I found S’more…

Okay so I found the recipe…sorry it took me so long to get it posted, but the hubby has been on holidays so we have been out and about enjoying summer and trying to keep cool in this ridiculous heat wave.

I found the original recipe at while I was looking for something else to make at Pastry Affair. The pictures made me drool a little and the squirrel made me laugh so I couldn’t resist trying to make it gluten free (you really need to read the post it is pretty funny).

So here is the recipe as promised:

Graham Cracker Cupcakes
Adapted from Pastry Affair

1/2 cup butter, room temperature
1 cup sugar
3 eggs, separated, room temperature
1 cup sweet rice flour
10 gluten free graham crackers smashed (1 ½ cups of crumbs is the actual amount recommended but I didn’t have that much…there may even have been less than 10 crackers but…)
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/8 teaspoon salt
1 cup milk

Make sure your ingredients are room temperature.

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.

Using a stand mixer (you can use a regular electric mixer but your arm might get tired), beat the butter until it is fluffy, about 30 seconds. Add the sugar and beat together the butter and sugar until it is very light and fluffy, about 7-8 minutes. Seems like a while but trust me!

Add the egg yolks to the butter mixture one at a time, mixing between additions. In a small bowl, beat together the egg whites until they are voluminous and foamy using an electric mixer.

Using whatever method available to you (food chopper, processor or hammer, or box of crumbs) turn your crackers into tiny crumbs.

In a medium bowl, sift together the flour, graham cracker crumbs, baking soda, baking powder, and salt. Sifting is important to get rid of the larger graham cracker crumbs and to add air to the cupcakes. You will want as much air as you can get.

Add 1/3 of the flour mixture to the butter mixture and mix with a spatula. Add 1/2 cup of the milk. Mix. Add another 1/3 of the flour. Then add the rest of the milk, and the rest of the flour. Add the foaming egg whites and fold the mixture until just combined.

Scoop the batter into cupcake wrappers 3/4 of the way full and bake for 15-18 minutes, or until the cupcake tops bounce back when pressed. Cool completely on a cooling rack.

Marshmallow filling

Adapted from theKitchn (there is a recipe with the original cupcake recipe as well)

1 ½ cups Marshmallow fluff (or other marshmallow cream)

½ cup butter

½ cup shortening (the original recipe uses just shortening)

1 cup icing sugar

Pinch of salt

Mix all ingredients together in the bowl of a stand mixer until well blended.

Chocolate Glaze

You can follow the recipe in the above link to Pastry Affair, but I didn’t have any chocolate so I made a glaze.

2-3 Tbsp butter

2 Tbsp water

3 Tbsp cocoa powder

1 cup or so of icing sugar

1 tsp vanilla

In a saucepan on medium heat melt the butter and water together. Add  the cocoa powder and mix. Remove from heat and add the icing sugar slowly to avoid clumps, add vanilla.

Meringue Topping
4 egg whites
1 cup sugar

In a double broiler, whisk together the egg whites and sugar until the sugar is completely dissolved and the egg whites are warm to the touch, about 3-4 minutes.

Remove from the heat, transfer to a medium mixing bowl, and beat the egg whites until they form shiny, stiff peaks, about 5-8 minutes. Use immediately.

To assemble cupcakes:

Using and apple corer or paring knife, remove the centre of your cupcake. Fill the whole with marshmallow filling. Cut the piece that was removed in half and stick back into the hole. Place a spoonful of chocolate glaze on top of each cupcake. Using a piping bag, pipe the meringue onto the top of the glaze. Place entire cupcake under broiler until tops are browned (you can also use a kitchen torch for this step if you have one). Enjoy!!

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What She Ate: By The Campfire

 

I am going to let you in on a little secret here, okay well maybe even a couple of secrets. Ready?  Number 1) the week just got away from me and I kind of forgot about yesterdays post (which is why I am doing it now , and number 2) is that we haven’t been camping since I was pregnant with monkey number 2…yikes…to put that in perspective monkey number 3 turns three next week. We keep saying we are going to go and something just comes up…we really need to go and soon. Some of my best memories from growing up are while camping…like the day my mean older brother told me where bacon came from…that was a sad day in my world, but bacon tastes so good that I got over it (though a video I watched the other day thanks to Netflix almost changed my mind again).

Anyway, put those two secrets together and you really have nothing to make for a blog link up called by the campfire right?! Not so…I made S’mores cupcakes 😀 Okay so I am stretching the theme a bit but I hope I will be forgiven.

 

and I really, really , really want to share the recipe with you but I can’t….I can’t find it…I adapted a non-gluten-free one and turned it into the most AH-MAH-ZING gluten free cupcake, but I DIDN’T WRITE IT DOWN (my very pregnant sister is going to be SO PISSED…so pardon me while I find a good hiding spot from which to continue the search…if I can find the original I can re-create the gluten-free, please be patient with me).

I know I used sweet rice flour and gf graham crackers LOL. I stuffed it with marshmallow frosting, put chocolate ganache on it and some meringue  on it and then broiled it to get the toasty to. 

Looks toasty doesn’t it? (I am looking for it I swear)

and then (please don’t hate me)…I cut it open to show you the inside.

While I am looking for the recipe, check out the other fabulous bloggers that took part in this weeks link up Stars in Jars and Let it Unravel.

I will post the recipe as soon as I re-create it for you I PROMISE!

 

Swimming in Strawberries

 

 

 I don’t know about you but I LOVE this time of year…okay well I could do without this week’s humidity and the weatherman’s five day forecast that involves a lot of tiny pictures of angry clouds and flashing lightning bolts, but it could be worse (my heart goes out to everyone affected by flooding this year and I hope very much that all your loved ones are safe).  But this is the time of year when those beautiful red berries start appearing in farm stands and market stalls all over. Most of all I love that the pick-your-own fields are also open. I look at them with aniticpation and dread…they bring back many memories of one-for-me-one-for-the-basket” picking with my family while growing up and I love the so many possibilities that they provide me. The dread part comes in when I think about the four children under 6 that will be going with us this year, and the inevitable “doneness” they will have before we are done, but I am putting that aside so that they too can play “one-for-me-one-for-the-basket” and so that my sister and I can see their pink stained hands and faces and the sense of accomplishment they have when their baskets are full.  My sister is also very pregnant this year which, as it did three years ago when we were both eight months pregnant and picking, will cause the lady at the farm a great deal of alarm (thankfully I think that time we only brought my oldest with us and she was 4).

We haven’t hit the fields yet but I did pick up a basket at the Kemptville Kinsmen Farmer’s Market. 

The basket of strawberries was way more full before we left the market but then this happened:

This week’s challenge for the “What She Ate” linkup is “In Season” and I of course am going to pick strawberries (pun kind of intended…what can I say, I am my father’s daughter and he was a puny kind of guy). There are so many things I could make, but my absolute favourite (okay well next to lemon meringue pie) dessert pre-celiac was Strawberry Shortcake! Not the most original, but there are a reason classics are classics, right?!?!

So I hit the internet to look up a gf version that I had all the ingredients for…in fact I hit the internet so long I almost ran out of time before dinner to make it. In the end I cheated…instead of a completely from scratch recipe I used a gf biscuit mix that I picked up at Price Choppers for emergencies the last time we crossed the border. We decided to add some chocolate chips because who doesn’t love chocolate…

I would hang my head in shame, but I feel none…they turned out DELICIOUS!!! My older two kiddos even took a biscuit each to school the next day as a treat.

 Gluten-free Chocolate Chip Strawberry Shortcake

strawberries

2 1/3 cups gluten free biscuit mix (I used the Price Chopper store brand box)

¼ cup sugar (I used organic cane sugar)

3 eggs beaten,

5 TBSP butter

¾ cup milk of choice

½ tsp of vanilla

2 handfuls Chocolate chips (optional)

Whipping cream

Slice strawberries and set aside (you can sprinkle with sugar but I thought ours were sweet enough without). Mix together the biscuit mix and sugar.  Cut in the butter using a pastry cutter, or two knives or even your fingers (that is what I did. We aren’t fancy around here).  Next, mix in the eggs, vanilla and milk. Mix in chocolate chips if you are using.  Drop by large spoonfuls onto a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper (I used about 1/3 cup for each and it made 8).  Bake in a 425 oven for 10-12 minutes. Allow to cool for a few minutes before serving. While cooling, whip your cream until peaks form (you can add powdered sugar but we went without). Top with the strawberries and whipped cream. 

This would also be delicious with coconut whipped cream.

Enjoy!!! We sure did!

For other in season treats, be sure to check out the rest of our link-up Sondra at Abhaya and Stacy at Let It Unravel.

What She Ate (Spice It Up)

It has been super busy around here lately. With the brief spots of nice weather in the midst of the rain we have been trying to make every moment of being outside happen, but boy it has been chilly and wet. The garden is both loving and hating the weather…we have spinach ready for picking so I am making a garlicy chicken pizza ASAP (maybe friday because tonight is soccer, tomorrow my pizza partner in crime won’t be here and Thursday is also soccer). The Kemptville Kinsmen Farmer’s Market also started this past weekend and went pretty well. It was windy but thankfully the rain held off for the afternoon (and my sister ate her poutine happily while I had a delicious muffin and homemade chips from some other booths 🙂 ) I let her eat her yummy fries happily because I have heard rumours   of places “nearby” that have gluten-free gravy so I will be able to indulge every once in a while too, but the thought of driving 40 minutes into the city will make sure I don’t do it too often. Most of the yummy yummy things we are selling at the market (and everything that comes out of my kitchen is going to be gluten-free and delicious. Speaking of indulgences, here is my entry for the What She Ate Link up . This week’s challenge was Spice it up. I was excited and had a plan…of course in the true vein of me-being-me (remember how I said part of my brain fell out with each kid, and then the add to that the Gluten-fog that is only just lifting, but still appears on occasion as I figure things out), I thought the link up was tomorrow…not today…I was going shopping tonight to get all the stuff I needed to re-make and de-glutenize a favourite spicy chocolate cake, with yummy cinnamon whipped icing. Then I rechecked the date, and raced to see what I had in the kitchen that I could make while still keeping an eye of the trouble twosome (my youngest and my youngest nephew).

And ta-da:

Five Minute Spicy Chocolate Mug Cake 4Tbsp gluten-free flour mix (without xantham gum) 3Tbsp sugar 3Tbsp cocoa powder 3/4 tsp cayenne powder (I found this a bit spicy but my husband did not) 1 egg 3 Tbsp coconut oil (liquid form) 3 Tbsp milk (I think I might add more next time) splash of pure vanilla handful of chocolate chips sprinkle of icing sugar to top Mix all the ingredients in a coffee mug until well blended. Microwave on high for 3 minutes. Allow to cool for a few minutes. Sprinkle with icing sugar or top with whipped cream (which I forgot to pick up…whoops). Not the healthiest of snacks, but because you make just one portion you won’t be tempted to eat the whole cake when your kids are in bed or distracted in the other room. I annot wait to try this in a few weeks with the addition of some fresh zucchini!

Enjoy!!!

Don’t forget to check out the other participating blogs.

Visit Stacey at Let It Unravel http://letitunravel.com/ and Sondra at Abhaya http://abhayayoga.blogspot.ca/

P.S. Please keep bearing with me as I learn how to put all the links and such in the blog…it is a slow process for me, but I am sure my 4 year-old-will be able to tell me soon 😀

my kingdom for a pizza…and a porsche

Have you ever had those moments when you think to yourself “This is silly. Of course I can have/do/eat (insert random item you have been told to quit here). After all I have had it/been doing it my whole life up to this point? Why would it need to change all of a sudden?!”

I had that moment on the way to my daughter’s school this morning. I packed my snacks and lunches for all three girls (the wee one was coming with me), but it was pizza lunch day for T and I knew that I would be surrounded by small children and pizza, and worse than that I knew that she would offer me the crust (which she did) so in the car I wavered…thankfully I had eaten before I left and I had snacks for lunch break, and I remembered how much better I am finally statring to feel (though part of me wants to just give in and see what happens…denial maybe LOL)

This is hard…some days are easier than others and I know it will get easier (my kitchen is slowly becoming gluten free…instead of me having a shelf with snacks there is a shelf with wheat bread and snacks and our dinners are almost all gluten free so I don’t have to make too many double meals…and the kids are gobbling it up in ways I haven’t seen before), but I miss certain things…often things I haven’t thought about in ages and then I crave only to find out it is gluten filled…sigh…like licorice…I love licorice…good thing I found a recipe to try to make it (maybe later tonight).

Oh and I made these 

They are gluten free chocolate cupcakes, with a peanut butter filling, topped with chocolate cream cheese icing and drizzled with peanut butter topping. They were pretty good. Nice and moist (not at all like I had been dreading). That day my husband ate three of them (though he said they were much better before I put them in the fridge).

And then I made these yesterday 

They started out as vanilla but since I used coconut oil and milk in them they had a bit of a coconutty taste to them so I just went with it…I topped them with vegan coconut “butter”-cream and some toasted coconut. They had kind of a weird texture…dense like a muffin but still kind of light?! Is that even possible.  Took them to parent council and they got eaten…though one of my parent council members was saddened…he said in reference to my old cupcakes vs my new gf ones “once you have driven a Porsche…”

so now I have time to play a bit and so it is time to tinker so that I ca work my way back up to a Porsche LOL

Poisoned kisses…

who knew that such a cute little face could be the spreader of poison…it is a whole new reality in my new gluten-free life. 

First an update: this is, I think, week 3 of being gluten-free and I am feeling so much better already. I feel like doing things again, and the desire to play n the kitchen. I haven’t asked the person I was with where I was going a million times in the car and I can focus so much better. I am still not 100% and not expecting miracles but things are still falling into place and if eating gf is the way to keep it happening I will.

I have gone back to making most of our dinners from scratch (yesterday I wasn’t feeling well so I admit I pulled out the mac’n’cheese for the kiddos yesterday and I ate and egg on gf toast later that night). For the most part the kiddos have embraced the change for dinner time with ease (and actually have gobbled up both tonight’s stew with rice and the other days amaranth pasta with sauce and meatballs stopping short of licking their plates), which is good because i have more plans for them. They have all tested negative so far, thank goodness but we aren’t convinced that the weest one has symptoms…she has an appointment with the doctor in a couple of weeks to discuss our next move.

I have been doing lots of reading and have fallen in love once again with recipe books and their glossy pictures singing their siren songs…I have gotten a lot of support from various people in different ways and I am very grateful. I went out for dinner with friends and who knew, our local restaurant has a separate gf kitchen (I had a divine club sandwich…yum).

The school has a tea every year for volunteers and I was sort of dreading going because i knew that they would have all sorts of gluten laden treats that I would not be able to eat, but I wanted to go because the tea is such a nice gesture…when I arrived at the tea however one of H’s teachers (whose granddaughter suffers from celiacs as well) made me gf brownies on a special separate plate. Lovely!!!

I had to get the hubby to pick up new toothpaste coming home one night because the brand/type we were using couldn’t guarantee to be totally gf…who knew…

Which leads me to the poisoned kisses…the amount of gluten it takes to start damaging a person who has Celiac disease is minute…like I can eat about 1/350th of a slice of bread a day (http://celiacdisease.about.com/od/PreventingCrossContamination/f/How-Much-Gluten-Can-Make-Me-Sick.htm) and be “okay.” There can be trace amounts of gluten in even foods labeled “gluten-free” (tricky I know) and this can add up. For those of you that have felt the way I did you can understand why even a minute amount is too much. In this vein, to prevent “cross-contamination” many of the websites and books and blogs have rather cheekily mentioned that the hubby should make sure to brush his teeth/wash his face (because of his beard especially) before any sort of canoodling (even the most innocent kind LOL), but no one mentioned the cute little face above…her and her two partners in crime are going to be mommy’s worst enemy, because while I was able to turn down the goldfish crackers she was so nicely trying to share with me, how can you turn aside from their love filled kisses, even while smelling the very poison in their hot little breath?!?!

Miner Temptations goes Gluten Free

It has been a long time since I have posted anything here. I am going to try to get back into the swing of things both for my friends who are interested and so that I have a place to keep track of everything I have learned and new recipes I have tried.

So here it is…my diagnosis as having celiac disease and how it came about.

It has been a rough year around here, within my own household as well as in my extended family and I had just been feeling off. It was something I had kept brushing off…you know , I was up with the kids, I have been worrying about everyone, I didn’t eat right the other day, etc. I was exhausted and extremely short-tempered and one day I snapped at my kiddos for something really stupid. I took a minute and realized that this wasn’t right. I wasn’t the person that I had become and there had to be more than just being stressed to do with it. My goal at this point became to make myself healthy over the summer and give my kids back the mom they needed and deserved.

At a visit with the kids to the doctors office for yet another random illness picked up in kindergarten, the doctor commented on how tired I looked. I made an appointment to see her the following week (I suffered from mild anemia with each of my pregnancies and had wondered if I had just gotten so run down over the winter that it was back). We chatted and she took my vitals and then suggested blood work to see what was going on. I believe the tests she requested had to do with my thyroid, vitamin B and my various iron levels. The doctor called me from home on her day off (did I mention how much I LOVE my new doctor) to discuss the results. My iron levels were ridiculously low so I was diagnosed with Iron Deficient Anemia, and put on a crazy dose of iron supplements to boost it back up. She discussed a few tests to see why and said the paperwork would be in her office on Monday. When I picked up the paperwork there was a note from her suggesting that I might want to get the blood test for celiac disease as it might the reason my body wasn’t absorbing the vitamins and minerals it should be. She did warn that there would be a cost as the test isn’t covered by OHIP but we decided I should get it anyway just to be sure (and luckily we found out afterward that the hubby’s insurance will cover it…yay). I stuffed myself full of toast for a couple days and went for more blood work. So about a week later I was in the dr office with my kiddos (AGAIN…darn those kindergarten petrie dishes) and after chatting about the kids it was confirmed that I do in fact have celiac disease. For those questioning whether I will have the biopsy, the answer is no. My doctor’s office doesn’t request them unless your blood work is negative and you still have symptoms.

So basically: I didn’t think I had celiac disease until I found out I had anemia and I was lucky in that my doctor was the one who suggested the test.
I have since discovered that many of the things I have been experiencing over the last few years may in fact have been caused by this, but I have several of the less common symptoms as well as some of the more common ones. I couldn’t concentrate, had a crazy brain fog, was exhausted, moody and irritable, and I could cry at the drop of a hat, I have migraines and got night sweats, breast tenderness, canker sores, all sorts of various intestinal issues, my finger tips get cold (might be connected according to some resources), leg cramps and back pain, I bruise easily, my head got really itchy and I had sleep issues…I am sure there are more but these are the ones I can think of.  My kids are getting tested as well because there is a chance they might have it (some of them have symptoms but may be too young for accurate testing.

I was trying to describe the way I felt to a friend the other day and the best I could come up with was that I feel like I have been asleep (both literally and figuratively for most of my youngest daughter’s life, and that just isn’t fair to her (or the rest of the family) or myself.

So now, a little over a week into my new gluten free life I am feeling so much better already. It is hard because I am replacing many of my go to items, but I found a shampoo and lip balm that I love, I will get to figure out new cupcake recipes because many alive there is not a lot of really yummy gf baked goods out there and I will be darned if I can’t bake my cake and eat it too. But I am feeling much better already and I am so grateful that this is all it is…changing my diet is a small price to pay to get healthy again and I will do my absolute best to keep the complaining about it to a minimum.

I hope that I have answered some of your questions. If not let me know and I will try again.