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Looks a lot like beef, to be honest. This cut is an “arm chop,” which is only relevant to note because it has a bone in it. You can use pretty much any type of lamb meat for this stew, but having a bone will help make the broth nice and thick like it ought to be.

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Another thing that’s going to help beef up the broth (so to speak) is breading the meat chunks before we cook them. Put 1/4 cup gluten-free flour in a bowl (I used Bob’s Red Mill All-Purpose blend, but for this any type will do,) and add in 1 teaspoon of salt and 1/2 teaspoon of black pepper for a little flavor boost.

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Heat up a large soup pot or dutch oven on the stove with a little oil. You want the oil to be nice and hot before you put the meat in. Then dredge a handful at a time in the flour and toss them in as you go.

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Stir the pieces quickly so they can brown on all sides. It should only take a couple of minutes before all the dustiness of the flour and visible redness of the meat is gone.

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Now add 1 1/2 cups of water, and 1 cup of white cooking wine to the pot. Generally speaking, wines are made from grapes and should be gluten free, but always check the ingredient list to be sure it’s not some blended product. Above all, the word “malt” should not be anywhere on the bottle. The alcohol content will cook away, but if for some reason you don’t want to use it, you can always substitute white grape juice or apple cider in any recipe that calls for white wine.

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Remember the bone? Toss that in the pot too. It’s going to impart not just a ton of flavor, but also natural gelatin which will thicken the stew and result in the most awesomest broth you’ve ever tasted.

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Also add in 1 teaspoon each of oregano and rosemary. Then bring the pot to a boil, cover and simmer for 1 hour.

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After your house has been filled with a wonderful aroma, add in about 2 cups of carrots (I like shreds, but you could do diced as well) and 2 cups of small potato pieces. These cute little things I’m using are actually called fingerling potatoes, which I like because the peels are super thin so you can leave them on. But any type of potato will do as long as the pieces are bite-sized. Put the lid back on, and continue to simmer for another hour, until the potatoes are nice and soft.

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Finally, add in 1 cup of frozen peas, and cook with the lid off until the peas are warmed through, another 5-10 minutes.

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Make sure you fish out that bone piece before you ladle it into bowls. Finding that in your spoon would put a bit of a damper an otherwise delectable stew experience.

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Happy Eating!

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Lamb Stew

2 lbs. lamb meat
1/4 cup gluten-free flour
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp pepper
1 cup white cooking wine
1 1/2 cups water
1 tsp rosemary
1 tsp oregano
2 cups carrots, diced or shredded
2 cups new potatoes, diced
1 cup frozen peas

But wait, not yet! Save your caresses for when the meat is cooked, please. First, we need to build up a little tension, am I right? You can use anywhere from 1 to 4 chicken breasts for this, depending on how much meat you want in the final product, but always use the same amount of marinade, because it’s an integral part of the sauce later and you don’t want to throw the balance off. So start with one Tablespoon of sugar…

And 2 Tablespoons of Thai Kitchen fish sauce. This brand is common enough that you will probably be able to find it in your normal grocery store, and they’re generally really good about not hiding gluten in their various Asian food products. [As always, the brands I use were GFCF at the time of posting, but manufacturers can change recipes without warning. Always check your labels!]

Add 1 Tablespoon of minced garlic, and 1 teaspoon of black pepper. Stir everything together thoroughly, cover the bowl, and stick it in the refrigerator for whatever length of time fits your dinner schedule. If that happens to be first thing in the morning before you leave the house, or no more than 10 minutes before you start cooking the rest of the meal, it’s all good.

Cut up about 1 lb. of smallish potatoes (I think I used 5 of them) into bite-size chunks. I leave the peels on, but you don’t have to if you don’t want to. I’d like to claim I do it because the peels are the healthiest part, but really it’s just because I’m lazy.

Chop an onion into similar-sized pieces (or smaller, if your kids don’t like onions and you’re hoping they’ll accidentally get a few on their fork without noticing.)

Heat up one or two tablespoons of olive oil in a large soup pot, and dump in the potatoes, onions, and a chopped up red bell pepper as well. Truth be told, that’s actually 2 red bell peppers in mine, because I adore red bell peppers (but I absolutely loathe the green ones; go figure.) You’ve got to go with your gut on how many are right for you. Once you’ve settled that conundrum, sautee everything over moderately high heat for about 5 minutes, stirring frequently.

Then pour in your chicken along with all the marinade. Stir rapidly until the outside of the chicken is opaque but it’s not cooked all the way through.

Now for the most important part — the love potion, if you will. (Did I just type that? I’m really having second thoughts about this whole “romance” metaphor I’ve got going on…) Thai Kitchen Green Curry Paste. It comes in a tiny jar, but you only need 1 Tablespoon of it at a time. Normally I’d give you an idea of what’s in it in case you want to approximate, but there’s really no substitute for this complex combination of flavors. Mix it into your pot and cook for one minute, just enough to get the fragrance going.

Now, add one can of coconut milk. Make sure you stir inside the can before you pour, because coconut milk will tend to separate.

Also add 1/4 cup of water…

And 1 Tablespoon of lime juice.

Cover the pot, and let it simmer until the potatoes are tender, about 7-8 minutes.

If necessary, let it simmer uncovered for another couple of minutes to let it thicken a bit.

This is best served over rice. Why is there no rice in my bowl, you ask? Because I’m a doofus and forgot to put it in there before taking the picture. It happens. The peppers and onions may intimidate some kids, but I promise you, they’re going to love this sauce if you can get them to give it a chance. Coconut milk is sweet, and you may also recall we added a Tablespoon of sugar way back when. After cooking in the sauce for so long, all the veggies have soaked up the flavor too, and the result is something you will want to embrace very deeply indeed.

Happy Eating!

The GFCF Lady’s Green Curry Chicken

2-4 chicken breasts
1 TBS sugar
2 TBS Thai Kitchen fish sauce
1 TBS minced garlic
1 tsp black pepper

1 lb. small potatoes
1 onion
1-2 red bell peppers
1 can coconut milk
1 TBS Thai Kitchen green curry paste
1/4 cup water
1 TBS lime juice

Granted, plain white potatoes are not really that nutritious in the grand scheme of things, but they can be an excellent vehicle for a wide variety of toppings. Like a lot of meals, they aren’t traditionally GFCF, what with all the butter and cheese and sour cream, but who wants to be traditional anyhow? A little creativity goes a long way.

But before we can revel in our topping choices, we have to get our potato into a baked state of mind. First, jab it liberally on all sides with a fork. (If you don’t, you will have yourself an exploding potato instead.)

Then wrap it loosely in a paper towel, and microwave it for 4 and a half minutes. Now, this is important: take it out of the microwave and let it sit for another 5 minutes. It will continue to cook as it rests, so that by the end the middle will be perfectly cooked without the outside being overdone.

If you are making several potatoes instead of just one or two, you may want to do it the slow but simultaneous way, which is to put all of them in a 350 degree oven for one hour. Of course you don’t want to put a paper towel in the oven, but the fork-jabbing step is still quite necessary, believe me.

Now, on to the toppings! Today I decided I was going to go with kind of a modified version of a BLT, because I had some leftover bacon in the refrigerator. “Leftover” is a bit disingenuous, actually, since it’s always part of my plan when I make bacon to cook a few extra slices so I’ll have some ready to use in a salad or whatever later in the week. See here for a description of how I make bacon in the oven with zero effort and very little mess. Unfortunately, this wasn’t destined to be a true BLT, because I didn’t have any lettuce, and I wasn’t convinced the texture would be that good on the potato anyway.

But I did include what I consider to be a vital part of a BLT, and that’s chipotle mayo! The chiles in Sriracha (also sometimes known as Rooster Sauce) are not truly chipotles, but they get the point across. You could mix in real chipotles in adobo, or even dried chipotle spice or chili powder, whatever you have on hand. The proportions are a little fuzzy; start with 1 teaspoon of spicy stuff in 2-3 Tablespoons of mayonnaise, and go from there. Not all mayonnaises are gluten-free, but Hellman’s actually prints it right on the label for us, isn’t that nice of them? [As always, the brands I use were GFCF at the time of posting, but manufacturers can change formulas without warning. Always check your labels!] And, if you mix it up in one of these tiny single-serving disposable tupperware things, then you can just pop a lid on whatever you don’t use and save it for a sandwich or GF tortilla wrap later in the week. Efficiency is your friend!

And here we have my completed Bacon-Tomato-Chipotle-Mayo potato. (Read that out loud once or twice, it’s fun.) I was really wishing for some fresh green onions to go with it as well, but my empty refrigerator mocked me in this regard. But what’s important to understand is that anything, absolutely anything, can go on a baked potato. Meats, beans, veggies, GFCF dressings, guacamole… If you’re not up for baking gluten-free hamburger buns, for example, you could just fill a baked potato with ground beef and hamburger fixings. Or rather than always buying the expensive gluten-free pastas, you could fill one with chicken and spaghetti sauce. Why, just a few days ago I even made one with Thanksgiving leftovers:

That’s turkey, cranberry sauce, and some extra deviled egg filling I still had hanging around after I’d already filled all my egg halves to overflowing.  This was one of my favorite baked potato combinations I’ve ever eaten, and believe me, I’ve made a lot.

Happy Eating!

So what’s a GFCF mom to do? Well, making great homemade mashed potatoes isn’t hard at all, if you have a good recipe. And hey, if we’re bothering to make our own mashed potatoes, we might as well make them perfectly, right?

First, peel your pile of potatoes. (And say that ten times fast.) This is approximately 2.5 pounds of potatoes, based on the fact that it’s about half of a standard 5-pound bag. Use the other half for Potato Salad or Tandoori Chicken later in the week. Or, double the recipe and save the leftovers for Shepherd’s Pie. Oh humble potato, is there anything you can’t do?

Chop them into decent-sized chunks, and boil for about 20-30 minutes, until they are really thoroughly cooked. When you stab a fork in to check them, the piece should pretty much just fall in half. This is more cooked than you would want for, say, potato salad, where you expect the potatoes to retain a little firmness.

Drain the potatoes and return them to the pot. See how they’re all falling apart on their own back there? Now add 4 Tablespoons (aka 1/4 cup) of Fleischmann’s Unsalted Margarine. Make sure you do not use the Original flavor; only the unsalted kind is dairy-free. [As always, the brands I use were GFCF at the time of posting, but manufacturers can change formulas without warning. Always check your labels!]

Stir everything around until the margarine is melted, then pour in about 1/3 to 1/2 cup of almond milk. You’re never going to get exactly the same amount of potatoes in any given batch, and the threshold between dry and soupy can be very thin. So start with a little less and add with caution as needed.

Look at that fluffy, perfectly smooth texture! You’d never believe I managed that with a spoon and a bicep. Actually, that’s because I didn’t, I used the hand mixer like any normal human being. That thing will hunt down and decimate any remaining lumps in no time flat. If you have persistent lumps, that’s a good indication that the potatoes weren’t boiled for long enough. It’s really very hard to overboil potatoes.

You’ll want to add at least 1/2 teaspoon of salt, especially since we used unsalted margarine. Some people may prefer more, but 1/2 teaspoon is a good starting point.

And if you want to be all snazzy, add a teaspoon of parsley and declare them to be herbed mashed potatoes.

You could also add a teaspoon of minced garlic if that’s your thing, but I like them just the way they are: perfect.

Happy Eating!

Perfect Mashed Potatoes

2.5 pounds russet potatoes
4 TBS Fleischmann’s unsalted margarine (NOT Original flavor)
1/3 cup almond milk
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp parsley

Fast forward to the beginning of our GFCF adventure, and I learned some very important equivalencies: gram flour = chickpea flour = garbanzo bean flour = the main ingredient in Bob’s Red Mill All-Purpose Gluten Free Flour Blend. All of a sudden, this whole book of recipes was useful again!

Confession time: that whole introduction was a bit disingenuous, because this recipe did not in fact come from the Indian cookbook in question. But it is an Indian recipe, so I stand by the moral of my story. I’m an “ends justify the means” kind of gal.

Anyway, here we have a can of coconut milk, which is in general an excellent milk substitute. Pour one cup of the liquid into a bowl, which should be about half the can. (Save the other half for later in the week, when you are compelled to make this recipe again because it was just so dang good.) Make sure you stir the contents of the can thoroughly before pouring, because coconut milk has a tendency to separate.

Then add 1 1/2 Tablespoons of McCormick curry powder. Because curry is a spice blend rather than an herb in and of itself (there is no curry plant,) you must be extra careful about buying a brand without gluten. Manufacturers will often add flour to spice blends to help keep things from clumping. Not all McCormick spice blends are safe, but the company has committed to always clearly labeling the presence of gluten on their spice jars. [As always, the brands I use were GFCF at the time of posting, but manufacturers can change ingredients without warning. Always check your labels!]

Then add 2 teaspoons of paprika, and 3/4 teaspoon of salt.

3 Tablespoons of lemon juice…

1 1/2 Tablespoons of minced ginger (I’d show you how to mince it, but I get mine out of a jar. Life’s too short, you know?)

And 2 cloves of minced garlic (or 1 teaspoon of the jarred kind.)

Now dice up a medium onion, and get out 6-8 boneless chicken thighs, or a couple pounds of whatever kind of boneless chicken parts you prefer. Always make sure your chicken is all-natural and not injected with broth.

Throw the chicken, sauce, and onions all together in a giant Ziplock bag, and punch it around until everything’s mixed.

Seal it up and let it marinate in the refrigerator for several hours, or however much time you can spare.

Later, when you’re gearing up to actually cook the meal, peel three medium potatoes and chop them into big chunks.

Pull the chicken pieces out of the marinade bag and set them aside on a plate. Don’t worry if some of the onions stick to the chicken, it’s all going to back together in a minute. Add an extra 1/2 teaspoon of salt into the bag, and toss in the potatoes so we can get a quick coating on them.

Shake it (like a Polaroid picture, even,) then dump the whole bag into the bottom of your dutch oven. (You don’t have a dutch oven yet? For heaven’s sake, why not?) Make sure to squeeze out all the extra sauce too, like the world’s largest ketchup packet.

Lay your chicken pieces on top of the potatoes, and give the top a good sprinkling of paprika. Put on the lid, and place the whole thing in a 450-degree oven for one hour.

Look how beautiful that is! And those potatoes are perfect, I’m telling you right now. You will practically be able to hear the sitar music right there in your kitchen.

Happy Eating!

Tandoori Chicken with Potatoes

1 cup coconut milk
1 1/2 TBS McCormick curry powder
2 tsp paprika
3/4 tsp salt
3 TBS lemon juice
1 1/2 TBS minced ginger
2 cloves minced garlic

1 onion
6-8 boneless chicken thighs
3 medium potatoes
1/2 tsp salt
additional paprika for garnish

I don’t know if I buy it, but I’m desperate for approval, so I’ll try to conform in my own lazy way. Let’s cook up some breakfast tacos!

I don’t know about you, but I like potatoes in my breakfast tacos. Ore-Ida also makes a more traditional hash brown product, which would strictly speaking be more, well, traditional here. But you know what you would have if you took a bunch of hashbrown pieces and squashed them back together? A french fry! And by the transitive property, it is therefore completely legitimate to cut these fries up and call the result a suitable potato ingredient for breakfast tacos.

Also, it was what I had in my freezer.

We like the Zesties fries, but you could go with a plain Ore-Ida frozen potato product of pretty much any kind. [As always, the brands I use were GFCF at the time of posting, but manufacturers can change their formulas without warning. Always check your labels!]

Anyway, the whole point of getting the potatoes out first is they have to cook in the oven according to package directions. And toss the bacon in there while you’re at it.

Wait, what? Yes, I said cook the bacon in the oven. A friend of mine taught me this trick, and I’m telling you, it has changed bacon consumption in this house forever. Just spread some parchment paper on a large pan, and lay out your bacon strips. A general cooking guideline for them is anywhere from 15 to 35 minutes at 350, depending on how crispy you like your bacon. But if the oven has to be hotter for the potatoes, don’t sweat it, just keep an eye on the bacon and pull it out whenever it’s done. It will come out perfectly, with far less mess, and then you too will be a bacon-in-the-oven convert. (And for the record, you don’t have to use turkey bacon, regular bacon is fine too, though you will need to stick with a brand that uses no gluteny preservatives, like Applegate Farms.)

Now, grab some Food For Life brown rice tortillas out of the freezer, and pop them in the microwave for about 10 seconds. Then peel off the actual number of tortillas you need from the now not-quite-frozen stack, and toss the rest back in the freezer for another day.

Okay, it’s finally time to cook the eggs. See why I don’t put out this much effort often? Although I will admit that in dinner terms, it’s not as much work as most other meals, so half the time we’re not actually eating these for breakfast at all. But regardless of what the clock says, you’ll need to grease your pan. I use tub stuff for pans because you can use more or less than an exact tablespoon without messing up those handy measurement markers they put on my margarine sticks. Please note that not all Smart Balance products are casein-free–as far as I know, this one “light” flavor that says “Now with Flax Oil” is the only one.

Scramble your eggs in a bowl, and dump them in the heated pan. Resist the urge to shove them around the pan too much while they’re cooking, just let them sit until the bottom starts to set, then scrape it up so more liquid can flow underneath it. Repeat this a few times, and it will naturally create the right texture. Seriously, don’t stir them all over the place the whole time, it messes them up. Scrambled eggs is one of the few things I was really good at cooking before embarking on this adventure (and I lucked into the technique just by ignoring the pan for the most part–see, sometimes being a lazy cook works out for the bettter!)

Finish heating the tortillas, and fill with scrambled eggs, bits of french fries, and a slice of bacon. Feel free to add a GF salsa, if that’s your thing. Down here, it kind of goes without saying: everything gets salsa on it.

Happy Eating!

Breakfast Tacos

Food For Life brown rice tortillas
Ore-Ida frozen potatoes
Applegate Farms bacon
Eggs
GF salsa (optional)

And what could be more basic than the humble potato? I love the little red ones, they’re so cute. Just cut them in half, maybe quarters for the bigger ones, and toss them with a couple tablespoons of olive oil. Normally you would see my little oil spigot thing, but somehow it didn’t make it into the frame. Just imagine there’s a thin stream of oil about to hit these apples of the earth.

That’s what they call potatoes in French, you know: pommes de terre, or “apples of the Earth.” In Spanish it’s patata, but that’s not nearly as interesting. Oh look, we’re oiling a sheet of foil on a baking pan up there. I think that’s what, sunflower oil? I don’t even remember; I play pretty fast and loose with my oils.

Salt them generously. How generously is up to you, but I like it pretty generous. Then again, you can always add more after they’re cooked, so if you want to stay on the safe side, that’s okay too.

Then sprinkle them with rosemary, and put them in a 350 degree oven for about 45 minutes. I wish I could tell you an actual measurement of how much rosemary to use, but I just keep sprinkling until it looks right. I determined what “right” was by the highly scientific method of “remembering what those new potatoes looked like at that one wedding buffet I went to.”

That’s how you know this is an easy dish, by the way: anything that can sit in a chafing dish for an hour and still taste good by the time you get to the front of the line must be impossible to ruin. So if they have to sit in the oven a little longer, or if you’re cooking something else at a different temperature and you want to cook the potatoes at the same time, don’t sweat it. You can throw them in at pretty much any temperature, and just pull them out when they’re starting to brown on the edges, and they’ll be good.

Happy Eating!

Roasted New Potatoes

Small red new potatoes
olive oil
salt
rosemary

When cooking for kids, often the texture of a dish is just as important–if not more important–than the taste. And one thing kids are not usually fond of is chunks, especially “chunks coated in slime,” which is how I once heard a particularly eloquent young lady describe potato salad. Mashed potatoes, on the other hand, are always a big hit, at least with all the kids I’ve ever met. Thus, I present to you the best of both worlds: Smashed Potato Salad!

We start with 3 lbs. of medium gold potatoes, cut into quarters.

Boil them until fork-tender, about 10-15 minutes.

Meanwhile, hardboil 3 eggs. (That’s 15 minutes at a full rolling boil, in case no one’s ever specified. I used to have so much trouble peeling my hardboiled eggs until I discovered by accident that I wasn’t cooking them quite long enough.)

While those pots are going, mix together 3/4 cup Hellmann’s mayonnaise, 1/4 cup Grey Poupon, 1 TBS brown sugar, and 2 TBS lemon juice. [As always, the brand names I use were GFCF at the time of posting, but manufacturers can change their formulas without warning. Always double-check your labels.]

Stir until the sugar has fully dissolved, and then add 1/2 tsp Lea & Perrin’s worcestershire sauce, 1 tsp pepper, and 1 tsp salt.

When the potatoes are done, drain them and rinse with cold water to stop the cooking process.

See how the peels just fall right off after the potatoes are cooked? It’s so much easier than scraping them all by hand with a vegetable peeler.

After you’ve discarded the peels, mash the potatoes. It’s up to you how chunky you want the final product to be, but I recommend nothing bigger than a half-inch or so.

If I can crack an egg with one hand, you’d better believe I can peel one with one hand, too. I just love action shots with water, they always look so cool. Anyway, as you can see, the eggs are done and now we’re peeling them.

And now we’re using my favorite kitchen tool of all time, the egg slicer. I wish everything were this fun to dice.

Add 1 tsp of minced garlic (or two cloves, if you have fresh garlic lying around, but I never do, so I use this handy jarred stuff.)

Make sure the potato mixture is cool, and then add in the dressing. Stir and stir until it’s completely incorporated. Now, this is one of those dishes that needs to sit in the refrigerator for awhile to let the flavors mellow and blend. Trust me, if you taste it now, you’ll say to yourself, “Ugh! That’s way too overpowering, no child would ever eat that! The GFCF Lady is a fraud!” But let it sit for at least an hour, and the potatoes will soak up all those delicious flavors and balance everything out, I promise.

Oh man, that’s what I’m talking about. I could eat this stuff all day long.

Happy Eating!

The GFCF Lady’s Smashed Potato Salad

3 lbs. medium gold potatoes
3 eggs
3/4 cup Hellman’s mayonnaise
1/4 cup Grey Poupon
1 TBS brown sugar
2 TBS lemon juice
1/2 tsp Lea & Perrin’s worcestershire sauce
1 tsp pepper
1 tsp salt
1 tsp (2 cloves) minced garlic