More Amy's pizza -- GFCF spinach

Ok -- here's another Amy's review. And, it's another pizza. I'm very impressed with the taste of Amy's Kitchen pizzas so far. This time, we tried the Rice Crust Spinach Pizza. This is a whole frozen pizza, perfect for two to share for a meal, or four kids at snack time. Not too spinachy. Not too gluten-free-ey and again, very good soy cheese flavor. Like the last pizza, this has soy. So, obviously, if you're avoiding so, this isn't for you. And, again, with the rice crust, anyone avoiding rice should stay away. Overall, this tastes like a real pizza. Very tasty. I'd recommend this. The pizza is GFCF, Vegan and Kosher. It contains soy and rice and also has some potato in it.

Amy's gluten-free, dairy-free pizza

Ok -- so this is the first in a handful of product reviews that I'll post. Amy's Kitchen has supplied a few items with no strings attached. If I offer a poor review, they likely won't do it again. I agreed to this because I thought it might help readers looking for good pre-made products to grab in the store.

The first item is called the "Single Serve Non-Dairy Rice Crust Cheeze Pizza."

The first bite of Amy's gluten-free, casein-free pizza surprised me because it lacked the cardboardy taste of soy cheese.

The folks at Amy's somehow found a fake, soy mozzarella that really passed my taste test. I forgot I was eating a GFCF pizza.

Pizza is a tough issue in GFCF land. First is replicating the crust, which is not easy using GF flours. Second is how to replace the cheese. The options aren't great. Some skip it altogether (I'm among those since I can't stand soy cheese). Others suffer through the bad taste of soy cheese.

Many GFCF folks also cannot handle soy, leaving them little option. For those people (my kids included), this product is not for you. There's definitely soy in here.

If you can handle the soy, this pizza offered a very nice experience.

I'm impressed with the cheese replacement and equally impressed with the simplicity of the rice flour crust and the taste of the crust. Many GF bread products smell GFy from store aisles away. This didn't. It was good.

This is a personal-sized pizza that would be great to split for a lunch or snack. It might not be enough for a dinner -- if you split it. I would hesitate to serve the entire pizza to my child because of the fat (28g) and carb content (46g).

My wife and I split this pizza for an evening snack and we both enjoyed it.

As for allergens, Amy's is great about listing ingredients on their products and offers a tremendous website that notes allergen issues. This item is listed as gluten-free, dairy and lactose free, vegan, corn-free and kosher.

Other highlights worth noting are that the product has no trans fat, no added MSG and no preservatives.

Other notes from the ingredient list:

- the flour used is rice and tapioca.

- tomato is used for the sauce.

- oils used are safflower, sunflower and olive.

- the crust contains yeast.

- potatoes are listed.

I would recommend this product. Very tasty.

Amy's Kitchen review coming

I'll be reviewing some GFCF foods from Amy's Kitchen in the next few days and I'll post my review for you to read. You might already be familiar with Amy's, but if not, the company makes quality vegetarian and organic foods. Many are GFCF and the company's website offers easy-to-use guides for allergens like soy.

A GFCF TVP burger

OK -- this recipe won't be for everyone, especially if you're avoiding soy. If you can eat soy, this would be an interesting experiment. I've tinkered with TVP lately -- that's textured vegetable protein. It's really dry chunks of soy that you can reconstitute with water quickly and make meat substitutes, like burgers, nuggets, chili, etc. I'm using it for myself -- trying to lose some weight. The TVP is high in protein and has some carbs. It's a good way to get protein food without the high cholesterol in regular beef. I posted this recently on the SparkPeople website -- a health site.

Basic TVP burger

Ingredients
1 cup dry TVP -- you can find this at a health store. It's inexpensive.
1/2 onion for 1/4 cup
Shredded carrot for 1/2 cup
Corn/tapioca starch 1/2 cup
Olive or canola oil 2 tbsp
1/2 cup fat free chicken broth
1/4 cup water
spices

Boil broth and water, add spices -- I use soul seasoning, pepper, salt. After boiling, pour over dry TVP. Sit 10 mins.
Add chopped onion, shredded carrot and starch. Stir together.
Heat half the oil in a pan on medium high. Mold a 1/2 cup of the mix into a burger shape and brown on each side -- two burgers at a time.

Number of Servings: 6

Nutritional Info
Fat: 4.5g
Carbohydrates: 20.6g
Calories:193.8
Protein: 16.2g

Patience

Thanks folks. The issues seem to be worked out. You still may find a missing photo here or there in the old posts. If so, feel free to let me know so I can fix them.

Technical issues

Sorry for the shabby look of the blog today. Something really went wrong with some graphics. I'll try to find time to correct it in the next day or two. You can still find the links to my recipes at the bottom of the blog -- they should be down the side. It's all there -- just looks goofy.

BK & GFCF

Following the theme of my last post, I thought I'd mention that we've had nothing but success at Burger King restaurants. I've now taken my kids to three different BKs, including one out of state. They all fry the same way and seem to have a uniform process that we can count on. To bring some of you up to date, you'll find in my Restaurant Guide that I found Burger King fries their potatoes aside from the other items so there's no risk of cross contact. They are gluten free. And, you can order a plain burger without the bun -- they put it in a little salad container for you. It's a great thing to know when you're on the run and need to stop somewhere for a quick bite to eat (not everyday though -- have you seen the calorie counts on the Whopper?) Anyway, we were visiting relatives out of town recently and stopped at a BK without problem. Just thought I'd mention it.