or this tart base. To this particular batch I added a couple teaspoons of dried lemon peel powder.  This ingredient is made of lemon peels rolled in sugar and dried, leftover after make homemade lemoncello liquor.  They become powder after a few moments in my spice blender. The fine powder adds a subtle lemon flavor but its okay, you don’t absolutely need it to make this recipe work.  It is in the original recipe but I never bothered before to make some even though I had the dried lemon peels.  The addition is great and if you can add it you won’t be disappointed.   lemon peel

A few instructions to assist you if you make this tart: I cut up the plums first and sprinkle them with sugar, let them stand while I mix the dry stuff up and then stir up the wet items in a small mixing bowl.

Be sure to use a 10 inch tart pan; it can be made in a 9 inch one but it may well spill over and burn on the bottom of your oven which is never a good thing.

We like it with a small scoop of vanilla ice cream on the side. It is fine all on its own.  Makes a great breakfast too with a cup of coffee or tea.

plum tart

GF Fall Plum Tart

1 cup cobbler dry mix; recipe below

mix with 1/4 cup sugar

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2 eggs

3 Tbps. buttermilk

2 Tbps. melted butter

1/2  tsp. vanilla

1/2  tsp. almond extract

1 ½ lbs prune plums (enough to cover the entire tart pan) cut in halves or quarters. Mix them with 2 tbsp sugar

Directions:

Heat oven to 350 degrees. Mix dry ingredients in a small bowl.

Spray a 10 inch deep tart pan or 9 in pie pan with cooking spray

Beat eggs in bowl, add rest of wet ingredients, mix well, add to dry ingredients, stir briefly just to mix up.  Pour into the prepared pan and spread it out with a spatula.  Top with plums, cut side up, push each in slightly into the batter and cover the entire surface of tart base.

Bake 30 min.  Top with mixture of 1 ½ tsp sugar and ½ tsp cinnamon

Bake ten more minutes or until top looks done.

Cool somewhat before slicing/serving.

Dry Cobbler Mix

2 ¼ cups white rice flour

½ cup potato starch

½ cup tapioca flour

1 tsp. baking soda

4 tsp. baking powder

1 tsp salt

1 tsp. xanthan gum

1/3 cup sugar

Bittersweet Chocolate Tart….Best Chocolate Tart Ever!

Two years ago I made this dark chocolate tart and we ate it around a bonfire. Someone had the bright idea of putting toasted marshmallows on their slice.  Last Saturday I made the same tart but gluten free and we made sure to have plenty of marshmallows to toast and top our slices with.  Most of us had seconds, but I was able to save a tiny sliver for my mom to enjoy.  It was a big hit with all of the chocoholics there so here is the recipe.

Bittersweet Chocolate Tart

Crust

1 cup gf flour (recipe below)

¼ cup sugar

1 tsp xanthan gum

¼ tsp salt

½ tsp cinnamon

5 tbsp. butter cut into 5 pieces

1 tsp. vanilla extract

1 tsp. water

Mix all the dry ingredients in the bowl of a stand mixer.  Add the butter pieces and blend until they are tiny crumbs.  Then add the vanilla and 1 to 2 tsp. water and blend.  It should be thick crumbs.

Spray a 9 inch tart pan with a removable bottom with cooking oil and then sprinkle with some gf flour; shake to coat.  Dump the crumbs of the crust evenly all over the tart pan bottom and press in with your fingers to make a fairly even crust, be sure to push some up the short sides of the pan so it is to the top of the metal and not too thick near the edges.

Bake at 350 for 11 or 12 minutes.  Let cool while you make the filling.

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Filling Ingredients

¾ cup heavy cream

1/3 cup whole milk

7 ounces bittersweet chocolate, I like Ghirardelli.  Break into small squares/pieces.

1 large egg slightly beaten

Put the milk, heavy cream and chocolate in a heavy bottomed sauce pan and heat on low to moderate heat; stir often until chocolate is melted.  Remove from heat and cool a few minutes.

Add the beaten egg, blend well.  Pour into the tart pan and bake at 375 for 15 minutes. 

Brown Rice Flour Recipe

Ingredients

–         1 c brown rice flour –

–         1/3 c potato starch (not potato flour-

–          3 tbsp tapioca flour

Directions

Mix all the flours in a big jar or bag

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This tart is best eaten warm with two or three toasted marshmallows pressed onto the top.  Whipped cream or vanilla ice cream is also yummy.  This picture was taken in total darkness with an i-phone and the owner of this slice of tart was ticked off that her marshmallows cooled while the shot was made so she toasted up two more marshmallows and had all four on her slice of tart.  This dessert is seriously delicious and really easy to make. If you love dark chocolate this is a must recipe for your repertoire.  It can easily be made by you wheat eaters; just use your favorite cookie tart crust recipe.  The filling will be the same.  Now, go get some good chocolate and make your own tart and don’t eat the whole thing yourself; share it with someone you love!

Brownie Meets Cheesecake and Love Ensues!

I never thought I would want another brownie recipe after I made the gluten free version that is so easy to make and so tasty.  Then I met this recipe.  It is from a book of Gluten Free Christmas cookies, by Ellen Brown that my best friend gave me for Christmas.  I made some very minor changes.  It is like a brownie and a cheesecake meet, fall in love and this is their baby!  A bit more work than my other brownies but just totally nummy good! And I am not a big cheesecake lover.  This is an exception to that rule.

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Marble Brownies

Ingredients:

4 ounces semi-sweet chocolate, chopped

1 stick unsalted butter

3 large eggs

1 cup sugar, split

½ c brown rice flour

¼ tsp. xanthan gum

Pinch of salt

1 8 oz pkg light cream cheese, softened

½ tsp. vanilla extract

Directions:

Make sure the cream cheese is room temperature.  Do not use fat free cream – it is dreadful in baking!  I get the best quality chocolate I can find. Frankly I often use regular salted butter in my baking. It is what I normally have in my kitchen so I tend to just use it.

Melt chocolate and butter in a heavy saucepan, stirring frequently.  Take off heat, cool for 5 minutes.

Grease an 8×8 pan and dust with rice flour.

Combine 2 eggs and ¾ c. sugar in mixing bowl, beat with electric mixer for 2 minutes until light and fluffy.  Add cooled chocolate mixture and beat one minute.  Add dry ingredients and beat at low speed just til mixed.

In a separate bowl combine cream cheese, remaining ¼ c sugar, other egg and vanilla.  Beat with electric beater for 2 minutes.

Spread chocolate mixture into pan, Top with cream cheese mixture, swirl together with spatula.

Bake at 350 degrees for 35 minutes, until top is springy. Cool in pan on wire rack until completely cooled before cutting into 16 to 20 squares.

Store in airtight container between wax paper sheets for up to 5 days, room temp.  Can freeze for up to a month.

Mine weren’t too swirly but the cream cheese mixture mellowed the chocolate into a creamy dreamy delight.  There were very few leftover squares. I took this photo of the last brownie square the next morning!  I know this recipe is a lot more work than the other one I had blogged some time ago but if you like cheesecake you will love it and it makes a nice change of pace or a great snack to take to a party.

Get Charmed by Chia Green Tea

A few weeks ago I was eating lunch at an elementary school and sitting next to the building sub.  She was drinking something pale green and there were things floating in the liquid! I asked what the heck it was and learned that every morning she makes green tea and puts a spoonful of chia seeds in it.  I was struck by the fact that she did it every day.  To my mind that meant that there was good reason for this drink. So I felt I would investigate it myself regardless of my memories of weird chia pets that were advertised on TV decades ago.  Image

So I googled chia seeds and found this paragraph in Wikipedia:          “According to the USDA, a one ounce (28 gram) serving of chia seeds contains 9 grams of fat, 5 milligrams of sodium, 11 grams of dietary fiber, 4 grams of protein, 18% of the recommended daily intake of calcium, 27% phosphorus and 30%manganese.[7] These nutrient values are similar to other edible seeds, such as flax or sesame.”   That is a whole lot of nutrition.  I also read that ancient Mexicans like the Aztecs cultivated it as a major staple food.

WebMd had some kind words for chia seeds, mentioning their Omega 3  fatty acids, carbohydrates, protein, fiber, antioxidants, and calcium.  It suggested they can be sprinkled on foods, put in breads, and used in beverages.  The focus of the WebMd article was whether they help with weight loss.  It concluded that more study is required before such claims can be verified.

Nuts.com had a list of seven benefits to eating chia seeds.  I would be happy to have 3 or 4 of those benefits!  So chia seeds in my tea? Maybe yes!  Image

I personally have always felt green tea was rather blah in flavor.  I drank it occasionally but not with any enthusiasm. The addition of chia seeds to tea might be fun I thought.  I tried them a week ago and I think I am hooked!

Here is my simple recipe.  I make a large mug of green tea using one tea bag, be sure to let your boiling water cool a minute before adding the tea bag.  I brew for 3 minutes.  Then I add ½ a teaspoon of local honey.  Bechdolts is my source for great honey. The typical honey in  your supermarket is somewhat suspect as to quality.  Best to get it as close to the bees as possible!  Many people think there are health benefits for allergies to local honey.  Maybe, I just think it tastes much better and is not adulterated as I fear much commercial honey is these days.  I digress.

Anyway, I put a tsp of chia seeds in a small dish, add about ¼ cup of filtered water and let it stand as the tea cools.  In about 15 or 20 minutes I add the chia seeds which have swollen with water to the tea.  Stir well. I like to put a couple ice cubes in a glass and add the chia tea.  Sometimes I put it in my water bottle and take it to where ever I am going.    Image

You can use any type of tea.  I have several flavored green teas and chia seeds are great in all of them.  It works fantastically in plain green tea.  I love the addition of these slightly weird slippery balls of chia seeds spinning around in my tea.  They make it much more interesting to drink.  I like to stir it up or swirl it around so I get a few slithery seeds in each sip.  I am positive it will work great for your favorite herbal tea or black tea.  So use what ever tea you prefer and have a silly iced chia tea time!

Some recipes put as much as a tablespoon of chia seeds in each cup.  I suggest you start with a teaspoon and see how you like it before considering increasing the amount.  And many recipes just put the chia seeds right in the hot tea without soaking them; feel free to do that if it makes life easier!

My healthy green tea is much more playful and nutritionally improved by this small addition.  I get nutrients and fiber and fun! I find myself drinking more green tea, maybe 3 or 4 times as much as I used to.  This hydrates my body in this hot weather which is a real benefit.  It is cheaper and considerably healthier than commercial ice teas which can be laden with sugar and a variety of not so healthy additives.  Goes without saying that it is gluten free too!

Try it and you will be happily hooked on chia tea too.