Monday, November 28, 2011

Potato Latkes (especially for Chanukah) serves 8 to 10 people

HINTS:
~ I recommend using good tasting thin skinned potatoes like Yukon Gold, and preferably organic because they grow underground and sit in the soil.

~I like to microwave my onions for three minutes before I combine them with the potatoes (which brings out the sweetness.)

~When I fry them up, I let them float in an eighth inch of good expeller pressed oil which gives them a crispy texture.

With that said, here's the recipe for:

Potato Latkes, Gluten Free

6 raw medium sized potatoes, scrubbed but not pealed. Cube into bite-sized chunks.
2 to 3 medium onions, sliced in chunks and microwaved for 3 minutes
3 raw eggs
1 cup brown rice flour
2 teaspoons sea salt (or more to taste)
Expeller pressed oil for frying (Safflower, Canola)
A few paper grocery bags cut opened, to drain the latkes

As is the tradition in my family, I like the texture of my latkes to be pureed, not grated, and I use a powerful blender to do this. The trick is to start with blending a raw egg and half the onions which easily becomes a liquid. Slowly, add the potatoes and when the mixture becomes too thick, add another egg and more onions. If the blender gets full, pour half of it onto a large bowl and continue adding the rest of the onions and potatoes. Pour all of this mixture into the bowl and then add the brown rice flour and salt to taste.
Let the mixture sit for five minutes and get thick. In the meantime, heat up one eighth inch of oil on a medium flame until it is very hot. (Don't be afraid to use oil because it is only with a sufficient amount that you will get the most delicious crispy texture.) Turn on your exhaust fan and make sure you have on an apron because splattering happens. Spoon dollops of the sizzling mixture into the hot oil and when the latkes brown on the edges, flip them over.
Drain latkes on paper bags and serve right away with sour cream and/or applesauce. Leftover cooked latkes can be stored in the refrigerator and reheated in the toaster oven the next day.
ENJOY!!!!


Tuesday, November 1, 2011

GF Biscuits/Scones


Home-style Drop Biscuits                  Preheat oven to 350º
Servings: 8 large biscuits

Ingredients:
~ 2 cups Arnel's All Purpose Flour/Pie Crust Mix
~ 1 teaspoon baking powder
~ 1 teaspoon baking soda
~ 1 teaspoon salt
~  ½ stick of butter or Earth Bal. Marg.(chilled in the freezer)
~ 2/3 cup milk substitute
~ 1 ½ teaspoons apple cider vinegar
~ 2 eggs, beaten
*Note: Reduce the liquid if necessary, you don't want the batter to be too runny.

To Make:
• In a large mixing bowl thoroughly combine the flour (a fork works well for this), baking powder, salt, baking soda,
• For an easier time working with the butter, grate the butter into the flour using the small holed side of a box grater. Mix the butter into the flour so that there are no large balls of grated butter.
• Add the milk, vinegar and beaten eggs to the flour and stir until the dry and liquid ingredients are combined.
• Using a large spoon, drop the dough onto a greased pan to make 8 large biscuits.

Cook at 350F degrees for 15 minutes or until golden brown


Friday, June 10, 2011

Butter Cream Frosting (Dairy Free/Gluten Free/Corn Free)

3 cups powdered sugar (I make my own by using 1 cup evaporated cane juice and 1 tablespoon tapioca flour ground in a Vita-Mix or coffee grinder, to a fine powder.)

4 egg whites
Whisk sugar and egg whites in a double boiler until it reaches 160*. Remove from heat and pour in a mixing bowl. Using a wire whisk, beat for 10 minutes.

Change to a mixing paddle and slowly add:

2/3 cup Earth Balance Margarine, organic shortening, or coconut oil
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/8 to 1/4 teaspoon sea salt

Chill and warm it up when you are ready to spread it on your cake.
You can add some fresh or dried fruit to use as a filling for a layered cake.

Almond Butter Balls

Perfect Protein Snack to take on the road, or munch on when you're too busy to stop for a meal. There's no cooking involved so anyone can whip it up.

1 cup almond butter, roasted no salt
1/2 cup honey
1/4 teaspoon sea salt
5 - 6 cups Enjoy Life Perky's Nutty Rice (enough so that the almond butter mixture acts like a glue to just hold the cereal together)
sesame seeds or coconut flour to coat

Mix the first 3 ingredients together and then add the Nutty Rice.
Form bite sized balls and roll in sesame seeds or coconut flour.
Can be left on the counter or stored in the refrigerator for up to a good week.

Friday, April 29, 2011

Passover Mandel Brød (Jewish Biscotti)

~ 2 cups sugar                                                        }
~ 1 cup salted butter or Earth Balance Margarine } CREAM THESE TOGETHER
~ 1 1/2 teaspoon sea salt                                        }

~ 6 eggs, add one at a time to above mixture

~ 2 3/4 cups Arnel's Originals GF All Purpose Flour 
~ 1 cup potato starch
~ 1 1/2 teaspoons xanthan gum 

 • Mix well and add the following:

~ 1 cup GF chocolate chips
~ 1 cup walnuts

• Refrigerate over night.
• Form two rectangular mounds and place each mound on a greased cookie sheet
• Sprinkle with cinnamon and sugar

• Bake for 40 minutes in a 350º oven

• Remove from oven and carefully slice into pieces, 1 inch thick.
• Separate the pieces so that air circulates around each piece.
• Place mondel brød back in the oven for another 20 minutes, or until each piece is firm and crispy
• Cool and store in an air tight container


Gluten Free Potato Kugel (Claudia's recipe)

1/2 cup oil
8 medium raw potatoes
2 medium onions quartered
1 Tablespoon sea salt
1 teaspoon ground pepper
2 1/2 Tablespoons sugar
5 large eggs, beaten

Pour oil in a large 9 x 13" pan.
Peel potatoes and place in cold water
Finely chop onions
Puree' potatoes and add to the chopped onions
Add salt, pepper, sugar and eggs
Put pan in oven with just the oil, and when it begins to sizzle, remove from oven and pour the oil in the potato mixture. Stir and pour the whole potato mixture back into the oiled pan.
Bake uncovered for an hour in 425º

Mock Chopped Liver Pate' (vegetarian) Ilene's recipe

In a blender, put
6 hard boiled eggs
1 can of LeSueur Peas, drained
1 large saute'd onion
1 cup walnuts (keep a bit chunky)
sea salt to taste

Blend and refrigerate. Serve cold. Can be kept for up to a week.

Gluten Free MATZO Balls (for 8 people)

1/4 cup almond meal
1/4 cup instant potato flakes (GF of course, and the kind that makes mashed potatoes)
1 Tablespoon of potato starch
1 Tablespoon golden flax meal
2 eggs
1/4 teaspoon sea salt
1 Tablespoon Earth Balance Margarine (
or coconut oil with a pinch of salt)
2 Tablespoons club soda

Mix all ingredients together and refrigerate for at least an hour. Bring a pot of salty water to a boil and drop spoonfuls of matzo ball mixture in the water, one at a time. Boil for 30 to 40 minutes. Carefully scoop out cooked matzo balls and either set aside for later or refigerate for a later time. Place one matzo ball in each soup bowl and pour hot soup into the bowl.

Friday, February 25, 2011

Buckwheat SOUR DOUGH - EGG Free Bread


How do you make Sour Dough Starter? Here it is, short and sweet:
(Taken from Tamara Clark and the blog site “SimplyAlaskan.com”)

1. Find a crock
2. Wash the crock and find a top for it (any plastic lid that fits lightly on top will work fine).
3. Dilute 2 Tablespoons of commercial yeast in 2 cups of warm water. Put 2 cups of brown rice flour into your crock and pour in your warm water mix. Add 2 Tablespoons of sugar (white, brown, honey, molasses) and mix well. Let your covered crock sit in a warm place for 24 hours. You can start using it the next day, if you'd like, or you can repeat the feeding process by adding some more sugar and letting it sit another day or so before using it. Usually, we start using ours the next day and watch in amazement as our sourdough's (flapjacks) get better and better each day after, as we use and replenish our starter.
4. If you use your starter, replace what you used. If you use a cup of starter, for instance, for flapjacks in the morning, replenish your starter with 1 cup of rice flour, 1 cup of warm water and 1-2 T of sugar. Pretty easy. (I usually make my starter the consistency of pancake batter.)
*Note: you don't have to use your starter every day but if it's at room temperature it's best to feed it daily. (flour/water/sugar)
That's it.

Now, take one 13 oz package of Arnel’s Originals Bread Mix.
Add 9 oz of water, 3 Tablespoons oil, ½ teaspoon apple cider vinegar
Mix till smooth and stretchy. Add 8.7oz sour dough starter. Mix again.
Let it rise in a warm place until it rises (Maybe a couple of hours)

Bake on 350* oven for 35 minutes and viola ENJOY your Whole Grain, Organic, Gluten Free, Sour Dough Bread.

(Egg free, Soy free, Corn free, Dairy free, Gluten Free!)

Tuesday, February 8, 2011

LEMON BARS

Absolutely delicious!

CRUST
1 cup Arnel's Originals Gluten Free All Purpose Flour and Pie Crust Mix 
1/2 cup Earth Balance Margarine
1/4 cup sugar

  Mix flour, margarine, and sugar and press in bottom of square pan 8 x 8". Bake in 350º for 20 minutes. Prepare the mixture below: 

LEMON MIXTURE
2 eggs
3 Tablespoons lemon juice + zest
1 cup sugar
2 Tablespoons AO All Purpose Flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon sea salt


Beat eggs and lemon juice and zest for 2 minutes until light and fluffy. Add dry ingredients, beat for another minutes, and pour mixture over the hot crust. Bake 25 minutes longer in a 350º oven. 
Dust with powdered sugar while hot out of the oven and cut into squares


Elimination Diet for the top 11 food allergies


FOOD ELIMINATION DIET
Over the years I have encountered many people who quietly live with chronic maladies like rashes, hay fever, and digestive disorders, and they wonder if food might be a contributing factor. Some of them have heard about food elimination diets but have no idea how to successfully go on one. Well, here’s my plan for an easy FOOD ELIMINATION DIET to try. Keep in mind that if you are very diligent, you will only have to do this once. Also, the actual diet is easier than you think. Just plan well and focus on all the things you CAN eat, rather than all the foods you CAN’T eat.
This experiment will take approximately one month, two weeks for your body to expel the irritating foods, and two weeks to slowly add them back in. It will be easier to have the whole family go on the same diet but if you have someone who is digging their heels in the sand, just tell them to eat whatever they would like OUTSIDE the house but at home, these are their only choices.
First, a little allergy background: There are four general categories of irritants to the body: food, animal dander, chemical smells (bleach, formaldehyde in clothing, nail polish, etc.), and environmental particles (dust mites, mold spores, pollens, etc.). Most sensitive people are challenged with more than one of these categories but it’s the food irritants that are the easiest to control. Let’s dive right in.
The 11 most common food irritants in their purest forms are:
dairy products – milk, cottage cheese
gluten – wheat, barley, rye, malt (pasta, grape nuts cereal, rye crisps)
sugar – sugar cubes
eggs – usually it’s the yolks that are more of a problem
cocoa – chocolate powder
red and yellow food dyes – Jell-O, unsweetened Kool-Aid (sweeten with honey)
corn – corn on the cob, popcorn, corn chips
citrus – oranges, pineapple, lemons, tomatoes
soy – tofu, soy nuts, edamame
peanuts – natural peanut butter, peanuts
preservatives – BHT (in most chewing gum), sodium benzoate (flavored drinks), potassium sorbate (frozen otter pops)
(Although there are countless preservatives in our foods, for some reason these three are the most common irritants.)
These are the foods you will be eliminating for 2 weeks!
STEP 1: Go through your cupboards, refrigerator, freezer, and pantry, and bag up all of the foods that contain these ingredients. If you have been eating a traditional American diet, you should have about 80% of your food in bags. Put them somewhere out of eye sight (perhaps the garage,) and head to the store to stock up your next two weeks of acceptable foods.
STEP 2: Go food shopping. Here are lists of acceptable foods by category. BE CREATIVE and take your positive attitude to the store with you. Basically, you will be eating simple foods with a few ingredients in a non-processed form.
OILS – all cold pressed oils are safe (except corn oil).
PROTEINS – all nuts (except peanuts), seeds, meats, poultry, nitrate-free sausages, and beans, are safe. Season with salt, garlic, onions, or anything else that’s pure.
VEGETABLES – all veggies (except corn)
FRUITS – all fruits (except oranges, lemons, pineapple, limes, tomatoes, anything citrus)
DRINKS – non-citrus juices, non-caffeinated teas, club soda
CARBOHYDRATES – anything with rice, potatoes, tapioca, buckwheat, millet, quinoa, amaranth
Here are some meal and snack suggestions:
Breakfast – rice cereal with almond milk, homemade home fries, fruit, beans and rice
Lunch – rice crackers with almond butter and fruit sweetened jelly, turkey, chicken, roast beef, rice pasta with garlic and oil, salad, tuna or salmon with Best Foods Mayo, baked potato with broccoli, homemade potato salad, rice cakes topped with tuna
Dinner – meats, poultry, fish, or beans, brown rice, rice pasta, quinoa, millet, buckwheat, healthy oil potato chips, homemade cole-slaw, homemade potato pancakes thickened with rice flour
Snacks – dry roasted nuts, celery and carrot sticks, cucumbers with salt, potato chips, fruit (melons, blueberries, and peaches), smoothies with almond milk, non-citrus fruits, and honey, apple sauce, jicama, avocado dip (just mash it with water and salt.)
STEP 3: Start the diet. One very important thing to keep in mind is that food which you are sensitive to, can act like a drug. There might be withdrawal symptoms. On day three, my six year old daughter had a screaming tantrum for almost an hour in front of the refrigerator begging, I mean desperately begging for a piece of bread. I almost gave in but something told me to stand firm. Boy am I glad I did because from this diet we found out how intolerant she was to gluten products. It was my homemade organic whole wheat bread sweetened with honey that caused her to have the most violent reactions.
STEP 4: Add one category of food at a time back into your diet every other day. It a small amount in the morning, and if you do not have any violent reactions, eat lots of that food for lunch and dinner. Make sure the food consists of one or two ingredients. For instance, on the day you eat dairy, don’t eat ice cream which also has sugar and eggs. Drink milk and/or eat cottage cheese instead. Keep a journal of how you sleep, how you feel emotionally, and what your body does physically (rashes, irritability, tension, gas, sneezing, itchy nose, palette, or skin, joint aches, respiratory congestion, stomach cramps, nausea, etc.) If there are no negative reactions, you now can add that food back into your diet. If you are not sure if you reacted, keep the food out and test it again later. If you have a reaction, stay away from that food. Often times, you can handle certain foods in moderation but not in excess. In that case, you could probably rotate a small amount of that questionable food in your diet every 4 days or just eat a small amount once in a while when you are eating out and do ok. That’s what I do with dairy products.
Well, my friends. Good luck with the diet and stay healthy!
Arnel McAtee
2/2011

Tuesday, January 18, 2011

The bigger picture about CANOLA OIL

Over the years, we hear about products that are harmful to consume and often it is difficult for us to separate fact from fiction. Canola oil, is one of those questionable products.
Hilary Kallaway, (who works for Spectrum Naturals, a leading brand of organic oils,) just gave a very informative seminar on the properties of the various oils we ingest. She was a wealth of information and below you will find her response to the controversy about canola oil:
Hi Arnel,
I've consulted with our R&D Director to find out a bit about Canola Oil history.
Canola originated from the Rapeseed plant. Rapeseed contains high levels of Euric acid which is toxic. Plant breeders, through seed selection and plant hybridization (not genetic modification), selected out the seeds with less Euric acid. After 30+ years of this we have Canola seeds which are very different from the original rapeseed, but still have the stigma associated with rapeseeds and their high levels of Euric acid.
It is true that today Canola is one of the top Genetically Engineered crop, so it is wise to make sure your source of canola oil can verify that their product is GMO (genetically modified organism) FREE.
Have a good day.
Hillary
Hillary Kallaway
Training Manager/Associate Brand Manager
Spectrum Organic Products
2201 S. McDowell Ext. Suite 210
Petaluma, CA 94954
707.559.2661
Canola oil has a neutral flavor which makes it a great choice for baking. It is high in the beneficial Omega-3's and it also has a high heat tolerance which makes it easy to use for sauteing and frying. As digestively sensitive as I am I have never had any adverse reactions to the expeller pressed/non-GMO canola oil I buy from Trader Joes or Whole Foods.
I use "Nothing but the Best" ingredients in my gluten free products.
Arnel McAtee
www.ArnelsOriginals.com