Salmon kabobs with roasted brussels sprouts

This is one of my favorites. Mostly because I LOVE brussel sprouts. I used to not like them at all, but I found a recipe that works and now I love them. The key, in my opinion, is roasting them. For the kabobs: Salmon, cut into 1 inch square pieces green pepper, cut into 1 inch square pieces purple onion, cut into 1 inch square pieces garlic powder salt pepper olive oil For Brussels Sprouts: Cut the ends off your brussels sprouts and slice in half, length wise. Drizzle with olive oil and salt and pepper to taste. Layer all the kabob goodies onto a stick, drizzle with olive oil and season with the above seasoning to taste. This would be great on the grill, but because of our temporary living situation we did not have that option. So instead I lined a large baking sheet with tin foil. I put the kabobs on one half of the sheet and the brussel sprouts on the other. I covered both with tin foil and baked at 400 degrees for 40 minutes. It turned out great!

Pot Roast Chili

We had a crock pot beef roast the other day, and as always we had left overs. I was trying to think of something different to do with the left overs, so I decided to make chili. It came out pretty good! You will need: 1 large container gluten free chicken stock (or vegetable stock if you prefer) 2 Large tomatos, finely diced 3 garlic cloves, finely diced 1 medium onion, finely diced 1 can chili beans (make sure it says gluten free on back or check manufacturers website) 1 can kidney beans (same as above) 2 Tablespoons chili powder (this is to taste really, everyone likes their chili different) Left over Pot Roast (I had about half a roast left, seasoning on the roast was just garlic and parsley) I started by sautéing the onion and garlic in a little bit of olive oil in a large soup pot. Once tender, I added the tomatoes and quickly mixed together. Then I added the stock and beans. I chopped up the remainder of pot roast and added it to the soup, and finished with the chili powder. Bring all ingredients to a boil, then let simmer. The trick to really good chili, in my opinion, is simmer time. The longer you simmer, the better it tastes.

Beef Tacos with Sweet Potato Slaw

This recipe is both a success....and a flop. It's a success in that both things tasted great, however the pairing is just not right. They would both be good paired with something else, so I decided to post them anyway, with that disclosure.

I'll start with the tacos, which are pretty self explanatory! You will need: 1 lb ground beef (or turkey) 2 garlic cloves 1 small vidalia onion, finely diced 1 teaspoon chili powder 1/2 teaspoon salt 1/2 teaspoon pepper Gluten free corn tortillas ice burg lettuce baby spinach sliced avacado shredded cheese diced tomato Brown the ground beef with finely chopped garlic cloves and onion. Add seasoning. Once cooked top with your favorite toppings (or use mine listed above!) Sweet Potato Slaw 1 large sweet potato, diced 1/2 head of purple cabbage, shredded 1/2 head of green cabbage, shredded 1/2 cup carrots, shredded 2 tablespoons olive oil 1 teaspoon brown sugar Mix all ingredients in small roasting pan and roast at 400 degrees for about an hour (or until sweet potato fully baked). This was good, however too sweet to go along side a taco.

Crock Pot Chicken Lettuce Wraps

Hello all! Well things have been busy lately and I have been unable to post. I have been trying to take note and pictures of my recipes anyway, so I'll have a few to post today. We are in a new location for my husbands work, and are staying in an apartment for a couple months. It's been strange not having my own kitchen to cook in! While we've been here I have been trying to make more of an effort to eat "clean" and make nutritious meals for the family. I'll start with lettuce wraps! I have been trying to use the crock pot a lot lately. For one thing, it's easy. You can throw whatever you want in there in the morning and not have to worry about dinner for the rest of the day! Since we are more or less on "vacation" from our normal lives (ok, maybe just the girls and I, Clayton still has to work), it's nice to spend less time in the kitchen and more time outside enjoying the pool and playground!

You will need: *3 chicken breast *1 8 oz can bamboo shoots *1 8 oz can water chestnuts, finely chopped *1 cup diced mushrooms *2-3 celery stalks, diced *1/2 cup gluten free peanut butter *1/2 cup gluten free soy sauce *1 tablespoon brown sugar *1/2 cup finely diced or shredded carrots *Ice Burg lettuce, washed and peeled into cups I placed all ingredients except the last two in the crock pot and let it cook all day (about 8 hours). I did go back and stir the ingredients a couple times throughout the day, to make sure all the flavors were mixing and the peanut butter was resolving into the rest of the dish. Before serving, I transfered everything to another dish and shredded the chicken. Then I added to carrots (not cooked, I did this for the texture, to add a little crunch) and mixed well. Add this to your lettuce bowls and that's it! Enjoy!

Coffee Cake Banana Bread (Gluten Free)

I tried baking last night and it was terrible. I burned it. I will blame it on getting carried away with the Walking Dead finale on TV. Anyway, I decided to try again tonight. Tonight's attempt came out MUCH better. I adapted this recipe from one I found in my husbands family cook book, and added the filling based on one I found online.

You will need:

Batter:
*1 stick of butter, softened
*1/2 cup splenda
*1/2 cup sugar (you can skip the splenda and do 1 cup sugar if you wish)
*1/2 cup honey flavored greek yogurt (I'm sure plain or vanilla would suffice, this is what I had)
*2 eggs
*2 medium over-ripe bananas, mashed
*2 cups Bobs Red Mills all purpose gluten free baking flour mix
*3/4 teaspoon xanthan gum
*3 Tablespoons flaxseed meal
*2 teaspoons gluten free baking powder

Filling:
*1 Tablespoon butter, melted
*1/2 cup packed brown sugar
*1 Tablespoon cinnamon

Topping (optional):
*walnuts

Preheat oven to 350 degrees and grease a loaf pan. In electric blender, mix butter, sugar, and yogurt until creamed together. Add eggs and bananas and mix well. In separate bowl, combine dry ingredients. Add dry ingredients to bowl and mix well. Mix filling ingredients together separately. Poor half of the batter into the loaf pan. Spread filling evenly over batter. Top with remaining batter. Add walnuts if desired. Bake for 40-45 minutes (until toothpick comes out clean).

I am not a baker, and frequently mess up my attempts, however I think this turned out good! Enjoy it, this may be the only baked good that makes the blog!

Veggie and Coconut Quinoa

This recipe was inspired by a conversation with my friend Kim. We both love coconut. She was telling me about something she makes with coconut, and I couldn't remember if it was rice or quinoa. Since quinoa takes on 20 minutes to prepare and gluten free brown rice takes 45 minutes, I went with the quinoa. I suspect either option would taste great.


What you will need:

1 cup coconut milk
1 cup water
1 cup quinoa
carrots, finely diced (I used about 5 or 6 baby carrots)
Frozen peas (I did not measure, but I would guess about 1/2 cup)
1/3 cup shredded, sweetened coconut
1 tablespoon butter
dash of red pepper flakes

In a medium sauce pan, mix coconut milk, water, and quinoa. Bring to a boil, cover and simmer 15-20 minutes or until all liquid is absorbed. While quinoa is simmering, begin to melt butter in a small frying pan. Add carrots and sauté until tender, about 3 minutes. Add red pepper flakes. Add frozen peas and sauté for about a minute. Finally, add the shredded coconut and cook until just toasted. When both things are done, serve veggie mixture over top of quinoa.

This tasted great. The sweet flavor of the coconut and the slight hint of spice from the red pepper flakes went well together. I made this a vegetarian dish tonight, but next time I think I'll try adding shrimp.

Mexi Pizza

Friday night in our house is Pizza and a movie night. Because of Layna's allergy, we do not order pizza, but rather make our own. This recipe was thrown together when we had a busy Friday and no time for the traditional pizza crust. This is quick and easy and you can switch up the toppings pretty easy!


You will need:

*Small corn tortillas (Make SURE they say gluten free if you are Gfree)
*Philadelphia Cooking Creme, Santa Fe flavor
*Gluten free refried beans
*Small roma tomato, chopped
*Small can roasted and diced green chilies
*Mexi blend shredded cheese


Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Begin topping pizza, beginning with the Santa Fe cooking cream as your sauce, followed by refried beans, tomatoes, shredded cheese, and finally the green chilies. Bake for 10 minutes (or until cheese is melted) and serve! This would also be good with a bit of sour cream on top.

Egg & Avocado Grilled Cheese

Disclaimer: This is not a healthy recipe. In fact, I almost didn't post this because of that. But then, I started thinking that although I try to feed my family healthy nutritious meals as much as possible, sometimes you just need straight up comfort food. And that is what this is! And let's be honest, it isn't THAT bad. It may be high in fat content and calories, but it COULD be worse, right? I also thought this would be a good opportunity to debunk a misconception that going gluten free automatically means being "healthy". This is just not true. Sure, it CAN be healthy, but so can all diets that people live by if they choose to make it so (maybe not all diets, if you live by a double the sugar, fry the carbs only diet, you may be in trouble. Sorry.), but it isn't always healthy just because you take the gluten out of it. When I tell people we don't eat gluten in our house, they almost always ask if it's to loose weight. Yes, some people are successful at this, but my point is you have to do more then just take out gluten to be healthy. Take out processed foods, refined sugars, etc. On that note, lets get to this non healthy dish for the night!

Egg & Avocado Grilled Cheese Sandwiches. It gets better. Paired with tator tots! YUM! I realize I've been doing a lot of meals containing avocado lately. If you do not like avocado, please do not be frightened by my posts. I just happened to have avocado in the house so it ended up in a few meals this weekend. This is not the norm.

You will need:

*2 eggs, scrambled
*1 small avocado, thinly sliced
*Thin sliced colby jack cheese
*4 slices Gluten free bread (I use Udi's whole grain)
*butter for spreading
*Orde Ide tator tots (this brand is gluten free)


This is pretty self explanatory. First I set the oven to 450 and started baking the tator tots. While they were cooking I spread a very thin layer of butter on each slice of bread. I lay the bread butter slice down in a warm frying pan (mine was still warm from scrambling the eggs). Lay a couple slices of cheese on the bread and let toast slightly. From there, move the bread to a baking sheet. Add the eggs and avocado to 2 slices. When there is about 5 minutes left on the tator tots, put this in the oven and bake for remaining time. When done, put the sandwich together.

This turned out very good. I recommend having an eating buddy though, as I could only finish half of mine. It was very filling. Both my girls split one sandwich and ate every last bite. It was a hit. The perfect comfort dinner for a cold snowy day like we had today!

Energy Sustaining Breakfast Bars

This next recipe is good. Really good. You can't have just one good. That aside, there are two reasons why I love this recipe; It's healthy and it's fast. It took me roughly 10 minutes start to finish to prepare these, plus chilling time.

This recipe was given to me by my good friend Kimberly Janssen. Kim is a very healthy person, however she is also an excellent cook/baker. So I love getting recipes from her. Her recipe below says to turn these into patties, I decided to use a medium cookie scoop and turn them into balls. The girls LOVED these for snack time and had no clue they were a healthy option. I followed a tip from Kim and put the left overs in a zip lock back in the freezer, so you can pull one out when you need a treat. Also, I did not use spirulina in mine because I did not have any on hand. Still tasted great.

Thank you Kim for sharing this recipe with me and for allowing me to share it on my blog. On a side note, she is trying to find her source for this recipe. If she is able to find it I will post that here.


2 ½ c. old-fashioned quick oats*
½ c. whole flax seed
¼ c. dark cocoa powder (or slightly less)
½ c. natural peanut butter
½ c. honey
½ t. spirulina
½ - 1 c. HOT water

Stir ingredients together and form into individual, hamburger-sized patties. Wrap in plastic wrap and keep in freezer or fridge.


*The oats. This is important for people following a gluten free diet. You must make sure you oats are certified gluten free. While oats are naturally gluten free, they almost always pick up cross contamination either from the field they are grown in or from being processed in the same facilities that process wheat. That little warning on the back that says "may contain traces of wheat"? Yeah, that might as well say "this has wheat in it, don't eat". I found this out the hard way in our early days. The same goes for rice. Always check that is SAYS gluten free on the package. A good rule to live by with gluten free living is, if you aren't sure, don't eat it. For people with a severe gluten allergy, it's not worth the risk. I like to use Bob Red Mills gluten free oats, as shown here.

Sneaky Vegetable Smoothies

My oldest daughter is a very picky eater. If it's green or resembles a vegetable, she won't touch it. She does have a sweet tooth though. I starting looking up recipes for smoothies online and came to this conclusion: as long as you have a good base (I like banana, greek yogurt, strawberries, and honey) then you can throw pretty much anything else you want in there and it will go undetected. I've been mostly successful with this theory! There are lots of ways to change this up, but this is what I usually make for my kids (and myself!)

*1 large banana
*hand full of frozen strawberries
*1/2 cup plain greek yogurt (I like the protein punch you get from greek)
*1/2 cup whole milk (you can easily use fat free, since I am dealing with toddlers I use whole)
*1 tablespoon honey
*1 tablespoon flaxseed meal
*1 hand full fresh spinach
*frozen peas (I just use a small hand full, not sure exact measurements)

Blend well! That's it, super easy. I've also used an avocado in place of greek yogurt when I've been out. It is high in good fats so great for growing toddlers and comes out to the same consistency

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Tomato Basil Chicken Quinoa Casserole

OK, this should probably have a shorter name. I threw this one together tonight based on what I had in the fridge and it turned out amazing (in my and my childrens opinion, please try and comment your thoughts!!). I did not have a better name for it. And since I'm from the midwest, everything is a casserole. SO, here we go! My first recipe! I apologize for the picture quality, it's from my phone. I literally had one bite and grabbed the nearest camera source b/c it was so good.

You will need:

*Quinoa prepared (I followed the directions on the box, 2 cups water, 1 cup quinoa. bring to boil, simmer 15 min or until liquid is absorbed)
*1 chicken breast, diced in small bit size pieces
*1/2 small onion, finely chopped
*1 garlic clove, finely chopped
* olive oil for frying pan (I eye ball this, I would guess a tablespoon)
*1 tub Philadelphia cooking creme, tomato basil flavor
* 1/4 cup fat free milk
*2 large roma tomatoes, diced
* 1 cup fresh spinach, chopped
*1 cup mozzarella cheese, shredded
* avocado, optional.

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Heat frying pan, add oil. Add chicken, onion, and garlic. Cook until chicken is fully cooked, stirring frequently. Add philadelphia cooking creme and turn heat down to low. Add milk. While this is cooking, start your quinoa in a separate, medium size sauce pan. Once both things are fully cooked, combine the chicken mixture into the saucepan of quinoa. Add spinach and tomatoes and mix well. Poor mixture into casserole pan and top with mozzarella. Bake for 20 minutes. I paired with a sliced avocado and thought they went well together! Enjoy!!

It's been a while, what's new?

Hello! I'm back! As promised, I have been horrible at keeping this up! I have been meaning to get on here and post recipes, since that was my main reason for this blog, but of course life got in the way and it never happened. I will post a few recipes tonight in other posts, but I thought perhaps I should update on Layna first!


We have been living the gluten free life for nearly 6 months now, and I cannot begin to tell you what a difference it has made to Layna. We'll start with the weight, which was the original problem that started us on this. Within two weeks of us taking her off gluten, she gained back the pound she lost. Amazing. On top of that, her teeth came in (another developmental delay that we did not realize was associate with gluten intolerance), and I'm talking they came in full force. She went from being a year old with no teeth, to being 14 months old with ALL her teeth. She started sleeping at night (well, most nights, we still have our moments). And the constant "spitting up"? Well, turns out she was actually throwing up as a reaction to gluten. It stopped almost immediately, and it is now our signal that something we are cooking has gluten in it. If she eats gluten throws it up, within the hour. No fail. I learned the importance of not only reading food labels, but checking websites for allergy info this way. She one time smiled at me then immediately threw up chocolate pudding, along with everything else she ate (so gross) because I thought the food label looked safe and I was wrong.

The other allergies, good news. She seems to be outgrowing all of them. She has dairy now with no issues. We recently started introducing things that contain soy at the instruction of her pediatrician, and so far so good. We do small amounts for now, but will work our way up. It looks like she'll only have to deal with a gluten free life, nothing else.

She is now a happy, healthy, almost 18 month old little girl. I can't wait for her 18 month check up to hear her stats and compare! She has had some other issues, unrelated, I think. She apparently also has asthma and sadly we ended up in the ER one night after an episode. She was fine in the end, Thank GOD!

Well that is pretty much what's new with Layna health wise! Now I'll get on to posting recipes. Most recipes I get from other sources, such as pinterest or gluten free cook books. But every once in a while I come up with my own, which is what I'll start with next post! Enjoy!