Coasting along

Hey -- I haven't posted much lately and I recently asked myself, "why?" The answer is that I've really been coasting along, making the foods that really have worked and don't take much time. It's a good thing. So I really haven't tried much new lately. I have made pizza a few times with my "polenta cheese" and GF pepperoni. The kids love it. Still working on how to best make the crust. I like a thin, firm crust rather than soft or thick. I'm still tinkering, but I'm at the point where I think making a bunch of mini personal pizza crusts rather than a sheet crust is the way to go. Any time I've made the mini pizzas, the crust has been perfect. It gets soft or soggy when I make the sheet. I'll keep trying and update you later. I'm very happy with the sauce I use and the toppings.

New GFCF pizza crust recipe

Note: This is an older recipe. I've refined my pizza crust recipe, which you can find by clicking here.

This is a revised pizza crust recipe, which my kids like much better. I do too.

I still base it on Noah's Bread.

For mini pizzas or a small pizza, use 1 recipe. For a larger pizza, double this recipe.

Ingredients:
1/4 cup brown rice or sorghum flour
1/4 cup corn meal
1/3 cup tapioca flour
2 tsp xanthan gum
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 tbsp oregano
1/2 tbsp garlic powder
1/3 cup oil
1/2 cup CF milk
1/3 cup water

Recipe
Preheat oven to 400 degrees
Mix all ingredients well. This will make a very liquidy batter, like a cake batter.
Grease your oven pan -- I use Spectrum shortening.

To make individual pizzas, put the batter in plastic bag, like a ziplock bag. Cut a corner and squeeze the batter out onto the pan. I make english muffin-sized circles and then take a wet spatula to even the batter out. Or, make a small pizza by dumping the batter onto your pan and use the wet spatula to spread it out.

Double the batter to make a larger pizza.

For mini pizzas or a small pizza, bake 10 mins and check. For a larger pizza, it will take about 15 mins, but possibly 20.

Once out of the oven, add your sauce and toppings. Then, bake another 5 mins or so.

This makes a thin, soft-crust pizza. I'll tell you later how to make a crispier crust.

Try my polenta cheese on this pizza -- dairy and soy free!

A GFCF offer, from me

Just a note that you'll soon notice a small ad -- for myself -- on this blog. I've been asked several times now how to convert recipes to GFCF or to develop GFCF meals that children will eat -- especially for kids with other food allergies and intolerances.

It's no problem -- I enjoy doing it. It just takes time and I've decided to offer it on a regular basis to those visiting my blog. The fees will be very affordable, but enough to cover the time it takes to do it. Payments would be accepted thru PayPal or check. I'll post those details later.

So, if you're interested, just email me, let me know what you're looking for and we can agree on a price before I start.

jim

Secret non-dairy & soyless cheese

I've been on an endless search for a way to make my kids a real pizza -- you know, something that looks and tastes like the real thing, or as close as possible. So, first, the problem was making a gluten-free crust. That took a while. Now, I've finally developed a crust recipe that's actually very good. It's a variation of Noah's Recipe.

Then, it was the sauce. That wasn't so hard. I use a very basic pizza sauce, based on Hunt's tomato paste, which is GF.

The toppings really aren't that difficult either. Choose any you want that you know is GF and CF. I buy a GF brand of pepperoni. It's perfect.

The problem, of course, is the cheese, especially if you can't eat soy, which is what most "fake" cheeses are made from. Even so, most soy cheese tastes horrible.

And in my kids' cases, the cheese doesn't have to taste great, it's more of the appearance of real cheese that's important to them. We just can't have something that tastes bad -- like the soy.

So, I've finally found a solution: polenta.

Yes, polenta, for those who don't know, is corn meal that's been boiled into a solid cakelike substance. It's often sold in tubes and some brands clearly are marked gluten-free. You also can make this at home fairly easily. (If you can't eat corn, don't worry, you can make polenta out of nearly any grain, like millet, for example, or teff).

So, I took the polenta and grated it, like I would cheese. Say, about a cup. Toss it into a bowl. Then, add 1 tsp olive oil. And, add 1/2 tsp sea salt. Stir. This is the cheese topping. The polenta will cook, but not melt. The oil keeps it from drying out. The salt adds some flavor.

Trust me, this works.

I'll post the entire pizza recipe -- crust, sauce and cheese -- later this week. For now, go find some polenta and experiment. I'll also share some other polenta recipes using different grains.

Spicy rice - a GFCF dish

Don't think I'm weird for posting this recipe. It's super easy, but if you read this blog, you know that I like super easy recipes. I've dubbed this "spicy rice" because that's what got my oldest to eat rice. My youngest can't eat rice -- food intolerance. But, I really wanted my oldest to try something other than her favorite potato dish -- Dutch Potatoes (really just steamed potatoes). But, she wouldn't eat the rice I'd make her. No brown rice. No white rice. I figured it was a no go.

One day about two weeks ago, I was in a bind. I was running late, didn't have time to cook, but had a bowl of leftover brown rice in the fridge. I made the following recipe in 5 mins and she ate it. What was missing (to her) -- the spice. She likes her foods spicy, both in appearance and taste. So, now we have "spicy rice."

Ingredients
------------
Brown or white rice, cooked
Oil -- I use canola. Olive would be fine.
Sea salt.
Black pepper
Or any other favorite spice -- paprika, chili powder, cumin, ground red pepper, oregano, etc.

In a stove top pan, heat oil for a minute, about 1 tbsp. Scoop out 2-3 cups of the pre-cooked rice and place in the pan. Use a utensil to separate the rice and mix it well with the oil. Add 1 tsp sea salt and a few dashes of the pepper or any other spice you think might work. My kids like all of them, so I'll mix it up day to day on their foods. Just heat this up, tossing it around a few times to make sure it's coated and the spice is mixed well.

You only have to heat this a few minutes. Then serve.

I buy long grain brown or white rice, the kids like white best and I know Lundberg sells this, because it's healthier. It's just raw. I make big batches in a rice cooker each week and the put it in the fridge. I use it all week long. We found an affordable rice cooker at a local store. Very handy. If you buy rice in bulk, like 10 lb., 25 lb. or 50 lb. bags, you save a ton of money.

I know rice is going up in price right now, and I'm watching those prices carefully. If it comes to the point that it's too expensive, I'll post some options that I've researched.

For now, enjoy this recipe.

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.