You can easily make this an appetizer recipe too, if you happen to be lucky enough to have a party to attend. Just put the stuffing we’re going to make into a bunch of small mushrooms instead of 4 big portabellas. Portabellas will need a few minutes of pre-baking, though, so if you are keeping this meal all to yourself, then brush them with a little olive oil, and put them in the oven for 5 minutes at 350 degrees while you mix up the rest of it.

Can’t have crab stuffing without crab, can you? Important note: fake crab, sometimes labeled as “krab” but more often masquerading as the real thing, is made with wheat. Lots of it. Those crab sticks that go in sushi rolls are a prime example, they are jam-packed with gluten. Most of the crab you see in the market these days is going to be the fake stuff, so be very careful to choose a container that is only 100% real crab meat. You’ll want about 6 to 8 ounces of it.

Finely dice half of a red onion. Red onions tend to be stronger than white, which is good if you’re trying to balance a strong flavor like crab. But if you don’t like a lot of onion flavor, you can substitute a white one, or even sautee it before adding it in so it can caramelize a bit. Did you know that process is called pyrolysis? Well it is.

Slice up 2 green onions, and add them to your bowl along with 1 teaspoon of minced garlic, 1 teaspoon of lemon juice, and 1/2 teaspoon of Lea & Perrins worcestershire sauce. [As always, the brands I use were GFCF at the time of posting, but manufacturers can change recipes without warning. Always check your labels!]

Dump in 1 teaspoon of parsely, 1 teaspoon of dill…

1/4 teaspoon of salt, and 1/4 teaspoon of pepper.

Now then, mix it all together with 1/2 cup Hellman’s mayonnaise. You can add a little more if the consistency is too dry, but don’t try to take any out because that totally won’t work.

Spoon your mixture into your mushrooms, be they big portabellas or little creminis.

Sprinkle with crushed Rice Chex or your preferred brand of gluten-free breadcrumbs, and bake them at 350 for about 12 minutes. Little ones may be done a minute or two sooner, big ones may take a minute or two longer. Serve them to your guests or eat them all yourself, I won’t tell.

Happy Eating!

Crab Stuffed Mushrooms

4 portabella mushrooms, or about 36 cremini mushrooms
6-8 oz container of 100% crabmeat
1/2 small red onion
2 green onions
1 tsp minced garlic
1 tsp lemon juice
1/2 tsp Lea & Perrins worcestershire
1 tsp parsley
1 tsp dill
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp pepper
1/2 cup Hellman’s mayonnaise
1/4 cup crushed Rice Chex

First, we’ll prepare the hollandaise sauce. The basic ingredients are butter and egg yolks, so it is not exactly a heart-healthy menu item. But boy, does it taste good. Here we will start with one whole stick (1/2 cup) of Fleischmann’s Unsalted Margarine (NOT the Original flavor, as that contains casein.) Your list of possible substitutes is going to be a bit truncated here, since it will need to be butter-flavored, but some other options include ghee, Earth Balance spread, and Spectrum butter-flavored shortening. [As always, the brands I use were GFCF at the time of posting, but manufacturers can change formulas without warning. Always check your labels!]

Gently melt it in the microwave, inside a measuring cup. We’re going to need that handle and pouring spout later.

Separate 4 eggs, and place the yolks in a metal bowl. To separate an egg, crack it over a bowl and pass the yolk back and forth between the two shell halves, and the white will just fall off. I throw the whites away, but I guess you could make an egg-white omelette with them, or maybe whip them into a meringue for that pie you just had sitting around.

Add 1 Tablespoon of lemon juice, and whisk the egg yolks very rapidly for a few minutes, long past when your arm starts hurting and you have to switch the other one. They say it’s done when the mixture has doubled in volume, but I’m not a good judge of that sort of thing, so I just do it until I can’t stand it anymore.

Now, this is why it needed to be in a metal mixing bowl. If you don’t have a metal bowl, you can use the top half of a double-boiler, or just a regular metal pot that will fit snugly inside the rim of another pot like we have here. But it’s easier to whisk in something that has a rounded bottom, especially when it’s turned sideways so you can whisk in an up-and-down motion instead of around in flat circles.

That bottom pot contains water, heated to just barely simmering. This way we will gently heat the sauce without allowing it to get above 212 degrees F (the boiling point of water,) and thus not end up with scrambled eggs. And yes, I know my pot isn’t actually on the burner anymore. I was turning the handle around this way and that, trying to get a good angle on the bowl-inside-a-pot for you to see. That, or maybe my super power is getting water to boil without any heat, and I’ve just blown my cover.

Keep whisking — yes, more! — while you gently stream in the melted margarine from the microwave. I only stopped whisking to try to take a quick picture, don’t be like me (unless you, too, have a website with lots of people wondering why you haven’t updated in over two dang weeks!)

Look, more whisking! When the sauce has thickened from the gentle heat and again doubled in volume, you’re done.

Well, almost. Add in a pinch of salt and a pinch of cayenne pepper, unless you’d rather garnish the final product with the cayenne on top. There’s only so far I’ll bother going for presentation, and I’d rather not delay eating for even a moment once these babies are ready. Also, my kids are usually like, “OMG that’s got spices on it, it must be spicy!” and I’d rather not listen to it.

Cover the pot and stick it in a warm spot while you assemble everything else. This is not something you want to make ahead of time and store in the fridge for awhile, since it’s made with raw eggs. (Though before you go freaking out about the thought of eating raw eggs to begin with, remember that fried eggs with even slightly runny yolks are also technically raw.) If you’re really concerned, you could buy those pasteurized eggs they have at the store now.

Okay, so! The rest of the meal. Properly speaking, this should be on English muffins, and there are a few gluten-free brands out there. But they’re harder to come by, so I go for the simpler solution and just put them on O’Dough’s hamburger buns instead, which are appropriately dense. And of course Canadian bacon is a processed meat, so you have to make sure it’s GF as well. This Hormel product says it right on the back of the package, so that’s convenient.

Put several inches of water in a wide pan, bring it to a simmer, and ignore the rest of the photo. The chef who told me to do that thing you see me doing above is a complete liar. It has no quantifiable effect. The man is a charlatan and a scoundrel, and I have told him so to his face. He suggested pistols at dawn, or something, I can’t remember.

If you’re really deft, you can crack the eggs directly into the poaching pan. But I find it helpful to crack them into a little measuring cup first…

…and very gently slide them into the water, which should be just barely simmering by now.

Boy they do look ugly while they’re cooking, don’t they? But you see how the one on the right has a clearly defined central blob of egg white, with the thin skirt around it? That skirt bit is going to mostly fall away and cloud up your pan some more, the blob is the real part of the egg we want.

Cook them for exactly 3 1/2 minutes to achieve soft-set but still slightly flowing yolks, then scoop them out with a slotted spoon. Also, let’s blame the blurriness of this photo on the steam from the pan, rather than my palsied, uncoordinated hands.

Drizzle with hollandaise sauce, and dig in! You might want to serve this with some fruit or something, so you don’t feel guilty about all that extra sauce you know you’re going to put on.

Happy Eating!

Eggs Benedict

4 egg yolks
1 TBS lemon juice
1/2 cup Fleischmann’s Unsalted margarine (NOT Original)
pinch of salt
pinch of cayenne pepper

6 eggs
1 pkg GF canadian bacon
3 GF english muffins (or GF hamburger buns)

Speaking of standing, have you ever heard that joke about how you can tell a male bell pepper from a female one? — the answer being that the female peppers have four nubs on the bottom, so they can stand on their own, but the male peppers only have three, so they fall over without another pepper to lean on.

It’s not actually true, the fruits of the pepper plant have no gender, and the number of feet is just genetic variation. Factual biology isn’t very funny after all. But it is true that the ones with more feet tend to have more space inside, so choose your serving size accordingly. You can fill anywhere from four very-large to eight rather-small peppers with this recipe.

The fastest way to clean them out is to use a pair of kitchen shears to snip straight down the inner ribs…

…then just reach in and pluck the guts out whole. Very efficient.

For the filling, first chop up 1 cup of cilantro, which is conveniently about one bunch, in grocery store packaging terms.

Also dice up 1 onion, and dump in two 4-oz. cans of diced green chiles. Don’t worry, “mild” in this case means truly mild, it’s not too spicy for kids at all.

Add in 2 teaspoons of cumin…

1 teaspoon of chili powder…

…and 1 teaspoon of salt.

Now mash around 1 pound of ground turkey until everything’s nice and meaty. Incidentally, I originally got this recipe from the fantastic Elana over at Elana’s Pantry, but somehow mine come out looking completely different than hers. I think she must use fresh chopped up turkey, even though her recipe says ground. It would certainly be a good way to use up leftover holiday poultry.

Stuff the meat mixture inside each pepper, making sure to press it all the way down into its little feminine feet.

Lay them in a greased dish, and bake at 350 degrees for an hour. If you’re especially fastidious in choosing well-footed peppers, you could save space and cook them all standing up, but only if you don’t overload them like I did here.

Mine are so crammed full of deliciousness, they couldn’t even make it down a chimney.

Happy Holiday Eating!

Stuffed Red Peppers

4-8 large red bell peppers
1 lb. ground turkey
1 cup fresh cilantro
1 onion
8 oz. diced green chiles
2 tsp cumin
1 tsp chili powder
1 tsp salt

For this salmon we will, not surprisingly, be using a lemon. No fancy prep here, just cut it into several slices.

Then do the same with half of an onion, long thin slices.

Toss your salmon filet onto a large piece of greased foil, laid over a baking sheet for sturdiness. I used Spectrum coconut oil cooking spray if you’re curious, but oil is oil, it all prevents sticking. Then haphazardly arrange the lemon and onion slices all over.

Sprinkle 2 teaspoons of dill and 1/2 teaspoon of pepper over the top, then fold up the sides of  the foil like you’re making a little boat.

If your foil piece is big enough, you might be able to wrap the whole thing up in one package. If not, just get a second piece of foil and cover the top, making sure to pinch tightly around the edges so it isn’t leaking steam. Place the pan in a 350 degree oven for 15-20 minutes, depending on the thickness of your fish filet.

You have probably heard before that fish is done cooking when it flakes easily with a fork. The problem is, this also means it completely falls apart when you carve off servings to put on plates, and I didn’t think to take a picture of it until after I’d done that. So this salmon is sort of raggedy looking. But don’t let that fool you, it tastes fantastic. I mean, as fantastic as fish can taste in my book, anyway — but I find that the easier things are to cook, the better they taste to me, so by that measure it is truly fantastic after all!

Happy Eating!

Lemon Salmon

2 lb salmon filet
1 lemon
1/2 onion
2 tsp dill
1/2 tsp pepper

Wait, that doesn’t sound right — I mean for one thing, I don’t even get minimum wage.

Fortunately, I already had everything I needed to throw together some steak sandwiches, GFCF Lady style. You probably do, too. It really doesn’t require much. I started with one onion, cut into long strips and sauteed to extremes in a little oil. To get the onion fully soft and caramelized without burning, it helps to put a lid on the pan to trap in the moisture and cook it from all sides. I let the onion cook the whole time I was making everything else, so probably about 20 minutes in total.

Next, a steak marinated in Lea & Perrins worcestershire sauce. [As always, the brands I use were GFCF at the time of posting, but manufacturers can change formulas without warning. Always check your labels!] I just laid it on a rack and tossed it under the broiler in my oven for about 6-8 minutes per side. (I’m morally opposed to using an outdoor grill when it’s still above 100 degrees after sunset, you know. But if you don’t live in a state adjacent to Hades itself, you might choose to see things differently. I’m also morally opposed to cleaning greasy pans, which is why I always line mine with foil.)

Meanwhile, I whipped up a tasty little sandwich spread by combining 2 Tablespoons of gluten-free mayonnaise (try Hellman’s if you’re looking for a national brand) and 2 teaspoons of worcestershire. The GFCF Husband likes to call this “flavornaise,” and I like to ignore him.

Thin slices of steak, thin slices of onion, thin slices of tomato, all on a sandwich-spreaded gluten-free bun. Oh my god y’all, it was so good.

But here’s a tip: do not, I repeat, do not put this on a round hamburger bun like I did. Use GF hot dog buns instead. There’s a reason this kind of sandwich typically gets put on a long roll, and for once the children weren’t the only ones making humongous messes on their plates. We gave up and got out forks within the first 3 bites. But man, I totally didn’t care.

Happy Eating!

Steak Sandwiches

1 onion
1-2 lb. steak
1 tomato
2 Tbs Hellman’s mayonnaise
2 tsp Lea & Perrins worcestershire
2-4 Kinnikinnick hot dog buns

Indeed, when shellfish are the main course, they can be quite lovely, as I will demonstrate today. First, we have to prepare three bowls. In bowl number one, we will start with 1/3 cup of potato starch (or tapioca starch, or cornstarch, or arrowroot starch… yeah, it totally doesn’t matter.) Then with a fork, blend in 1 teaspoon of salt…

…and 3/4 teaspoon of cayenne pepper.

Bowl number two should contain 3 egg whites. To separate an egg white from the yolk, just crack the shell over the bowl, and carefully pass the yolk back and forth between the two halves a few times. The white will slip right off and fall into your bowl. Toss the yolks in the trash with the shells, unless you have some other random thing you want to do with them. But please don’t tell me what it is; this is a family blog.

Beat the egg whites aggressively with a fork for a minute or two, until it gets really foamy.

If you did this long enough, you’d end up with a meringue. But it would take a long time, your arm would get sore, and you’d have no lemon pie to put it on anyway. So this right here is foamy enough for our needs.

And finally, in bowl number three we will put about a cup of flaked coconut. I like this kind from Bob’s Red Mill, because it contains no preservatives, added sugars, or anything else gunky, just plain coconut. But you can get the wet kind from the baking aisle too, if you want.

Finally, we’re ready to start cooking! Don’t worry, it goes fast from here on out. The amounts we put in the bowls will cover about 3/4 lb of shrimp, though of course you could do more or less to suit your family’s needs. I bought my shrimp pre-shelled and deveined, because I have neither the dexterity nor the time for such a ridiculous task. Grab one by the tail…

Flop it around in the starch mixture…

Dip it in the frothy egg whites…

And stick a bunch of coconut to it. Make sure you get your hands all messy too, that’s important.

Repeat the tar-and-feathering process, placing each shrimp on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper as you go. Technically foil will work too, but you have to oil it pretty thoroughly to prevent the little guys from sticking. Nothing ever sticks to parchment paper. Then, bake them in the oven at 400 degrees for 15-20 minutes, turning them over about halfway through.

Look how golden and crunchy they are, with absolutely no frying necessary! It’s kind of this weird tradition that you’re supposed to eat coconut shrimp with orange marmalade. I really don’t know where that idea came from, but the GFCF Husband considered it important, so I tried to oblige as best I could. I used Cascadian Farms apricot jelly (which I have on hand because I also use it in this fantastic recipe,) and mixed in a few drops of lemon juice for more of a citrus-y tang. It worked well enough I guess, since their plates were almost empty before I even got to sit down.

Happy Eating!

Coconut Shrimp

1/3 cup potato starch
1 tsp salt
3/4 tsp cayenne pepper
3 egg whites
1 cup shredded coconut
3/4 lb shrimp, peeled and deveined

Optional:
1/4 cup Cascadian Farm apricot jelly
1/4 tsp lemon juice

I love steaks. And clearly I’m not the only one — did you know our university’s mascot is, in fact, a Longhorn cattle? I can’t think of any other place that would happily eat their alma mater’s ambassador. But let’s face it, they’re delicious. A slab of meat and a little heat is all you need. Well, okay, not entirely. You need a couple other things. But not many!

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First, you need salt, pepper, and rosemary. I can’t give you exact measurements, you just sprinkle them all on. Make it look like this and you can’t go wrong.

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Then put them seasoning-side-down in a pan with just a little oil. Important tip: you want the pan to be hot before you put the meat in. Not spattering oil everywhere, just hot enough to make the meat sizzle when you put it in. And hey, now that the underside is exposed, you can season it too.

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You want to only have to flip the meat one time, which means you want to leave it until the cooked part is climbing more than halfway up the sides, and the bottom is nice and browned. After you flip it, you can either play forensic detective with your steaks trying to figure out when they’re done, or you can just get out your trusty meat thermometer and pull them off the heat when they’re exactly 150 degrees F.

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Transfer your steaks over to their respective plates, but don’t turn the heat off yet. See all that fantastic brown stuff the meat left behind? We want it off the pan and into our sauce. So we’re going to pour in about 1/4 cup of red wine vinegar and deglaze that mofo. This is one of those foods that ought to be gluten-free, as long as you’re using real red wine vinegar and not some “red wine flavored” knockoff. Above all, make sure the word “malt” isn’t anywhere on the label, because that could mean barley, which would mean gluten. You could also substitute a balsamic vinegar, if you happen to have that instead.

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There’s no real reason for this extra shot, but photos of pouring liquid look cool. Just milliseconds before it hit the pan!

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The mad bubbling will do most of the work, but you can help it along by scraping up any remaining brown bits with a wooden spoon. A few moments later you’ll be left with an incredible sauce infused with all the flavors of the meal.

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Drizzle the sauce over the steaks, and prepare to experience a serious meat coma.

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Happy Eating!

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Rosemary Steaks

2-4 steaks
Salt
Pepper
Rosemary
1/4 cup red wine vinegar

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Because, you see, like so many of the recipes I foist upon my unsuspecting children, these meatballs contain secret ninja vegetables. And not just a couple ninjas. We’re talking the whole dojo, here.

Three. Entire. Zucchinis.

(Or three “courgettes,” if your ninjas happen to be British. Man, now I really want to do an eggplant recipe too, just so I can be posh and call them aubergines.)

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Where was I? Oh yes — peel and chop. You must use a food processor or immersion blender for this next step, a regular upright blender won’t even come close. This is largely because you don’t want to add any liquid to the mixture at all, so it’ll be rough going at first. But just keep at it, and as the zucchini compacts, it will release its own liquid and things will start to flow in there. Slowly add more of your chopped pieces to the cup as you get the space, until you ultimately end up with about 2 cups of smooth puree.

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Check out those colors. It’s truly beautiful. Pour your puree (three whole zucchinis’ worth!) into a large bowl with 2 pounds of ground lamb.

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Now squeesh. And squoosh. And squarsh. And so on.

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Look! Where did all the bright green zucchini go? It’s magic, boys and girls. Do not look behind the curtain. Oh yeah, also mix in 1 teaspoon of salt, and 1/2 teaspoon of oregano. Almost forgot that bit.

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Sculpt your mixture into meatballs about one and a half inches in diameter. It will be fairly gooey, but just sort of cup and scoop it between your hands until it’s roundish.

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Lay them out in baking dishes brushed with a little olive oil. I don’t know what it is, but I always end up with exactly 19 of them. The OCD person inside me really, really wants it to be an even 20, but it never is.

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Bake them at 350 degrees for 45 minutes, then remove them to a paper towel to drain. These things freeze really well, by the way, so it’s worth it to make a big batch like this. Of course the logical way to serve them would be with GF pasta and marinara sauce, but I haven’t done that here because my kids strangely prefer them plain. Go figure.

Speaking of figures, let’s pause for a moment to do a little math (I know, you all love it when I talk nerdy to you.) If your kid eats just three of these meatballs, he will have unwittingly consumed nearly half of an entire zucchini as well. Seriously? Seriously. And you know what they taste like? Meat. Go on, embrace your inner veggie ninja.

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Happy Eating!

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The GFCF Lady’s Lamb and Zucchini Meatballs

3 zucchinis
2 lbs. ground lamb
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp oregano

I vote yes!

Before I started all this dang cooking so many years ago, I didn’t even know they made ground chicken. I mean, of course I knew they could, just like you could put a shoe in the meat grinder if that’s what you felt like grinding up that day. But oh, my eyes were opened. A chicken sandwich does not, in fact, have to come breaded and fried from a skeezy drive thru.

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The “Southwest” part of this recipe should be readily apparent here. But don’t be afraid, they’re not spicy. (Well, the mild ones aren’t, at least.) Toss in 2 Tablespoons with the same reckless abandon you would use with any other seasoning. In fact, I have it on good authority that reckless abandon itself is an excellent flavor enhancer.

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Also add in 3/4 teaspoon of chili powder…

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And 1/4 teaspoon each of salt and pepper.

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Smoosh it all together until it’s well-blended, and form 4 patties out of it. The mixture will be a little wetter than you are used to, and will distinctly need to be plopped into the pan rather than laid there. If you need to, just make them meatballs with your hands and then squash them flat in the pan.

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While they are cooking (about 6-7 minutes per side,) heat up your gluten-free buns. My store was out of our regular ones, so I ended up with this O’Doughs brand. They were okay. A little on the dense side for my tastes, but not crumbly or dry at all, which is good. For those of you who find the Kinnikinnick buns to be too lightweight and chewy, these may be a better fit for you. And of course, these have the added benefit of having actual sesame seeds on them, if appearance is an issue you have to consider.

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I really like using chipotle mayo with these, but you could do normal hamburger condiments as well.

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And, of course, an avocado rounds out the Southwestern theme. I adore avocado. If you are one of those people who doesn’t like them, well, we can still be friends — but it’s a little like insulting one of my children.

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Speaking of my children, no, they do not eat sprouts on their chicken sandwiches. But I do! These are radish sprouts, which are just the tiniest bit zesty. Horseradishy, if you will.

Please pay no attention to the fact that my burger has been constructed upside down. Obviously I wasn’t.

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Happy Eating!

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The GFCF Lady’s Southwest Chicken Burgers

1 lb ground chicken
2 TBS diced green chiles
3/4 tsp chili powder
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp pepper

GF hamburger buns
chipotle mayo
avocado
sprouts

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First, start with about 1 pound of gluten-free sausage. And look, Aidell’s has one that’s Cajun flavored. How relevant! [As always, the brands I use were GFCF at the time of posting, but manufacturers can change formulas without warning. Always check your labels!] Traditional jambalayas often contain shrimp as well, but I don’t really like crustaceans invading my red meat dishes, so I left it out. You are welcome to be more tolerant of our sea-friends if you would like.

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Chop those suckers up into half-moons, and add in 2 chopped green onions. This being a throw-it-all-together-and-walk-away recipe, it goes without saying that it will need to be made in a dutch oven. I don’t think you can substitute a crock pot for this one, because the rice has to have pressure in order to cook properly, but hey, maybe a diehard crockpotter out there will correct me.

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Measure out 2 cups of uncooked rice. I was going for a healthier edge the evening I cooked this, so I used brown, but white will work too.

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Now pour in an 8-ounce can of Muir Glen tomato sauce. (Yes, some tomato sauces have gluten. No, I can’t explain such silliness, I just know it’s true.)

But wait, you say! What’s all that liquid already in the pot? Well, the previous couple of photos came out blurry. Not just a little blurry, like the kind I make you suffer through all the time, but completely, unusably blurry. What it is, is 4 cups of Pacific Foods beef broth, and also a diced onion. You’ll just have to take my word for it.

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Also add in 6-8 ounces of sliced muhrooms. Using the jarred ones for this saved me time because they’re already thoroughly soft. If you use fresh mushrooms, you will want to sautee them in a pan before adding them in, because soft comfort food dishes do not taste good with big firm pieces of mushrooms in them.

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Of course it ain’t Jambalaya without a liberal dose of seasoning. Specifically, add 1 Tablespoon of parsley, 1/4 teaspoon of cayenne pepper, 1 teaspoon of thyme, and 1/2 Tablespoon of McCormick Cajun seasoning. If you use a similar seasoning blend from a different company, be sure to check for gluten, as spice blends are notorious for using white flour as filler.

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Give everything a thorough stirring, put on the lid, and cook for 90 minutes at 350 degrees.

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When it comes out, make sure you shout “Ai-yeeee!” like a real Cajun.

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Happy Eating!

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Jambalaya

1 lb. Aidell’s GF Andouille sausage
2 green onions
2 cups uncooked rice
4 cups Pacific Foods beef broth
1 medium onion
1 8-oz. can Muir Glen tomato sauce
6 oz. jarred, sliced mushrooms
1 TBS parsley
1/4 tsp cayenne pepper
1 tsp thyme
1/2 TBS McCormick cajun seasoning