Sep 29, 2014 | Desserts
There’s not a lot that you can say about a cake that involves veggies. I have loved a chocolate
This was a single recipe with walnuts only. I had to fight to take leftovers home from the party!
zucchini cake before, but carrot cake with cream cheese icing is the stuff that rabbit’s dreams are made of. And I need to stop typing right there and compose myself for this family friendly site!
Ahem.
I have a friend of mine who told me that the only way he likes to eat carrots is in cake. He has tried this cake and has told me that I can make it any time for him. While I’m at it, I can make a cake for the rest of my family and myself as well. It really is that good!
Carrot Cake
2 cups (480 g) GF flour
2 cups (480 g) sugar
2 tsp (10 g) baking powder
1 tsp (5 g) baking soda
1 tsp (5 g) salt
1 tsp (5 g) cinnamon
1 cup (250 ml) veggie oil
5 eggs
3 cups grated carrots
1/2 cup GF certified walnuts
1/2 cup raisins
- Pre-heat your oven to 325 degrees. Beat your sugar together with the oil on high and then add the eggs one at time.
- After scraping down the sides, add the dry ingredients sans the carrots, walnuts and raisins.
- Add the carrots and mix well. Scrape down the sides a number of times to ensure that the wet mixture is thoroughly combined.
- At this point, I typically pour the cakes into parchment lined 9″ round pans and mix the walnuts in one half and the raisins in the other half. You could mix it all together and just bake it as one in a 9″ x 13″. I like the walnuts, my wife likes the raisins – as I’ve said before, I typically cook two different meals, sometimes two different desserts as well.
- Bake for about 60-65 minutes until toothpick comes out clean. Let it cool for about 20 minutes before trying to ice it.
Cream Cheese Icing
8 oz (250 g) cream cheese
3 tbsp (45 ml) veggie oil
3.5 cups (840 g) icing sugar
1/4 tsp (2 g) salt
2 tbsp (30 ml) vanilla
- Cream the cheese in your clean blender before adding in the oil.
- Once that is thoroughly blended add in the other ingredients besides the sugar, combine and then add the sugar.
- The icing will be easy to use, almost sliding off the cake if it’s too hot. So either wait for the cake to cool completely or ensure that your icing is a bit colder before you start to ice the cake.
Sep 22, 2014 | Egg Free, Nut Free, Side Dishes
Up here north of the border, Thanksgiving is around the corner. And that is a fine reason for me to celebrate as Thanksgiving was my favourite (eating) holiday in the States. It became an even bigger celebration for me after I got married and was able to start eating, I mean, celebrating twice in one year!
One of the best things about Thanksgiving dinner was the dressing. I started using my mother’s recipe for dressing when I first started doing the turkey – unfortunately, I can’t make biscuits. So I started using my mother-in-law’s recipe with bread. Then I got diagnosed with Celiac’s and I realized that I would have to figure something else out.
Fortunately that meant that I was able to do it hot and spicy since I would be the only one eating it. So I went with Cajun and rice – and lots of other fun stuff thrown in. I hope you enjoy it as much as I have …
Cajun Rice Stuffing
2 cup (480 g) long grain white rice
1 medium red onion
2 stalks celery
2 tbsp (28 g) minced garlic
2 tbsp (28 g) butter
1 tbsp (15 g) poultry seasoning
1 tbsp (15 g) sage
2 tbsp (28 g) Cajun Seasoning
1 Granny Smith apple
1/2 cup (120 g) bacon pieces
1/4 cup (60 ml) dry sherry
- Cook your rice while you saute the diced onion and apple with everything but the sherry.
- Once the onions are translucent add the sherry and cook for a few minutes to let it thicken.
- Add the rice, stirring thoroughly. Stuff the bird and go!
Sep 14, 2014 | Dairy Free, Egg Free, Entrees, Nut Free
I love pork – prepared in just about anyway but ham and regular barbecue. Sorry Mom – but they may have ruined those “treats” for me. So pretty much any other kind of bacon or pork I will inhale.
And I recently developed a new way of doing a pork roast after my wife starting buying beef roasts in their own gravy, which contained – you guessed it – glutenized gravy. So I had to come up with an alternative that in my book far surpasses the other roast in not only taste but in being gluten free!
Caribbean Pork Roast
3-4 lb pork loin/roast
2 tbsp (30 ml) olive oil
1/4 cup (60 g) Jerk Seasoning
1 large red onion
1/4 cup (60 ml) spicy sweet mustard
1-2 cups (~.5 l) cooking sherry
- Heat your olive oil in a stainless steel saute pan while you rub down your pork with the jerk
seasoning. Once the oil is hot, you want to sear the pork on all sides sealing in the juices – should develop a nice browned skin at about 3-4 minutes per side. Pre-heat your oven to 425 degrees
- Saute the julienned red onions in the drippings after you pull the pork out. While the onions cook, brush the mustard over the entire roast. Let it rest for about ten minutes.
- While the roast is resting and after your onions are done, add the sherry to the pan to deglaze. You can add a little butter if you want to make the sauce richer.
- Once the sauce has thickened a bit or your 10 minutes rest is up, add the pork to the pan and put it in the oven for about 10-15 minutes or until it’s at about 145 degrees internally in the thickest part of the roast.
- Serve the roast and sauce over rice and enjoy!
Sep 3, 2014 | Desserts
So a post featuring a cookie shaped as a Wookie should be a clear indication that I like “Star Wars.” But in case you weren’t clear, I grew up on “Star Wars”, I have twins that are not named Luke and Leia (my wife’s fault) and we will all be trick-or-treating next year as the Skywalker clan!
At any rate, I was crazy enough to just pull this together because my wife and daughter went to a concert leaving my son and I together for the evening. We had a “Star Wars” day featuring a Wookie Cookie, SW Trouble and Episode I (his choice). That said this peanut butter cookie and the frosting can obviously be made separately or together and do not have to be Wookie shaped. But if you did that, it would not be a Wookie Cookie – and that’s just nutty! 😉
Peanut Butter Cookie
2.5 cups (600 g) GF flour
.5 tsp (2.5 g) baking soda
.5 tsp (2.5 g) salt
1 cup (250 g) butter
1 cup (250 g) peanut butter
3/4 cup (180 g) brown sugar
3/4 cup (180 g) sugar
2 eggs
1 tbsp (15 ml) vanilla
- Cream the butter and peanut butter together in a blender.
- Blend in the sugar followed by the eggs and vanilla. Ensure that you are scraping the sides to get everything mixed well.
- Add in the flour and other dry ingredients, again scraping the sides to ensure even mixing.
- Roll it out as one big sheet on a piece of parchment paper atop a cookie sheet.
- Cook at 350 for about half an hour. The edges will be slightly browned and the middle just about the height of the rest of the cookie when it is done. As a note in a convection oven, it takes about 20-22 minutes.
To assemble the Wookie Cookie
- Make one recipe of Chocolate Frosting.
- Cut the baked cookie to in a head shape with no discernible neck – like it was just a girl with long hair. Then cut small pieces out of the bottom to form the head fur bottom.
- With a star tip, pipe on the hair.
- For the teeth and eyes use primarily white chocolate chips with milk chocolate chips for the irises and the nose. Add a cut pink marshmallow for the tongue and there you have a wookie!
Sep 3, 2014 | Desserts, Nut Free
Chocolate Frosting
1 cup (250 g) butter
1 cup (176 g) milk chocolate chips
3 cups (720 g) icing sugar
3/4 cup (180 g) cocoa powder
1/2 cup (120 ml) milk
- Microwave your chips for about 30 seconds at a time until they are just melted and stir after each session to get all of them melted. Try to make sure you get all the chips melted so they don’t form unnecessary clumps.
- Cream the butter and then add the cocoa and icing sugar blending it all well.
- Add the melted chocolate quickly blending it and then adding the milk. The mixture will suddenly become dry if you take too long between adding the chocolate and the milk.
