Day three hundred and twelve

Dinner: Gluten-free chicken nuggets, brown rice pilaf (with pureed cauliflower), green beans, and fruit salad.

Day three hundred and eleven

My daughter's gluten-free lunch: Rolled deli turkey, mozzarella stick, edamame crackers, carrots, and grapes.

Day three hundred and ten

Breakfast: Blueberry pancakes (we tried a gluten-free mix that a friend gave us) with turkey sausage and oranges.

Dinner: Turkey burgers, brown rice penne mac and cheese (crockpot; Make it Fast, Cook it Slow), steamed broccoli, and fresh tomatoes and mozzarella. 

Day three hundred and nine

Breakfast: Oatmeal with chunks of apple.  I was SO thrilled to find that gluten-free oats exist... not sure I could live without oats!

A man's dinner (aka, my husband made it): Rotisserie chicken, green beans, apple, and tater tots (gluten-free from Trader Joe's).

Day three hundred and eight

Chocolate chip cookies (almond flour; Recipe: Elana).  These were neat-- really nutty and chewy, almost like a PB cup flavor.

Fresh mozzarella and farmer's market tomatoes.

Dinner: Asian chicken meatballs, brown rice (with pureed cauliflower; Double Delicious), steamed broccoli, and pineapple.

Homemade vanilla ice cream with chocolate chip cookies. All of this gluten-free business is hard work.  We deserved a treat.  ;)

Day three hundred and seven

Breakfast: Bob's Red Mill gluten-free hot cereal, with apple.

Dessert: Pound cake (gluten-free; recipe: Gluten-Free on a Shoestring).

Day three hundred and six

Dinner: Chicken tetrazzini (crockpot; Recipe: Crockery Cookery) over brown rice fusilli, steamed veggies, and clementines.  The tetrazzini was something I'd made a while back as a double, frozen, and thawed earlier today.  All I had to do was boil the pasta and heat the chicken and sauce.  I love when I cook ahead- it gives me a night when I have almost no clean-up.

Day three hundred and five

Dinner: Maple dijon chicken with sweet potatoes (crockpot; Recipe: Make it Fast Cook it Slow), fruit salad (frozen), and steamed broccoli.  I do not like mustard, so I did a little sleuthing online and found white wine to be a good substitution for the dijon.  It worked.

Another gluten-free first: BREAD!  I discovered this cookbook what has quickly become one of my new Bibles, "Gluten-free on a shoestring." In it, there is a great bread recipe.  This was delicious.

A kitchen staple: Vanilla yogurt.  I will always be indebted to the Frugal Girl for her no-frills method, which requires no more than a pot and a picnic cooler for awesome yogurt.

Day three hundred and four

Another gluten-free first: PIZZA!!  I would not, could not live without pizza.  Perfecting the best gluten-free crust is a project still in progress, and this was our first attempt.  It was pretty tasty, but I'm not sure how authentically "Italian" it tasted.  I'll get there sooner or later...

Before going into the oven: Pizza crust made with almond flour (recipe: Elana).

Dinner: Pizza (almond flour crust) with chicken, fresh mozzarella, and broccoli.  My daughters prefer their broccoli on the side rather than as a topping, so I don't put it on half of the pizza.  The crust had a nice crunch to it, so overall we were satisfied with dinner.

Day three hundred and three: Blueberry muffin challenge

My husband was out of town, my daughters wanted muffins, and we decided to give the gluten-free muffin experiment a try.  As I've been learning, a lot of gluten-free cooking is trial and error, so I decided to take two recipes, as well as two very different types of flours, and see what happened.

This first batch is made with coconut flour, and the recipe comes from the gluten-free Elana.  They are grain-free-- one baking method with which we're experimenting.  The muffins tasted good, but to be honest were very wet and oily, and didn't rise very much, so we decided to bake batch #2.

This second batch was made with Bob's Red Mill gluten-free flour blend.  The biggest downside to baking with this flour blend was that there is a slight bean-y aftertaste, which I did not care for.  On the flip side, they were light, fluffy, and not too wet or dry.  After the fact, I discovered a flour blend which I like MUCH better.  I'll get to that in a future post.

For comparison sake, here are both muffins.  In a taste test, #2 were much better.  The coconut-flour ones weren't too bad, though.  I froze the extras in a ziploc bag, and used them for the next month as a snack to toss into my daughter's school backpack.

Day three hundred and two

This is a mystery lunch.  I'm a month behind in posting photos, and I can't recall what this one is.  It's clearly sauce with mozzarella cheese on top of it, but I just can't tell what's under it.  Brown rice pasta?  Anyone?

Dinner: Chicken in a teriyaki glaze (Recipe: Double Delicious), brown rice (with pureed cauliflower; Double Delicious), sliced apples, and salad.

My daughter wanted me to take a pic of her plate as well, so here it is.  :)

Day three hundred and one

Dinner: Chicken and black bean soup (crockpot; Recipe: Make it Fast Cook it Slow).  This is my favorite soup in the world.  My two others are cream of broccoli and potato leek, but this is just to die for.  It's the simplest recipe and it is so, so, SO good.  This alone made buying an immersion blender worth it.  If you like mexican food at all, I highly recommend making this soup, pronto.

Day Three hundred and one

Dessert: Apple crisp.  This was the first gluten-free dessert I made, and I was very proud of it.  My grandfather, who is a bakery aficionado, had no idea this was gluten free; I take that as a compliment.  I actually stuck to my regular recipe, but substituted gluten-free oats and brown rice flour for the regular oats and flour, and wouldn't you know, it was great.  I've learned that when you're serving dessert to a "gluten" crowd, it's better to pick a recipe light on flour (as this one is mostly fruit) and no one will be the wiser.

Day Three hundred

Potato cake with (turkey) bacon (Recipe: Rachel Ray)

Sauteed spinach and apples

Dinner: Potato cake with (turkey) bacon, sour cream, and apples (Recipe: Rachel Ray).  I loved that this was a gluten-free dinner I didn't have to think much about, but I loved even more that I'd put it on the menu rotation before we even became gluten-free.  ;)

Day Two hundred and ninety-nine

Gluten-free lunch: Cottage cheese, edamame crackers, carrots and green beans, and cantaloupe.  In case it's not obvious, this is my daughter's school lunchbox.

Dinner: Chicken and rice soup (crockpot; Make it Fast, Cook it Slow).