The Gluten-Free Newsy Food Tasting Panel

My ENTIRE family is gluten free.

And.

We all have ENTIRELY different tastes.

I decided.

My family can be my food tasting panel!

Thus, in my future blog posts I will be featuring comments and reviews from the different members of my family (or as like to refer to them my.... “entourage”).

Below is a description of each panel member (or family member) to help give you an idea of their background and food preferences.

The first person on my food tasting panel is the...
Hyper-allergenic Carnivore (or for short the H.A.C.): His food preference is for any type of meat or sugary substance that he can eat without getting a stomach ache. He likes his food spicy and hot and is an avid eater of sausages. (Salad generally makes him frown). His food allergies include: Gluten, soy, lactose and corn. At the moment however he is also not eating any grains (that includes rice) and sugar. If you want the opinion of someone who’s options are limited…then listen to him.

Next I have...
Picky Patrice: Her flavor profile includes quinoa salads, seafood (particularly scallops), Indian and Thai curries, thousand island dressing, and Americanos with almond milk in place of cream. She likes healthy food in any shape or form. Her standards however are precariously high. Sub-standards do not cut it. Food must be piping hot and properly prepared in order to please her.

Another finicky eater is...
Mermaid Critic: She is known for her preference for food from the past. When I say “food from the past” I mean the food she used to eat before she became gluten-free. Her gluten filled history is a source for much chagrin. She does not sugar coat her opinions, so beware. I call her the “Mermaid Critic” because of her love of seafood. Her tastes are very broad but above all she loves seafood. However, she is not prone to liking food merely for its health benefits so do not expect her to jump for joy over a salad.

As well there is the critic with a duo personality, like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde! He has his unhealthy meat-loving side “Pizza Pete” and his health obsessed side that can’t get enough raw nuts and protein bars “Healthy Harry.”

Lastly is....
J’aime Fromage: Thus named for her love of cheese. It is interesting however, because she does not like any type of cheese {no indeed} only medium cheddar cheese. Her passion for food is ignited by any dish that heavily incorporates cheese, pasta and bread. She is definitely not the healthiest diner on the block (nor the most adventurous). She likes to stay away from spicy foods and anything new and exotic is out of the question.

And of course there is me-The G.F. Newsy. What do I like? I would consider myself a blend of all the different qualities described above. I love cheese, some curries and spicy dishes (but not too spicy). I enjoy keeping myself healthy, but I also love to splurge on outrageously delicious desserts.

There you have it. The Gluten Free Newsy's Food Panel.
FUNNY FOOD PHOTO!

Mongolie Grill- in Whistler, Canada

The Mongolie Grill is an upbeat contemporary restaurant in Whistler, Canada that offers gluten-free options. This restraurant has become a classic for me and my family. By classic, I mean that every single time we go to Whistler, Canada we eat at the Mongolie Grill. There was one time that we didn't eat there....that's because they were closed.

Their gluten-free friendly menu makes it the ideal place to eat out. The food service is unique in that it operates like a buffet. Each  diner picks a bowl, large or small, to fill with food. You go through a sort of buffet that has a wide selection of raw vegetables, noodles and meats. You can take as much or as little as you want. I especially love the Mongoli Grill because I don't have to share. I can get my own bowl, and fill it with what I want, topped with the sauce I like, and get as much food as I'm hungry for. In a regular restaruant, if I was especially hungry, I would have to beg for scraps from my siblings plates. Usually I get a couple of fries that way, sometimes carrot sticks, maybe even a piece of half-bitten chicken.

The Mongoli Grill offers gluten-free rice noodles and a wide selection of gluten free meats. There is pork, chicken, scallops, shrimp, salmon, and even some spicy Italian sausage. Be sure to check the labels however, as some of the meats are marinated in sauces that are NOT gluten free.  Once you have completed your personalized entrée, take your bowl over to the sauce station. Clearly labeled signs indicate which sauces are gluten-free, wheat-free and vegan. 

 You can mix and match the sauces or stay with one or two classics. I like to top my bowl of shrimp, noodles, and cashews with a tangy sweet chili sauce. Once you are done making your selection, you bring your bowl to the grill. The food prices are by weight. It allows you some flexibility to get less or more food, depending on the size of your appetite. Tell the chef you are gluten-free and they will sanitize the grill for you before they grill your meal. Wait for your meal to cook and watch the chefs flip their spatulas in the air as they cook your meal to just the right temperature. While you are waiting you can also take a look at the “Wall of Fame.” The “Wall of Fame” consists of a list of the customers who ordered and ate the largest amounts of food. The most food ever eaten was  5000 grams. That is either a testimony to Mongolie Grill’s delicious food, or evidence of the fact that the person was starving.
~Once your food is cooked, you can head back to your table to enjoy your food. Complimentary brown or white rice is served with your meal along with the option of miso soup.
 The atmosphere of the restaurant is contemporary and upbeat-yet still relaxing. The large windows look down onto the square below and afford a perfect opportunity for people watching. 
IMPORTANT: Customers who order before 4:00 p.m. get a 20% discount. And diners who choose to eat vegetarian AFTER 4:00 also get a 20% discount. 
Thank you Mongoli Grill for offering gluten-free options!

Fabulous Crackers ~ Gluten Free Desert

Fabulous Crackers are a magical combination of peanut brittle, caramel, cookies, butterscotch and chocolate!

First you steal all of your child's candy.
Then you lock yourself into your kitchen and turn on the stove.
Melt butter and sugar together until you have a rich caramel sauce.
Spread sauce over gluten free crackers.
Bake in Oven.
Take out.
Chop up candy.
Place candy on crackers.
Place in oven.
Melt.
Take out and Refrigerate.
EAT AND EAT UNTIL YOU ARE GORGED WITH DELICIOUSNESS!
Here is the *ahem* real recipe:

Bob's Fabulous Crackers 
1 recipe of Gluten Free Crackers (recipe below)
2 sticks of Butter
1 cup Brown sugar
Lots of chocolate chips, peanut butter chips, butterscotch chips, white chocolate, and any candy bar you can get your hands on crushed into bite sized pieces.

Butter a large cookie sheet and arrange crackers on it so they are packed tightly together. Melt butter and brown sugar on medium heat until golden and syrupy. Spread this caramel sauce over the crackers and put crackers in the oven at 350 degrees for 4 min. Take out after the caramel begins to bubble. (This step allows the caramel to seep into the crackers) Next sprinkle a liberal amount of chocolate chips and chopped candy bars over the top. Put back in oven for another 3-4 min. Take out of the oven and squish the chocolate/candy layer with a spoon. Freeze for 15 min and then eat.

Gluten Free Crackers:
Note: These crackers are best eaten within the first two days of making them.
2 cups Key Gluten Free Flour (recipe below)
1 tbls. baking powder
1tsp. salt
1/3 cup butter
2/3 cup almond milk (or other milk of preference)
Mix together dry ingredients and then cut in butter with a fork. The butter should be in pea sized pieces and evenly distributed throughout the flour mixture. Next add milk gradually, stirring until it is completely incorporated in the flour. Lastly roll out as thinly as possible on parchment paper and bake for 8-12 min. at 450 degrees Farenheit until crispy.

Key Gluten Free Flour
2 cups of Brown Rice Flour
2/3 cup Tapioca starch
1/3 cup Potato starch
1tsp. xantham gum

Gluten Free in the Whole Foods Stores

Gluten Free food is most easily found in health food stores. There is one store in particular I shall be reviewing today it is called....WHOLE FOODS!

Whole Foods has its own special brand of gluten free goodies. 


Their cookies and pies are still extremely delicious and sugary :) The Whole Foods brand of GF baked goods include cherry pies, molasses cookies, cupcakes, and biscuits...to name a few. Personally I highly recommend their molasses cookies along with their cherry pie. (Lovin' it!)
 Note: The Whole Foods Gluten Free Bakery actually has a testing lab AT their bakery. Samples of each finished product are tested for gluten.

Now the cookies and desserts are simply smashing but what about lunch and dinner? Each Whole Foods store differs slightly but on a whole (ha ha pun!) all their store locations have both a salad and a hot deli bar. Naturally the moment I hear Hot Deli Bar, images of pizzas, sandwiches, pastas, noodles, and chicken roast enter my mind. Whole Foods is a bit of a disappointment in this catagory however. In all the store locations I've visited, (mainly in the Seattle area) Whole Foods gluten free deli options simply were not up to par. In some store locations they serve gluten free pizza and paninis. (Paninis are fresh grilled sandwiches). I wouldn't put all your eggs in one basket however. Oftentimes Whole Foods is out of their gluten free pizzas, or they simply are not on the menu for the day. Whenever this happens to me I feel like boycotting Whole Foods. Of course I come running back as soon as their gluten free pizza is back in stock. I give their GF pizza four stars.
   Another factor to consider when visiting whole foods is the customer service. My family has found that in all the stores we've visited (several in Seattle and another in Maui) the deli customer service folks were sub-par on their knowledge of gluten free foods. They were not well informed of how to avoid cross contamination. And they did not always know whether or not their deli items were gluten free.

Rest assured however, that whichever Whole Foods store you choose to visit, at the very least there will be a large salad bar to eat from.
Check out their website to see if there is a Whole Foods Store near you.
http://www.wholefoodsmarket.com/

Gluten Free Cream Puff Recipe with Lactose Free Pastry Cream

Do you want to know a secret?
I love cream puffs. 
Do you want to hear a story?
Once upon a time there was a group of children who had a grand old time acting in a play. They had so much fun together but all that acting made them hungry. To ward of the hunger the nice Moms and Dads of these kids would bring snacks at intermission. All the kids loved snacks. Who doesn't? All the children loved it best when the parents brought cream puffs. All the kids except for one little girl. As the other children gobbled their cream puffs away in glorious bliss, this little girl watched the others with woeful eyes. Her heart nearly broke as she watched bite after bite of that beautiful dessert disappear down the other children's throats. She couldn't eat those cream puffs because she had food allergies to gluten and lactose. She didn't give up though. As she watched the other children eat those cream puffs she dreamed of the day when she would find and eat her own gluten free, lactose free cream puffs.
One day, years later, she found a recipe, tweaked it a little and voila...she had her cream puffs. I have this recipe for gluten free cream puffs posted below. These Cream Puffs are the truest definition of the word Fabulous. I filled them with pastry cream which is a type of pudding. You can also fill them with whipped cream, ice cream, or coconut cream if you choose.
 Special note I had to wash about 8 dishes by hand and 8 utensils in the dishwasher.(Just in case you care about how many dishes you have to clean)

Cream Puff Paste Recipe (makes approx. 12 largish cream puffs)
1/2 cup Water
4 T. Butter (or butter substitute)
1/2 T. Sugar
1/2 Cup SIFTED Key GF flour (recipe at bottom of blog)
3 Eggs (depending on how big your eggs are maybe 3)
1/2 tsp. vanilla

Preheat open to 400 degrees Farenheit. Put parchment paper on a pan.
Bring 3 eggs to room temperature. Beat the eggs lightly and set aside.
Boil water, butter, and sugar in a small saucepan. When the butter melts stir in the flour using a WOODEN spoon. Stir mixture over MEDIUM HEAT until the paste is oily and there is a crust on the bottom of the pot. Remove from heat.
This is what it should look like.

Now using the wooden spoon add in the eggs a little at a time. I added the eggs in increments of six, putting about 2 T. of egg into the mixture at each interval. Blend the eggs EXTRMELY well! If you don't completely mix the eggs in the mixture you could ruin the entire recipe! After you have added approxomitaely 2 1/2 eggs check the mixture. It should look something like this.

Cut a pastry bag to a diamater of about 4 cm. Spoon the paste into pastry bag and pipe onto prepared cookie sheets to about this size.

 The paste might be slightly runny, but do not worry. The paste will rise and rise and rise as it bakes like little bubbles in a lake except the cream puffs are in the oven not a lake. Anyways my point is that the cream puffs will literally PUFF UP. That is why they are called cream puffs. Bake for 22-28 min. The cream puffs should be golden and sound hollow when tapped. (Tap them gently or they will collapse). Be patient when your cream puffs are baking, if you open the oven door too soon your cream puffs could collapse.
 Drizzle your cream puffs with melted chocolate to make them look beautiful. Fill them with either whipped cream, whipped coconut cream, or ice cream. I filled my cream puffs with almond milk based pastry cream (aka vanilla pudding) The recipe is below.

Pastry Cream Recipe
3 egg yolks (room temperature)
2 Cups Lactose Free Milk (or Half n Half) or Almond Milk
1/2 cup sugar divided
5 T. Potato Starch
3 T. butter
1/2 tsp. vanilla

Tips: Make sure you don't have any egg whites mixed in with your egg yolks. The egg whites cook faster and will create lumps in your pudding.

Whisk eggs, 1/2 cup of milk, 1/4 cup of sugar and potato starch together in a medium sized steel bowl. (or any bowl just so its not plastic)
 Put  1 1/2 cups of milk in a saucepan along with 1/4 cup of sugar. Bring this to a boil over medium heat.
Next add about 1/3 of the heated milk and sugar into your egg mixture. Whisk constantly and briskly to combine. Now add the egg mixture to what is left of the milk mixture and set back on heat. Whisk briskly until the mixture thickens. Turn off heat and mix in the butter and vanilla. Allow your pastry cream to cool in the fridge before attempting to use in a recipe. 

Key Gluten Free Flour Recipe
2 cups Brown Rice Flour
2/3 cup Tapioca Flour
1/3 cup Potato Starch

Top Five Gluten Free Brands

 I have made a list. (Yipee!) of what I believe to be the top five gluten free brands overall.
I am not pretentious enough to act like I actually know what the top five gluten free brands are. But based on the gluten free food I've tasted over the years these brands have delivered delicious tasting products the most consistently.  If you don't believe me feel free to try them out yourselves. Each brand has their strengths and weaknesses. I have listed the brands in no particular order.

1. Glutino (They make wonderful cookies. Also their crackers are the best GF crackers I've ever tasted. Some of their products contain soy and corn however, which is problem for some folks.)

2. Pamela's (They have a terrific pancake flour blend. I also love their cake mixes.)

3. Gluten Free Pantry (Their mixes taste fantastic! Unfortunately they use lots of potato, corn, and tapioca starches in their flour blends, this makes their foods rather unhealthy. Still they taste terrific!)

4. Canyon Bakehouse makes delicious soft gluten fee bread. Their bread uses whole grains and is generally healthier than most GF breads out there. If you can find this bread near you I definitely recommend buying it.

5.Udi's bread is also great. Their bread makes fabulous toast. It is not as soft as Canyon Bakehouse's bread but it is still quite tasty. And while Udi's bread is not as nutritious as Canyon Bakehouse's bread, it really does taste good.

Dairy Free/Gluten Free New England Clam Chowder

        I'm sitting in the restaurant with my family gazing at the menu. My foodie heart sinks like the Titanic, as I realize the only thing I can have is a salad. I'm surrounded by beach decorations; driftwood, buoys, through the window I can see waves crashing against the sand. The perfect meal for this setting would be a bowl of clam chowder with saltine crackers. But no, cut out the crackers (I'm gluten free) and the clam chowder is also out of the question. The rich creamy soup is filled with lactose (I shudder at the word as I'm also lactose intolerant).
Has this ever happened to you? Well I'm glad to say I've finally found a delicious solution for my little dilemma. What do we do when the restaurants turn their back on us? We turn our backs on them and make the food ourselves!
Trust me folks this clam chowder is absolutely up to snuff. I originally got the recipe from foodnetwork.com  (great website!) and adapted it to make it free of lactose, dairy and gluten. If you think this recipe will disappoint you, it won't. A couple of notes before you begin.


1. Don't overcook your soup or the clams will give your soup a grayish tint. Just follow the recipe and you'll be fine.

2. The half n half gives the soup a more traditional cream color. The Almond milk on the other hand will make your soup gray tinted.
(I tried both milks and loved both results. The almond milk is definitely healthier, but the half n half looks prettier.)

3. Lastly you never want to rush yourself the first time you've tried a recipe. If this is your first time making clam chowder take your time and be thorough. (I have tried rushing recipes I've never tried before and believe me it does not work out.)

Ingredients

2 tablespoons unsalted butter (or butter substitute if your dairy free)
1 medium onion, finely diced
2 celery stalks (reserve tender leaves) trimmed, quartered lengthwise, then sliced into 1/4-inch pieces
3 tablespoons Key Gluten Free Flour (or other all purpose gluten free flour)
2 cups chicken or vegetable stock
2 (10-ounce) cans chopped clams in juice
1 cup Almond Milk or Lactose Free Half an Half
2 bay leaves
1 pound potatoes, cut into 1/2- inch cubes
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
(Optional) Fry up some bacon and add as garnish.

Key Gluten Free Flour
2 cups Brown Rice Flour
2/3 cup Tapioca Flour
1/3 cup Potato Starch

Directions

Heat the butter in a large pot over medium-high heat. Add the onion and celery and saute until softened, mixing often. Stir in the flour to distribute evenly. Add the stock, juice from 2 cans of chopped clams (reserve clams), milk, bay leaves, and potatoes and stir to combine. Bring to a simmer, stirring consistently (the mixture will thicken), then reduce the heat to medium-low and cook 20 minutes, stirring often, until the potatoes are nice and tender. Then add clams and season to taste with salt and pepper, cook until clams are just firm, another 2 minutes.