I recently advised a friend to buy ice cube trays for a pittance rather than $600 to fix her refrigerator because the ice maker was broken. People say I have a gift for problem-solving. Today, I bring you the gift of the technological recipe capturing device, your smart phone.
If your kitchen is like mine, you have one or more recipe boxes full of recipe cards, newspaper clippings, and pages torn from magazines. Our recipe boxes contain both recipes that either we use all the time, or those which looked interesting when we first saw them but have never gotten around to making. Today I was browsing the latest (free) issue of Better Nutrition magazine and an interesting recipe for Savory Sweet Potato Balls jumped out at me. My first inclination was to tear it out of the magazine and add it to the others in the box, maybe to try sometime, maybe to forget about. But just a scant hour before this, I was working on reducing the clutter that I have allowed to accumulate on my quadrant of the dining room table. I have a number of projects in the works and this space is my staging area while things are in process. I had allowed too many bits of paper and partially completed projects to accumulate and was pleased that I had made a pretty good dent in reclaiming my zone. I couldn't bring myself to add to general household clutter with another scrap of paper, even one with a pretty delicious-sounding recipe, which might just go into the card box to languish and take up space. Yay for technology! I took a picture of the recipe with my smart phone. I can sort and file it and back it up to the recipe file on my computer. If it turns out to be a keeper, I can decide later to commit it to the recipe box if I want. If it turns out to be a languisher, then at least I haven't added any clutter to my life. Feel free to take this idea and make it your own. Better living through technology. These are definitely treats for a long holiday weekend. They violate my usual code of fast, easy, and few dishes. They were none of the above. But because Jenn specifically asked for a coffee cake-like treat, how could I say, "Nah. Too much of a bother."? She makes very few culinary requests. Luckily they turned out great and thus, blog-worthy on the first try. They are very moist, probably because I went ahead and used a full stick of butter rather than cutting it in half and adding applesauce. The butter was probably also the reason they didn't stick to the muffin papers. So, once in awhile, maybe it's okay to stress the "happy" and "gluten-free" part of Happy Healthy Gluten-free and know that "healthy" is found both in eating these in moderation and at your next meal in the form of a nice salad or plate of greens. These muffins DO have two advantages: 1) because they are muffins, the portion control is built right in, and 2) they have the benefit of Xocai healthy dark chocolate which boosts your antioxidant intake and adds a nice sophistication, making them a little less than over-the-top sweet. The creation of these muffins has a number of steps, and my younger son Scott had a great time helping out. He measured, mixed, scooped batter into the muffin tins, unwrapped and inserted the chocolate squares, spread and patted down the topping, and more. So though they weren't particularly fast to make, it was good quality time in the kitchen. Ingredients: For the cake part: 1 3/4 gluten-free flour blend (I used Arrowhead Mills, which has xanthan gum built in. If your favorite gf flour blend does not, add 1 ¼ teaspoons of it for this recipe.) 2 teaspoons baking powder 1 teaspoon baking soda ¼ teaspoon salt 1 cup plain unsweetened almond milk (or the milk-like product of your choice) 3/4 cup sugar 1 stick of melted butter 2 eggs 12 Xocai Power Squares or other dark chocolate squares For the topping: 1/2 stick of butter 1/2 cup gluten-free flour blend 1/2 cup brown sugar 1 teaspoon Cocoa Powder Preheat the oven to 350. Thoroughly combine the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt in a bowl and set aside. Combine the milk, sugar, butter and eggs in a big bowl. Add the dry ingredients to the milk-sugar-eggs and mix well. Spoon the rather sticky batter into a lined muffin tin. Worry that it may be too dry. Insert the chocolate squares upright in the middle of the muffin batter. For the topping, combine the flour, sugar and cocoa powder in a bowl. Cut the chilled butter into small pieces and combine it with the dry ingredients. Use a pastry blender, two knives or your fingers (I used my fingers) to mix until course and crumbly. Spread it evenly over the muffins and pat them down a little. Bake for 20-22 minutes until a toothpick inserted (but not in the middle of the chocolate stripe) comes out clean. Eat them warm! Though room temperature was good too. We froze some of them to keep us from devouring the whole pan in one day. Keep your face over your plate. Oh wait, that's what I say to Scott. I tend to do variations on my culinary creations, so if this looks kinda familiar, it's because I'm borrowing and altering from my own recipes. These bars have no added sugar, and I reduced the fat by using powdered peanut butter and some actual chopped peanuts, rather than getting out the jar of Jif. I hid some Xocai healthy dark chocolate power squares within for an added boost. You could use other chocolate squares, but you owe it to yourself to try Xocai!) Banana Peanut Chocolate Oat Bars Ingredients: 1 1/2 cups gluten-free oats (I use Trader Joes) 2 ripe bananas, mashed 1 egg 1/4 cup plain unsweetened almond milk 2 tablespoons powdered peanut butter (I like a brand called JustGreatStuff and I found it recently at my local supermarket in the health food section. There's another brand out there that's good too, called PB2) 2 tablespoons chopped roasted lightly salted peanuts 9 Xocai Power Squares Directions: Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Line a 6" X 9" baking pan with non-stick parchment paper. Combine all the ingredients except the chocolate and mix well. Pour half of the mixture into the pan. Arrange the 9 chocolate squares so that you'll get one square per serving. Spread the remaining oat mixture over the top. Bake for 22 - 27 minutes, until the edges are lightly browned. Let cool and cut into 9 bars. Great for a quick pre-fab breakfast or on-the-go snack! This recipe is featured in the current So What CAN You Eat newsletter. Sign up here to be sure to get future issues delivered right to your e-mailbox! We had such great success at our holiday gf meetup cookie swap that we thought we attempt a springtime reprise with a baked goods potluck brunch. I had a hankering for strawberries, and I’m very into dark chocolate, so I created some muffins to share with the group. The ones I shared with my friends were pretty mild-mannered, but two muffins that didn’t make the lineup for the potluck were my (very successful) trial of adding A LOT of chocolate to them. I call them Strawberry Chocolate Bomb Muffins. My partner Jenn reports that eating them is like having fudge without having to go to one of those touristy places that make you watch them spread it on a slab of marble. If you wanted to make these muffins and were stranded on a desert island and had to forego the chocolate, you could, but you’d be sad and you’d have to change the name. Strawberry Chocolate Bomb Muffins 1 ¾ cups all purpose gluten-free baking mix (I used Arrowhead Mills, which contains xanthan gum. If you use a blend that doesn’t include xanthan gum, I’d advise 1 ¼ teaspoons of it for this recipe.) 2 teaspoons baking powder 1 teaspoon baking soda ¼ teaspoon salt 1 cup plain unsweetened almond milk (or the milk-like product of your choice) ½ cup sugar ½ stick of melted butter ¼ cup vanilla yogurt (if you don’t have this, you can double the butter and add an additional ¼ cup sugar) 2 eggs 1 cup fresh or frozen strawberries, cut into smallish chunks 18 Xocai Dark Chocolate Nuggets (or do a mix of some with chocolate, some without) Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Sift flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt together and set aside. In a bowl, mix together the milk, sugar, butter, yogurt and eggs. Fold in the strawberries. Add the flour blend a bit at a time and stir until moistened. Pour batter into lined muffin tins 2/3rds full. Push an unwrapped nugget into the middle of the chosen muffins. It’s okay if it doesn’t get completely covered with batter. Bake for 20-25 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the cake part comes out clean. Let cool enough for the molten lava chocolate to not scald you – maybe ½ an hour or more. Makes 18 muffins. For you Philadelphians interested in learning more about the gluten-free diet, register for the Mt Airy Learning Tree Class Why and How to Go Gluten-Free. I am leading the workshop, which will be held at Food For All Market and Café, and in addition to some delicious samples of their gluten-free fare, I'm including my ebooks Gluten Free: Practical Advice for a Happy, Healthy Gluten-Free Life and So What CAN You Eat? Gluten-Free Paleo Vegan (mostly) Recipes for Health and Weight Loss (which I will have printed out for your benefit, of course!) Here's the course description: Do you feel lousy and don't know why? Have doctors not been able to figure out what's wrong? Have you recently been diagnosed with celiac disease or gluten intolerance? Do you wonder if going gluten-free can help you lose weight? Do you want to know what all the buzz is about? During this fun and interactive hour and a half session, you'll get facts and practical tips for eating gluten-free safely and well. Tuesday, May 7th, 6:30 - 8 pm Food For All, 7127 Germantown Avenue, Philadelphia PA 19119 $20 for the class, $5 Materials fee REGISTRATION THROUGH MT. AIRY LEARNING TREE IS REQUIRED I hope to see you there! |
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