Bananafana-bo-bagel

So last week I decided to bake some banana scones and a loaf of sourdough Einkorn Walnut and Raisin Miche. At the same time. With my phone beside my work area. While answering texts and replying to Facebook comments about tasty recipes that would use up my excess supply of ripe bananas.

Needless to say, I was distracted a tee-weency bit.

But I didn't realize it till 4 hours into proofing the bread. It was not rising at all. I raised my head after peering down at the dense dough mound and looked directly at the covered bowl with the sourdough levain in it. "No way," I said to myself, but I knew it was true. Painfully, painfully true. I had never added it to the mix.

A cold chill ripped through me as I tried to retrace the steps of the recipe. "Oh, no!" my poor brain shrieked. "I must have used my sourdough starter instead of the levain! And it was all I have!"

Frantically, I started searching the internet for a solution to my crisis. Maybe I could convert the levain back to starter. I felt sick. As quickly as the fear had consumed me, my reasoning brain came back and whispered, "Why don't you check the refrigerator and see if your starter is there?"

I felt like slapping my forehead in desperation.  I took a deep breath.

I dropped my internet query and quietly searched the Inner Sanctum of Chaos, otherwise known as the interior of my refrigerator.

There it was. The starter. Just where I had put it the night before after I made the levain.

If someone had offered me a measuring cupful of whiskey at that moment, I'm quite sure I would have tried my best to gasp it down, so keenly did I feel the need of a balancing shock to my system.

Not surprisingly, no one appeared with the longed-for libation. And so I returned to the limp dough, plunged my hand in, snatched back a goodly clump, and glommed it into my mouth.

It was delicious and deeply, awesomely comforting. Only a dough eater would understand. A faint hope rose in my grieving breast.

I grabbed another clump and baked it for ten minutes on a cookie sheet. I removed it, drenched it in butter, and consumed it, steaming hot.

It reminded me of a cinnamon raisin bagel. I snatched my doughnut baking pans from the cabinet and started rolling segments of dough into the desired size. I was able to get nine "bagels" out of the forlorn loaf. No one would guess that they weren't bagels unless they picked one up. I tossed one of those rings on the scale: "Holy bagel, Batman!" It weighed in at 6.5 ounces!

Presently dear hubby came home and devoured one greedily, grunting, "good" as he chewed.

"Huzzah for the Wholy Heavyweight Champion of the Whirl!" (Don't worry if that doesn't make sense to you. It's just me entertaining myself.) I hung up my oven mitts and exited the ring, triumphant but utterly exhausted.

And after all that, I didn't like the banana scones.

The Gluten-Intolerant Family Member and Holiday Food Traditions

One of the hardest things about taking control of your own health is that it often requires that you eat much differently than the way most Americans eat.  It can be extremely isolating, especially when it comes to family traditions, gluten intolerant family members, and celebrating the holidays.

Sharing a meal together is one of the primary ways we celebrate community.  So I have favored ditching old family favorite foods and replacing them with something that everyone can eat and enjoy.

For example, my family, both nuclear and extended, always expected to have a Buttermilk Pound Cake at Thanksgiving and Christmas.  Unfortunately, it requires white flour to make it.  This ingredient has been stricken from our kitchen since we learned six years ago this month that Emma is allergic to it.  A couple of months later we learned that she had to strictly avoid corn and rice as well.

Now, the Lighter Than Air Chocolate Cake has replaced the Buttermilk Pound Cake as our go-to celebratory cake.  Everyone loves it, and it is completely flourless.

Just so you know, I have tried baking with white flour for other family members, but the stuff goes everywhere.  You open the container and scoop, and a cloud rises up and dissipates on countertops and appliances.   Trying to clean everything perfectly afterwards to prevent cross-contamination is time consuming and stressful.   And you are expending more precious energy cooking twice.  I finally decided it just was not worth it.  Family members who want to eat white flour have endless opportunities to do so when they are not at home, whereas Emma can eat at very few places away from home with peace of mind.

If there is one place where a person with food allergies should feel safe and supported, it is in their own kitchen.

Believe me, the support is incredibly important, because many folks think that gluten-intolerant people are just selfish troublemakers who want attention.  And they let you know it by their expressions.  The nay-sayers fail to realize that gluten-intolerant people would like nothing more than to be able to eat the white flour with no concern for the consequences!  Giving it up is hard, but being able to function normally on a day-to-day basis makes it worth it.

I believe that a lot of people who are gluten-intolerant don't even know it.  My neighbor down the road stopped in yesterday with his wife to tell me that he had found enormous relief for his interstitial cystitis since I recommended to him that he do a Whole 30 elimination diet.  He had struggled with it for years under the care of urologists, had undergone surgery seeking relief, and had to take early retirement because of it.  I gave him the original Whole 30 book and a companion recipe volume last month, and he told me yesterday, "I absolutely did not believe that this would work, but I was so desperate for pain relief that I started it the day you gave me the books."  He took out his phone and showed me his log of taking serious prescription pain medications and how over the course of the 30 days it diminished to none.  He also explained that his energy has returned.  He is able to work on building his house again, and is now going to drive to his daughter's house in San Antonio for Christmas, a trip he could not make prior to the Whole 30.  His wife is amazed at the change in him.  She is going to do a Whole 30 herself starting in January.

So I encourage you to adapt your celebratory foods to ones that everybody can enjoy together.  Make new traditions.   The family celebrating together is more important than the individual menu items.

Dreams Worth Keeping: Two Suckling Pigs, a Goose, and a Duck

"We need red solo cups, paper plates, napkins, a tablecloth, and a lot of lunch meat for sandwiches," my mom advised me shortly after learning that my sisters and some members of their families would be joining us for a five-day Christmas visit.  Some of them will be sleeping at Mom and Dad's house and some at ours, but Emma and I will be preparing both houses.

"And canned biscuits.  Lisa and her children like canned biscuits," she added, thinking hard.

My dad started telling me about how he wanted me to order hickory nuts and how delicious they are. By the next day he had been shopping for nuts online and discovered Black Walnuts coated in dark chocolate.  He asked me to order them.  His face would light up like a child's every time he mentioned them.  So far that has been two to three times a day.

"They're going to go pretty fast once everybody finds out how good they are,"  he confided to me, grinning happily.  "Make sure you order enough."

Where were my thoughts?

I began dreaming of pig roasted outdoors on a spit with all the menfolk gathered round in the heady smoke, talking and laughing and speculating on the doneness of the meat.

And I dreamed of succulent goose and duck.  I could see them each in a roasting rack in my oven, dripping juicy goodness into the pan.

And I dreamed of moving our dining room table into the living room in front of the fire and placing silver goblets of wine and heavy tankards of ale at each place, and...

I don't actually own any silver goblets or heavy tankards, but I imagined them just the same.

And purple cabbage and collard greens and sweet potatoes and cranberry salad.  And dogs under the table!  Flickering candlelight and ancient Christmas carols playing in the background with all my dear ones gathered round about.

Dear Baby Jesus in his manger at last.

O the giddiness, the tingling, the soaring anticipation of the Feast of Christmas!

I grew restless to begin.

So this morning Emma and I bundled up in sweaters, jackets, hats, and gloves and hurried to the farmer's market to arrange for the procurement of the desired delicacies.

First stop, the duck and goose booth.  We decided on a ten-pound goose and an eight-pound duck.  We put down a deposit and were instructed to return to the market early Christmas Eve morning to pick up the freshly-slaughtered birds.

Next we visited the pig man.  I've bought pork from him many times before but never a whole pig.  I arranged with him to pick up two suckling piggies--a 15 and a 16-pounder--at the market on Christmas Eve morning when I pick up the birds.  He said he would send me a picture of the lil porkers so I would know what to expect.  He promised to put a coin over each of their eyes because he feared I would be disturbed by their missing eyelids, which for some reason are removed during the butchering--surely a most creepy practice.

Maybe crispy-fried pig eyelids are a delicacy somewhere and they sell 'em separately to make more money!  At least they left the pigs' heads on.  I wouldn't want any headless pig.  That would ruin the whole dream for me.

Our business with the pig man completed, Emma and I sampled juicy sweet Satsumas at a booth across the way.  We bought ten, and we also bought a bag of Navel oranges from another vendor.  I plan to put some in everybody's stockings.  Then we found these delightful long and thin sausages that I thought would be great in the stockings too.  So we bought an assortment of those and added them to our bag.  We stopped at several other booths for individual little gifts.  Such great fun!

Unfortunately, we couldn't linger, as we had to hurry home to give Grandma and Grandpa lunch.   While I did that, Emma worked on decorating the rest of the gingerbread cookies she had baked for St. Nicholas Day.  Seeing her handiwork along with all the goodies we had brought home from the farmer's market made me think, "This is good.  This is very, very good."

I am looking forward to lighting the pink candle this Sunday and the fasting of the Ember Days next week.

And contemplating the fullness of time.

Come, thou long-expected Jesus!

Dumpling Daze

Grandma has been hankering for dumplings for several weeks now.  We wanted to make her some but weren't sure what recipe to use.  Grandma eats gluten-free.

Emma and I thought that the Urban Poser's tortilla recipe would give us a good starting place for strip dumpling experimentation.  It uses Otto's Cassava Flour which is naturally gluten and grain free.

Grandma nixed this idea, favoring biscuit-type dumplings made from a gluten-free mix that she had on hand.  It includes corn flour, which Emma is allergic to--thus the necessity of dual dumpling development.  Emma made the strip dumplings while I made the biscuit ones.

With both of us working in close proximity to the stove and Emma's kitten, Elsie, underfoot and sometimes climbing our legs while our hands were doughy, it got pretty interesting at times.

Finally Emma stuck Elsie in her apron.  We had a few moments of peace, for which we were grateful.

I cooked Grandma's dumplings in a separate pot of chicken broth to avoid cross-contamination.   They turned out well, and she scarfed them up.  Yay!  It's great to be able to satisfy someone's craving, especially when that someone is in a wheelchair and can no longer cook for herself.

The cassava flour ones were definitely not like the traditional Southern (white-flour) strip dumplings that I grew up eating in Chicken and Dumplings.  But they were still good, and we're looking forward to trying them again with the addition of some grain-free baking powder to make them a little fluffier.  And I think Emma said she will roll them out a little thicker as well.  The only thing we regretted with this first try was not having more homemade chicken bone broth on hand to make a bigger batch of soup.

One word of warning.  If you grew up nibbling dumpling dough while you made the dumplings like I did, do not try this with cassava flour.  It tastes gross.  Bleh!

Forget the Election and Celebrate Catholic Thanksgiving

From the movie "Babette's Feast"

Editor's Note: I got the idea and the historical background for this post from reading Dr. Marian Horvat's "The First Thanksgivings Were Catholic."

If you, like I, really detest the whole Puritan/Pilgrim party that is foisted on us every November, right when Catholics should be preparing for Advent and Christmas, your chance to fight back with a holiday that is truly meaningful is coming up: Saturday, April 30.  That's the day the second Thanksgiving was celebrated, in Texas, with Holy Mass and a great feast.  Even better, according to "The First Thanksgivings Were Catholic," after the Mass, the expedition leader, "Don Juan de Oñate, took formal possession of the new land, called New Mexico, in the name of the Heavenly Lord, God Almighty, and the earthly lord King Philip II."

Now that's more like it! 

May Catholic men rise up in the spirit of Don Juan de Oñate and renew the effort that Catholic missionaries began so valiantly long ago, establishing outposts of the True Faith in the midst of our  pagan land.  Why waste time worrying over which narcissist will be the next president of the United States?  It's just another distraction at this point.  Plus, should Catholics aspire to getting back to America's Masonic roots and its godless Constitution as "conservatives" propose?

No, we must build from a solid foundation; we must establish a Catholic order, replacing Lady Liberty with Our Lady of Guadalupe, and it is not going to happen with anyone who is "electable" in the present system.  

The first priority is establishing the Social Reign of Christ the King in our homes and in our communities.  That will provide the rich soil from which the seeds of good government may burst forth and flower.  Catholic mothers, with Rosary in hand, must form Catholic citizens.   And it can start with simple things like celebrating Catholic Thanksgiving on April 30 and again on September 8, the day on which we celebrate the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary in a month rich with Marian feasts, when the real first American Thanksgiving was celebrated in Florida by Spanish Catholics.

And by all means invite your non-Catholic friends.

I highly recommend watching Babette's Feast.  It seems the perfect artistic representation of the difference between celebrating Protestant Thanksgiving and Catholic Thanksgiving, and not only that, it is a truly beautiful movie that will uplift and inspire you and increase your sensus Catholicus.

A Savory Question with a Hint of Romance

"Can I love my broth overnight?"  dear daughter Emma asked me in a text message this evening after she put Grandma to bed.  Emma had a pot of bones simmering on the stove.

"Oh, yes!" I thought to myself.  "Love your broth overnight and every day!  As long as it's grass fed bone broth, my dear!"

Then her question sparked a memory in my crazy head, and I had to go hunt down the old novelty song, Does Your Chewing Gum Lose Its Flavor on the Bedpost Overnight?

Scary, huh?

But I didn't tell Emma all that.  I just texted back a laughing Emoji.

"Shut up," she said, which made me laugh harder.  She had realized her mistake--that she had typed "love" instead of "leave".  That doubled my fun.

Seriously, though, I don't know how to cook anymore without homemade bone broth.  Give me some  good long-simmered bone broth and some Red Boat fish sauce and some Coconut Aminos, and dang, I can make anything taste good.

My dad got hospitalized on Sunday, and on Monday when I was visiting him, I asked him what he had for lunch.  He said he had some chicken and some carrots and some rice.  Then he looked at me with a puzzled expression and said, "That chicken didn't have any flavor.  It didn't taste like yours."

And I just grinned like unto a Cheshire cat.

I Know What I'm Doin'

One of the best things about taking care of my parents is getting to hear bits about their lives that I would probably have missed otherwise.

Like tonight, out of the blue, my mom told me that her Grandma Thomley cooked fantastic meals on her wood stove and that she always had sweet potatoes baking in there.  She also said that Grandma Thomley picked cotton up until the year before she died at 92 or 93 and that she was a "go-getter."

"She cooked until she died," Mom said.  This gave me pause.  I wondered if I would even want to cook until I died.  Already at age 55, some days I am pretty tired of cooking.

Then Mom remembered that she and Dad stopped to visit Grandma Thomley early in their marriage, and she was cooking cornbread and talking with them.  My dad said, "You better pay attention to that cornbread," and Grandma Thomley said, "I know what I'm doin'," not snarky, just as a statement of fact, according to my mom.  She was in her 80s at the time.

Previously the only thing my mom told me about Grandma Thomley was that she lived in a dogtrot cabin and that when she spied my mama and her twin sister coming down the road to her house, she would start in making chocolate tarts for them, and they were the best chocolate tarts ever.  As background my mom had told me that the extended family always did their hog killing at the Thomley grandparents' home and that when my grandmother experimented with the new-fangled margarine that came out during the Great Depression, the kind you had to add artificial coloring to, my mother would resolutley walk to her grandparents' house to get real butter, because the margarine was nasty.  Some things never change!

Is There Any Dessert?

Yes, I am using my old iPhone 4s, and it doesn't take great pics.

I've been taking care of my parents full-time since June, and there were certain rituals established by their former caregiver that I've had to keep going, one of which is nightly dessert.

It seems like a simple thing, and my parents really, really, really look forward to it.  But I have failed in this task many times.  Each time I comforted myself by remembering that said former caregiver, a true sweetheart, was not also taking my parents to all their doctors' appointments, doing the grocery shopping, paying their monthly bills, doing all the housework, or managing home maintenance.  That thought worked great until suppertime came, and I would see the crestfallen looks on my parents' faces when my dad would invariably ask, "Is there any dessert?" and I did not produce the longed-for treat.  I don't think he cares if his toilet gets cleaned, but no dessert?  Tragedy!

With those sad mugs in mind, I hit upon the happy mug solution--mug cakes.  They take about 4 minutes to mix up and two minutes each to cook in the microwave.  The first one I tried was a coconut flour one by EverydayMaven.  It was absolutely prepared in a whirlwind of desperation.  After I dumped them out of the coffee mugs, I turned them on their sides, sliced them into thirds, and then popped them in the freezer to cool while I whipped some heavy cream and threw frozen strawberries in a pan on the stove with a little water and honey.  Once the cakes were cooled off, I spread them with some St. Dalfour's strawberry jam, then stacked them with whipped cream and strawberries between each layer.  It made a stupendous tower.  Mom's face lit up when she saw hers, and she dug right in.  Dad was late coming to the table, and all of a sudden his tower leaned, and the top third slid off onto the plate.  I didn't let the strawberries cool enough.  Drat and double drat!  So I stuck it back together the best I could.  He didn't care one bit, but I was disappointed because I didn't think to get a picture until Mom's was half eaten and Dad's was a mess.

Dad's Slippery Slope Strawberry Shortcake

The next night I made EverydayMaven's chocolate mug cake.  While they were cooking, I melted some chocolate chips with butter and stirred in some heavy cream and a handful of chopped up frozen cherries.  I spooned this concoction in between the layers and topped each cake with whipped cream and a whole cherry.  See picture at top.  

Another night I repeated the vanilla (coconut flour) cakes and stirred chocolate chips into the batter, then squirted Ah-laska chocolate syrup on top when they came out of the microwave.  No pic, use your imagination.

Last night I made the chocolate ones again, spread chocolate syrup on the layers and served it with Emma's amazing homemade peppermint chocolate-chip ice cream, which has like a gazillion egg yolks, all heavy cream, and tons of Kerry Gold butter in it.  Yeah, it will satisfy your ice cream craving.

Chocolate mug cake topped with chocolate syrup and served with peppermint chocolate-chip ice cream

So I am officially out of the dessert dog house, but I need to get off this blog and go make a big pan of something, peach cobbler maybe, so I can face suppertime stress-free.

The Ascension: Accent the Octave

One of the things I am learning about the Liturgical Year is that prior to 1955, the Church celebrated many more octaves than it does now.  As a procrastinator, this has been an exciting revelation to me, because now I have more opportunities to actually do something special if the feast sneaks up on me, which it so often does.

So today, the Octave of the Ascension, I am baking Cloud Bread and Lighter Than Air Chocolate Cake--flourless paleo recipes--and planning a picnic.   I will use the Cloud Bread for sandwiches.  I am going to make the cake recipe into cupcakes because they bake in less time, and I can skip lining four cake pans with parchment paper.  Plus cupcakes are more portable for a picnic, even though it will just be on the back patio.   The cake recipe can also be adapted for dairy-free by substituting coconut cream in the frosting.

Starving for Details from My Boy

I spent the past four days away from home, so this morning I happily resumed my regular routine of breakfast preparation.  I had just switched on the mixer when Nathaniel wandered into the kitchen.  I had been looking forward to visiting with him and hearing all about his week.  We exchanged hugs, and he then peered contemplatively into the mixing bowl as the dates, apples, and walnuts rode the muffin-batter whirlpool.

Satisfied, he turned, looked at me, and drawled, "Emma made some good food in a pan."

My brain shifted into high gear, desperately searching for pictures in those bland words.  My brows lifted with the effort.

Nathaniel read my face.  Hurriedly he interjected, "With chicken and peppers!"

"Ah," I thought.  "Now I know everything."

Celebrating St. Lucy Grain-free

The top roll has glaze.  I decided to wait on icing the others until I could do some taste-testing with Emma.

Emma and I just finished eating almond flour cinnamon rolls that I baked for St. Lucy's feast.  I definitely need more practice at this recipe from The Urban Poser, but it shows good promise.  Or maybe I show promise as a baker of almond flour goods.  That's probably more accurate, as the problems were caused by operator error.  :)

The main problem was that I should have rolled the dough out into a thinner rectangle.  If I had done that, I think I could have rolled it up into a tighter log for slicing, which would have prevented the second problem of the individual rolls falling apart.   On second thought, this may have been caused by my inability to follow the "less is more" philosophy.  I could not stop myself from loading the dough with raisins and nuts.  I totally disregarded the amounts called for and just plastered the dough until I basically could not see it anymore. Last of all, they probably should have baked longer, but with almond flour's tendency to burn, I opted for doughy.  Also, Emma was in a hurry to leave to go spend the day with a friend from church who has three little girls and is now expecting twins.

Despite all the issues, they tasted pretty good, and we had managed to fittingly celebrate the Liturgical year with a grain-free feast.

Well, I just went back and nibbled on one of the rolls.  I think they taste even better now that they are cold.  The texture has improved too.  They are not doughy after all--quite nice, actually.

While I was baking the cinnamon rolls, I re-heated Mexican hot chocolate on the stove that Emma made yesterday for the Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe.  She followed a paleo recipe that used coconut milk.  When the rolls were ready, Emma poured us each a cup of the thick chocolate and scooped a dollop of whipped cream on top of each.  She took a sip and complained that it burned her throat.  I've noticed that both of my children are more sensitive to heat than I am, so I didn't think anything of it.  Then I took my first sip and squealed.  That chocolate burned the roof of my mouth and all the way down my throat!  I don't know if it held the heat more because it was so thick or because that is some mysterious property of coconut milk, but boy, that was a surprise.

Here's a what we did for Our Lady of Guadalupe.  We never got to any particular food, though I did add Mexican spices to the sausage, potato, egg, and cheese "scramble" I made for brunch.

I had planned to use this Mexican chocolate (in the yellow box), but Emma found a different recipe that she wanted to try, which used regular cocoa.

It really helped pull it all together when Emma added her little bouquet of  flowers that you see in the picture above.

I'm off to take a Christmas bow and package class.  I hope I pass!

Those Green Bean Times

I cringed when I looked at the date of my last post.  Sept. 24th!  Oh, my goodness!

September seems soooo long ago.  I remember vaguely that time as one of making a grand attempt at getting a lot of canning done.  Oh, and I had started an online canning course, which I have also, like blogging, let totally fall by the wayside.

The canning did not go well.  I blame it on my stove--my stupid, modern stove with the smooth ceramic top, which absolutely refuses to respond in a timely manner to my instructions.  This obstinance caused wild pressure swings in the canner, which in turn caused the dreaded "siphoning", a process by which some of the contents of the jars is sucked out into the canner.  I persisted anyway and canned a quantity of chili and green beans.  By some miracle, most of them sealed despite the siphoning problem.    The ones that didn't I just refrigerated.

I have an especially fond memory of getting the green beans ready to process.  I had about 15 pounds to snap.  Emma and I divided them up into our 13-quart stainless steel bowls.  It was a gorgeous fall day--cool and crisp.  We threw the windows and doors open, and as we sat on the couch with our green bean bounty, we chatted and snapped and listened to the chimes and the gentle burbling of chickens at work near the back door.  The breeze washed over us like baptismal water, renewing us.  It was an extremely satisfying interlude, one of those rare instances where you feel like everything is rightly ordered, almost like a prayer.

I wonder about those green bean times and how you go about getting more of them and less of the pressure canner ones?  How do you live your life as a prayer?  And is it possible *for me* while being a "friend" on Facebook?  Or using an iPhone?  I've been thinking a lot about that lately.  While I have been away from my cozy little blog living room, I have been camped out alongside the rushing torrent that is Facebook Falls, watching the good, the true, and the beautiful wash by, along with some raw sewage.  Blogging is certainly not ideal, but for now, I am going to spend a lot less time on Facebook and more time here.  Especially with Advent beginning in just a few days, my soul yearns for more quiet: less "likes" and more one-on-one, heart-to-heart communication.  Real friendship in Christ.  I am not expecting that I will get that by blogging, but writing here is a more contemplative activity than posting on Facebook.  I think I may grow to be a better friend here.

Manual Food Processor: As Not Seen On TV

I always laugh about these "as seen on TV" promotions.  I didn't see this food processor on TV, and if I did, I would have been less likely to buy it because I'm just a rebel that way.  Ha!  I bought this thing because I was trying to solve two problems: 1. I wanted a quick and easy way to chop basic things like onions, celery, and nuts during power outages and 2. I was looking for a way to chop onions without being totally incapacitated by the fumes or having to wear swim goggles. 

 I was leery of it because everything is plastic except for the chopper and slicer/julienne blades, but it was under $20, had good reviews on Amazon, and it had suction cups on the bottom of the bowl, something its competitor didn't have.  

So I ordered it and have been experimenting with it for the last week.  I will definitely get my money's worth out of this gadget.  It has made short work out of everything I have chopped so far--onions, celery, and nuts.  It really surprised me.  I used the julienne slicer last night to make zucchini noodles, and this morning I tried the mixing blade, a use that I wasn't even considering when I initially was shopping for a chopper.

I usually stir up eggs with a hand whisk, but this did the job more quickly, and the mess was all contained, no drippy whisk to deal with.

I got a little carried away and made a bunch of foam.  I think it worked more efficiently than my whisking technique.  Next time I will mix for half the time, maybe fifteen seconds?

  A lovely bonus is that this is a peaceful way to get some kitchen tasks done.  It's much quieter than an electric food processor.  Heck, it's even quieter than my hand whisk because there is no clinking against the bowl.  I have a Zyliss chopper, the kind that you place over the food you want to chop and then repeatedly depress the plunger.  That thing drives me crazy with the noise, and it hurts my hand after a lot of chopping.  This is infinitely better.  I might buy a second one for the camper.

A Lot of Vanilla

I stopped by the liquor store and bought a giant bottle of vodka the other day.

And 25 Madagascar vanilla beans online.  They were on sale at beanilla.

I'm going to make vanilla extract.  The recipe says to just stick 5 vanilla beans, split lengthwise, in 8 ounces of 35%+ alcohol for two months.  I think I can do that without messing it up.

All this almond flour baking that I do requires whopping doses of vanilla, usually about a tablespoon per batch of cookies, so I am constantly running out.

Plus, you have to be careful nowadays because I've noticed that many of the commercially-prepared vanilla extracts have sugar or corn syrup and water added to them.  Making it myself I know that I will have a high-quality vanilla.

I am hoping that making it myself is cheaper, but honestly, I already forgot how much I paid for the 1.75-liter bottle of vodka!  I did go to this conversion site and find out that 1.75 liters converts to 59.174540 ounces.  Dividing this by 8, I find that I have enough to make my five bottles of extract with 2.3968175 ounces left over.

Hmmm.  What shall I do with the extra?

Carrie Vitt is One Smart Cookie

She created this grain-free chocolate chip cookie recipe.

Carrie Vitt's cookies look perfect.  I think I can see the influence of her military husband in her orderly rows and consistent shapes.

My cookies are a mess, but they taste good, so I am happy.

And it is my all-time favorite, bar none.  I got it from her "Deliciously Organic" site.  

Yes, I am saying I like them better than white flour chocolate chip cookies.

You start with two cups of almond flour plus two tablespoons of coconut flour.  That's pretty basic for grain-free.  I think what makes the difference is a half teaspoon of gelatin.  I've never come across that in any of the grain-free cookie recipes that I have tried.  Hmmm.  Maybe I should qualify that with, "at least not that I can remember."  

Easy Ghee

My friend Jennifer asked me how I make ghee.   I've been pretty discouraged with the method I learned when we first started the GAPS diet.  It involved lots of skimming, was time-consuming, and not that effective.  I persisted with it anyway.  But when Jennifer asked me, I started researching other methods. It's funny how I will continue doing something in a way that I don't like, but when someone asks me about it, that's when I look for a better way.  How nutty is that?  So the video above is the better way that I found this morning.  The instructors advise only using unsalted butter because the salt causes foaming.  I had never heard that before.    I will be much more regular about making ghee with this method.  I have come to really enjoy having this alternative oil for cooking.  It's so incredibly flavorful!

Gee, Ghee! And a Salmon Cakes Post Script

Three weeks ago Emma and I decided to go back to eating totally grain free.  I felt tired all the time since we added corn and rice back to our diets last fall.  Emma's scalp had become very itchy and flaky, and she was starting to need to take naps every day.  We decided to do the Whole30 plan to help us get back on track.  So no grains, no dairy, no sugar, no industrial seed/vegetable oils, no MSG, no processed foods, etc., for thirty days.

I can do without the corn and rice, but boy do I miss butter on this plan!  We can have ghee (clarified butter), though, so I have been making that.  It's a rather painstaking process.  Today when I was at Kroger, I decided to buy some ghee.  I found an organic one by Purity Farms.  It is made from the milk of grassfed cows. I found another by Ziyad that was not organic and was made from conventionally-fed cows' milk.  They both had no other ingredient besides the butter oil.

They were expensive.  The Purity Farms organic, grassfed one was $9.29 for a 7.5 oz jar!  The Ziyad brand was $7.99 for a 16 oz. jar.  I was surprised when I opened them to see that the non-grassfed one had a deeper color.  Then I dipped my spoon into the Purity Farms ghee and tasted it.  I didn't like it.  It was almost rancid tasting.  I tried the Ziyad, and it tasted better but still was not anything near what I would describe as tasty.  This shocked me.  I assumed that as expensive as this stuff was, it would be a better product than what I had been making at home.  As far as flavor goes, my homemade ghee from Organic Valley's Pastured Butter is far superior.  Unfortunately, I can't give a cost breakdown because I don't have a batch of homemade ghee that I can measure to figure out how much it costs.  Whatever it is, it is worth it.  This store-bought stuff was a waste of money.

The good news is that I found a good salmon cake recipe.  That's my other problem with this diet--trying to go without cheese on Fridays when we eat no meat.  These salmon cakes were easy, nutritious, and didn't scream for cheese.  Here's the recipe.  I didn't have the lemon-pepper, so I just squeezed half a lemon into it and added an extra teaspoon of coconut flour.

Ready to make into patties and fry.

Fun with Popovers

I've been wanting to try the popover recipe on the back of the King Arthur's gluten-free all-purpose flour. I finally did last week.  They baked perfectly, but, perplexingly, these popovers would not pop out of the pan.  I had prepared the pan with palm oil.  I don't know if that was the problem, but next time I will try coconut oil.  Anyway, removing the popovers turned into an operation where the surgery was a success, but the patient died.  I managed to rip the bottoms off of most of them.  I was holding one in my hand and mourning its destruction when I realized, "Hey, I have created a bowl!  Yippee!"  I hurried to the stove where I had just finished cooking sausage and making gravy.  I scooped up a sausage patty, dropped it neatly into the popover and then drenched it in gravy.  Ahhhh!  So delicious and filling and comforting.  Later that afternoon I was reading Catholic Cuisine's post about Pope St. Gregory eating cherries on the feast of St. Mark, and I had another brilliant idea.  Two in one day!  Woo-hoo!  I filled two popovers with creme fraiche and cherry preserves.  I took them to Emma's room, and we sat on her bed and gobbled them up.  Between mouthfuls, I related the story from Catholic Cuisine.  Suddenly, I realized I had now made Pope-overs!  Wow!  I'm so awesome!

Adventures with Pork

I've never bought one of these things before, but I was feeling cocky. . .It's a bone-in picnic roast.  Cooking it was not a picnic.

If I hadn't consulted Julia, it probably would have been fine.  First off she told me, "The flavors of a marinade will penetrate pork more thoroughly if the meat is boned."

"Oh, great," I muttered.  I could foresee trouble as my butcher skills are practically non-existent.  I would have to find a recipe that didn't require marinating.

I pushed onward.  Julia described the different pork cuts.  Mine was next to last in the long list.  I read,

 "Picnic Shoulder or Shoulder Arm--No French equivalent."

  Ouch!  What an insult!

She went on to explain "part of it is palette; part is jambonneau."

I don't know what those words mean, but apparently my pork shoulder is some kind of half-breed, not worthy of a French equivalent.  My heart was sinking.  Then Julia moved in for the kill:

"This is lean meat and should be boned," 

How did she know I was looking for ways to get out of shoulder surgery? Drat and double drat!   Heaving a sigh, I resigned myself to the grisly ordeal.

Slowly, I inserted my knife into the meat alongside the bone and started working my way around it.  I pushed and sawed and hacked my way through until I conquered it at last.  It took me about ten minutes.

  

My poor roast certainly wasn't going to be featured in Bon Appetit.

Why butchers wear aprons.

Oh, well.  I proceeded to make up the marinade that Julia said was her favorite.  It was really a dry rub.  I tried grinding it with a mortar and pestle.  After three minutes of totally wasted effort, I got out the little electric spice mill.  Did you know that if you get in a hurry and take the lid off before the blade is completely done spinning,  you will be enveloped in a spice cloud, which will make you sneeze. (Yes, peppercorns.) Then the cloud rains on your countertop, appliances, and floor.

   Once I had the spice mixture rubbed in, I went to get my favorite huge yellow Tupperware bowl with the plastic lid.  I was going to put the roast in there and leave it in the refrigerator overnight.  I peered into the cabinet and found the bowl but no lid.  I got down on my hands and knees and rifled through the contents of the cabinet.  Still no lid.  

All of a sudden, I remembered where I had seen it last.  It was not the kitchen.

I went out to the garage and peered into the cat food can.

No lid.

I lifted out the bag of cat food.

No lid.

I poked all around the vicinity.

No lid.

Baffled, I went back to the kitchen.  While at the sink washing my hands, I spotted something out of the corner of my left eye.  No, it wasn't.  It couldn't be.  

It was. 

I must have brought it in recently to wash?  I don't remember.

At last I got the roast installed in the refrigerator.  Oh, the relief!  It was like I used to feel when Nathaniel was a toddler and I finally got him to bed for the night.

Thankfully, the rest of the preparation went smoothly, and I was pleased with the final result.  

I've Been His Mom for 20 Years, and I'm Still Learning

The way to a man's heart is through his stomach, and you better go there.

I have basically maintained a gluten-free kitchen since December of last year.  That means I no longer bake all the white-flour goods that I used to for my family.  No more Buttermilk Pound Cake.  No more Toll House Cookies.  No more Butter-Me-Not Biscuits.  I've tried a couple of times, but no matter how hard I try to contain it, that all-purpose "dust" seems to go everywhere, eagerly awaiting a chance to cross-contaminate something.

Nathaniel has taken this pretty hard, even though he is free to eat these kinds of baked goods away from home, and he is away from home a lot between college classes and work.  I thought at the beginning that it wasn't such a big deal because of this.  I thought he was lucky because at least he didn't have to give it up totally like Emma.  And I thought he would realize this and actually be supportive.

Nope.

He has grumbled and complained and has refused to try the alternative baking that I have done using almond flour.  I was pretty disappointed in his attitude.  Then he started asking me to buy him cookies at the store.  I would do it rarely.  Reading the ingredients on the package always makes me feel like I am poisoning him instead of doing something nice for him, so most times I would talk myself out of it.  This happened again a couple of weeks ago.  I got home from the grocery store, and he immediately searched through all the bags to see what I had gotten for him.  "You didn't buy me any cookies!" he announced, furrowing his brows in consternation.  Then he said it.  He asked me the big question that revealed all, that explained why he had been such a grumpy, unsupportive young man.

"Don't you LOVE me anymore?"

My jaw dropped as I thought,  "Is that what he thinks?  I tell him I love him every day and hug him and kiss his cheek and talk with him and wash his clothes when he has been too busy because of work and school, but Cookies = Love?"

Then he smiled and laughed to cover up his wounded heart.  I smiled and laughed with him, but the next time I went to the store, I bought him a bag of Chips Ahoy.  When I got home he looked through all the bags and found the one labeled, "MY MOM LOVES ME A LOT".  His attitude has improved dramatically.