{Gluten Free} Blueberry Cookies

I got a great deal on a couple of pounds of organic blueberries at Costco last week so I have been trying to make some new recipes using blueberries before they go bad. These blueberry cookies are the perfect little bite for an on the go morning treat. But really they can be enjoyed any time a day & are especially good paired with a nice steamy cup of coffee. They are pretty simple to make and they are topped with the most delicious candied lemon peel. {I seriously couldn't stop eating the stuff} Plump, moist, and not to sweet they'll make the perfect weekend treat. {I hope my poetic skills really make you want to try these} ;)







What you'll need:
2 mixing bowls
something to mix with

measuring cups
measuring spoons
cookie sheet
parchment paper or non stick cooking spray

Ingredients:
1 3/4 cup of gluten free all purpose flour
1 teaspoon golden flax seed powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1 1/2 teaspoons cinnamon
1 stick of butter (room temp)
3/4 cup of brown sugar
1 egg (room temp)
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 tablespoon milk (room temp)
1 cup fresh blueberries

Candied Lemon Peel: mix together 2 tablespoons regular sugar & zest of one lemon

Now for the how to:
In a small bowl combine flour, flax powder (see previous post on how to make flax powder), salt, baking powder, cinnamon. Mix to combine then set aside. In large bowl combine butter, brown sugar,
egg, and vanilla. Once combined pour dry ingredients into wet. Note that the dough will be very thick! Don't worry you haven't done anything wrong. Now incorporate the tablespoon of milk. After the milk is all mixed in then you'll want to fold in the blueberries. Cover and refrigerate your dough while you make the candied lemon peel & while you're oven heats up. Set your oven to 350 degrees. Take a heaping spoonful of dough and top with a generous amount of candied lemon peel. Bake for 12 minutes. Allow cookies to cool a bit before you remove them from the cookie sheet. This recipe yields 12 cookies.

 This recipe was adapted from How Sweet It Is.

{Gluten Free} Blueberry Muffins

It's been a little while since I've created a new recipe but I'm back at it again. Muffin recipes are my favorite to create and I have a new trick that I'm excited to share with you all. Hubby says these are the best ones I've made yet. Hope you like them as much as he did.

What you'll need:
2 bowls for mixing
something to mix with
measuring cups
measuring spoons
cupcake pan
cupcake papers or nonstick baking spray

Ingredients:
1 cup of gluten free all purpose flour
1 cup of gluten free oats
3/4 teaspoon flax seed powder
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon of salt
1 egg
1/2 greek yogurt
1/3 cup coconut oil
1/4 cup brown sugar
1 cup of fresh blueberries
1 mashed banana

Now for the how to:
But first here's my new tip for you! If you have read any of my previous recipes you know that I have been using a flax seed "slurry" instead of xanthan gum. Well one day I got the brilliant idea to try and grind up the seeds to make a powder and use that instead of the slurry. I don't know about you but I don't always like having little seeds in my nice smooth muffins. So I took a couple of tablespoons of golden flaxseed, tossed them in my magic bullet, and grind them right down into a powder. Now instead of having to make a slurry I just toss some of the flax powder in with my dry ingredients and it seems to be doing the trick! Now back to the how to...

Preheat over to 400 degrees. Measure all refrigerated ingredients and set them aside to allow them to come to rooms temperature. (I find this to be extra helpful especially when using coconut oil). Mash your banana. In a small bowl combine are of your dry ingredients. In a large bowl melt your coconut oil and then allow it to cool. Once the oil has cooled you can mix in egg, yogurt, and sugar. Once that is all mixed together add your mashed banana. Then you'll want to dump your dry ingredients into your wet ingredients and mix together. Lastly you'll want to fold in your blueberries. Fill your muffin tin almost all the way full. This recipe will yield one dozen muffins. Bake for 15 minutes.

Meal Planning

I have had several friends who know how religious I am about meal planning and have asked me to share my process for choosing meals, making grocery lists, budgeting, shopping, etc. So I have decided to put “pen to paper” and share my process. I am sure there are many different ways to do it and lots of great posts out there about how to get it done. But here’s how I do it.

First of all I do a major grocery shopping trip every two weeks. This schedule coincides with my husband pay day. When I shop I go to three different stores: Costco, Trader Joes, and Safeway. I have found there are a few items worth buying in bulk at Costco and we get our gas from there as well so it makes it worth the trip even if I’m only getting a dozen or so things. After shopping these stores for several years now I have also figured out what stores have better deals on certain items. Anyways so back to planning.

Step 1: We make a list of all the none meal meal related items that we are out of or close to running out of. I enlist the help of my hubby and kids since we all like and eat different things. They are able to tell me what they would like more of and what they have run out of.

Step 2: I make a list of 10-12 meals to get us through 2 weeks. Sundays are family dinner night with my folks so that is at least two meals in two weeks that I don’t have to do all the cooking. We might have take out once or twice in those two weeks and sometimes we have left over night. This would bring us to my 10-12 meals.
From all my years of cooking I have probably 20-30 meals in my repertoire. So I consult my list of meal ideas and I also hit good ole Pinterest of course to try and find some inspiration on at least one to two new meals to try. Once I have all my meals picked out its on to…

Step 3: I go back through my list of meals and jot down all the things that I need to purchase for each meal. Here’s a little money saving tip for you. As you’ll see from this weeks meal list I have chicken something more than once on my list. Safeway sells an almost 3lb pack of boneless skinless chicken thighs for a little over $2/lb. I bring the chicken home divide it up for my meals, put it in freezer ziplock bags and freeze it until I need it. I do the same thing for ground beef as well.

Step 4: I open up my handy Just4U Safeway app. What an awesome idea this thing is. I always wanted to be once of those cool couponing people but for whatever reason never took the plunge. But hey Safeway came through and I can do all my couponing through my phone. So I jot down the prices of things if there is something I normally buy at another store to make sure I’m getting the best price.

Step 5: I go through my two lists and mark what I will get from each store. As you can see from my picture I color coded for each store.

Step 6: Now this is where I get a little cray. I make my list for each store and because I have been frequenting these stores for several years now I know where everything in the store is. So I make my list according to the aisles of the store. This helps me stay focused and on track at the store. It saves me time and ensures that I don’t miss anything on my list. It also helps minimize my impulse purchases.
I’m telling you the effort that goes into the meal planning process totally out weighs the stress that would come with opening the fridge at 5 o’clock and not knowing what to cook or not having enough ingredients on hand to make what I want. It also helps cut down on waste and throwing away food that rots in the fridge because it was never cooked. I hope that you can find this helpful. Please feel free to comment and ask questions. I’d love to hear your meal planning process. What tips and tricks do you like to use when meal planning? What are some of your favorite go to meals?

{Gluten Free} Peanut Butter Chocolate Brookies

Have you ever been at a party or a potluck and there are brownies and cookies and you’re faced with a choice. Do you choose the brownie or do you choose the cookie? But what if you want both? Well I have the perfect solution for you. Bake the brownie and the cookie together! Brownie plus cookie equals brookie. And let me just say who ever decided it was a good idea to combine peanut butter and chocolate was pure genius. It’s a tiny bit salty, nice and creamy, and of course rich and “chocolatey”. Just plain yum!

These brookies require a little extra work since you’re essentially making two desserts at one time. But absolutely worth the little extra mess and effort. I also snuck in my favorite little dark chocolate peanut butter cups from trader joes for a little surprise treat.

What you’ll need:
2 mixing bowls
Measuring cups and spoons
Baking dish
Something to mix with
Knife
Cutting board
Non stick cooking spray

Ingredients for the brownie:
½ cup oil
½ cup sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 eggs
½ cup all purpose gluten free flour
1/3 cup of cocoa powder
¼ teaspoon of baking powder
¼ teaspoon of salt
¼ cup of cornstarch
6 dark chocolate peanut butter cups

Ingredients for peanut butter cookie:
1 cup peanut butter
½ cup of sugar
1 egg
1 teaspoon of baking powder
1 teaspoon of vanilla
¼ teaspoon of salt
¼ cup of all purpose gluten free flour

Now for the how to:
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.  Spray your baking dish with non-stick cooking spray and set aside. In one of your bowls mix together oil, ½ cup of sugar, vanilla, and 2 eggs until combined. Then mix in ½ cups of flour, ¼ teaspoon of baking powder, salt, and cornstarch. Lastly mix in cocoa powder. Pour batter into prepared baking dish and set aside. Next roughly chop up the peanut butter cups and sprinkle them on top of the brownie batter. In the other bowl you will mix together the peanut butter cookie dough. Combine all of the ingredients except the flour. Once all the ingredients are incorporated then mix in ¼ cup of flour. To form even sized cookies I used my tablespoon measuring spoon. Form dough into a ball and if you’d like to get a little fancy make the crisscross indentions with a fork. This recipe will yield 12 cookies. Place cookies evenly on top of brownie dough and bake for 25 minutes. Allow them to cool before cutting. Serve with some vanilla ice cream and you have a complete dessert sure to wow your taste buds. Enjoy!

{Gluten Free} Chicken & Wild Rice Soup

There’s just something so comforting about a great steamy bowl of chicken soup. On a cold windy day it just makes you feel so warm and cozy. There are so many variations of chicken soup but recently this chicken and wild rice soup has become one of our favorites. It is definitely one of the more “fussy” meals that I make and I’m sure I could cut my prep and cook time in half if I just threw all the ingredients in the crock pot but doing it this way just seems to extract so much more flavor from all the ingredients. So if you’re up for spending a little extra time in the kitchen I promise this soup will be worth your time.



What you’ll need:
* large soup pot
* knife
* cutting board
* peeler
* spoon

Ingredients:
* chicken (this time I used 2 pieces of boneless skinless thighs & 2 pieces of boneless skinless breasts)
* ½ cup of black wild rice
* ½ cup of long grain white rice
* ½ cup long grain brown rice
* 2 carrots
* 2 celery stalks
* 1 yellow onion
* 1 package of mushrooms
* 3-4 cloves of garlic
* a handful of baby spinach
* 3 tablespoons of gluten free all purpose flour
* 6 tablespoons of butter
* 1 tablespoon of olive oil
* 2 quarts of chicken stock
* spices: salt, pepper, garlic powder, thyme, parsley, 3-4 bay leaves

Now for the how to:
There are several different steps to making this soup. If you don’t have time to be in the kitchen for a long time you can definitely do a few of these steps in the morning or on a different day and store the ingredients in the fridge until you are ready to assemble your soup. To cut down on the clean up I used one pot for each step.
First thing I did was cook the rice. Put all three of the different types of rice in the pot with about 3 cups of water and cook according to package instructions. While your rice is cooking you can dice all your vegetables. (I like to dice the carrots, celery, and onions to be all the same size and on the small side.) Once your rice is cooked remove from the pot and set aside. It’s ok if you remove the rice from the pot before it is completely cooked because it will continue to finish cooking once you add it to the soup.
Next thing you’ll want to do it cook the chicken. For this soup I boil the chicken. Fill the pot about half way full of water. Place raw chicken and sprinkle in some salt, pepper, one or two shakes of ground ginger, garlic, and onion powder. It will take about 30 minutes to cook through. Once chicken is cooked drain the water, remove chicken from the pot, and set aside to cool. Once the chicken is cool enough to touch shred the chicken into nice bite size pieces.
Next up is cooking your mushrooms. I like to cook my mushrooms before adding them to the soup because I feel like it brings out all the delicious natural flavors of the mushrooms and gives them a nice bite. Place the pot on medium high heat and put a tiny bit of butter in the pot. When your pot is hot and the butter has melted drop in your mushrooms and then leave them alone. After about 3 minutes then you can move them around the pan and let them cook for another 2-3 minutes. They should be nice and brown and should smell amazing! Take them out of the pot and set aside.
Keep your pot on medium high heat and add about 2 tablespoons of butter and 1 tablespoon of olive oil. Then you’ll want to toss in your onions and garlic. Cook for a couple minutes until the onions are almost translucent. Then you’ll want to add in the carrots and celery and all your spices accept the bay leaves. (Like most of my other savory recipes I don’t really measure out my spices. I do a few shakes of each of the spices and a generous amount of salt and pepper.) After this has cooked for a couple minutes now the magic most important part that will give your soup the perfect thick amazing texture that we love in a great soup. Take your remaining 3 tablespoons of butter and drop in the pot and stir it all around until the butter melts. Then you’ll want to take about 3 heaping spoonfuls of gluten free flour and mix it all in. Don’t worry it will look chunky and strange but its ok its suppose to. Keep stirring it around. Then you’ll want to take your chicken stock and slowly start pouring the stock in and continuously mixing it around until all the thick lumpiness starts to go away.
After you pour in about a quart of the chicken stock the broth should be very thick. Now you’ll want
to pour in your spinach, chicken, mushrooms, rice, and bay leaves. At this point you’ll want to start adding the next quart of chicken stalk. After you get most of the quart of stock incorporated you’ll want to taste your broth (be careful its hot) to see if you need to do a second round of seasoning. Let your soup simmer for at least 30 minutes but even longer is better.
I hope you enjoy this soup as much as we did. Hubby had 4 bowls, I had 2, and the kids each had 1 big bowl (veggies and all!). Its great for a nice cool evening and will make your tummy oh so happy!

{Gluten Free} Chocolate Peanut Butter No Bakes

We are getting closer to summer and you know what summer brings warm weather (my favorite)! When those temperatures start to rise the last thing you want to do is fire up that oven and heat up an already hot house. But sometimes you just really want some cookies. Such a dilemma right!? Well you’re welcome because I have a solution for you. These cookies are a “fudgie” delight. They are not only easy to make (they take about 5 minutes to mix) but they are packed with healthy stuff like gluten free oats and quinoa. These cookies can handle tons of add ins like chocolate chips, shredded coconut or dried fruit. And if you would like to make them vegan friendly just omit the butter and use all coconut oil.


What you’ll need:
* a medium sized pot
* some measuring cups
* something to mix with
* wax paper or parchment paper
* a couple of plates of cookie sheets

Ingredients:
* ½ cup almond milk
* ¼ cup coconut oil
* ¼ cup butter
* ½ cup honey
* ¼ cup cocoa powder (I used dark chocolate cocoa powder)
* ½ cup peanut butter
* 2 teaspoons of vanilla
* 2 cups of gluten free oats
* 1 cup of cooked quinoa

Now for the how to:
Lay out some parchment paper or wax paper on your plates or cookie sheets. Trust me you’ll want to do this first or you’ll be scrambling to lay it out when your hands are all messy and you’re ready to scoop out your cookies. Not that I’m speaking from experience or anything like that. Put your pot on the stove and place on medium heat. Toss in your coconut oil, butter, and honey. (Remember: if you measure your oil first and use the same measuring cup to measure your honey it’ll come sliding right out of that measuring cup.) Once your butter, oil, and honey have melted you can stir in your peanut butter. Remove your pot from the heat and stir in your cocoa powder and vanilla until combined. Lastly toss in the oats and quinoa. Combine and then use one of your measuring cups to scoop out some perfectly uniformed cookies onto your parchment paper. This recipe yields about 18 cookies. After scooping out your cookies place them in the fridge to cool. Once they are cooled you can store them in a Tupperware in the fridge. Use parchment paper between your layers of cookies to keep them from sticking together. Be sure to stash some of these behind the sour kraut because these bad boys are so tasty though won’t stick around long. Enjoy!

{Gluten Free} Banana Orange Chia Seed Muffins

We have an orange tree in our front yard so I am always trying to come up with new and interesting ways to use our oranges before half of them end up falling off the tree and rotting in our grass. Yesterday with the help of my little man we made some really great banana orange muffins. They have just the right amount of sweetness. They are nice and moist and really simple to make.

What you’ll need:
A small & large mixing bowl
Muffin Tin
12 cupcake papers
1 cup & 1/4 cup measuring cups
Measuring spoons
Fork
Something to mix with
Microplane

Ingredients:
2 cups gluten free all purpose flour
2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon of chia seeds
1 large orange (zest & juice)
2 mashed bananas
1 egg
3/4 cup of almond milk
1/4 cup of sunflower oil
1/2 cup of agave
1 teaspoon of vanilla

Now for the how to:
Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. Put cupcake papers in muffin tin. Do you have a little one around that likes to help out? I do! My little man loves to help me in the kitchen. Yesterday I put him to work on pealing the bananas and mashing them in the large bowl. While he was doing that in the small bowl I measured out the flour, baking powder, salt, chia seeds, and the zest of the orange. Once little man was done mashing the bananas I gave them a once over until that looked like this.
To the large bowl we then added the egg, milk, and oil. Here’s a tip if

you’re going to have to measure out something sticky like agave I like to measure my oil first so that it makes the measuring cup nice and slick and all the agave will come slipping right out. So next up is the agave and lastly the juice of that big orange. Then you’ll want to add in the flour mixture into the bowl of the wet ingredients. It’ll look something like this.

Now its time to fill up those muffin tins. I like using that same little 1/4 measuring cup that I used to measure my ingredients with to fill up my muffins tins. As you can see from the photo I fill up those bad boys all the way to the top. Bake them for 25 minutes. Once they come out of the oven let them cool on the cooling rack until you can handle them with your bare hands then remove them from the muffin tins and allow them to cool the rest of the way on your cooling racks.