If you’ve ever bought a loaf of gluten free bread, you know how dry and dense they tend to be. They are so bad that I pretty much just gave up bread. GF bread just does not compare. I didn’t/don’t really miss bread at all, but it’s something I do like to have around for “emergencies”– those times when I realize that I.HAVE.TO.EAT.RIGHT.NOW! Put a little nut butter on there, maybe some jam and you’ve got a well-rounded snack. Besides that, Amanda likes it too (her fave is sunflower seed butter and jam).

A GF friend gave me her bread recipe (ingredient list, actually, as there were no instructions since she makes hers in a bread machine) and it sounded great. The only problem is that it was not vegan. At all. So, I’ve made some subs, figured out the instructions and made a really good loaf of bread on my first attempt. That never happens. I’m going to start looking around for a cheap bread machine to make this in. I think it will be even easier and just as good. If you’ve already got a bread machine, go ahead and use this recipe in it and let me know how it turns out (put the ingredients in according to the manufacturers recommendation for your bread machine).

Gluten Free Vegan Sandwich Bread
(yes, it’s really good)

Makes 1 glorious loaf

Dry Ingredients

2 1/3 cups brown rice flour
1/2 cup sorghum flour
1/3 cup potato starch
1/3 cup cornstarch
1/3 cup teff flour
2 tsp salt
4 1/2 tsp xanthan gum (for a gum free version, you could try subbing 1 TB agar powder)

Wet Ingredients

1 1/2 cups warm water
1/3 cup maple syrup
1 packet (2 1/4 tsp) active dry yeast
2 TB ground flax mixed with 6 TB warm water
1/4 cup Earth Balance, melted (or olive oil)

Directions

1. Measure dry ingredients into a large bowl. Whisk to combine. Set aside.
2. In a small bowl or large measuring cup, combine the 1 1/2 cups water, maple syrup and yeast. Allow to sit for a few minutes for the yeast to proof.
3. In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, mix together the ground flax and 6 TB water. Add the Earth Balance (or oil). When the yeast has proofed, add the water, syrup, yeast mixture to the flax and oil mixture. Mix a few times to combine the wet ingredients.
4. Add the dry ingredients to the wet and turn the mixer on for several minutes. The dough will be very sticky once mixed.

5. Transfer the dough to a large, greased bowl. Cover with a clean towel and set in a warm place. Allow to rise 2 hours or until the dough has doubled in size. It will sort of resemble a head of cauliflower.

6. Preheat the oven to 425 degrees.
7. Grease up your hands and transfer the risen dough to a greased loaf pan. Allow to rise 30 minutes while the oven gets nice and toasty.

8. Bake for 30-45 minutes until golden brown on the top. The bread will sound hollow when you thump it. If you stick an instant read thermometer in the center, the internal temperature will be about 160 degrees. Remove from oven and allow to cool.
9. Let it cool some more.
10. Seriously, don’t try to cut it if it’s warm. Let it cool.
11. After the bread has cooled for about an hour, dump it out of the pan and slice. If it still feels warm to the touch, you might want to let it cool some more. If you cut into it while still warm, it will be gooey and mushy.

12. Store any leftover slices in an airtight container at room temperature. It will probably only last a 2-3 days (at the most). If you can’t eat it that fast, stick it in the freezer.

I’ve struggled to make tasty pancakes ever since going gluten free several months ago. I’ve tried several recipes, but always found mixes to be better than my homemade ones. I don’t like to make two versions of one food– for example, I’m not about to make 1 batch of wheat-based pancakes and 1 batch of GF pancakes. Instead, I’ve been trying to find a GF version of that food that we all can agree is good (a good example is the cookies we made earlier– they taste exactly like wheat-based chocolate chip cookies; Emma had no idea they were any different).

So I’ve had extremely bad luck with GF pancakes. That is until I tried this recipe here. It’s just as simple as making it from a mix (hello– only 3 GF flours involved here!) and they turned out wonderful. Time saving tip: if you’re whipping these up for a Sunday morning breakfast, prep several ziploc bags or mason jars with your dry ingredients all at once. This way you’ve got all the dry ingredients already measured out (like a DIY pancake mix) and all you have to do the next time you want to make pancakes is add the wet ingredients. Tip #2: what an excellent gift or favor idea!

One itty bitty change I made to the recipe is that I added 1/4 tsp salt. Since I made these plain (not tiramisu like in the original recipe), they needed that wee bit of salt. So there you have it… the easiest, tastiest, homemade gluten free, vegan pancake recipe ever! While following the link to the recipe, spend a little time poking around the pure2raw blog. I follow it and enjoy it quite a bit. I’ve also tried a few of their recipes that I really liked but never did get around to blogging about here.



One problem I had with these guys is that they weren’t very fluffy. I’m not sure what I did wrong (they looked like they would be super fluffy), but I will try adding a full tablespoon of baking powder next time instead of just the 2 tsp called for in the recipe. 1 TB = 3 tsp. We’ll see if that fixes things. I’ve made these pancakes twice for the family and this recipe is our new go-to for pancakes.

A stupid stomach bug got in the way of my blogging this week. We all got it within a day of each other, so at least we weren’t all sick at the same time. Still, it was no fun and we haven’t really eaten much but my appetite is slowly returning and today Emma and I made these cookies. They are vegan, gluten free, and really, really simple to make. The best part is that they only require 2 flours!

So this recipe actually comes from the back of the Let’s Do… Organic! brand of coconut flour. Since I had to change it up to make it vegan, I don’t think they’ll mind my sharing the recipe with you. First, I’ll take a minute to tell you that this is the only brand of coconut flour that I use. Not only is it organic, but it’s also the least expensive coconut flour on the shelf at Whole Foods. If you’ve ever made gluten free goodies, you know how spendy all those flours are and how quickly that tab adds up when you need to buy more than one. I like this brand a lot.

Gluten Free, Vegan, and Very Easy Chocolate Chip Cookies
(That You Won’t Even Know Are Gluten Free)

1/2 cup Earth Balance
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 TB flax mixed with 3 TB water (or Ener-G to replace 1 egg)
1 1/2 tsp vanilla
3/4 cup + 2 TB brown rice flour
1/4 cup Let’s Do… Organic brand coconut flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt (my addition; the original recipe does not call for this, but you need it)
1 cup chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

In the bowl of an electric or stand mixer, cream together the Earth Balance and both sugars. Add the flax egg and vanilla. Beat well. In a separate bowl, combine the dry ingredients. Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and mix for a minute to incorporate. Stir in the chocolate chips. Drop by the teaspoonful onto an ungreased cookie sheet. Bake for 8-12 minutes until the sides and top are golden brown. Remove from oven and cool on a cooling rack. Dive in!

This would be another menu item if I owned a cafe. This is really easy to make and one of my favorites. It’s also only about 350 calories!

The trick is the tofu– you have to buy the firmest you can find that’s not packed in water. It comes in the vacuum sealed packs and has a much better texture than the kind packed in water. It also doesn’t require and pressing. Take two slices off the brick of tofu and put in a preheated skillet over medium heat. Brown on both sides. Reduce heat to low and add enough BBQ sauce to generously coat both sides of the tofu. Cook for another few minutes, then slice.



While that’s cooking, prepare your bread/tortilla/whatever. Warm it a little, spread a little Vegenaise and BBQ sauce on it, top with tofu slices, and add any produce you like. I used baby spinach here, but have used salad mix, cabbage, cole slaw mix, and broccoli slaw in the past. Anything works.

I bought a bag of onions a few weeks ago and it had this recipe on the back for a caramelized onion and mango quesadilla. At first I thought it sounded really weird, but I warmed up to the idea as I scanned the list of ingredients: mango, caramelized onions, pepper jack cheese…

And I had read somewhere recently that Daiya had a new flavor out (pepper jack) and I’ve been dying to try it. My WF has been out of it the last few times I’ve been in until today. Even better, mangoes were on sale for $1 each. It was meant to be.

To make this, you must first caramelize the onions. You then peel and chop your mango and heat a skillet to make the quesadilla in. Scatter some pepper jack Daiya on half the tortilla (I used brown rice), top with onions and mango, then add a little bit more cheese. As with every vegan cheese I’ve tried, Daiya takes a little bit longer to melt than cow cheese. You may even need to turn your stove to low (to keep the tortilla from burning) and put a lid on your skillet to circulate the heat. It’s worth the wait– I inhaled this in about 1 minute.

A note about the Daiya pepper jack: Hands down, without a doubt, this is my favorite Daiya and the only one I will buy from now on, even for pizzas. It’s awesome!!!!!!! I can’t wait to make a spicy mac & cheese with it.

I was sent some samples a while back of Dr. McDougall’s Asian Entrees. These are vegan, gluten free, non-GMO and relatively healthy for a meal that comes in a Cup-O-Noodle package. All were around 300 calories.

This is how the box arrived to me. Isn't it packaged so cute?!

I received 3 different flavors to try: Pad Thai Noodle, Lentil Curry Pilaf, and Masala Lentil Pilaf. As I said above, the packaging is exactly like Cup-O-Noodle with a separate flavor packet inside. All can be “cooked” by adding cold water and microwaving or by adding boiling water and allowing it to sit for several minutes.



The first flavor I tried was the Pad Thai Noodle. It’s made with rice noodles, freeze dried vegetables and some freeze dried tofu. I enjoyed this one very much, although it didn’t taste very much like Pad Thai to me. Instead of being a peanutty flavor (which is what I associate with Pad Thai), it was more like spicy tomato. Good, yes, but if you’re expecting a Pad Thai peanutty flavor, you might be in for a surprise.



Next up, I tried the Masala Lentil Pilaf, which was my favorite of the three. There was spice from the masala spice packet (spicy, but not hot), sweetness from the raisins, and the lentil/rice combo was more filling than just the rice noodles from the Pad Thai.



And for dinner last night, I gobbled up the Lentil Curry Pilaf. I was expecting it to be like the Masala one, but it wasn’t and so it was just ok. It was good and filling, but I preferred the flavor of the Masala to the flavor of the Curry.

These are so easy to make that they would be great for camping. If you’re a student, these are perfect for throwing into your backpack. Or if you just want to have something shelf-stable lurking in the cabinet for the times you don’t want to cook anything, these will definitely do the trick. I will for sure be buying the Masala flavor because I liked it so much (and will look for other flavors and McDougall’s products to try). Another great use for them is in your Emergency kits (hope you all have those in your house and cars!!). All you need is boiling water so you could really eat these anywhere you can boil water!

I’ve got a couple of winners to share. If you’re looking for delicious, gluten free, VEGAN cupcake recipes, you’ve hit the jackpot today. These are easy to make and really, really good. No weird gritty texture. No weird aftertaste. None of that nonsense. (For those who don’t eat/bake/experiment with GF stuff, it’s pretty near impossible to find a GF baked good or recipe that doesn’t have egg in it. Gluten free and eggs seem to go hand in hand. The fact that these are GF AND vegan is a real treat.)

Gluten free baking is pretty tricky. I’m still not very good at it, but I learn a little more every time I try out a new recipe. Trying to make a gluten free and vegan chocolate cake was really challenging for me. I tried no fewer than 10 recipes before finding this one, which was so easy to make (and only uses 1 GF flour) that I thought for sure it would be another fail for me. Not so.

I’m telling you– this recipe is a winner. Since it’s not my recipe, I can’t post it here, but you can follow this link to get it. Go now. I did make one small change and that was the addition of 1/8 tsp of xanthan gum. It’s a texture thing– it’ll make it just a tad more chewy and a little less crumby. You can totally leave it out and still get a great result.



And through more experimentation, I found this other little gem. Add some lemon extract to this GF vanilla cupcake recipe here and you’ve got yourself one lemony, delicious little cake. Again, not my recipe, but I’ve made several little tweaks to it which you’ll see in “Note #3″ after you follow the link. I also topped it with a lemon buttercream, which is nothing more than a vanilla buttercream with lemon extract added.

Although I haven’t tried it, I’m fairly certain you could add any extract to the batter to change up the flavor. Orange might be nice, or maybe some lemon and lavender. Or lemon cake with lavender frosting. Actually that sounds REALLY good– I just might have to give that a try next after I recover from my sugar hangover.

Stumped for what to make for breakfast, I realize that I haven’t made pancakes in a really long time. Amanda would probably love them, Emma will probably not touch them, but I figured I’d go for it anyway.

I had an opened package of Bob’s Red Mill (BRM from now on) Gluten Free Pancake Mix, but not enough to make a full recipe of pancakes. The recipe on the BRM package says:

1 1/2 cups BRM GF pancake mix
1 egg/egg substitute
3/4 cup milk
1 TB oil

After having made pancakes before following this recipe, I only had a cup of mix left. Why do they do that? They should make the package an even 3 cups so that you can make 2 batches, instead of making it 2 1/2. Typically when I make these pancakes, I use banana or applesauce as the egg substitute because the pancake batter itself is really quite bland. Seriously, these are no wheaty, fluffy, butter”milk” pancakes.

So I find myself with 1 cup of pancake mix, 1 1/2 really old bananas, and some leftover apple cobbler. Really, I’m SHOCKED that these actually turned out and they were really good.

Whacky Batter

To make these, mash 1 1/2 super ripe bananas, mix in 1/2 cup of coconut milk (or whatever milk you like), 1 TB of oil, 1 cup of BRM GF pancake mix, and 1/2 cup of leftover apple cobbler. If batter is too thin, add a little sorghum flour to thicken (maybe 1-2 TB). Pour onto hot griddle… blah, blah, blah… you know how to make pancakes, I’m sure.

Pile O' Pancakes

My Plate of Whacky Pancakes

Emma's Plate of Even Whackier Pancakes

And just as I suspected, Emma ate the fruit off hers but left the pancakes untouched, while Amanda ate the entire thing.

The other night, I wanted a salad, but didn’t want it with any of the dressings I had in the fridge and I was too lazy to make a vinaigrette. Since Amanda loves avocados so much, I almost always have those around so I thought I could mash it into a yummy, creamy dressing. This was the best salad I have ever eaten in my life and since I’ve been trying to shed a few pounds and have been eating my weight in salads lately, I needed a new spin to keep it interesting.

Creamy Avocado Salad Dressing
1 small avocado (these are sometimes sold as “pee wee avocados“)
Juice of 1 lime
A few dashes of Tabasco sauce (optional, I use more like 1/4 tsp)
Salt to taste

In the bottom of a large bowl, mash the avocado with the other ingredients. Toss in salad fixin’s and enjoy!

In my salad pictured above, I had some romaine in there, some baby lettuce mix, carrots, snap peas, green onions, grape tomatoes and about 1/2 cup of black beans. Alongside, I had some leftover oven roasted broccoli. Together with the avocado dressing, the entire meal was about 400 calories. How do I know how many calories this was? Well, from my calorie tracking app, of course! And just because I’m trying to lose weight doesn’t mean I avoid fat and fatty things like avocados. In fact, I eat at least half an avocado every day.

Have you guys used this? I’ve been using it for about the last 6 weeks and have lost about 6 pounds so far. I sort of fell off the wagon last week and am just now getting back to logging everything. For a free app, it’s really quite impressive. If you’re trying to keep track of what you’re eating for whatever reason (weight loss, weight gain, whatever), I highly recommend it.

I don’t really like broccoli all that much, but I. LOVE. THIS. BROCCOLI. Oven roasting it makes it cooked, yet still with a little bite. The charred areas get super flavorful. And you can top it with whatever spices or dried herbs you like. We eat a lot of broccoli over here, so I make a big batch of this every few days.

Oven Roasted Broccoli

Broccoli (I usually do 3-4 heads at a time)
Oil
Spices and dried herbs of choice

Preheat oven to 425 degrees. This is crucial– be sure to let it preheat 5-10 minutes. Prepare broccoli by washing it and cutting into florets. Arrange broccoli florets on sheet pan in a single layer. Drizzle or spray with oil of choice (anything works here, even coconut oil). Generously sprinkle with spices and dried herbs of choice. I always use salt and pepper and also sometimes also use garlic powder or Trader Joe’s 21 Seasoning Salute. That’s it! Once you sprinkle the stuff on, there’s no need to toss the broccoli around. Put into the preheated oven and allow to roast 7-8 minutes or until tender. Once it’s in the oven, don’t touch it, turn it, or flip it and avoid the urge to open your oven door all the time to check on it.

Sometimes I just use the salt and pepper only and then top with lemon zest and juice after it’s done cooking. When you pull it out of the oven and it’s still hot, zest a lemon over top of it, then squeeze the juice all over. It’s so good!