Stagg chili is gluten free

Another company puts gluten free on the label. Thank you Stagg.

I’m still here. Sorta. 🙂 Since I’m gluten free for life, you won’t get rid of me that easy! I’m blogging more often at JessieGunderson.com and busy with my five Thinglets, five acres and being a home school junkie. Haha! Anyhow, if you subscribe you won’t miss it when I post. I’ll just stick to the best of the best. Thanks for being patient.

 

Tomato Harvest

I’m not saying it’s time yet to pull out the ear muffs and wool socks but since I picked a five gallon bucket full of tomatoes the other day it was time to get soupy and saucy and salsa-ie.  Seriously, it was crazy and being the goof that I am there are tons more to come!

Obviously I did not follow the cardinal rule of tomato planting.  What do they say?  One’s enough for me, two to share, three is out of the question!  Well, I can’t resist tomato plants.  I got them at the market, I saved them from the highschool nursery and I even let the volunteers that came up from last years crop stick around in wierd places.  I think I have eight or more plants.

What do you do with your tomato harvest? Feed them to the baby?

So far I’ve made tomato sauce, salsa, tomato soup and even sun dried tomatoes.

If it is still swelteringly hot in your neck of the woods you’ll have to bookmark this recipe for a rainy day!

So lug in that big bucket of tomatoes and pick the ugliest one’s you have.  This is an excellent recipe for the warped and twisted tomatoes that you can’t pawn off on the neighbors or the one’s with the cracks and blemishes that you can’t sneak past the family!

If you have fresh tomatoes coming out your ears, your eyes and your fingertips like I do this recipe is nearly FREE!  Although, in my house it might cost you a quarter.  Thing 1 is quite the wheeler and dealer.  He told his brothers they could get a white piece of paper and draw George Washington on it if they didn’t have a quarter.

One Ton Tomato Soup (dairy and gluten free):

p.s. can anyone come up with a better name? How boreing is that? Thanks Dianne for the new name!

You will need:

• 1 dozen tomatoes (all sizes shapes and kinds)
• butter or non dairy substitute
• 2 T brown sugar
• 2 T corn starch or rice flour
• 1 red onion (we picked one from the garden)
• 2 cup chicken broth (reserve 1/2 cup and use if needed)
• 1 T  balsamic vinaigrette
• season to taste

Dice up a dozen or so.  No need to skin them but if you so desire slice an x on the opposite side of the stem and drop into very hot water for 30 sec or more, but not long enough to cook.  The skin should peel right off.

1. Melt  1/2 stick of unsalted butter (or marg) in a large pot then add the diced tomatoes.

2. Add one chopped red onion, and 2 T brown sugar and cook over med/high approx 15 min.

3. Add most of the chicken broth and the 2 T corn starch. Simmer covered 10 min.  My tomatoes were so juicy I did not need the whole 2 Cups of broth.

4. Let cool slightly then puree the soup in a Magic Bullet or food processor.  Please to not be a dunce like me and fill the blender 3/4 full to save time.  Tomatoes stain EVERYTHING!  It’s best to fill your blender no more than half full.  Yay me, always having to learn the hard way!

5. Strain through a cloth or small slotted strainer. You can omit this step if you peel the tomatoes first.

6. Pour soup back into the pot and taste!  Simmer adding balsamic vinaigrette (if the tomatoes are too sweet – the one’s from my garden are almost like apples) salt, pepper ( I like to use the colorful peppercorn) and if you desire cayenne or red pepper flakes.

7. Serve with croutons from your last gf bread mistake and enjoy!

Variations: If you do not have allergies you can add 1/2 Cup heavy cream in the last step to make Cream of Tomato Soup but I found the soup to be creamy enough without. Also regular croutons go nicely if you are not avoiding wheat.  We forgive you! 😉

Please visit Linda’s new and improved “What Can I Eat That’s Gluten Free” and don’t forget to check out the other great recipes this week!

Chronicles of a one armed cook.

I should have named my blog, “The Chronicles of a One Armed Cook”!  There are always at least two other thing going on while I am trying to make food.  Often times I am fixing a bottle for the Bubba, listening to and helping Thing 1  to read or blending up various foods in the Magic Bullet for Pee Wee.  Thing 2 tends to be good at entertaining himself, for better or worse.

This meal was no exception and though I’m sure I’ve said it before; I am no amazing chef, just a busy mamma trying desperately to find inexpensive and quick meals for a large gluten free family!  I want gluten free to be something that is not allusive, not expensive and at this stage in my life, not gourmet!  Sorry to those of you with lots of time on your hands, these recipes will rarely be for you! 🙂  I do, however, occasionally make things ahead (late at night) to ease my pain during the week. 

The bbq chicken in this meal is made all at once.  We buy a bag of chicken thighs at Costco, marinade it in Italian salad dressing overnight and throw all of it on the barby the next day.  Throughout the week I use the pre-cooked chicken in various ways.

It seems that I mention Costco often but truthfully we don’t buy a lot of things there…

1. salmon
2. chicken thighs
3. coffee
4. tortillas
5. avacado’s
6. and sometimes diapers

Chicken n’ Rice Soup:

This recipe is not as obnoxiously large as others I have posted since I’m “repurposing” my bbq chicken.  All you will need is chicken broth, chicken, rice and any veggies you would like to include or have on hand.

If I can do it you can do it! (Recipe):

1. Pour 16 oz of chicken broth into a med pan and set the burner on high.
2. Add cooked or instant rice (1 Cup will make it quite hearty)
3. Add shredded or bite size cooked chicken (2 thighs or 1 breast)
4. If desired add shredded carrots and a bit of cilantro
5.  bring to a boil (especially if using instant rice) then immediately reduce heat to med/low

Serve with sunflower carrots!

This has been another recipe for the “What’s for Dinner Wednesday Blog Carnival” Hosted by the Gluten Free Homemaker. Thanks for stopping and check out more great ideas here.

Green smoothie pants and still smiling.

Well, as always I had a bit of fun this week and my darling Thinglets never disappoint. 

Little Pee Wee has been chowing down her twice daily “bulk up” baby smoothie.  It’s a mixture of avocado and banana with goat milk or water and looks exactly like Nickelodeon SLIME.  She gets a bit frantic about me shoveling it in her mouth and flaps her arms while smacking- mouth wide open, “WAHHH!” too slow mom- then smack, open again like a little bird. 

Meantime the Bubba had just emerged from an early morning (and yes, premature) bath time, thanks to potty training, so he was standing in the buff next to me insisting I “Wap Bubba, Mom!”

He wanted his “Nigh-night” wrapped like a cape around him.

“Wap!”

Smack!

WAHHH!

“Wap!”

Crash!

You guess it, the Bubba got wrapped, Pee Wee got smacked and Mamma got SLIMED! ICK!

The awesome thing is I didn’t even cry or yell.

With company coming over for a Bible Study and no time for anything fancy we made our simplest meal ever.  Another winner suggested by my wonderful MIL who is forever surprising me with easy, feed an army solutions for my crazy hand to hand combat of a life!  I think she must giggle when I try to plan ahead by calling her in the morning “Do you have any ideas?”  then when she does I have to call her three more times before I can get it all written down.  I have to giggle at myself when I finally sit down to read what I wrote and it goes something like this…

Boil

Drain

Smash

Add sour cream or ?

Stir

Serve

Nearly as simple as getting SLIMED!

My kids even ate thirds!

Potato Soup for a Party:

Do I really have to go there? (Shopping List):

• potatoes 24 sm- serves approx 15-20 people
• sour cream or non-dairy milk (16oz sour cream)
• 2 small onions
• ham (if you like)

If I can do it you can do it! (Recipe):

I made this meal ahead so if you do not have time for that start at step 4 then back to step 1.

1. Dice (into bite size pieces) and boil Potato’s (we used 24 small russets) 5-8min just until a fork can pierce one.
2. Drain off most the water then smash up some of the potatoes (this will be the broth).
3. Add sour cream (16oz- if you are expecting a crowd or if you plan to freeze and murder the menu plan  notion as I have done). You can also use Mocha Mix or another non-dairy substitute.  We pulled out some of the potatoes and made a second non-dairy batch for the Bubba.
4. Season to taste.  Puree  and saute 2 small red onions (I can’t stand the texture of onion) with 4 garlic cloves (pressed) and add salt and pepper to taste.
5. The potatoes went (mostly) into a large crock-pot and then the onion mixture got stirred in and the whole thing simmered on low until we were ready to eat.
6. Freeze the leftovers and re-heat in a pan over med/low heat or return the whole mess (I mean delicious and oh so gourmet soup) to a crock-pot on low 1hr (or more).  You can add more liquid if it is too thick at this point.  Water works fine.
7. This is also delicious if you add diced up ham. I had some in the freezer and I added it in at the last minute.

Again, my main man, the real Goof couldn’t resist calculating the cost of this one.  We scored a huge bag of potatoes on sale for $0.99 and a container of sour cream costs about the same.  Realistically a $5.oo meal.  This meal would serve approx 15 people so it’s less than a $0.35 per serving even if we had to pay more for the potatoes and use some Mocha Mix.

This has been another recipe for the “What’s for Dinner Wednesday Blog Carnival” Hosted by the Gluten Free Homemaker. Thanks for stopping and check out more great ideas here.

I’ve also submitted this recipe at the $5 dinner challenge at www.5dollardinners.com check it out, there are tons of inexpensive ideas!