If I could sum up in one word the first installment of Supper Club for the new year I’d say…”FUN”. We hosted the the January edition of the supper club on Saturday and everyone seemed to have a blast. The meal included a veggie platter from Bobby Jo, Chili, Potato + Ham Soup and bread by Sue, corn bread from Elisa and brownie ice cream sandwiches from Annette. Needless to say it was an extremely tasty and filling feast.

The kids all ganged together and played with various toys and games. At on point the games and toys became second hat to a new game called “Pile on Nathaniel”.(see pic) Thankfully no one was majorly hurt but there may have been some bumps and bruises.

Kids attempting to pile on Nathan.

Kids taking a break after a crazy time downstairs.

These gluten free strawberry muffins came out amazing. Using the Stonyfield Farm Strawberry yogurt added the extra flavor *umph* that made these muffins delicious.

• 2 cups gluten free flour mix*
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1 tsp xanthan gum
• 2 eggs
• 1 cup Stonyfield Farm Strawberry Yogurt
• 1/4 cup butter, melted
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 1 cup chopped strawberries, fresh or frozen

Preheat oven to 375. In a bowl, mix together flour, sugar, baking soda and xanthan gum. In another bowl, mix eggs, yogurt, butter and vanilla. Toss strawberries into the flour mixture. Then pour yogurt mixture into flour mixture and stir. Spoon batter into lined muffin tins. Bake for about 20 minutes or until tops are golden brown. Yields: 18 muffins

*Gluten free flour mix

3 parts white rice flour
3 parts brown rice flour
2 parts potato starch
1 part tapioca flour

One of the challenges we run into when going out to eat is finding gluten free options. Usually you will have to be satisfied with a salad, steak or chicken. This is not necessarily a bad thing but there seems to be only a tiny handful of restaurants that actually go the extra mile to make dining a pleasure when on a gluten free diet. Uno’s Chicago Grill is one of those places. Before making the move to gluten free we would frequent Uno’s because the food and atmosphere were great. Now with their gluten free menu we are continually impressed with their offerings and from our research they have the biggest gluten free menu of any chain restaurant in our area.

Uno’s offers numerous gluten free steak and chicken recipes, vegetable, rice and potato sides, and the normal salads. Uno’s then goes a couple steps further in offering gluten free pizzas (3 of them), frozen drinks and Redbridge a gluten free beer.

It is so refreshing to see restaurants accommodating dietary requirements. It is even more refreshing to see the restaurants embrace the gluten free community and cater to our needs. Ryan’s comments after eating the gluten free pepperoni pizza from Uno’s, “Mommy, I really like this pizza. I like it better than yours!”

Track down your closest Uno’s and give the gluten free menu a try. Store Locater

This recipe came out crisp and tasty. You can eat the Apple and Oatmeal Crisp plain, with ice cream or warmed with ice cream.

Ingredients:

• 1 Cup Gluten Free All Purpose Flour Mix
• 1 Cup of Rolled Oats
• 1 Cup of Brown Sugar
• 3 Cups of Apples (peeled and large dice)
• 1/2 Cup Butter (melted)
• 1/2 Cup of Sugar
• 2 tsp Cinnamon

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees
2. Grease or non stick spray a 9 inch square baking dish.
3. Mix floar, oats, brown sugar and butter until mixture forms crumb topping
4. Place a layer of crumb topping on bottom of baking dish (approximately half).
5. In a bowl combine sugar, cinnamon and apples together and place on top of crumb layer.
6. Cover the apples with remaining crumb topping and bake approximately 40 minutes. Top should be golden brown.

This Stuffed Shell recipe came out tasting amazing. Combine it with some gluten free garlic bread and you will have a very tasty meal.

Recommended Shells
1 pkg. Brown Rice Grand Shells by Tinkyada

Shell Stuffing

• 1 bunch fresh chopped spinach, cooked
• 1 lb. ricotta cheese
• 2 eggs, slightly beaten
• Salt & ground black pepper
• 1 tsp Italian seasoning
• 1/2 c. grated Parmesan cheese, Romano optional
• 1/2 c. shredded mozzarella cheese

Sauce

• ¼ cup butter
• 1 cup heavy cream
• 1 tbs. cornstarch
• 1/2 tsp. garlic powder
• 1/2 tsp. parsley
• 1 cup Parmesan cheese

Heat the oven to 375 degrees. Rub the bottom of a 9 x 13 inch baking dish with olive oil.

In boiling water cook the shells, drain and transfer to cold water. Follow the directions on the package for cooking.

For the sauce, melt ¼ cup butter over medium heat. Mix 1 cup of heavy cream with 1 tbs. of cornstarch, add, and simmer for 5 minutes. Add ½ tsp. of garlic powder, ½ tsp. of parsley, and 1 cup of Parmesan cheese.

In a bowl, combine ricotta, eggs, salt and pepper, spinach, parmesan, and spice. After filling each shell with filling, gently set them in the baking dish, cut sides up. Spread sauce over all and sprinkle mozzarella cheese over top. Cover with foil and bake for 40-50 minutes. Serves 6-8.

Keeping up with your favorite topics on the web has never been easier. The variety of methods continues to grow with blogs, twitter search, various RSS aggregators and much more. One of my favorite ways to keep up on Gluten Free articles, recipes and foods is to set up a Google Alert. If you are not familiar with Google Alerts let me give a quick overview.

The idea behind Google Alert is to keep you up-to-date on new happenings around the web that involve a topic you are interested in. As Google indexes articles, blogs and other writings it stores the information so it can be searched easily. With Google Alerts, you set up a keyword or phrase for the topic you are interested in and Google compiles the information on that topic when it is made available.

As an example, I have a Google Alert for “gluten free”. As new information is indexed by Google about things gluten free I receive an email with a list of links and a short snippet of each article. So instead of scouring the web looking for gluten free information, I have that information coming to me.

There are a few settings you can choose to make the information available to you. You can choose to have it appear in an email within your Gmail account or you can have it pass to a feed reader such as Google Reader.

For topics that are getting written about frequently I would recommend using the feed reader to aggregate the information into a nicely formatted list. For topics that receive less frequent updates or topics that are very important to you you might want to have the aggregated links sent to your Gmail. Another nifty setting for Google Alerts is the frequency you gather the updates. By changing the “How often” setting it is possible to receive updates as-it-happens, once-a-day or once-a-week. Lets face it, we are inundated with information daily and sometimes we do not need to know everything right away about a particular subject.

I am sure there are “Alert Power Users” out there that can offer other benefits or techniques in using Google Alerts. If you don’t already have a Gmail account get one and utilize the wonderous Alerts system.

There were some highs and lows today. The lows were when Tom and I went to the “1st Annual Chris Doherty Ping Pong Tournament”. Naturally we expected some level of disorganization and we were not disappointed. They announced that 150 participants had signed up for the tournament and obviously they were a little shocked by the turn out. The tournament began and there were games being played by each age bracket including the “Open”. We signed up in the Open bracket and after watching other players in the bracket we realized with went in a bit over our heads. Those players were very good. Anyway, we sat and waited to play while our bracket was slowly being neglected so we left before either of us got to play…three hours later. Other players were upset with the organization of the event but hopefully it will be better planned next time. Ok, enough of that rant…

Supper club was at the Rootes house this month and it was the high of the day. Sue attempted to make rice in the crock pot but for whatever reason it was not done by the time we had to leave. I dropped Sue and the boys off at the Rootes and ran to the nearest Chinese food joint to get some rice…3 quarts of rice. Bobby Jo put together a great meal of tacos, southwestern chicken soup and margaritas. Annette brought chips, salsa and taco fixings. Elisa made some cupcakes decorated with icing in the Mexican flag colors. Sue made up a sour cream dip for chips and some ice cream cupcakes for dessert.

Following the meal we went for a walk down an extra secret path from the Rootes home that led to the area high school’s outdoor basketball court. After almost being run down by a rogue 4-wheeler we played games of four square, P.I.G and some Tip-in game I was not familiar with. Oddly enough we never broke into our customary rounds of Knock-out. Everyone seemed to be gearing down for the evening so we headed back to the house for a little dessert and discussion. Nathaniel and Bobby Jo were great hosts and Supper Club was another success.

Kids playing in the sandbox. Hannah not keen on the paparazzi.

Tom averting his eyes as he plates up.

Elisa and Chuck conducting a soccer clinic.

A little chaos at the high school hoops. Tom, are you playing defense in a game of P.I.G.?

Sometimes we need a mortality check. Just a wake up call so we know there are things bigger than us and we are not going to be here forever. A few years ago my sister-in-law Pauline was diagnosed with cancer. Pauline is thirty five years old…the same age as me. Her recent prognosis is that she only has a handful of months left with us. You can read her story at our store Beads and Quilts – Pauline’s Story.

We all like to think that we are in difficult situations each day but I can not imagine being in the same situation as Pauline. Since she was diagnosed I sometimes vicariously put myself in her position and it almost brings me to tears thinking about all the things I might miss. Things like my boys growing up, growing old with my wife and enjoying some of my ‘golden’ years. When you are young it is difficult to digest such a situation.

With Pauline’s guidance we developed a bracelet that shows the continued “Hope” Pauline and our family members have that she will overcome the cancer. All profits and donations from the bracelet will go directly to the Pauline Benefit Fund that will be used by the family for medical expenses and other needs. See Pauline’s “Hope” Bracelet at our store. The bracelet would make a great Mother’s Day gift.

We thank you for your prayers and any contributions you can make.

I really knew nothing about gluten or eating “gluten free”. When my son Ryan was diagnosed with a gluten allergy we immediately started research on the web. Thankfully there were a number of sites that had information and links to alternate foods we could try. Look for some resource links at the end of this post.

I worked in food service for eleven years, some as a cook and some as a manager. Throughout my career I have come up against others with dietary requirements. One of the most common requirements was a vegetarian diet. I never had someone require a gluten free diet.

There was a point where I had to limit my diet because my gallbladder was giving me trouble. For a few months I had to avoid fatty foods until my gallbladder calmed down so it could be removed. After that I got to enjoy the foods I had to avoid and for the most part felt great. So why did I just recently change to a gluten free diet?

1. It’s Healthy -
When you embark on a gluten free diet the foods you replace are usually much healthier. Breads and other baked goods contain lots of white flour which is generally an unhealthy and cheap way to produce these products. Gluten free breads are made with healthy flours such as white rice flour, potato starch and tapioca starch among others. On a gluten free diet you tend to eat more fruits and vegetables as your snacks and fillers during meals. We already eat too few of these so why not take advantage of the opportunity to introduce more into our diet. Another healthy plus is you start paying attention to labels more. With all the quick and easy meals out there now people forget to be health conscious with their choices. In addition to removing gluten you can also focus on reducing things like sodium and fat in your diet.

2. Family Members Must Do It Why Not you? –
If you have a family member that is on a gluten free diet for whatever reason, why not jump in and try it yourself? This is the way I started with the diet. My son has been on the diet for a few years and my wife and I made the decision to give it a try for a week to better understand what he goes through. We found that it is easier for us to just cook a complete gluten free dish than two separate dishes each meal. Since making the change it seems to have brought our family even closer. There is no long a disconnect we had by eating foods in front of Ryan that he may never get to eat.

3. Cooking is an Adventure -
When Ryan was on the gluten free diet himself he would stick to his ‘old stand-by’ meals of fluffer nutters with ricemellow and soy nut butter on tapioca loaf. Since the family made the move to gluten free we have been experimenting with numerous recipes. We first had to filter through ingredients that do not contain gluten. Once we had our list we got recipe ideas from magazines, cookbooks and websites. We are continuously adding the recipes we create or find to this blog under the tag Gluten Free. Not only have we created some great tasting foods but we have been creating a small library of foods everyone in the house loves.

Overall, going gluten free has been an easy transition for us. Over the past few weeks I have been feeling better and lost a few pounds in the process(not that I need to). One thing to be conscious of is to make sure you get your vitamins and minerals. As was said earlier you will and should eat more fruits and vegetables in addition to varying your diet. With so many great recipes coming to the web daily your meals should be the equivalent of non-gluten free in taste but healthier.

Resources:
Gluten Free Mall – Great place to get all the ingredients you need for healthy gluten free meals.

The Gluten Free Mommy – An assortment of great recipes that have never failed us.

Ener-G Foods – Wonderful product list of gluten free breads, cookies, pastas and more.

Our local grocery store had some turkey sausage that was completely allergen free for my son including gluten.

We used Barkat Animal Shapes Gluten-Free Pasta as the pasta which came out a perfect al dente. The feature of the meal though was the turkey sausage. The flavor it delivered to the dish made your mouth consistently water for another bite. We removed the casing from the sausage and cooked it up in a frying pan with some diced onions.

To plate it up just put a bed of pasta on the plate, spoon the turkey sausage and onion mixture on top and cover with Pecorino Romano cheese. A very flavorful and filling dish.