Menu Plan Month- A month of meals

Is it really February already??? How time flies when you're having fun. Or something to that effect.

Last months' planning of a month worth of meals worked out so great I'm doing it again. Really, it was so nice to have a plan, know I had all the ingredients (cause I did all my shopping immediately after my planning) and know that things were going to be taken care of. It made my life less stressful and it made things easier on my husband who has to feed kids 3 to 4 of the night out of the week. We won't go into why I have to plan and get everything ready. It's our reality and sometimes it's just easier to go with what works than to fight.

Biggest hit meals last month were the crock pot pulled pork from Living Well Spends Well , and shakshuka from  Nourish Atlier

I figured I should fess up for a moment. While I'm not one to reinvent the wheel, I also don't follow recipes to the T. While I almost always link to others recipes, I hardly ever follow their steps exactly. I tend to view recipes as more as guidelines than rules. I say this because this month especially I'm going to be deviating from what is written on the recipes. I may even take the time to post about how I changed things up and how it was received. We'll see.

Reminder: I have a kid who eats gluten free. So I always substitute corn starch from flour, use GF noodles instead of wheat and make sure that the meal does not contain gluten when I serve it. I realize this doesn't help you if you are new to a gf diet because I'm not giving you instructions on how to do so as well. But it does show that it's almost always possible to rework recipes so they work for you and yours.

February's Menu 
Week 1
Monday: leftovers -clean out the fridge day
Tuesday: Slow Cooker Mexican Rice
Wednesday: Broccoli Cheddar Soup in the crockpot
Thursday: Baked Egg Ham Cups with tater tots
Friday: Fend for yourself
Saturday: Crockpot Pulled Pork, chips, carrots
Sunday: Popcorn Cheese and apples

Week 2
Monday: Frito Taco Pie- use Pillsbury's Gluten Free pizza crust
Tuesday: Crockpot Rice lasagna 
Wednesday: Crockpot Ranch Onion Chicken, roasted potatoes, peas
Thursday: Sweet Potato and Chicken Hash
Friday: FFY
Saturday: Groundnut Stew in the crockpot- original recipe from More with Less Cookbook- going to see if I can convert it to the crockpot. More information to come later
Sunday: Popcorn Cheese and Apples

Week 3
Monday: One Pot Shrimp and Rice 
Tuesday: Crock pot Ham and Bean Soup
Wednesday: Crock pot Coconut Chicken Curry- recipe to come later
Thursday: Lo-mein 
Friday: FFY
Saturday: Crockpot Lentil Casserole - original recipe found here
Sunday: Popcorn Cheese and Apples

Week 4 
Monday: Sweet Potato, Bacon and Sage Pasta
Tuesday: Crock pot Pesto Minestrone 
Wednesday: Crock pot Beef and Broccoli- served over rice
Thursday: Pizza Braid
Friday: FFY
Saturday: Leftovers
Sunday: Popcorn Cheese and Apples

Need more inspiration? Check out Organizing Junkie and all the linked menus there.  Happy meal planning!

Menu Plan Monday March 10, 2014

Despise the lack of posts, I have been menu planning. In fact in the last month alot has happened that I really ought to record here on the blog. We'll see if I find the motivation. For those not in connection to me on Facebook, I have recently moved from a part time position at the local bookstore to full time Assistant Manager. :) I'm very excited about it and really enjoying my work. However this has meant lots of shifting and changing at home, and we are still working out the kinks. One shift has been more use of my crockpot. As I don't come home till after 6pm, dinner needs to be done when I come home. As let's be honest, Mark IS NOT going to cook unless it's maybe spaghetti. While I like spaghetti I don't want it every night. So slow cooker meals has become our saving grace. The internet is a life saver in the area. But I have also recently bought a new cookbook. Not Your Mother's Slow Cooker Cookbook by Beth Hensperger and Julie Kaufmann. So far I'm pretty pleased, Although there are recipes I can't used because they only require a few hours cooking time or require you to add ingredients half way through. For someone else I"m sure that's not a problem but I just can't do that. So here is this weeks menu. I'm off Monday so that meal I'll cook without the use of my crockpot. The rest... well just look

Monday: Black bean and sweet potato taco salad (uses the Simple in Season Burrito filling)
Tuesday: Chicken with Onions and Cheese (Not Your Mother's Slow Cooker) potatoes and peas
Wednesday:  Corn Chowder (Not Your Mother's Slower Cooker)
Thursday: Breakfast Casserole
Friday: Sloppy Joes
Saturday: Left overs or simple meal
Sunday: Popcorn Cheese and Apples

For more menus be sure to visit Organizing Junkie. Happy Meal Planning!!

Menu Plan Monday- May 20,2013

Happy Monday everyone! Hopefully yours started off better than mine. Although the day has ended pleasant enough. I can tell we are at the end of the school year, as my 6 year old has become hard and hard to deal with. 6 Days left of Kindergarten. And only 3 left of Preschool. Arrgg when the end of the year come so close? On the up side that means we leave for Kansas in less than two weeks :)

I'm going to keep this short. Here is our menu this week.

Monday: Stir-fry noodles (Simply in Season)
Tuesday: Quiche
Wednesday: Quinoa Pizza Bits
Thursday: Groundnut Stew (More with Less)
Friday: Mexican Rice Casserole
Saturday: Black Bean Burgers
Sunday: Leftovers or other simple meal

It should be noted that weekend plans might change if we decided to have friends over. But I figure I could at least make some plan even if I change it  later. There more like guidelines, than rules :)

For more menus head over to Organizing Junkie. Happy Menu Planning!

Menu Plan Monday- April 1st, 2013

Wow, it's been awhile since I posted a menu. Last week was crazy being Holy Week. Add to the fact we made a trip to PA, heading out Palm Sunday and arriving home late, late on Wednesday night, for Mark's grandfather's funeral and I was feeling exhausted. Despite the fact that Holy Week and Easter seems to fly right on by, I feel like I got to enjoy Easter. We had dinner at a friends house with another family which was so nice. Our host made ham , rice, peas and salad. I brought pies (chocolate pudding, peanut butter chocolate, and strawberry). And the other family brought cheese and crackers. It was wonderful. And we had a big egg hunt with some other families from church. Now we are on spring break. Which has it's advantages and disadvantages. Aiden has been cranky and I'm starting to wonder if it's because he has spent so much time with his brothers without a break. With our trip last week we are on week two of time together without school. On the up side, my mom and step-dad arrive tomorrow afternoon for a few days! We'll get to spend tomorrow afternoon and Thursday with them. They we'll all head to Chicago on Friday for the day. Mom and Andrew will head back home sometime in the evening and Mark, the boys and I will stay the night and spend Saturday in Chicago. Should be a fun weekend. :) With that all in mind here is our menu for the week.

Monday: sweet potato oven pancakes (Simply in Season cookbook- sub gf flour for wheat) with bacon on the side. (Ian went to the dentist and had to get a filling. He was told only soft food for the day.)
Tuesday: Cheese corn chowder (More with Less cookbook)
Wednesday: Egg curry (Extending the Table cookbook)- maybe make gluten free naan
Thursday:???? I'm going to leave this undecided and have my mom help me. :)
Friday and Saturday: Chicago!!
Sunday: Leftovers or simple meal such as popcorn and cheese

For more menus go visit Organizing Junkie. Have a great week!

Menu Plan Monday- Feb 11th, 2013 and Fat Tuesday Meal

So clearly I have not updated in awhile. Of course we have been sick around here. I think I was sick for two weeks with only a few days in between. First the fever, ache body flu, then the stomach flu which Cai and Aiden gave me and I gave to Mark. Only Ian seemed to be spared. We are all healthy now. And I couldn't be more grateful. Really!!!!
This week will be different for my family as far as menus cause I'm leaving Thursday with a group of women to go to Meridian, MS for the weekend. We are helping out at the Women's Retreat at Jublee Mennonite Church and then our pastor Brenda is preaching there on Sunday. It should be lots of fun and I'm very much looking forward to the trip.
 For those who follow the Christian church calendar you know that tomorrow is Ash Wednesday. It's so early this year. To be honest it's kinda freaking me out. I'm not sure I'm ready. But here we are. Which makes today (Tuesday) Shrove/ Fat Tuesday. So in honor of the day I made sure to prepare us a feast. :)

We had steaks with this marinate. Baked potatoes. Peas.

For dessert we had these gluten free yeast donuts.

 I used an egg and 1% milk in place of the flax seed and rice milk. They turned out nice.

Everyone liked them.

 It was a good feast. Mark especially liked the steak. I know he likes my cooking but on nights like tonight it is really nice to hear and hear multiple times. :)

Okay so here is our menu for this week.

Monday: Basic Curry recipe over rice (La Leche League's cookbook Whole Foods for the Whole Family)
Shrove Tuesday Feast: Marinated steak, baked potatoes and peas.
Ash Wednesday: Lentil soup
Thursday: I'll be eating on the road- Mark and the boys will eat Cheese Corn Chowder at Grandma and Grandpa Saner's house
Friday: Mark's cooking
Saturday and Sunday: Mark will cook one night and his mom will cook another. TBD

Mark has told me he plans on having Chicken Dijon one night. He loves it but I'm not a huge fan so I haven't made it since our first year of marriage. We have had it at his mom's on occasion.

For more menus head over for Organizing Junkie. There are always lots of ideas and recipe links.

Jan Pinterest project- angry birds pizza

So I saw this pin on a friends board and quickly showed it to the boys. The boys love angry birds and this pizza was so fun. They of course wanted me to make it. I put it off. Of course in my defense I haven't made homemade pizza is weeks. Sadly I should confess that when we have had pizza it's been take out or even store bought frozen. Anyway last night I didn't feel like making curry as I had planned. So I asked everyone if pizza sounded good. It's not often pizza is turned down.

I used a gluten free crust that was given to me by friends. I then made two pizzas. One into Red and one into Chuck. Here is where I should note that at our house we know all the names of the Angry Birds. Cai bought the National Geographic Angry Birds book at Ian's school's book fair. In addition to learning about angry behaviors of birds we learn a little about all the Angry Birds. Really it's a great book. Anyhoo! I wanted to make two pizzas because I've been feeling that one hasn't quite been enough. But the thought of having 2 Red birds seemed silly. So the advantage of making Chuck is that he's yellow. Around our house people like Hawaiian pizza, well if you exclude me it's still not my favorite.  Pineapple is yellow! Tada I had my second pizza. Like the pin, I used pepperoni for Red.

 I didn't have mushrooms so I just used more cheese for the eyeballs. For Chuck I shaped the crust into a triangle. In some ways this might be easier with gluten free crust, seeing as how gluten free dough is more like a thick cake batter or cookie dough than traditional bread dough. I could use my spatula to help spread the batter into the correct shape. My original idea was to place pineapple chunks along with ham all over the body. Turns out I didn't have pineapple chunks, just crushed pineapple. 

The over all look is probably more what I was going for. Sadly this meant pieces with no ham on them. I had a bowl of ham that could be added on after the fact. Really I think they look very good. And they tasted good. And probably the most important  the boys loved them. We even started talking about what other angry birds we could make into pizza. Pesto and spinach pigs? Blueberry dessert pizza blue bird? A whole black olive pizza Bomber bird? There are lots of possibilities. We might just have to get creative with our pizzas :)

Menu Post Monday- 12/17/12

It's hard to believe that there is only a week till Christmas. I'm almost ready. I think. On the bright side, my brother gets in on Thursday. I'm so very much looking forward to seeing him and having him here for a week. It will be great fun. Assuming he doesn't become exhausted by the boys. I'm needing to go start dinner so I'll keep this short. Here is the menu this week.

Monday: Leftover Green Lentil Soup with Coconut milk
Tuesday: Homemade Hamburger Helper -using  these Gluten Free noodles
Wednesday: Winter Squash Risotto
Thursday:  Chili
Friday: Pizza Rice Casserole (More with Less cookbook)
Saturday and Sunday: I'll decided when we get there. I'm not sure what our weekend is going to look like right now so I figure it might be better to decided our meals once we know rather than before. :)

For more menus visit Organizing Junkie. Happy Meal Planning!

Menu Plan Monday- 12/10/12

It may be Wednesday, but I thought I would post my menu anyway. Half way into the second week of Advent and already I feel way behind. I had such good intentions has to having more prepared for Christmas. I still haven't finished decorating. Although really all that is left is our stockings (which I need to get hooks for) and some greenery that I want to hang (branches we cut off our tree that I thought would look nice in other places). So I guess the decorating could be considered done, even if there is more I want to do.  I've currently got cutout cookie dough in the fridge to cut out here in a few minutes. So while there are alot of other cookies I want and still plan on making, I've at least started the list. :) And with the exception of my brother I think I have everyone's gift figured out even if they are not purchased/made yet. Can I blame Ian? He has been home sick since Monday. Monday and Tuesday he had a fever. It finally broke sometime during the night last night but since his temp was still 100 when he went to bed we kept him home today.Poor kid. Being sick is no fun.

Ian and Cai looking at pictures on the computer. Can't you just see how yucky he feels

Especially when the first snow on the ground was yesterday and while his brothers got to go out and troop through the dusting of snow, I made him stay indoors. I'm so mean.

The list dusting of snow we got- taken in the morning

On another note, it was awfully cute watching Aiden make foot prints and raking snow with a stick he found. Oh and don't forget eating any he could get on his mittens. Which of course translates to eating dirt as well cause really there wasn't that much there.

Aiden raking with his stick he found

 It was mostly gone by afternoon and today you can hardly tell it had snowed at all. It's sorta a weird winter thus far. That lack of snow is disconcerting  Not to mention just plane disappointing for little boys who look forward to it every year.

The boys in the afternoon- eating snow off the grill and fence

Okay on to our menu.

Monday: Chicken noodle soup- using these Gluten Free egg noodles  

Tuesday: pancakes (Ian's choice)

Wednesday: Mid Week meal at Church- cookie bake- I'm taking Gluten Free cut out cookies pre-baked so kids can decorate. The hope is that it keeps Cai busy and away from the tons of gluten cookie dough. Plus then he has a treat to eat in the end too :)

Thursday: Green Lentil Soup with Coconut milk

Friday:  Sweet Potato and black bean taco salad

Saturday: Leftovers or simple soup

Sunday: Popcorn and apples 

For more menus be sure to visit Organizing Junkie. 

Menu Plan Monday- Aug 13, 2012

This week is starting out crazy. But I have basically accepted the fact that my life will not slow down anytime soon (if ever). And despite the flustered start to our day yesterday, the rest of the day went pretty good (if you ignore the fact that I didn't get this posted). This morning seems to be going better. With Ian wanted to eat breakfast at school (students get a free breakfast), I had one less kid to really worry about. Overlook Cai's grunts and whines (he is so my kid) then things have gone smoothly. And it's not even 8:30am!! I have the dishwasher unloaded, my second load of laundry in the wash, the first in the dryer, and all the trash collected and taken outside. I'm on a role. So overlook my bragging please, cause i feel like I deserve to brag just alittle. Now it's time to drink my coffee, relax just a few minutes before starting on the sweeping. Last week I restarted the Fly Lady cleaning system. I've tweaked it to fit me, our house and our routines but I'm happy to say thus far I'm feeling it working. I'll let you know again at the end of the month. Anywhoo............ let get to the point of this post. Our menu. This week should be pretty easy. I mean I'm not cooking half the time. So here it is.

Monday: Zucchini Garden Chowder (Simply in Season) with gluten free biscuits
                              Note about biscuits: I added 2 tablespoons more fat/butter to a basic biscuit recipe in                     More with Less and 1 teaspoon xanthan gum. I then just substituted my gluten free flour mix for the flour. They turned out great. The best biscuits I've ever made!
Tuesday:  Dinner at Grandma and Grandpa Saner's - I have a meeting at 6 and Mark doesn't get home from Tennis Practice till 6:30 thus we are eating at Grandma and Grandpa's so the boys can hang out there while I'm off to my meeting
Wednesday: Midweek Meal at church
Thursday: Homemade gluten free pizza
Friday: Dinner at Grandma and Grandpa Saner's - Grandma and Grandpa are watching the boys for the weekend. Mark and I are heading to Chicago Friday evening to celebrate our anniversary!!
Saturday: Mark and I in Chicago! It's our Anniversary! Boys at Grandparents
Sunday: leftovers or other simple meal

Check out more menu's at Organizing Junkie.

Menu Plan Monday July 30-Aug 5, 2012

So much for posting on Monday. Sigh. Is anyone else in shock that today's the 1st of August? I'm both excited and dreading that fact we are now in August. We now have 5 days till Cai is 4. And 9 days till Ian turns 6 and starts Kindergarten. While I'm very much looking forward to Ian starting school, I'm also somewhat freaking out. This is my baby! When did he get so big? Surely he is not going to be 6! Sigh. Where does all that time go? Well despite the fact that I'm not sure I'm ready for all this, here we are. August has begun. So here is our menu for the week.

Monday: Garden Vegetable Curry (from More with Less)
Tuesday:  Black bean, Zucchini and Tomato Quesadillas  made with Homemade GF tortillas
Wednesday: Coconut Milk Curry
Thursday: Loaded Quinoa Veggie Burgers with homemade GF buns, side veggie of some sort
Friday: First Fridays- eat downtown
Saturday: Leftovers
Sunday: Simple Supper or breakfast or popcorn

Need more menu ideas? Check out Organizing Junkie.

Fat Tuesday 2012

Fat Tuesday seems to have come and gone. But not without a little celebrations in our household. When I was growing up my mother often made Carnival Cookies. They are a dough rolled very thin and fried in oil then covered with powered sugar. I've thought about getting the recipe from her to make for my boys. And maybe one day I will. I'll have to play with gluten free flours to make them gluten free, but hey I'm getting pretty good at that. :) Anyway, without my mother's Carnival Cookie recipe, I decided I would try my hand at doughnuts. I mean, they are fried. And sweet. They fit. Plus in my new book To Dance with God: Family Ritual and Community Celebration, the author talked about making doughnuts with her kids as part of a Fat Tuesday celebration. So we did our own variation of this.

 I used a  doughnut recipe I found on Celiac.com The recipe calls for Bette Hagmans gluten-free mix. I happened to have The Gluten-free Gourmet Cooks Fast and Healthy  However, I don't tend to like GF flour mixes with too much rice flour. I took Hagmans' example and halved it to get a smaller portion. Than did some substitutions to come us with this. 1 1/2 cups Sorghum Flour, 1 1/2 cups Sweet Rice Flour, 1 cup Potato Starch, 1/2 cup Tapioca Flour. I still have flour mix left over but hey I'll use it for something right? The other change I made to the recipe was I used guar gum in place of xanthan gum. My understanding is they are very similar and are often used simultaneously. Anyway, after mixing up the dough, I rolled it out on my counter and had the boys come in one at a time and cut out large circles. 

I don't have a doughnut cutter, So we used a large circle and then I used a small circle to cut out the center

 I then fried them in canola oil in  a pan on my stove.

 Then I placed powdered sugar in a large bowl with a lid and let the boys take turns shaking the bowl. They seemed enjoy this.

Shake Shake

checking to make sure the doughnuts are covered

 But eating the leftover sugar was even more fun. It was a mess. But hey they had fun. And I figured one day of eating plain sugar is not going to hurt them. 

eating leftover sugar

Besides Fat Tuesday is all about indulging in all the fatty, sugary, unhealthy food we will be abstaining from during Lent. Seems to me that letting them eat the remaining sugar fit the bill for the day.

 The doughnuts turned out pretty good. They were more cake like in taste and texture. But still yummy. Next year I might try to find a yeast doughnut recipe. We'll see. 

he is trying not to smile

In addition to doughnuts, this year I wanted to enjoy fried foods that I rarely, if ever, make. So I made fried chicken. And I fried it in at least an inch of oil. I used gluten free crushed corn flakes and flax seed in place of breadcrumbs for the breading. They were very yummy. 

We then enjoyed mashed potatoes with gravy and peas. Cause let's be honest, I can't serve a meal without a vegetable. And while I tossed around the idea of making a green been casserole or something, it was just one thing too many. Frozen peas take five minutes in the microwave. Simple. Easy. And the boys love them, so hey it's works.

 Overall a satisfying feast. 

Completed Projects :)

Almost every year, since Mark was in high school, several members of Mark's family and another family from church, along with other family and individuals depending on the year, travel up to Boyne Highlands in northern Michigan for a weekend of skiing and fun. I've had the pleasure of joining in on this awesome weekend now four times. This year being the second year in a row! With us living in Goshen now, and thus the trip easier to manage than when we were in Kansas, Mark and I both hope to continue the family tradition for our boys to grow up in. Last weekend was our Boyne trip. And prior to this trip I had a long list of things I wanted to complete. Really I was very proud of myself. In the two weeks leading up to the trip I got most of what I wanted to do accomplished. And I have to say I'm very pleased with all my efforts. 

Christmas 2009 my creative sister-in-law Rachel gave the boys a felt puppet theater and two felt puppets. She had seen a puppet theater held up by a tension rod in a store and thought "I could do that." We have enjoyed the theater, and enjoy the puppets even more.

Christmas 2009 

This last Christmas (2011) Rachel gave Cai two more puppets, an owl and a dragon, to go along with our frog and bear.

Christmas 2011

 Also this Christmas, Ian was giving The Frog and Toad Treasury. If you have never read Frog and Toad and have small kids you should. They are fun. Both Cai and Ian love the stories. So realizing that we have a frog puppet, I thought wouldn't it be great to have a toad puppet and then they could act out the stories from the books. So I set to work making them a toad puppet.

Toad front and back

 Being that my nephew also loves Frog and Toad, I made him a set as well.

set for Josiah

 Since I was making puppets I made a cat for Aiden cause he loves cats right now

after detailed glued on

. And a tree. Now this once might seem weird, but trust me there is a reason. Ever since Cai got the owl at Christmas the boys have used this puppet only with an odd green one (I think it looks like a green gingerbread man) and sing Owl in the Tree, a song they learned at the library storytime. Watching them I decided that maybe a tree would be fun for them.

owl in the tree says "hoo hoo hoo"

 All three new puppets were met with squeals of joy.

one of the boys took this

And I learned some thing in the process. Most importantly, if you use hot glue to attach any detail pieces, glut them on after you sew the puppet pieces together. You can not machine sew through hot glue. My poor cat puppet had to be hand sewed because I had already hot glued the stripes on. Still it seems to be holding together.

The next thing I wanted to complete before our Boyne trip was a car road made out of old jeans. Rachel had told me about this when I was telling her about all the old jeans I had. When she asked if she could have some, I told her I would be glad to make it. Rach had seen the idea on pinterest.

all our road pieces

 Of course it should be noted that I didn't finish it until the night before we left. Oh well, it was made and the boys all enjoyed it.

 I had meant for it to go home with Rach, but it ended up in our bag. I'll give it to her sometime this week. Since the boys were giving an awesome road area rug from their grandparents for Christmas we don't need the road pieces.

In addition to some new toys, I made several new snacks for our trip. Since Cai can't have peanut butter, I tried soy nut butter in puppy chow. It turned out really good. Sunflower butter (our normal peanut butter substitute) just isn't the same and can sometimes just make a recipe taste odd. But the soy nut butter worked great, no oddness at all.  I made strawberry fudge from a link my mother shared with me. Two ingredients- strawberry icing and white chocolate chips. It turned out ok, really sweet and soft. Not something I would make very often to be sure.

 The snack I'm most excited/proud about was the gluten free goldfish crackers I made.

My sister-in-law Andrea sent me the link to this recipe. I used my own flour mix in place of Bob's Red Mill gluten free all-purpose flour. I also added a teaspoon of xanthan gum. The original recipe come from Chef Chloe. I didn't have a goldfish cutter. But when I was talking to Rachel she said something about using old aluminum pop cans. So that's what I used. I cut a strip out of an old coca-cola can, folded over the top edge so it wouldn't be sharp when I pressed down on it, and shaped it into a fish, Then I used scotch tape to tape it together. Simple.

 The downside to this type of cutter is that after only a few uses it would bend out of shape and I would have to reshape it.

 

Other than that it worked great.  Next time I make these I will add less onion powder and maybe less nutritional yeast. The flavor, while great for me, was alittle much for the kids.

one of the boys took this

The last completed project I want to share is this. I finished my sweater! Yes, the sweater I started last year. Here is the blog where I shared my goal of finishing within the year.  I'm alittle late, but not much. And mostly I'm just so excited to finish it. I don't have a picture of it completed yet. I'll try and take one soon. Next up is socks. We'll see how quickly I get a pair done. I haven't started yet. Spent most of my time up at Boyne reading when I wasn't skiing, playing with kids or playing games with everyone else.
Well that's it. I realize this isn't an update on our family or the kids. But that's what you get today. Boyne and skiing update to come soon. Any fun projects you've completed lately??

Gluten free Reviews #2

So we started our adventures in eating gluten free back in August. Now in December I feel like I'm finally getting the hang of cooking and eating gluten free. And since it's been almost four months since my original review post  I figure it's time for another. As one might expect, after four months I have come to rely on a few staples in my kitchen. So I figure I'll start there.

Gluten Free All-purpose Flour Blend
In my freezer (because that is were I store the majority of my flours) I try to keep a gallon plastic bag of GF flour blend. My recipe is loosely based on Mary Frances' flour blend. Go check out her blog/website at http://www.glutenfreecookingschool.com/. She can be very helpful. Anyway, some friend of mine in Kansas fostered a child with Celiac Disease and so I turned to them early on for resources and suggestion for cooking and living gluten free. They happily gave me all sorts of information including several recipes that they loved. In there was an adaptation of one of Mary Frances' flour blends. (Their child could not have corn or dairy in addition to no gluten)
 Here is C and M's (my KS friends) recipe.
3 parts Brown rice flour
3 parts Sorghum flour
2 parts potato starch  (or tapioca starch)
1 part Millet flour
I have had a hard time finding Millet flour. In fact I haven't found any in the Goshen grocery stores. In the beginning I substituted buckwheat flour. And we liked that. More recently I have been using teff flour instead of millet. We really like the flavor this flour mix has.
And I tend to use it in everything. Such as
Pancakes- the recipe I have from C and M was adapted from Mary France's pancakes
Sandwich bread -again an adaptation of Mary France's sandwich bread. I should note here that I use a package of Active Yeast which is about 2 1/4 tsps I think. It seems to work well for me assuming I let it rise for a full hour in a warm spot.
Biscuits- this is one of the places I use a gluten free flour mix in place of wheat flour in a recipe. I have a great biscuit recipe  that I love And i have found that just substituting the flour with this flour blend works really well.

Cereal
We like cereal not only for breakfast but as part of snack with raisins and other dried fruit. Chex is gluten free and I tend to keep both rice chex and corn chex around. I even made gluten free chex mix using corn and rice chex, almonds, cashews, gluten free pretzels, and black bean chips. It was very yummy.

Rice Krispies has a gluten free version that my mother used to make rice krispie treats. They tastes good. And weren't too hard the next day. Of course we made sure to cover them with plastic wrap. I don't tend to keep these handy but it's nice to know they are available

ErviroKidz Organic Gorilla Munch Cereal seemed to be a big hit with Cai.  I send snacks with him to Preschool and this is what is currently there. He teachers say he loves them and is even disappointment when he doesn't get it due to the fact that snack that day is already gluten free.

Post Pebbles Cereals (both Coco and Fruity) are gluten free. Over thanksgiving my step-mother used Coco Pebbles to make rice crispy bars. Agian these are not something I keep on hand, but knowing it's out there and that it tastes good is nice. :)

Snack food
With little kids running around I have to have regular snacks available. Some things are easy, such as fruit or veggies with dip. Other things have been more tricky. Here are some of the staple snack foods I try to keep around.

Pretzels -Glutino brand twist and stick pretzels are enjoyed in our house. Everyone seems to like them. Although sometimes I'll hear Ian say he want the "gluten ones" again.

Crackers- Glutino has a round cracker that reminds me of Ritz. They taste pretty good. And we like them with soups or spreads.
                Crunchmaster as gluten free crackers. Although these did not go over as well with little boys. Don't know why, cause I like them.
                S'Moreables Graham Style Crackers are enjoyed by the younger too boys. Ian will only eat them after being told we have not other kinds in the house.
               Mary's gone Crackers are also enjoyed by all of us. I just got some to try in chex mix. We'll see how they taste that way.

Chips- Food Should Taste good has excellent chips. We really enjoy the multigrain and the sweet potato.

Snack bars- EnviroKidz Organic crispy rice bars are loved around here. Especially the chocolate.
                    Simply Sugar and Gluten Free by Amy Green has a great chewy granola bar recipe. I love it.It is one of the many wonderful recipes in Ms Green's cookbook.

Finally I want to share a book with you. The Essential Gluten-Free Grocery Guide put out by Triumph Dining has been very helpful. I have come to keep it in my bag so I always have it whether at the store or a friends house. It lists food companies and products that are gluten free along with alittle (not much mind you) information on the risk of cross-contamination. It has been a good purchase and makes finding things alot easier.

I'm sure there is alot more I could share. But I'll leave it here for now. :)

Menu Plan Monday- Nov 14th

Well Happy Tuesday! Its foggy and gloomy here. In fact schools have been delayed due to fog, giving me an extra hour this morning to get things done. How am I spending the time? Blogging and coming up with my menu that I neglected yesterday. :) Last's week potato crust for our quiche worked great. I had never used a potato crust before, even though there was a recipe in my Simply in Season cookbook. It was so easy, I used my food processor to shredded the potatoes and then pressed them into my pie plate with some oil. Prebake for about 10-15mins and ta da I have a crust. :) For our birthday party on Sunday I was in charge of cake. I used Gluten-Free Goddesses recipe for GF chocolate cupcakes. I didn't make the icing, although I want to try it in the future. The cupcakes were really good. Everyone enjoyed them. Point for me. This weeks I'm going to keep things as simple as possible. We leave for Kansas on Friday afternoon. I want to try and not have too many leftovers that will have to be thrown out. In case I'm silent again for awhile, its probably due to our Kansas trip. We'll be spending a week at my mom's visiting with family for Thanksgiving. :) Ok here is the menu for the week.

Monday: Cheese corn chowder with GF biscuits
Tuesday: Coconut milk curry over rice
Wednesday: Midweek meal at church
Thursday: leftovers or other simple meal
Friday and Saturday eating out while traveling
Sunday: At my Mom's! Hopefully she will feed us ;)

For more menus visit Organizing Junkie.

Menu Plan Monday- Sept 19th

Yes it's Tuesday, but you got a non-menu post yesterday. So I would say I'm not doing too bad. Plus I did plan my menu yesterday, just didn't get it posted here. I checked out a stack of gluten-free cookbooks last week. I'm hoping to try a few of the recipes in the next couple weeks. I'm needing good baked good recipes. I'm not as pleased with my  Gluten-Free Baking with The Culinary Institute of America cookbook as I had hoped. So now it's off too look/try something new. Hope all are having a good Tuesday. We had thick fog this morning but the sun is shining now. Looks like it will be a nice night to play softball (Mark is part of a community league and has a game tonight). On to our menu


Monday: Coconut milk curry over rice (a recipe given to me by a friend)
Tuesday: homemade pizza- haven't decided which new GF crust recipe I'm going to use yet. I'll try to remember to let you know.
Wednesday: Southwest Chicken with Peaches (from Cooking Free), side veggie, salad
Thursday: Summer Veggie Pasta with Lemon Yogurt Sauce (with GF pasta)
Friday- Sunday: I'm off duty
Note: Friday night- Saturday afternoon is the Michiana MCC Relief Sale. Although we haven't decided when we are definitively going at some point. :)

Don't forget to visit Organizing Junkie.

Menu Plan Monday- Sept 5th

Again it's Wednesday. This time though I feel like it's Monday. With Labor Day being Monday and Mark taking a vacation day on Tuesday, I feel like today is the start of our week. Mark went back to work. Ian started Preschool this morning. And I'm on for cooking dinner tonight. We have been hard at work over at our new house. Eileen was gracious enough to offer to cook both Monday night and last night. It sure made things easier to know that I did not have to worry about planning and cooking a meal after a long day of work. Now it's back to daily life; grocery shopping, cooking, cleaning and SCHOOL! Oh I can't tell you how happy I am for the routine that preschool provides. I'm desperate to get back to that regular routine, with some slight adjustments this year as Cai will be going on Tues and Thurs. YEAH!!! Ok on to our very short menu.

Wednesday: Pizza with a Gluten Free Crust (from Gluten-Free Baking with The Culinary Institute of America)
Thursday: Groundnut Stew over rice, side veggie (I substitute cornstarch for flour)
Friday- Sunday: my mother-in-law takes over cooking.

I might offer to cook Friday. In which case I think I'll make Chicken stir fry from Simply in Season

For more menus and recipe links head over to Organizing Junkie. Hope everyone is having a great week thus far.

Menu Plan Monday- Aug 29th

It's Wednesday yes, I know. But even a few days late is better than nothing, right?? Our weeks have been crazy. As I posted earlier today we closed on our house. Which means we have been trying to get things organized, work done, etc etc. Add to that a non schedule here at home and the boys and I are going alittle crazy. We will be ready for preschool to start next week. I'm so ready for the rhythms school will bring to our days and weeks. Anyhoo, here is our menu for this week.

Monday: Rice pasta with tomato sauce, green beans
Tuesday:Black bean, zucchini and tomato quesadilla on corn tortillas
Wednesday: Spicy Ginger Noodles, green beans, salad?
Thursday:  Zucchini Quiche
Friday - Sunday my mother-in-law is cooking :)

Like me and scrounging for supper ideas? Visit Organizing Junkie's Menu Plan Monday for menus, recipes and other dinner ideas :)

Gluten Free Reviews #1

Now I'm very aware that for families that have been gluten free for awhile these things may be a "no duh." But having now tired a few packaged/store bought gluten free (GF) products, I thought I would share our reviews. There are surprisingly many more options out there. And I'm sure I'll attempt to try some of the others available to us here in Goshen. But for today here are four product reviews. Extra bonus reviews on few online recipes :)

Homemade Bread-
There are several recipes I've found for bread online. And while I have not tried them all, or any but one. I was pleased with the result of the one I tried. No Gluten, No Problem has both a recipe for a GF flour blend, as well as a bread recipe using their flour blend. I had attempted the use the recipe but substitute their flour blend with a GF flour blend I found at our local food Coop Maple City Market. While the bread baked beautifully, neither Mark nor I enjoyed the flavor. I think it's due to the garbanzo bean flour, it over took the flavor of the flour blend thus making my bread taste like garbanzo beans (which I like, just not in my bread). When I then made a batch of the Artisan GF Flour Blend, the sandwich bread recipe was much more enjoyable. In fact we all really liked it. On top of a good flavor, it has a good constancy and texture. Plus it was pretty simple to make. I plan on experimenting with other recipes, but it's nice to have a good backup. :)

Pancakes-

Having used the Artisan GF Flour Blend in Alton Brown's GF chocolate chip recipe (and them turning our great), I thought I would try to substitute this flour in my normal pancake recipe. It did not turn out great. Cai ate them up no problem. Me, the grainy texture was alittle much. I ate them. They were OK. But not great.
This pancake fail happened in Kansas, as I had taken many of the flours/blends with me for just these types of things. I then forgot to grab them and let everything at my mother's. So while I have brown rice flour and potato starch, I do not have xanthan gum or any other binder. Thus until I get to the store am limited in want I can make that requires flour. Last Saturday our church had a pancake feed. I wanted to make pancakes for Cai so that we could attend. However I did not have the energy to shop for ingredients, search for a recipe. Thus I broke down and bought a box of pancake mix.

We were very pleased with the purchase. Gluten Free Pantry's pancake and waffle mix turned out to be really good. The pancakes were fluffy, yummy and the texture was not too grainy. So while I still want to find a good recipe, in a bind or when life is too crazy these are a great, convenient alternative.

Cake/Cupcakes-
The boys' birthdays were earlier this month. We celebrated with my mom and stepdad while in Kansas. But didn't get to celebrate with Mark. So Sunday afternoon we had a mini-party at the park for Cai, Ian and Oliver (their cousin). I really wanted to make a cake. In Kansas it was just easier to have ice cream sundays. And really that worked great. But I wanted cake. So while purchasing the above pancake mix we bought a cake mix as well.

Sorry no picture of the finished cupcakes (they were easier to eat at the park). Cherrybrooks Kitchen Gluten Free Dreams Chocolate Cake Mix turned out wonderful. The cake was moist. The top was sweet, even without frosting. And everyone enjoyed them. Mark and I were very pleased. Two success with store bought produces makes us hopeful for our future eating. :) Although we are bracing ourselves for the many failures that are sure to happen as I try my hand at making things myself. 

Pasta- 

We love pasta at our house. So I knew right off that we needed to find a good GF option. Thus far I have found one brand I like, and one I don't. 

Tinkyada Pasta Joy has worked well for us. We have enjoyed both the  brown rice spaghetti and the brown rice elbow pasta. It has good texture, good taste, and the claim to withstand over-cooking is very true. I'm mean come on, I have 3 little ones 5 yrs and under. Our pasta sometimes gets neglected. But this brand has yet to disappoint us. 

DeBoles Rice pasta did not turn out so well. It was chewy, grainy, and just left a bad aftertaste in my mouth. In fact after draining and tasting this pasta last night, I tossed it and made the Elbow from Tinkyada Pasta Joy. I have one more box of DeBoles (Rice Spirals). I'll give it one more try. But to tell the truth I'm not holding my breath. I don't think we'll be buying this brand again. 

Well there it is. Several review for you. I'm sure more will come. In fact I plan on sharing alot about our journey in Gluten Free eating. If you have suggestions, recipes, links and such you want to share, we would be very grateful. Cause really, while there is a plethora of information out there, it can be overwhelming to sift through.  Help is always welcome.