Sunday, February 23, 2014

Allergy Friendly Chocolate Chip Cookies


These cookies are nice and soft and super yummy! They are free of these common food allergens: gluten, wheat, nut, eggs, dairy.

Tools: scale, mixer, bowls, cookie scoop, baking mat
Oven Temperature: 350 degrees F
Weight: by grams

Soak your flax meal in a separate bowl while you prepare the other ingredients:
20   Flax Seed meal
60   Water

Whisk Dry ingredients together in a bowl and set aside:
100 Brown Rice Flour
100 Sweet White Rice Flour
60   Tapioca Starch
40   potato starch
8     Salt
5     Baking Soda
2    Xanthan Gum


In your mixing bowl, cream together the following ingredients until they are evenly combined:
150 Brown Sugar
100 Coconut Oil
10   Vanilla Extract


Combine all 3 bowls and mix for 3 minutes on medium speed.

Add:
200 grams of Enjoy Life Chocolate Chips.  (Or some other allergy free brand.)
100 grams GF Oats


Mix for another couple minutes and then scoop out 15-20 gram balls of dough onto a cookie sheet that has parchment covering it, or a silicon baking mat. Press each one with the spatula, they don't spread very well on their own.

Bake at 350 degrees F for 15 minutes, until golden brown.

When they come out let them cool for a few minutes before you transfer them to the cooling rack.
When they have cooled put them in an air tight container.

Tuesday, February 18, 2014

Soft gluten-free flour tortillas


These are great, and with a little practice you can be a tortilla master. They can also be used as naan for Indian dishes.

2 Cups Cybele Pascal's Basic Gluten-Free Flour
1 Cup Tapioca Starch
1 Tablespoon Baking powder
1 teaspoon Baking soda
1/4 teaspoon Xanthum Gum
1 teaspoon salt
1 Tablespoon sugar

Sift together and add:

1/2 Cup softened butter
1 Cup strained plain greek yogurt

Knead everything together. The dough should be easy to handle. For best results, let it sit covered for a few hours.

If you feel the dough is too dry, add a couple tablespoons of milk or water to help combine everything a little better.

Rolling out your tortillas:

Start heating up your skillet to medium heat. Layout  parchment paper, then grab a small handful of dough and cover it in tapioca starch and roll out with a rolling pin. I find it easy to get them very thin, but they taste great a little thicker too. To get a perfectly round tortilla, find a plate the size you would like and place it over your rolled out dough. Then cut around the plate with a butter knife. The scraps can easily be worked back into your remaining dough. Place the dough on the skillet and watch for it to bubble up a little bit, that is when you flip it and let it cook on the over side. Enjoy!



Friday, February 14, 2014

Vanilla Bean Sugar Cookies

These cookies are amazing. I can't think of a better way to spend Valentine's Day than eating some gluten-free, egg-free, and nut-free love.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F

Dry Ingredients:
3 Cups Cybele Pascal's Basic Gluten-Free Flour Mix
1/2 Cup Coconut Flour
1 teaspoon Baking Soda
1/2 teaspoon Salt
1/4 teaspoon xanthum gum
Sift together and set aside:

In a separate bowl cream together wet ingredients:
1 Cup Sugar
1 Cup Butter
1/2 Cup strained Plain Greek Yorgurt
1Tablespoon Vanilla Bean Paste* (you can get this online or at a fancy kitchen store)

* If you don't want to use Vanilla Bean Paste you can use regular vanilla, but only use 1 teaspoon.

Combine both bowls gradually. I get it out of the bowl and kneed it all together, but I only have a hand held mixer. The dough gets pretty stiff.

I don't chill the dough because the coconut flour would soak up all the moisture and make the dough too dry. It is nice because you don't have to plan in advance to make these yummy cookies.

Lay out your parchment and and use extra gluten-free flour to help you roll it out. Try to get them about 1/4"thick.

Place on parchment paper and doubled up cookie sheet (unless you have a fancy cookie sheet that prevents burning on the bottom).

Cook for about 15 minutes, or until they start turning a little golden brown along the edges.

Let cool and enjoy!

****A slight variation on this that I do sometimes is using 1/4 cup of coconut flour (instead of 1/2 a cup) and adding 1/4 cup milled flax seed. I gives it a nice texture.