May is Celiac Awareness month along with food allergy awareness month. Having one of these food avoidance diagnosis is difficult, and sometimes adding the second seems overwhelming. We started off with just food allergies but quickly found out that gluten was a problem. I have been free of gluten and dairy for more than 10 years. It is sometimes hard to remember what it was like to cook with wheat flour or what certain cheeses tastes like.
I am a much better baker than cook and really enjoy baking. I have a soft chocolate chip cookie recipe that I make often, so when I came across someone raving about this cookie recipe I had to try it.
During this time of Safe at Home it has been heartwarming to see the sharing and caring coming from so many companies. Even though I have never been able to partake in the the warm cookie at a DoubleTree, I was curious about the recipe. It is often the little additions that make a cookie great. This one has three things added to make it special (four if you count the nuts, but I don’t usually replace those in recipes). Cinnamon, oats, and a squeeze of lemon make the DoubleTree cookie memorable.
Gluten-Free DoubleTree Signature Cookie (Gluten-Free, Dairy-Free, Soy-Free, Tree nut and Peanut-Free, and Nightshade-Free)
The first warm sunny day in spring I always feel like making lemon bars. I love the tart sweetness and the shortbread crust.
I always plant a big garden that is growing bigger each year. I hope to add some more bushes this year, current, raspberry, and elderberry. For right now I have to be content with planting more lettuce, radishes, and beets since there is a chance the temperature will drop below freezing a few nights.
These lemon bars are easy to make. The crust is crumbly but holds nicely for slicing. If you are getting too much of a skin on the top of the egg/lemon layer try baking it a little less.
I hope you enjoy these in the sunshine of a summer day!
To make the crust combine all ingredients in a bowl and mix. I like to do this with a pastry cutter, but you can use the paddle attachment of a stand mixer.
Grease a 9 x 13 pan with coconut oil spray and lightly pack crust mixture in to the bottom of the pan.
Bake for 15 minutes. Will form bubbles (wholes) and will not be completely set.
Remove from oven and cool.
Once the crust is cooled make the filling by whisking all the filling ingredients together with the whisk attachment of your stand mixer.
Once well combined pour over the top of the crust.
Bake for 35 minutes. (Check at 30 minutes, if the top is getting too brown remove at 30 minutes).
Let cool and dust with powder sugar before serving.
The year of the rat started last week and I celebrated with some homemade fortune cookies. You really do need to move fast when they come out of the oven to get the four on the cookie pan shaped properly. I had just watched the The Great British Baking Show (S05:E02) where the technical was fortune cookies. I don’t remember which contestant put the still warm shaped cookies inside a muffin tin, but this is definitely the best way for them to retain their shape while they cool.
Fortune Cookies in muffin tin
They were easy to make, and it was fun to have for this years Lunar New Year. Next time I may attempt the orange flavored ones from the Great British Baking Show.
Happy 2020. I took a long time off for the holidays this year. It was a much needed break for me and I was able to visit family and spend time with those I love.
Traveling can cause a lot of anxiety for those of us who have to avoid food due to Celiac Disease, Food Allergies and other food avoidance diagnosis. Extra planning for your travels and taking your own food helps ease some of the anxiety with travel. For me, if you have been following you know, I take Bobo bars or Bobo bites. I always take a reusable water bottle to fill up at the airport after going through security. I also pack a reusable thermos for hot coffee.
When planning for a trip check out the airport you will be traveling to and from ahead of time. Even if there is just the standard gas station offerings there can be some safe food. For my Dairy/Soy/Peanut/Tree nut allergic Celiac child, Lay’s potato chips are offered almost everywhere.
Now that I am back and spent the last two weekends binging three seasons of The Great British Baking Show I have so many baking ideas in my head. I love the bold flavor combinations that so many of the contestants use in their bakes. I am not very artistic and the thought of piping anything is intimidating. My baking goals for the year do include “learn how to decorate cookies and cakes.” For today I will stick with some of my tried and true recipes.
My local veggie market has had blueberries at a great price so I made blueberry crisp twice this past week. I love my Apple Crisp recipe but find this drier topping pairs well with blueberries. You could use it with any fruit, and the addition of the oatmeal is a nice texture change from the hot fruit.
I heat this up for a treat mid-day, but have been known to have it for breakfast.
I love to try making all the fall baking treats. I still haven’t been able to make a good Pumpkin Bread, so I thought I would try a Pumpkin Bar. It was definitely a “No”. Too chewy and oily.
Baking fails happen. It often feel worse now that I’m using all the different gluten-free flours and dairy alternatives that are more expensive. But I had plenty of baking fails before we needed to change our diets due to Celiac Disease and food allergies.
It’s a good thing I have Aldi’s new Sea Salt Caramel Dessert Hummus to have with apples instead of the chewy pumpkin bars. Have you tried this seasonal dessert hummus? It is really good.
I better make some Brownies, since when my kids saw the pan yesterday they thought brownies (it is the only thing the pan is used for) and I had to quickly warn them it was NOT brownies.
I’m back to the pumpkin bar/ pumpkin bread drawing board. I also have one other dessert I am trialing this week. I hope it turns out better than my pumpkin bar experiment.
Cygnet Organizing 