Now That is a Lunch

Today, I chopped vegetables for salads so I can quickly pack lunches this week (short work week yay!).

Mixed greens, carrots, radish, cucumber, snow peas with homemade creamy dressing.  I had planned to make a creamy buttermilk dressing, but wouldn't you know, they were out of buttermilk at the store, so I improvised.  Gluten free Kinnickinnick sandwich bread, spicy brown mustard, smoked turkey, swiss cheese, tomato sandwich.  Delish.  Spicy Thai Kettle Chips.  Diet Dr. Pepper-wanna be drink from home soda maker.

Creamy salad dressing:
1 individual container fat free plain yogurt (they only had fat free, which I don't normally buy)
about 1/2 as much low-fat sour cream as yogurt
splash of milk
about 1/2 Tbsp to 1 Tbsp mango balsamic vinegar
about 1/2 Tbsp to 1 Tbsp dijon mustard
about 3/4 cup parlsey
about 1/2 cup dill
(you can tell I'm big on measuring ingredients carefully!)

Blend or process until smooth and creamy.  Salt to taste (and it does need salt, it was bland until I added quite a bit to mine.  It's a lot of dressing, don't hold back!).

Strawberry Jam

On Friday, we headed out to the nearest orchard/farm to pick strawberries.  We came home with one flat of strawberries - 11 pounds worth!  I wanted to try my hand at making jam.  It was an adventure!  But, it turned out pretty well.

Since we don't have a deep freeze, I didn't want to make freezer jam, because I didn't think jam would hold up well in our fridge-top, frostless freezer (the freeze-thaw cycle that keeps it frost-free isn't good for long term storage) so we had to water-bath can.

I had a pot I thought big enough to use, but I didn't have a rack that would fit in the bottom of it, to keep the jars off the pan while processing.  We ended up using two aluminum foil snakes.  It wasn't perfect, and it was really irritating to deal with (aluminum foil floats!) but it got the job done.  I think if we try to do this again (and I'd like to can more, it was fun!) we'll need to invest in a large canner, with jar rack.

I followed the directions that came with the pectin and it turned out really, really, well!  Oh, and I'm glad I used by big 6qt Le Crueset pot to cook the jam - when that stuff boils, it really expands!

Grand total: 10 1/2 pint jars of jam, two bags of frozen, whole berries (a little more than a gallon, I'd say, two whole sheet pans of berries), one large bowl for topping cake and ice cream, plus one box for eating.  That was a lot of strawberries!

I am ridiculously proud of how well it worked out, though.  This strawberry jam is delicious!  Fresh, fruity, sweet, and so very strawberry-y!

Arepas!

Every once in awhile, we make arepas.  They're so easy and so delicious, plus it's a nice change of pace from tortillas.

I made a small batch this time, so we didn't have leftover arepas, since we were just making arepas to use leftover filling from making tacos earlier in the week.  Follow?

1 1/2 cups, approx. of masa harina (MaSeCa is the brand I can find most easily around here)

about 1 1/2 cups warm water

~1tsp salt

Mix together until it forms a slightly wet, clay-like dough.  Let rest for 5-15 minutes. 

With wet hands, take a golf ball size portion and roll into a smooth ball, then flatten to make a disk about 1/4 to 1/2 inch thick.  Cook on medium heat in skillet or griddle for 7-10 minutes per side.  Arepas should cook slowly, browning but not getting too dark (in the picture, the arepa spots are just a smidge too dark).  Bake in 350 oven for 15 minutes.  Arepas should sound hollow when tapped (sometimes mine are hollow but could still bake a few minutes).  Split open halfway with a knife and stuff with filling.  

Tonight we stuffed with a mixture of leftover chicken, mashed avocado, salt, and lime.  Also served with queso fresco, roasted chipotle salsa, sour cream, pickled jalapenos, and chips.

Banana bread, peanut butter cookies, and the end of LOST

Banana bread with chocolate chips based on this recipe from Simply Recipes.
I used two previously frozen bananas, two fresh bananas, and substituted 1/2 cup high protein flour mix, 1 cup all purpose flour mix, and 1/2 Tbsp (1 1/2 tsp.) of xanthan gum for the wheat flour to make it gluten free.  The flour blends I use are from an old issue of Living Without.  I added 1/2 cup of semi-sweet chocolate chips as well.

Peanut butter cookies made from 1 cup peanut butter, 1 cup sugar, and 1 egg.

While watching LOST we had Trader Joe's chicken lime burgers with mayo, tomato, red onion.  I had mine on a Gillian's gluten free roll, which was really good.  The Big B picked them up for me at the grocery store!  (I had 1/2 a roll the next day for lunch too, topped with egg salad.)  The bun-burger combo, however, was kinda bland.  It definitely lacked for something zesty.  Like queso (Rotel dip to some of you).  Thankfully, that was our side dish for dinner!

Wraps: Trader Joe's Brown Rice Tortillas

All this week I'v been packing Greek salad wraps for lunch.  (I prefer to pick one thing and pack it all week - makes prep so much faster and there's no extra "What should I pack?" time wasted.)  It's worked pretty well, but I've learned a thing or two about using the Trader Joe's brown rice tortilla wraps to make sandwich wraps.  They are gluten free, of course, and like most bread-like-products that are gluten free they don't fold.  So, even if it's been sitting at room temperature for a few hours, it still needs to be microwaved for 10-15 seconds in order to actually wrap your sandwich without it cracking and making a mess.  There are a couple logistical issues with this.  You have to wrap your sandwich right before you eat it, so the tortilla has to be carried to work flat.  I carried mine in a gallon size zip top bag and slipped it into the outside magazine pocket of my work bag.  The wrap must be warmed, so you have to have a microwave at work.  And of course, you have to have the space to assemble your sandwich.  I do this at my desk since our shared pantry grosses me out.  Who knows what's been on that table!

(I didn't actually try wrapping at home and packing the sandwich pre-wrapped, but I'm pretty sure that once refrigerated again, the wrap would be just as dry and crack and fall apart, leaving you with a salad with tortilla pieces mixed in.)

1. Have all sandwich fillings ready to go.  In my case, this was baby greens "herb" mix, chickpeas, feta, olives, red onion, cucumber, and tomato. 
2. Microwave tortilla in bag for 10-15 seconds.  (Yes, micrwaving in a plastic bag is probably going to kill me.  Eventually.)
3. Place on napkin, add filling, roll, then wrap with paper towel to hold it all together and fold paper towel over the bottom to hold filling inside. 
4. Enjoy!

Are you sick of pizza yet?

Pizza, yet again.  And I don't think I've taken pictures of every time we've had pizza!

We've used both the Gluten Free Crusty Boule recipe and the Gluten Free Olive Oil Bread from "Healthy Bread in Five Minutes a Day."  The Crusty Boule recipe works so much better for us, and has the added bonus that we can make naan from it (so darn good the husband prefers it to his frozen Trader Joe's naan, if you can believe that!) on another night.  But I still plan on trying the olive oil bread again, once I track down corn starch to use in the recipe.

Tomato sauce (one can tomato sauce, one can tomato paste, dried oregano, dried basil, salt), black olives, green olives, onions, mushrooms, and lots and lots of mozzarella.

Eggs Florentine

This recipe was delicious!  We used a Giada recipe for eggs florentine to make a spinach cream sauce.  We served it on toast (GF for me, regular for the husband) with a poached egg, topped with crumbled crispy speck.  So good!  I also discovered that this cram sauce will make a delicious warm spinach and artichoke dip.  Have to remember that for football season!

Sweet Potato Fries: An Experiment Gone Not-Quite-Right

A while back, we decided to make sweet potato fries, based on this recipe from the NYTimes.  The idea is you start the potatoes in cold oil, warm the pan slowly, and cook at lower temperature until done.  No hot oil splattering on your stove and arms, no hot grease smell permeating the whole house.

So, we tried it: and it went well, for the most part.  Here are the sweet potatoes quietly bubbling away in their pan:

The thing is, though, that they don't look as golden brown in the oil as their really are after you remove them.  So, by the time we thought they were done (it took more than an hour) they were actually nearly burnt.  So, for future reference, this method works, but remove a fry or two occasionally to see how well browned they really are.

Scotcharoos

1/2 batch of scotcharoos made with

4 cups Erehwon rice twice
1/2 bag marshamallos
1/2 cup peanut butter
2 Tbsp butter
1/2 cup butterscotch chips
1/2 cup chocolate chips

And, we've made pizza a few more times recently.  This one was made with the Olive Oil Bread recipe from Healthy Bread in 5 Minutes a Day.  The dough was miserable to work with - extra sticky, tore constantly.  I ended up just pressing it onto a half sheet pan and baking it that way.  Worked just as well, I think.  I wonder if it was because I couldn't find corn starch at the store and used potato starch, which I had on hand, instead?

Tomato sauce, onion, sun dried tomato, dollops of olive spread, chicken, mozzarella, romano.