Pamela’s Mix - Chocolate Chip Cookies

On Sunday, I came upstairs for a little break from the noise and set to work on my computer.  It wasn’t that long before I went back downstairs, and found a container of cookies on the counter, and a little presentation plate set up.  Where did they come from?

Andy and the boys had made cookies using the Pamela’s mix, and the recipe on the bag.  He found that the 15 minutes called for was too crisp for his liking, so he tried 8 minutes for the next sheet.  Those were nice, but didn’t really hold together as well.

We liked the taste and texture of the cookies.  However, we do prefer the pudding cookie recipe.  You could use the Pamela’s mix in this recipe, too.  You know, I think we need to make some pudding cookies.  We sorta missed out on Teacher Appreciation Week last week, since we were all sick.  I think Braden’s teacher could use some cookies and brownies.

Time Is Running Out

The deadline is approaching to get the early bird pricing for the Gluten Intolerance Group’s Annual Education Conference. Register by May 21st to save some money. Conference dates are June 6 and 7, in the Dallas/Fort Worth area.

This conference is going to be a total blast. I know - I helped organize it. And, if you come, you can meet me Alive and In Person (and with a 6-month-pregnant belly, lol). I mean, you all want to come just to meet me, right?

Well, if that’s not a good enough reason, then let me give you some more.

We are going to have some fabulous speakers. Cookbook authors: Roben Ryberg, Carol Fenster, Annalise Roberts, and Jennifer Cinquepalmi. Dieticians: Shelley Case and Cathy Breedon. Gluten-Free life experts: Danna Korn and Andrea Levario. Doctors: Michelle Pietzak, Edward Hoffenburg, Jean Layton, Steve Wangen and Megan Tichy. And let us not forget our guest speaker, the one and only, Dr. Alessio Fasano (he will be speaking at the Saturday night banquet).

A Texas Hoedown Barbeque and Dance awaits us for the Friday night entertainment. We are going to have a Singing Cowboy, and line dance instructor. Come have some fun, Texas-Style! Our Saturday night banquet will have such a wonderful atmosphere. We get to be a little fancied-up, eat, and chat with our new friends, listen to Dr. Fasano speak, and participate in a live auction, which helps fund the various children’s camps that GIG puts on every year.

I even have the inside scoop on the items for the live auction. Shh. Come closer and I’ll tell you a few.

• Four different bed and breakfast packages, including the famous (to my blog readers, anyways) Chicken Paradise
• Two autographed Dallas Cowboys footballs
• A personal chef service
• A set of two American Airlines tickets to anywhere in the continental U.S. (round trip!)
• Sunday morning breakfast with Dr. Fasano (ladies, I know y’all want to bid on this one)

We’ve got some great silent auction items that will be available to bid on Friday and Saturday. Some will even have a “buy now” option if you’ve just got to have it. Here’s a few to tickle your fancy:

• Texas/Southwest themed kitchenware
• Giftcards from nationally recognized restaurants
• Unique handmade gifts, like jewelry from my friend, Tara
• Lots of great gluten-free food baskets

We had some ideas to spruce up the conference a bit, and make it even more user-friendly:

• A pack and mail service available, for all the food, books, and auction items you buy
• Chair massages
• A walk-around breakfast, where the vendors supply the carbs (get ready to chow down)
• A book table, run by me (and David, our treasurer), to outfit you with the speakers’ books - because I know you’ll want to buy some

If you are bringing a companion who is not into the whole conference thing, they will be just minutes away from Grapevine Mills Mall, which has just about everything, including a huge movie theater and other entertainment areas. Check out this Vacation In Texas brochure I helped create for more ideas.

So come and join us. It will be the highlight of your summer. I know it will be mine!

Pink Is My Favorite Color

It is, actually (I have become girlie in my adulthood).  But, dun dun dun duh!  I now get to buy a lot of pink.  We had our sonogram today, and it sure looks like a girl.  We are all very excited.

GoGo Rice Bowls

For lunch today, I tried a new (to me) product: GoGo Rice Bowls. Specifically, I had the Thai peanut.

Does life get much easier than microwaving a bowl of rice for a minute and a half? It’s healthy, too. The ingredients are: organic white rice, peanuts, dried mango, millets, kosher salt, dried carrots, spices, filtered water.

The Thai peanut is spicy. It is completely unlike A Taste of Thai or Thai Kitchen peanut noodles (which are completely unlike each other). I really don’t know how to describe this. You just have to try it for yourself.

These would be great to have around for minor emergencies, like finding out at the last minute that you are not eating at home, lol. I will definitely try the other varieties when I get the chance.

Attune Probiotic Bars

I recently received some samples of Attune Probiotic Wellness Bars (thanks, Sarika!).  When she told me they were chocolate bars, I didn’t know what to expect.  Boy was I surprised.

It’s almost like eating a Hershey’s bar, except there is less sugar, less funky ingredients, and they are good for you.  They have 5 times the live cultures as yogurt.  (You can read more about probiotics on their site.)

It really is like eating a good chocolate bar, though less sweet than what most people buy (which is better, IMO).  I really liked eating these.  Andy tried one, and incredulously asked “these are supposed to be good for you?  They just taste like chocolate.”  The response from my support group was similar - it’s basically good chocolate.

Oh, yeah, it also contains 12% of your daily value of fiber - the same as a serving of Metamucil (which I have only actually managed to drink once - ick).

Attune chocolate bars come in 4 flavors: chocolate crisp, dark chocolate, mint chocolate, and blueberry vanilla (made with white chocolate).  Best of all, these are gluten-free.  (FYI - they do make granola bars that are not.)

So if you like to help boost your immune system, or you just want a yummy chocolate bar (that’s good for you), then give these products a try.

My Kind of Fast Food

While getting some salad and carrot chips last week, I noticed these “butter blends” - bags of fresh veggies with a scoop of butter. I was starving by this point in my shopping excursion, and indescribably tired. So, of course, I bought a bag. I think I made a pretty good choice.

I got red potatoes. You stick the whole bag in the microwave for 5 minutes and out comes steamed potatoes - already buttered. Now, generally, I don’t like being bothered by butter, but I didn’t shake the bag before opening it, so mostly the butter stayed on the bottom. I sprinkled some rosemary and garlic seasoning on them, and Carter and I had a pretty good lunch.

My bag leaked a bit, so I had to clean some butter up from the microwave tray. I don’t know if that was an isolated incident or not. But next time, I’ll stick the bag on a plate, just to be safe.

No washing or scrubbing, I had fresh potatoes, and all I had to clean up was 2 forks and the microwave tray (we used paper plates, lol). Not bad, and pretty healthy.

Teff Wraps - La Tortilla Factory

We had soft tacos for dinner tonight, and for the first time in 4 years, did not have corn tortillas!

These tortillas worked really well for soft tacos. They had a good flavor, and held together really well (and our meat was pretty juicy - lots of taco seasoning tonight). At least mine did - Braden was taking all sorts of funky bites out of his because his taco was too big for his mouth.

They are a bit too big for children, because they are burrito sized tortillas. Carter had half of one, but promptly destroyed it anyways (though he did eat it all and all the insides, too).

I am really grateful to have finally found them. I have been looking since they came out, and asked every grocery store around to carry them. They finally showed up at the salvage health food store I go to.

You can’t really see it, but these are actually made by La Tortilla Factory. They also have teff wraps under their Smart & Delicious label, both dark and ivory teff.

I will definitely be buying these again (as long as I can find them). I have 2 & 1/2 packages in my freezer right now, and may go get some more before my store runs out of them.

Oh, very important, by the way, these are certified gluten-free by the Gluten-Free Certification Organization (GFCO) run by GIG (Gluten Intolerance Group). This process involves lots of testing. Cynthia Kupper (national director of GIG) said that they even swabbed the air vents to check for gluten in the La Tortilla Factory - those people do a fantastic job at cleaning.

If you get a chance to try them, I would definitely recommend it.

Chocolate Chip Shortbread Cookies

Remember that 4 pound bag of Pamela’s Pancake and Baking Mix I brought home the other day? (I know Ginger remembers, lol.) I basically gave that bag to Andy, telling him he could make just about any recipe with it and using it as the flour. “Just this? Nothing else?” Yes, just that.

(I did tell him that he was required to give me the recipe, and take pictures of his baked goods, for my blog, lol.)

Tonight he experimented with a recipe from the back of the Argo Corn Starch box. They were thoroughly enjoyed (I enjoyed all 2 bites of mine, lol).

Chocolate Chip Shortbread Cookies

1 cup butter (no substitutes), softened
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
2 cups Pamela’s GF pancake and baking mix
1/4 cup corn starch
1/2 cup mini chocolate chips
1 tablespoon sugar

Beat butter, brown sugar and vanilla thoroughly using an electric mixer. Gradually blend in flour and corn starch. Add chocolate chips.
Form into 1-inch balls and place on ungreased baking sheets. Pour sugar on a small plate; dip bottom of drinking glass in sugar and gently press down on each cookie to flatten. Press center of each cookie with tip of a teaspoon.
Bake in a preheated 300°F oven for 25 to 40 minutes, or until bottoms begin to brown.
Cool for 5 minutes; remove to a wire rack to cool completely.

Rice Chex and Recipes

I know everyone else has already written about it, but I was waiting until I could actually purchase a box.

Well, finally, they were available to me (they’ve had the old, non-gf boxes on the shelf, driving me crazy). I got a box today (I only got one because I still have some Crunch ‘Ems hanging around).

I’m excited, because it’s a mainstream company that has taken notice of us (and I hope they will continue to produce more gf cereals). Andy’s excited (or at least I will pretend he is) because it’s something from the evil cereal aisle (though we buy Fruity Pebbles and Cocoa Pebbles). Braden’s excited because they have box tops (box tops for education). Carter’s excited because I let him carry them into the house.

So we’re all excited. And all of us Celiacs are going to buy lots of these so GM will take notice, right?

Yeah, but what do you do with a whole bunch of Rice Chex? Oh, so many possibilities.

The obvious: eat them. Eat them plain, eat them with milk. My new favorite way is to add cut-up dried apples or pears, sprinkle a little cinnamon sugar, and add just a touch of honey, and have that as my morning bowl of cereal. (Okay, you ask, how do I have a favorite way if I just bought them? - well, I was using the Crunch ‘Ems like this.)

But oh, the recipes. Chex actually has a gluten-free page of recipes now. Currently, there are only 8 recipes on there. But I did some digging on the Betty Crocker website and found a whole bunch more. I posted them over at the Delphi Celiac group, here. There are more than just the “mix” type recipes - there is even a chicken pot pie recipe and a green bean casserole recipe (I think I may just make the topping, lol).

Rice Chex would make a good crumb crust, too. Just crush the cereal, add a little sugar (if you want a sweet crust), and melted butter, and press it in. You would probably bake it for about 7 to 10 minutes at 350° (just guessing - I haven’t done it yet).

So enjoy, and spread the joy. What is your favorite way to eat gluten-free Rice Chex?

‘Cause You’re Special! Muffins

Because - you are special.

And because I’m special too (that’s why my daddy bought me 8 bags of Trader Joe’s gf granola when he went to Albuquerque).

I’ve had this mix sitting around in my pantry for a little while - something I won from a raffle probably (gotta love those raffles). It called to me today, crying out to be made. I was happy to oblige.

It’s a really easy mix - just add milk, butter, and a little oil, and beat it (I used my $5 hand mixer). I folded in some frozen blueberries (because I love blueberry muffins). The batter is a bit sticky to get into the muffin cups (but probably would be easier if you weren’t using muffin liners that your child had previously flattened). The bag said it would make 9, but I got 12 with the blueberries (about a half cup).

The verdict: they were really tasty. I had 2. My dad said “these are really good” and Braden said “Mommy, you make the best muffins.” (Does it get any better than that?) They did have a little bit of a very fine grit to them, but I was feeling for it (so I could tell y’all about it).

These are very good, and I would definitely make them again.

I just wanted to share one other thing with you today. At the salvage grocery store, I scored a 4 pound bag of Pamela’s pancake and baking mix for only $4.99. I guess I will be trying that in something soon.