Gluten Free Mom

Gluten Free Cobb Salad and Honey Mustard Dressing

Spring in Seattle is beautiful. Seattle may be known for its evergreen trees but the beautiful blooms of spring – azaleas, rhododendron, cherry trees, dog woods, these are a heavenly site.

I love it when the gray fleece blanket of cloud cover that is our constant throughout the long winter lifts to reveal once again the glory of the sun - aahh the temperature has raised a few degrees from the winter norm of in the 40s to the spring kiss of 60 degrees, the sun has moved closer so that when it poops through the clouds you can feel its warmth on your skin, the moss starts to dry up, the wood pecker returns to send out its mating call from the metal liner of my chimney, and everything blooms!!  I know the rain will be back, but there is a promise of something new and brighter.

It makes me stop for a moment and gaze out my family room window.

This may be a sad metaphor for celiac disease, but it is similar to our recovery. After living in the grayness of feeling tired, the brain not quite functioning right, the stomach aches, we awoke to a new beginning. As we started to heal the sun started to shine in our lives again – new energy abounds, new discoveries are made.

Seeing our new "spring" we stopped to gaze at our lives for a moment and be thankful for our new beginning.

Okay, so much for the reflective moment – another thing that the new warmth brings me is a desire for a good salad. After spending our winter drinking hot chocolate and cozying up to comfort foods, I am ready to shed the fleece and have a light hearty healthy salad. The salads will be even better in a few months when we can pick the lettuce from our garden, but I can’t wait that long.

I remember when we first went gluten free there was a lot of talk about salad dressings and whether or not they contaminated gluten.  One of the main concerns was with vinegar.  We now know that balsamic, cider and wine vinegars are all safe.  The distillation process removes the gluten from the vinegar. The only exception to this would be Malt or a Barley Malt vinegar.

Another concern with salad dressings is that they may contain gluten as a thickener, although I honestly have not checked into this myself.  

Initially being overwhelmed by all of the changes required by our new diet, I went with our philosophy of it is easier, and the end result will taste better, if I just make it from scratch.  That is especially true with salad dressings. 

With a few simple ingredients on hand, you can whip up a salad dressing in five minutes.  And the taste  . . . even a very simple homemade dressing is leaps and bounds better than dressing out of the bottle.  Really, if you have not tried it, you will be shocked.  Often times after we have company over to our house for dinner, the one recipe they request when they leave is for the salad dressing!

Our favorite dressings change with the season - in summer when you can get fresh spinach and strawberries you will love the Strawberry Spinach Salad.  Since I cannot have dairy, I have come up with a simple dairy free replacement for Ranch dressing.  The Gluten Free Teens favorite dressing is the following Honey Mustard Dressing.  She adapted it from Red Robins dressing.  It is not necessarily low fat, but it taste great with chicken nuggets and is perfect on a Cobb Salad.

Cobb Salad with Honey Mustard Dressing

1 – 2 heads of romaine lettuce, washed and chopped

2 ounces tomatoes, chopped

1 avocado, chopped

3 strips of bacon, cooked and broken into pieces

2 – 3 hard boiled eggs, chopped

2 chicken breasts, cooked and diced (to save time try Hormel Natural Choice carved chicken breast)

2 ounces of your favorite shredded cheese (leave off for casein free)

2 tablespoons of chopped olives

Add altogether and toss with the following dressing before serving.

Honey Mustard Dressing

1 cup mayonnaise

3 T sugar

3 T honey

1 ½ T regular mustard

1 ½ T Grey Poupon Dijon Mustard

1 ½ T white vinegar

1 ½ T olive oil

Mix together with a wire whip or fork. Store in the refrigerator.

Gluten Free Bottled Salad Dressings:

Okay, you had to know I would not leave you hanging.  The Gluten Free in San Diego Group has put together an extensive list of GF salad dressings.  Remember, you should always double check yourself, but this list should get you started. 

Here is the link to the Gluten Free in San Diego Page - Gluten Free Salad Dressings  *** I tried five times to get this link to work and it keep coming back with an error message.  But if you click the link, then on the left of the web page there will be a search box.  Type in "salad dressings."  The page with the list of salad dressings was the second search result for me.  Sorry for the extra steps. 

Kauai Gluten Free

Greetings fellow gluten free friends.  Sorry for the absence, but from the title of this post you can probably guess where I have been.  The Blogging for Dummies book recommends that you post when you will be out of town, but the Weekend Chef was not too keen on my announcing to the world that we would be gone.  Although, I told him I'd be happy if someone would break in and clean my house!

So we have gone and come back, and the gluten free information that I have to share on Kauai will be relatively brief, mostly because we stayed at a condo and cooked most of our own meals. 

When we first went gluten free I mourned the fact that we would no longer be able to travel. We actually went camping about one week post diagnosis, and not knowing enough at the time, we starved by only eating grilled hamburger without the bun and yogurt and fruit.

Back  then, I could not comprehend how we would ever fly anywhere again with our restricted diet. I could not understand how God had given me this innate desire for travel while at the same time making it so hard.

Over time and with confidence, we realized we could travel again but that it would be easier to stay at condos instead of hotels. I have to admit that I also mourned for the luxuries of a hotel – I know I sound spoiled, but have you ever seen the hotels in Hawaii with their beautiful meandering pools and, better yet, pool side service, morning breakfast buffets . . .? To me, I served everyone at home so while on vacation I wanted to be served.

All of my past preferences being stated, I have fully converted at this point – we travel plenty and I have grown to prefer the convenience, space and savings offered by staying in a condo.

Yes, being gluten free requires planning ahead – you have to go on-line before you travel, seek out the places you can eat, and contact them before you go.

We also travel with a suitcase of our favorite gluten free pastas, bagels, muffins etc.

And, yes, I have to cook. But we go with easy meals and at least I am cooking in paradise. Moreover, the setting from the balcony on our condo in Kauai was quiet honestly more beautiful than any setting that a restaurant had to offer.

Lastly, when you are traveling with a family, a condo will give you twice the amount of space for the same dollars and you can save a bundle of money, I mean a bundle, by being able to prepare your own meals.

So what about Kauai gluten free??

Once again we felt blessed and taken care of, as our condo was within walking distance of the only gluten free bakery in the state of Hawaii.

Sweet Marie's is a dedicated gluten free bakery on Kauai. As the name implies, it is owned and operated by the most charming and sweet Marie. Marie is an east coast native (that is of the mainland US) who moved to Kauai almost 20 years ago. Being gluten free herself, she opened Sweet Maries just under two years ago. She bakes the most amazing muffins – our favorite was the Tropical muffin with toasted coconut and pineapple.  She also had to die for chocolate brownies. Even better, she will prepare gluten free meals for you during your stay on Kauai.

 

I emailed Marie before we left and we were able to stock up on muffins, cookies and brownies the first morning after our arrival. Of course, we went back later in the week for more! Marie is also very helpful with information about where to shop and dine on Kauai, and I feel like I have a new friend on the beautiful Island of Kauai.

At her recommendation, we ate our one meal out at Verde’s. It is set in a strip mall behind the Shell station in Kappa.  What was lacking in atmosphere was made up for in delicious Mexican food. This is authentic Mexican food, not your taco bell type, in huge portions. They were also very knowledgeable about all of the ingredients and cross-contamination. You can eat at the restaurant, or order carry out.

There are other places to eat out on Kauai, but we had the rest of our meals at the condo – getting ready to travel yourself? Here was our condo menu:

Breakfast – Sweet Marie muffins (so many muffins we do not need to eat any for a long time); eggs, yogurt, fruit, a box of Koala Crisp cereal

Lunch – (usually ate at the beach) salami, cheese slices, fruit, chips, quinoa salad, ham and cheese rolls ups (take a slice of ham and roll it around a mozzarella cheese stick)

Dinner – quesadillas with Food for Life brown rice tortillas that I packed; pork chops, Lundberg farm risotto and veggies; Bi-aglut spaghetti with some bruschetta bread from Bavarian Mills; grilled lemon chicken with Bi-aglut noodles and a salad; Pizza (Kinninnick now sells mini square pizzas that were perfect for traveling); Cobb salad and hot dogs for the kids

What I brought along – Food for Life tortillas, bread, Kinninnick bagels and pizza crusts, Bi-aglut pasta, Lundberg Farms risotto, bruschetta from Bavarian Mills, quinoa, tamari soy sauce

Grocery list when we arrived – olive oil, cheese, salsa and chips, pork chops, chicken, hot dogs and hamburger meat for the spaghetti sauce, spaghetti sauce for spaghetti and for the pizza, butter, eggs, ham, cheese sticks, yogurt, avocados (for guacamole) onion, tomatoes, lettuce, two lemons, mustard and green onion, plus miscellaneous snacks like ice cream!

For more on traveling gluten free, check out my website at Gluten Free Mom.com.  So how do you travel gluten free?

The Best Bread Machines for Gluten Free Bread

My first bread machine was the Breadman - it worked fine with standard mixes like the Gluten Free Pantry Favorite Sandwich Bread Mix, but because all of the cycles on it are automatically programmed (in other words, you cannot set the rise and knead cycles yourself), it did not work well with some standard mixes such as those by 'Cause Your Special and other recipes that I wanted to try.

When shopping for a gluten free bread machine, you want one with a programmable cycle, so that just a knead and rise cycle can be selected or one that features a gluten free cycle.  Breadman, Cuisinart and Zojirushi all sell bread machines wiht these features.  

I recommend the Zojirushi BB-CEC20 Home Bakery Supreme 2-Pound-Loaf Breadmaker,  

 

It has a programmable cycle to set for gluten free bread.  In fact, BreadInfo.com test the Zojirushi BB-CEC20 by preparing several types of bread in it. They say it does a good job making white bread and bread dough, but they're particularly impressed with its ability to produce "remarkably high-quality" gluten-free bread. 

 

Buying the right bread machine from the beginning will save you time and agony and the expense of buying a second machine, but this is just the start.  For a detailed guide to making gluten free bread in a bread machine, I recommend Annalise G. Roberts book Gluten-Free Baking Classics for the Bread Machine.  It has everything from great recipes, specific directions on how to set your bread machine and tips for when things just don't go right (and they will not go right at times, it is almost guaranteed so use that bread for bread crumbs!). 

I'd love to share Annalise's recipe with you, but I think she might prefer it if you buy the book!  I'd share one of my own, but have not developed one yet, and in all honesty Annalise has spent much more time perfecting bread recipes than I have, so I am sticking with hers for now. 

We have slowly but surely moved away from mixes, but we still like the Toro White Bread Mix and the Gluten Free Pantry Favorite Sandwich Bread Mix (although this one is moving down on our list of favorites).  You can purchase both of these from  .

We also like the "Cause your Special Home style White Bread Mix.

What are your favorites?

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