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Sunday, June 18, 2017

The BEST gluten free pie crust

I came up with this pie crust because I want to make gluten free cooking easy and less complicated! I've experimented with other recipes, but I didn't like all the small weird things you needed to have on hand.

Basically all I did was take a "normal" pie crust recipe and sub out the water for buttermilk. I always keep almond flour on hand and I like to use half all-purpose gf and half almond flour in most recipes, so that's the other change. But that is IT folks! 

This got rave reviews from my husband (diagnosed with celiac 2 years ago). Super flakey and not crumbly. Try it! You'll love it!


The BEST gluten free pie crust (makes 2 pie crusts)
1 1/4 c all purpose gluten free flour
1 1/4 c almond flour
1/2 tsp salt
1 c cold butter, cubed
6 T milk + 1T lemon juice (or 7T buttermilk)


Instructions:
Mix milk and lemon juice and set aside.

Combine flours and salt. With a pastry blender or food processor, cut in cold cubed butter until pea-size or slightly larger.

Pour in milk mixture (or buttermilk) and toss with a fork to moisten. Knead together quickly but thoroughly.

Divide into two balls. Wrap in plastic wrap and chill in the fridge for at least 30 minutes.

Roll out dough and put in pie dish. Fill with filling and bake! If cooking just the shell, bake at 350 for 8-10 minutes or until the crust is golden brown. Makes 2 pie shells.
Enjoy!


Sunday, April 24, 2016

Cilantro-Lime Vinaigrette




I can't remember where I originally got this recipe, but it's great and I've had several requests for this recipe. I finally worked it out and wrote down my adaptation. I had to tweak it a bit until I liked it and this the final result! Tangy, a little sweet, and oh so yummy! It goes wonderfully with Cafe Rio style salads too! I am not a huge fan of measuring unless I'm baking- fortunately it's really easy to add more and blend it again to your liking, this is a very forgiving dressing. :) It's definitely worth a try!


Cilantro-Lime Vinaigrette
4 TB vinegar
3 TB brown sugar
3/4 tsp mustard (I just used plain yellow mustard, nothing fancy)
3/4 tsp salt
1 clove of garlic (I just scooped a small spoonful of the pre-minced stuff in the jar)
1/4 c. lime juice
1 bunch cilantro
3/4 c. olive oil (I used extra virgin oil olive)

Dump it all in the blender, mix, and enjoy!



Thursday, January 9, 2014

Busy Board

I've seen these around for a while now, and I couldn't wait to make one for my son! My husband and I made this for him for Christmas this year and it has been a hit! It was one of the unwrapped gifts that "Santa" left for him, and he RAN to it when he saw it! It was precious. 



So, here's what we did. I went out the garage to see what kind of scrap wood we had left. I found a piece of MDF. I knew where I wanted it to go in his room, so I measured the space and cut it to size. You could have the guys at Lowes or Home Depot do that for you if you buy a sheet. {Other's have used wooden cutting boards if you want a finished edge} I found some leftover paint and gave it a couple coats.

Now the fun part. I went to our local Re-Use-It store. You could go to any hardware store, but if you shop the thrift shops, it'll be a LOT cheaper! One man's trash is definitely another man's treasure in this case! I searched the hardware bins for fun pieces that spin or move. Everything on there only cost me $10! {With the exception of the sliding lock ($4) and the wooden balls ($1), which I bought new.} So, all in all, this awesome Christmas present only cost me $15! I've seen these on Esty for as much as $70!

Using the thick MDF worked well for this since we attached pieces like the doorknob, that are more than just a screw. It took my husband probably about 30 minutes to attach everything.




The busy board has also become home to the few random action figures we have. C has fun trying to make them balance and stay on- working on some motor skills!


Sour Cream Banana Nut Muffins

My little boy love love LOVES these muffins! They are delicious and so easy to make! He ate 4 for breakfast this morning! I also caught him sneaking more later that afternoon :)
This recipes comes from food.com
This is my favorite recipe I've found thus far, and it's super easy to tweak.


1/2 cup margarine or 1/2 cup butter
1 cup sugar
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 1/2 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup mashed banana
1/2 cup chopped nuts (optional)
1/2 cup sour cream
1/4 chocolate chips (optional)


Directions:
Grease muffin tins (or 1 large loaf pan). Cream margarine, sugar, eggs and vanilla. Add dry ingredients, then bananas, sour cream, nuts, and chocolate chips. Mix well. Bake at 350 F for 25 minutes (1 hour if in a loaf pan).


Gluten Free Adaptation:
Sub out flour for a cup-for-cup gluten free mix or your own blend. I have used both the Krusteaz and Namaste brands (Sam's and Costco) and found that I used 1 cup in this recipe. They don't rise as much as normal muffins do, but they taste the same!

Friday, January 3, 2014

Cafe Rio Pork Barbacoa

This recipe comes from "Lizzy Writes" blog. This is THE BEST recipe and I follow the instructions to the letter! YUM. She also has recipes for the rice, beans, etc that goes with it!


Cafe Rio Pork Barbacoa
5 - 6 pounds pork tenderloin or roast
21 ounces Dr. Pepper (do NOT use diet or generic)
1 cup brown sugar
3/4 cup white sugar
2 cloves garlic
1 (7 ounce) can chipotle chilies in adobo sauce
6 ounces medium red taco sauce
1 teaspoon dry mustard
1 teaspoon cumin
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon pepper


Directions: Place pork in the crock pot and make sauce.

Put the chipotle in adobo into a wire mesh strainer and hold it over the blender. Pour Dr. Pepper over them to get all the yummy sauce off. You'll also need to rinse out the chipotle can with the Dr. Pepper to get all the adobo sauce out. Do NOT use all the chipotle peppers, it'll be super hot! I add 2 or 3 and it's just right, but I like a little flavorful heat! 
          Note: Instead of just throwing away all the extra chipotles I'll blend them up afterward into a paste. Then, the nexttime you need a bit of a kick in your dish, just add a little! (and I really mean a little, it makes anything hot really fast!)

Blend all ingredients together in either a blender until combined and pour over the pork. Cook on high for 5 hours or on low for 8 hours until the pork is easily shreddable. 

Gluten Free Adaptation: This is a naturally gluten free recipe! Yayy!

DIY Pinata Tutorial

We started planning a birthday bbq for C's birthday, and then we realized that we didn't have much for kids in way of yard toys- so I started brainstorming what I could do that would be fun.... so I started browsing Pinterest and party ideas. I found a few posts on pinatas and thought I'd give it a try. Keep in mind that the last time I've done anything even remotely close to this when waaaay back in 5th grade making a paper mache mask, haha. Anyway, here's a quick tutorial of what I did. It's time consuming, but really easy to do!

I started trying to make a basic shape of that I wanted it to look like. I was going for a dinosaur. Ya, I know, probably not the best thing to start out on, but whatever. I used 2 balloons, 2 empty toilet paper for the legs (I only had one, so I actually unrolled half a roll to get a second one, might have helped if I planned ahead, haha) and then just rolled up paper to make the hands and tail. (I wouldn't necessarily recommend this because it does get wet and soggy really easy, but it did work). I used masking tape to tape it all together.


Step 2: I fashioned some feet out of an empty cereal box. {again, the planning ahead thing... I may or may not have had to finish off a box of cereal in order to do this....}



Step 3: I gave a third balloon to my son because he wanted the two I was using :) 



I used the cereal box again to create the face and body shape. This doesn't have to be perfect because it is really easy to add detail when you're covering it.



Now the fun and messy, time-consuming part! Making the goop! 

Super simple recipe: 
2 parts water to 1 part flour 
or
2 cups water mixed with 1 cup flour

 If its too runny just add a little more flour. I like it more on the runny side because it dries faster.
Get a good chunk of newspaper {also failed on this too, garbage day and I threw mine away... thank heaven for friends who have a stash! wow, this is making me sound extremely unprepared....} and cut it into strips, I'd say about 2 inches wide, whatever you find works best for you.
Dip your newspaper into the goop and get it all covered and coated. Then, run your fingers down it to squeeze or wipe off the excess. The less of the goop left on the paper, the less time to dry. It does all need to be moist though or it won't stick.


This is what mine looked like with one full layer. Make sure your work around the object that you are covering evenly.... if you don't it will tip over. I even knew that, but I was reminded the hard way.


Do a couple layers. This is one is my third layer. This is where I added in more of the molding features. It's all just newspaper just like the layers, I just bunched it up to make the shape I wanted. Then, I added a layer over the top so that it would be smooth.


Way back in 5th grade, we painted our masks or used crate paper and made them look all frilly, but I didn't want that, I wanted a dinosaur! So, I used tissue paper and modge podge. It really doesn't get any easier. I cut my tissue paper into small square and starting gluing them on. I didn't take care to make them perfectly smooth because it didn't need to be, but you could if you wanted to. It does take quite a few layers of tissue paper to make it non-see-through. Again, didn't care too much, seeing that is was going to be destroyed in probably less than 5 minutes and it had already taken hours so far. At this point you can see that I left the top uncovered. Here is where I cut a hole for my string and cut a hole to stuff candy in. Just make sure you patch it up really good and then cover it the same as you've done the rest.

 

The end product!! I added a few more details, still out of tissue paper. I know it's not the best pinata I've ever seen, but I thought it was pretty good considering! Cameron loved it and stick his hand in it's mouth all the time. It took a while to make, but it really was fun to do.