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Start with about a pound and a half of fresh green beans (or go with a bag of pre-cut frozen ones, I’ll never judge,) and boil them with a Tablespoon of salt for 10-15 minutes, until they’re tender. It’s important to salt the water because we won’t be using a canned cream of mushroom soup, so we have to replace at least some of that sodium content your tastebuds will be expecting.

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Meanwhile, take a 10 ounce package of sliced mushrooms, and slice them some more so the pieces are pretty small.

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Pour some oil in a very large pan, and begin sauteeing your diced mushrooms along with 3 cloves of minced garlic.

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Also add 1 Tablespoon of dried chopped onions. You can find this stuff in the seasoning aisle if you’ve never seen it before, or for that matter you could just use onion powder instead.

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While the mushrooms are softening up (and don’t forget those green beans still cooking in the pot,) scoop out 2 Tablespoons of potato starch into a small cup. You could also use cornstarch if you prefer, but either way make sure you choose a brand that’s pure, not mixed with any other substances.

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Mix in one Tablespoon of dry cooking sherry…

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…and 3/4 cup gluten-free chicken broth. Pacific Foods is one good option. [As always, the brands I use were GFCF at the time of posting, but manufacturers can change formulas without warning. Always check your labels!]

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Stir it up with a fork until the potato starch is completely dissolved, then pour it into your mushroom pan.

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It should thicken right up within a minute or two.

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Once it does, add 3/4 cup of almond milk, and stir well.

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And that right there is dairy-free cream of mushroom soup! You could of course make that little mixture on a larger scale and serve it in bowls, if that strikes your fancy. But today, it’s getting a bunch of drained green beans dumped in instead.

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Also add in 1/2 teaspoon of pepper, and 2 teaspoons of salt.

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Pack it all into a 9 x 9 baking dish, and sprinkle flat-slivered almonds over the top. Classy and traditional. Bake it uncovered for 20 minutes at 350 degrees, and those almonds will become toasted and crispy: the perfect topping to the perfect side dish.

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Happy Eating!

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Green Bean Casserole

1 1/2 lbs. green beans
1 TBS salt
10 oz. mushrooms
3 cloves minced garlic
1 TBS dried chopped onions (or onion powder)
2 TBS potato starch
1 TBS dry sherry
3/4 cup GF chicken broth
3/4 cup almond milk
1/2 tsp pepper
2 tsp salt
3/4 cup flat-slivered almonds

Guess what, y’all? Today is this website’s one-year anniversary. Happy birthday to us! To celebrate, I’m going to have a little giveaway. All you need to do is post a comment below, telling me what kind of recipes you want to see more of in the future: maybe it’s dinners, or desserts, or maybe you’ve just got a pile of rutabaga sitting in your kitchen and you need a good GFCF recipe to use it in — you tell me!

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I’ll draw one post number at random to receive this Cuisinart immersion blender, in the winner’s choice of white or chrome. This handy little tool is truly indispensable in my kitchen, and I use it to make smoothies, soups, and most especially, to puree veggies to an absolutely smooth consistency so I can hide them in a variety of places in my children’s diet. I want to share my blending joy with you, so post your comment below, and then make sure to check back to see if you won! The contest ends at 9 PM Central Time (US) one week from today, on May 2nd, 2010.

And just to get your imagination working on what amazing things you’ll be able to do with your new immersion blender, here’s one way you can use it!

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The key to chicken and garlic soup is neither the chicken, nor the garlic. Well, the garlic is pretty important. But the key for us is the mirepoix, which is just a fancy French word for starting a soup with a base of common aromatic vegetables. Of course 18th-century French children didn’t get the modern advantage of having their veggies turned into pureed ninjas, they just had to suffer.

In this case, I’m using zucchini, onion, and celery, but the more traditionally-used carrots will also be coming in a minute. Right now that’s one peeled zucchini, four stalks of celery, and one onion, sauteeing slowly in a little olive oil. Plus 2 cloves of minced garlic there in the middle.

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Meanwhile, heat 6 cups of gluten-free chicken broth (Pacific Foods is one safe brand, or you could always make your own) in a giant soup pot, and submerge 3 whole chicken breasts to start cooking. [As always, the brands I use were GFCF at the time of posting, but manufacturers can change formulas without warning. Always check your labels!]

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Dump in one chopped carrot, and an 8-ounce container of sliced mushrooms. Now, I throw these big pieces in because my kids don’t care about carrots or mushrooms. But if yours do, just put them in the sautee pan with the other veggies instead, and it’ll be our secret.

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Add 1 Tablespoon (or roughly 6 cloves) of minced garlic to the soup pot…

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1/2 teaspoon of pepper…

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And 1 teaspoon of celery salt. Since this is technically a spice blend, there’s a chance some off-brands will add a gluten ingredient to keep the grains from sticking to each other. McCormick spices aren’t all gluten-free, but they have committed to always disclosing any source of gluten on their labels, so we can check that this one is safe.

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Once your sauteed veggies are nice and soft, probably a good 15 minutes on medium-low heat, spoon them into your blending container, keeping in mind that you may have to do multiple batches.

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You’ll need to steal a couple of scoops of liquid from the pot to make it blendable. Be careful not to burn yourself like I did, unless you like wearing bandaids. (Actually, as a kid I loved the smell of Curad plastic bandaids. How weird is that?)

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Immerse your immersion blender, and fire away!

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If I’d sauteed the carrots and mushrooms instead of dumping them in whole, this concoction would be a lot more brownish-orange instead of light green. Feel free to switch up the vegetables to your liking, or put in two or three times as many to beef up the nutrition content, it’s not really going to make much difference: it’ll still taste like chicken and garlic soup in the end.

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Eventually your chicken breasts should be cooked all the way through, at which point you can drag them out with a pair of tongs, dice them up, and throw the pieces right back into the pot.

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I also like to add in a drained can of diced tomatoes. (This is one of those foods that should have nothing but tomatoes and maybe a little salt listed on the label, by the way. Don’t even bother with anything else.) The tomatoes are just kind of a nice addition, though, not a dealbreaker, so if you’re not a fan of tomato chunks in your soup, then by all means, skip it.

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Near the end, add in about 1/2 teaspoon of sage, and 1/2 teaspoon of sea salt. If your soup has been simmering for such a long time that the broth has become more concentrated, you may need to adjust these spices downward a bit. Or alternately, you could add a little more chicken broth to thin it out. When it comes down to it, as long as the chicken meat is cooked, you can simmer for as little or as long as you like. I like to get it going in the late afternoon and then just let it hang out on the stove until I’m ready to serve dinner. Much easier than trying to tie everything together at the last moment before eating.

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Those are Boulder Canyon rice & adzuki bean chips that I’m enjoying with this delectable bowl of soup, by the way. They may claim to be “natural salt” flavor, but they have a definite kick to them. My kids still like them, but my kids like salsa too, so keep that in mind.

Don’t forget to post a comment to enter the giveaway!

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Happy Eating!

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Chicken & Garlic Soup

1 medium onion
4 stalks celery
1 small zucchini
2 cloves minced garlic
1 carrot
8 oz. sliced mushrooms

6 cups Pacific Foods chicken broth
3 chicken breasts
6 cloves minced garlic
1 can diced tomatoes (drained)
1/2 tsp pepper
1 tsp McCormick celery salt
1/2 tsp sage
1/2 tsp salt

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All of which is to say, your onions need not be quite so thoroughly sauteed as mine are here. If you’ve got the luxury of leaving your diced onion on the lowest heat setting for upwards of 20 minutes (or if you, too, have bleeding offspring to attend to,) then have at it. But normally, you’d just want to sautee this onion in a little olive oil until it’s just starting to turn translucent, nothing major.

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Meanwhile, warm up 3 1/4 cups of gluten-free chicken broth in a small pot. Pacific Foods is one safe brand. Just keep it at a simmer until we’re ready to use it. [As always, the brands I use were GFCF at the time of posting, but manufacturers can change ingredients without warning. Always check your labels!]

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After your onions get to somewhere between translucent and sauteed-to-death, add 1 teaspoon each of basil, parsley, and minced garlic. (That’s roughly two cloves for those of you who do your garlic the real way.)

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Also, dump in an 8-ounce container of sliced mushrooms…

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…And 1 1/2 teaspoons of salt.

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While the mushrooms start to soften, measure out 1 1/2 cups of arborio rice. As you can see, my funny little measuring cup indicates this is approximately 16,000 grains of rice. The other side is even funnier, with things like “volume of the brain of a Tyrannosaurus Rex.” I don’t get to use it as often as I’d like because it has a hairline crack in the bottom and is no good for liquids, but I love it just the same.

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Now, add 3 Tablespoons of oil to the pot. Because we’re putting in so much, I’m actually using grapeseed oil here, because it’s got a milder flavor than olive oil. Any oil will do, really, but a healthier oil is always preferable to basic cooking oil.

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Now pour in your arborio rice, and stir everything thoroughly. This species of rice is what makes a risotto a risotto, by the way. Could you make this recipe with another kind of rice? Yes, but then it would be a rice casserole instead of a risotto, and that doesn’t sound nearly as impressive. If you do substitute, you’ll definitely want to use a short-grain, stickier rice rather than a long-grain dry rice.

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Now, there is a type of chef out there who will tell you that in fact, to properly make risotto, you have to add the boiling liquid a tiny bit at a time, and stir quickly and constantly for as much as 45 minutes straight to get it all absorbed. But I firmly believe that this type of chef has only fooled himself into believing that his food tastes better just because he worked harder for it. Me, I can tell that it tastes just as good this way.

The reason they say you have to do all that stirring is that arborio rice is so soft, if you throw it in a rice cooker it will just congeal into one large mass. What we’re doing here with the oil is similar to what we do with Mexican Rice: we’re sealing each grain of rice by cooking it in hot oil before boiling it. With regular rice, this makes each grain dry and distinct. With arborio rice, this gets it to a sticky-but-separable consistency, without all the stirring.

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After the oil in the pan has been mosty absorbed, pour in your chicken broth, which should still be happily simmering away in your side pot.

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You can also toss in about one cup of frozen peas if you want. I love peas, so I always want to add them to things.

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Put on the lid, and place the whole thing in a 350-degree oven for 30 minutes. If you don’t have any ovensafe cookware, you can also do everything up to this point in a normal pot, and then pour the whole mixture into a 9×13 glass baking dish and cover it with foil.

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Doesn’t that just look so warm and inviting? If you can’t convince your family that a meatless item counts a main dish, you can also place some boneless chicken pieces right on top of the whole thing before putting it in the oven, and it becomes that great family classic, chicken and rice casserole. But you and I will know it’s really a risotto.

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Happy Eating!

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Easy Mushroom Risotto (aka Chicken and Rice Casserole)

3 1/4 cups GF chicken broth
1 medium onion
1 Tbs olive oil
1 tsp parsley
1 tsp basil
2 cloves minced garlic
8 oz. sliced mushrooms
1 1/2 tsp salt
3 Tbs grapeseed oil
1 1/2 cups arborio rice
1 cup frozen peas
boneless chicken pieces (optional)

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But first, the turkey. You’re going to want one that’s about 16-18 pounds, and comes with the giblets included. Pull that little package of giblets out of the cavity of the turkey, and set it aside. Then rinse the whole turkey off under the faucet, and pat it dry with paper towels. You will look ridiculous trying to strongarm this huge bird in and out of the sink, so don’t even try not to. Set it in a pan that’s at least an inch deep, and tuck the wings down underneath the legs. Most turkeys will come with this little piece of metal to hold the legs together, but if not, just tie yours together with a bit of string so it’s not flopping bird parts all over the place.

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If you’re not the kind of person who ever buys fresh herbs, now is really the time to give in. You’ll need a handful of both rosemary and sage. Stick one or two sprigs of each into the turkey cavity, and finely chop up the rest. Throw a couple pinches of salt and pepper into the cavity too, for good measure.

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In a small pot, melt 4 Tablespoons of Fleischmann’s Unsalted margarine – not the “Original” (salted) flavor, which has casein. [As always, the brands I use were GFCF at the time of posting, but manufacturers can change formulas without notice. Always check your labels!] Other non-dairy butter substitutes you could use are palm shortening, coconut oil, or plain old lard. (Hey, if it was good enough for your great-grandma…) Also mix in 3 Tablespoons each of chopped rosemary and sage, 1 Tablespoon of black pepper, and 4 teaspoons of salt.

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Now here’s the fun part. Take another two Tablespoons of your non-butter, and cut it up into about eight small pieces. Make tiny cuts all over the skin of your turkey, and insert these little knobs underneath.

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Just shove them right in there between the skin and the meat, so they look like a mouse under a rug. Once it goes in the oven they’ll melt and spread out, and you will end up with the most amazingly moist turkey you ever sank your teeth into.

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By now your herb concoction on the stove should be nice and melty, so it’s time to brush it all over the surface of the turkey. Go ahead and use it all, even if it’s dripping down the sides already, because you’ll be basting up from the bottom of the pan later in the cooking process.

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Place your turkey in a 325 degree oven, and let it roast untouched for 1 hour. After that, reach in and baste it every 20-30 minutes or so while it cooks for another 2 hours and 45 minutes. Adjust by 15 minutes in either direction if you have a slightly smaller or slightly larger turkey; in any case it’s done when a meat thermometer jabbed into the thigh reads 180 degrees.

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But don’t walk away from the kitchen just yet! You probably have some other side dishes you want to start working on, yes? You can do that for now, but later, when the turkey has about an hour and a half left to cook, it’s time to get started on the gravy.

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In a large pot, dump in the contents of your giblets bag, along with 5 1/2 cups of gluten-free chicken broth, one onion cut into quarters, and one bay leaf. Bring this to a boil and let it simmer for about an hour. It should hopefully be reduced to about 3 cups of liquid in this time. Strain all the big pieces out and throw them away.

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In a large pan, melt another 6 Tablespoons of dairy-free margarine. Dice up two more onions as finely as you can manage, and start sauteeing them over low heat. About ten minutes in, add 1 Tablespoon each of rosemary and sage, and continue sauteeing until the onions are golden brown and caramelized.

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Sprinkle in 1/3 cup of the gluten-free flour of your choice (I’ll probably be using Bob’s Red Mill All-Purpose, but I may end up trying sorghum flour this time since it’s a little finer-grained. The onion and herbs should overpower any slight flavor your flour might impart, so it shouldn’t really matter what you use.)

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Give the flour about a minute to cook while you stir continuously, and then gradually whisk the turkey stock into the pan with the onions. Remember the turkey stock? Hopefully it’s still sitting back there on your stove, and hasn’t been stolen for a delectable soup by some roving chef. Simmer the gravy pan for a few minutes to thicken it. Add in another teaspoon of rosemary and sage if you’re so inclined.

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Now then! Your kitchen should be smelling amazing at this point, and the turkey should be about ready to come out of the oven. Carefully transfer that behemoth to your serving plate, and make a tent out of foil to keep it warm until it’s time to eat.

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Then carefully, carefully pour the juices from the roasting pan into a large container. A measuring cup would actually be more ideal, but for some reason I used a bowl here. After it’s been sitting for a few minutes, the fat will all rise to the top and you can skim it right off with a spoon and throw it away. Or if you were smart and used a measuring cup, you can just pour the fat off instead. They even make special measuring cups that let you easily pour the good stuff out from under the fat instead.

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While your pan juices are resting and separating, pour 1/2 cup of balsamic vinegar into a small saucepan, and simmer until it’s reduced to 1/4 cup, which should only take 3-4 minutes. And of course, make sure you’re using real 100% balsamic vinegar, and not some weird “balsamic-flavored” vinegar that might contain gluten. The word malt should not be anywhere on the bottle.

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Here comes the tricky part. We’re going to add small amounts of both the turkey juices and the balsamic vinegar to adjust the consistency and flavor, respectively. Start by adding one Tablespoon of the balsamic vinegar, then about 1/4 cup of pan juices.

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It’s very hard to give exact measurements here, because it’s impossible to know if your turkey stock reduced to exactly three cups, or how thick your gravy has gotten while we were cooking this turkey. If you overdo it on the turkey juices, you can always let it simmer a little longer and thicken again. But once the balsamic’s in, it’s in, so you can go even slower than a Tablespoon at a time if you’re not sure it will agree with your palate. I generally stop at 2, personally. But be brave and don’t skip the balsamic vinegar altogether, because it really adds an incredible depth to this amazing gravy. Just keep tasting, and stop when it’s perfect!

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Pour the gravy into some nice boat-like serving container, carve your turkey, and make sure Uncle Wally doesn’t take all the mashed potatoes before everyone else has had a chance. And then be prepared for a lot of lavish thanks, as your family admires your astoundingly awesome Thanksgiving turkey.

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Happy Eating!

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GFCF Thanksgiving Turkey with Balsamic Onion Gravy

For the turkey:
1 16-18 lb. turkey (with giblets)
6 Tbs Fleischmann’s Unsalted Margarine, divided (not Original flavor)
3 Tbs fresh rosemary, plus a whole sprig
3 Tbs fresh sage, plus a whole sprig
1 Tbs black pepper
4 tsp salt

For the gravy:
5 1/2 cups GF chicken broth
giblets from turkey
1 onion, quartered
1 bay leaf
6 Tbs Fleischmann’s Unsalted Margarine
2 onions, diced finely
1 Tbs rosemary
1 Tbs sage
1/3 cup Bob’s All-Purpose GF flour
1/2 cup balsamic vinegar

First, start with one onion and one shallot. A shallot is like the unholy love child of onion and garlic, so I like to think of this as a little mother-and-son family portrait. Well, if you pretend the knife isn’t there I guess. That does make it kind of weird.

Chop them up and start to sautee them with some olive oil, in the bottom of whatever passes for a giant soup pot in your kitchen.

While those cook, it’s time to prep the tomatoes. You’re going to want about 15 to 18 standard-sized hothouse tomatoes. You could also use roma tomatoes, but you’d probably want to toss in some extras to make up for the size difference. First, cut the tops off, then cut them into fourths. You may notice I messed up and forgot to cut the top off this one first, but the picture came out so nicely I decided to use it anyway.

Now, stand them on their flat side, and run the knife through in a C-shape to remove the inner guts. It’s a lot of cuts, but it goes pretty fast this way. If your tomatoes are super ripe, you won’t even need the knife, you can just swipe your thumb through and it’ll come right out.

Also roughly chop up about six to ten leaves of fresh basil.

When the onions are translucent, dump in all the tomatoes and the basil, and add 4 cups of gluten-free chicken broth. [As always, the brands I use were GFCF at the time of posting, but manufacturers can change formulas without warning. Always check your labels!]

Bring to a boil, and simmer uncovered for 30 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Now whip out your immersion blender, and start pureeing everything in sight. Would it be possible to transfer portions of this to a regular blender and do it that way? Maybe, but I’m pretty sure you’d be left with big chunks of tomato and basil in there. At the very least, you would probably want to peel the tomatoes before cooking them if you’re going to do it that way. (You would do that by plunging them into rapidly boiling water for about a minute, after which the skins should slide right off and you can add them to the soup pot for simmering.) But it’s a wasted effort if you’re using the immersion blender, because those things can pulverize everything you throw at them.

Now add 2 teaspoons of balsamic vinegar. Real balsamic vinegar ought to be gluten free, but it’s always a good idea to double check. Make sure it’s not really just “flavored” vinegar, and it doesn’t have the word “malt” anywhere in it.

Then add one cup of almond milk. It will probably need about 1/2 teaspoon of salt as well, but that will depend on how salty your brand of chicken broth is, so you may need to adjust that measurement a bit.

I’ve already expressed my feelings on fake cheeses, but if your kids like them, by all means, bust out the gluten-free bread and make it a classic grilled cheese and tomato soup meal. I like it with these slightly spicy Rice & Adzuki Bean chips, personally.

Happy Eating!

Tomato Basil Soup

1 onion
1 shallot
15-18 whole tomatoes
4 cups GF chicken broth
6-10 leaves fresh basil
2 tsp balsamic vinegar
1 cup almond milk

But in this recipe, it’s at least a reasonably fair moniker, because it does include some very Southwestern ingredients. If you’d rather call it Arizona Chicken Soup to promote diversity among the Southwestern states, that’s fine by me. We start with about one pound of plain old chicken. (And I do mean plain–stay away from broth-injected packaged chicken, unless you like to gamble with your gluten content, which I’d hope you wouldn’t, being on this site and all.) These are some extra tenders I had leftover in the freezer, but you could do any kind of light or dark meat, it doesn’t matter. Boil them until they’re cooked through, about 15 minutes depending on the thickness of your pieces.

Drain the chicken and set the pieces aside. In the same pot (it doesn’t have to be the same pot, but why get extra dishes dirty?) pour in 4 cups of gluten-free chicken stock. Pacific Foods makes a good one. [As always, the brands I use were GFCF at the time of posting, but manufacturers can change formulas at any time. Always double-check your lablels.]

While the stock is warming up, shred the chicken pieces with two forks.

Also, measure out 1 1/2 cups of gluten-free salsa. The spice level is entirely up to you (and what your kids will tolerate.) They make some salsas that are as mild as ketchup, and others that will take a few layers of skin off your mouth. Mine is a local brand, so you’re unlikely to be able to find it in your area, but Tostitos (All-Natural line of flavors only) is another option that’s sold pretty much everywhere.

Oh and look, this one even calls itself Texasalsa. In my defense, I used to prefer a different flavor of Jardine’s 7J Ranch salsa, but that one had gluten in it, alas. Just goes to show, you can’t mentally mark whole brands as safe or not, you have to verify each individual product.

Add the chicken and salsa to the pot, and toss in some frozen corn. I guess this is probably about a cup, I just give the bag a couple of shakes until it looks right.

Also add in 2 Tablespoons of lime juice. You can cut back on this if your salsa is already on the acidic side. Mine is, but I like the extra bite anyway. And yes, the GFCFBoy likes it this way too–he’s got sensory issues with his mouth, and loves extremely spicy or sour flavors. Used to eat wasabi peas as a toddler, no joke.

Chop up about 1/4 cup of fresh cilantro. If you don’t have fresh, just skip it, don’t even bother with the dried stuff for this. Chances are decent your salsa already has some of that in it anyway. Fresh makes all the difference in the flavor here. Plus, there is evidence that cilantro is a natural detoxifier, among its many other health benefits. Some even go so far as to suggest that in the right doses it can be as effective as chelation drugs at removing heavy metals from the body, which is a topic of interest to many parents of autistic children. (And if you’re looking for other places to sneak cilantro into the diet of you or your offspring, I’ve got a nice cilantro pesto recipe that I promise I’ll post sometime soon.)

Now, I know that cilantro is a very polarizing herb; people either love it or they hate it. There are even some scientific studies confirming that a portion of the population has a genetic variance in their tongues’ chemical receptors, which sadly makes cilantro taste absolutely horrid to them. If you’re one of these people, don’t worry, there’s a community just for you. Also, if you’re one of these people, just try using parsley in this recipe instead. It won’t be the same as my soup, but I’d imagine that’s kind of what you’re going for.

Jeez, enough with the cilantro already, eh? Just scrape it into the pot and get on with it! Okay, I hear you. We’re almost done.

Season with salt to suit your tastes. Again, this depends on the base flavor of your salsa. I use about a teaspoon or so.

At this point what we’ve got is pretty thin. If you like it that way, great, but I tend to like my soups to be just a little thicker. So I mix a Tablespoon of potato starch in the minimal amount of water needed to dissolve it, and add that to the simmering pot. Sometimes I’m impatient and add two, it just depends. Another thing you can do if you want to stretch the soup further is add a cup or two of cooked white rice.

Let it simmer and reduce for as long as you like. Me, I usually just barely get everything warm enough before I start greedily ladling it into my bowl. This goes great with tortilla chips (make sure they’re 100% corn,) and even better with a side of guacamole. I gotta tell you, guacamole absolutely saved me when we first started this diet. It had that perfect creamy texture I was craving–everything that used to get cheese or sour cream on it got a heaping glop of guacamole instead. I’ll spare you the details, but suffice it to say that no combination was too weird. I was a guacamole fiend for weeks on end.

Happy Eating!

Texas Chicken Soup

1 lb. boneless chicken pieces
4 cups Pacific Foods chicken stock
1 1/2 cups GF salsa
1 cup frozen corn
1/4 cup fresh cilantro

OPTIONAL:
2 TBS lime juice
1 tsp salt
1 TBS potato starch dissolved in water
1 cup cooked rice

This is my favorite chili recipe of all time. You can use ground beef if you really want, but give the turkey a try at least once. It tastes better, it’s healthier for you, and it’s cheaper. How much more could you ask from a humble meat?

First, dump 2 pounds of ground turkey into a big soup pot with a couple tablespoons of olive oil. Check out those beautiful blue handles–that’s my Lodge dutch oven, and I’ve been in love with it since the day I got it. The inner surface is this sealed enamel stuff, and it cleans easier than any Teflon-coated pan I have. Plus, you can throw the whole thing in the oven, lid and all. Which means you’ll be seeing it again whenever I get around to posting my pot roast recipe.

While the turkey starts browning just a bit, dice an onion. I’ve seen some official definitions of “dice” that are pretty ridiculously tiny for the amateur chef to achieve, so perhaps you may choose to say I am merely “chopping” an onion. Whatever, just get it into the smallest pieces you can manage without cutting off a finger.

Add your onions to the pot, along with 3 cloves of minced garlic (or 1 1/2 tsp of the jarred kind) and 1 Tablespoon of chili powder. You can add more if you like it spicy, but don’t make that decision yet until you check out the next step.

This, my friends, is chipotles in adobo. It sounds fancy, but really it’s not–a chipotle pepper is actually just a jalapeno pepper that’s been roasted. The “adobo” part is where the real flavor comes from, and that’s what that red sauce is. Recipes vary, but it’s generally a mixture of tomato paste, apple cider vinegar, garlic, oregano, cumin, and black pepper. Think of it as a spicy Mexican barbecue sauce. Anyway, you buy this stuff in a little can in the ethnic foods aisle, but check your brands for gluten. I can’t even remember the name of the brand I get, because it contains whole peppers, which are kind of a pain to work with, so what I do is throw the entire contents of the can in a blender, and store it in a tupperware in the fridge–so that can is long gone. 1 Tablespoon of the blended sauce is equal to about one chili pepper. In this big recipe, 1/2 a Tablespoon will still leave it mild enough for the kids, or if you’re really worried you can just use the sauce without the peppers blended in. Don’t omit it entirely though, because that wonderful smokey flavor is really essential to the final product.

Okay, enough with the chipotle pepper lesson. Mix it all up and let the meat brown, stirring occasionally.

When the meat is cooked, drain a can of Bush’s red kidney beans and dump it in the pot. [As always, the brands I use were GFCF at the time of posting, but manufacturers can change formulas without notice. Always check your labels.]

Add a can of crushed tomatoes. My generic brand is probably not available in your area, but really, all a can of tomatoes ought to have in it is tomatoes, water, and maybe a little salt. Don’t even waste time with brands that put extra crap in their cans, whether it’s ultimately gluten-free or not. It’s a can of vegetables, for pete’s sake, it doesn’t need anything else.

Also add in two cups of GF chicken broth. This is another ingredient you have to hunt down a suitable brand for, and in my experience you usually have to spring for the organic brands before you get one that’s safe. As a side note, another thing you have to watch out for is that packaged chicken breasts will often be injected with broth (the package will say something like “Up to 10% solution.”) Take the time to verify with the manufacturers that the broth they’re injecting is gluten-free, or pay more for organic, it’s your call.

Now, give the chili a good stir and let it simmer for about 20-30 minutes. In the meantime, it’s time to make the corn cakes! The number of ingredients can seem daunting, but if you lay it all out in front of you it’s not so bad.

This is 3/4 cup rice flour, 1 cup of cornmeal, and 2 TBS brown sugar.

Then 1 tsp of salt, and 1/2 tsp of xanthan gum. I resisted buying xanthan gum for a long time when I started gluten-free cooking, because the name was just too weird, and I didn’t even know what it looked like, and I just didn’t want to deal with something so foreign, you know? But eventually I figured out it’s just another white powder in a Bob’s Red Mill bag, and hey, I already have like 3 or 4 of those in my kitchen already, so what the heck. And it really does make a difference in these recipes. It adds that fluffiness and stretchiness back in, the things that used to be taken care of by gluten in your old life.

Then 3 tsp of gluten-free baking powder, and you’re done with the dry ingredients.

Then the wet ingredients: 2 eggs, 4 TBS Fleischmann’s margarine, and 1 cup of almond milk. Don’t put that milk away just yet; we’re going to need it again in a second.

Melt the magarine in the microwave, and whisk in the eggs.

Then add the almond milk…

And work that bicep. My great-grandmother must have been super buff, whisking stuff like this every single day.

Now you want to add just a teensy bit more almond milk, to get the batter to the right consistency. It’s usually about 2-3 Tablespoons.

It will still be thick, like all gluten-free mixes, but you want it so the batter stretches, rather than tearing into chunks.

Ladle it into your preheated pan (oiled with Canola cooking spray or dabs of margarine,) and give it several minutes before flipping. You won’t see any bubbles surfacing like there would be with a normal pancake batter, you just have to test the underside every once in awhile and see if it’s easy to slip the spatula under yet or not.

Because the batter is so thick, sometimes an air bubble will get trapped underneath and you’ll end up with strange designs on your corn cakes. This one looks like a key to me, or maybe a guitar, I can’t decide. I’m still waiting for the day I hit the jackpot and get one that kind of looks like the Virgin Mary, and then I can sell it on eBay for a ton of money and hire someone to make all my corn cakes for me.

Right about the time you’ve cooked all your corn cakes, the chili should be ready to serve. You could, of course, serve the cakes alongside the chili, or even forego the whole cake shape in the first place and make them muffins or something instead.

But what I like to do is serve it underneath the chili. You get a bit of corn cake in every bite, and it’s a fun surprise, like fruit at the bottom of your yogurt. Except we can’t have yogurt anymore–all the more reason to adapt the food-hiding-within-food presentation to new and exciting dishes, am I right? Plus, it’s a corn cake, which makes this final product remarkably close to Frito Pie. Truth be told, when I’m running short on time I actually serve it over Fritos to begin with.

Happy Eating!

Turkey Chili with Corn Cakes

2 lbs. ground turkey
1 med. onion
3 cloves garlic
1 TBS chili powder
1 TBS chipotles in adobo
1 can Bush’s kidney beans
1 can crushed tomatoes
2 cups GF chicken broth

1 cup corn meal
3/4 cup rice flour
2 TBS brown sugar
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp xanthan gum
3 tsp GF baking powder
2 eggs
4 TBS margarine
1 cup plus about 2-3 TBS almond milk