GF Pineapple Upside-down Cake

Mooky made a delicious pineapple upside-down cake for his birthday yesterday. It tasted great right out of the oven. As you can see in the second picture, we all had a little taste right when it came out. That way, if the recipe had not converted well to GF we would still have time to make a diferent cake. Three hours later when we finally got around to eating it, I thought it was a bit too dry tasting, but Mooky didn't seem to notice! He liked it so much that he didn't even eat any ice cream. Earlier in the day he ate some of the Kinni-Toos cookies and said they were great. He also had a Kinnikinnick donut at breakfast, which was good.
So, basically he had a lot of sugar, and by evening he was REALLY feeling the effects.

the First Gluten Free Birthday

Last year at this time, Mooky was sick, and we were trying to eat more healthily. Organic, whole grains, less sugar, etc. He wanted a "cake made from a mix" for his birthday and since the birthday kid always gets to choose, we bought an organic cake mix at the health food store.
We didn't find out he was gluten intolerant until a few weeks later... Needless to say his cake made him sick! Nanay, Alex, (and Gabby?) came to the birthday party and Alex ended up with a terrible headache. It would be some time before we found out she was gluten intolerant as well. She blamed her headache on me! "Every time I go to Rachel's house, it makes me sick." (Or something like that.) But Nanay said, "No, every time you travel anywhere you get headaches."
So, even though we have been through several gluten free holidays, this is Mooky's first gluten free birthday. The only thing I am worried about is the cake.

The birthday menu:
Kinnikinnick donuts for breakfast.
A huge fruit salad for snacks throughout the day.
Pizza for lunch.
Chicken fried venison tenderloin, mashed potatoes and gravy, and green beans for supper.
Pineapple upside down cake with white chocolate chips, and ice cream for dessert. Cookies and Cream ice cream! I bought K-Toos for him to put in his ice cream.

I sure hope the cake turns out good since we are simply converting the regular recipe to gluten free. The amount of sugar in that menu is more than we have had all month!

Corn pasta

I found some Boles Corn pasta at the health food store last month and finally got around to trying it out last night.
It was a nice change from rice pasta! Mooky actually ate a good sized serving of it.

Our first ever order from Kinnikinnick arrived yesterday. Erinn was SO excited to see what I ordered for Mooky's birthday! She helped me get it all unpacked and hidden in the back of the freezer. I just need to remember to take it out the night before because it's BREAKFAST STUFF!

Cayenne pepper

Sometimes my kids amaze me. I suppose I should be used to them by now... :o)
Yesterday for lunch I diced up potatoes, onions, zuchhini and squash really small until I had a whole pan full, and added the last chicken breast (diced). Sauteed it all in olive oil, and added salt. It was a little blah so I added some cayenne pepper.
I handed Erinn her plate and she took it with a look of "VEGETABLES?" on her face. (She despises zucchini and squash plain.) But she ended up liking it a lot and even getting seconds.
Mooky said it was too spicy, but he liked it ok. Usually he LOVES that type of thing for lunch, so I was surprised at his lack of enthusiasm.
Within an hour he had a HORRIBLE stomach ache and diarrhea. We're pretty sure it was the cayenne pepper.
Bummer.

Chinese food

We love Chinese food, but it's pretty darn hard to make without gluten, and even harder without soy. So, since Mooky hadn't eaten any soy in a while, and technically he's allowed to have it every four days, we went for it. (BIG mistake.) I made fried rice to go with it, and Mooky ate some bean noodles with the vegetables as a topping.

It tasted great, but unfortunately Mooky got a BAD stomach ache that lasted for days. So, the good thing about this whole experience (besides the taste) was that we decided to get Mooky TOTALLY off of soy.

Gluten Free Brownies!

These are EXCELLENT, and we may even use this recipe as a chocolate cake for Mooky's birthday. Kris even liked these.

BROWNIES

2 sticks butter, melted
3/4 cup cocoa
2 cups sugar
4 eggs, room temperature
2 tsp vanilla
1 cup gluten free flour mixture (I used the sorghum flour blend.)
1/2 tsp xanthan gum
1/2 tsp salt
2 cups semisweet chocolate chips
Preheat oven to 350. Whisk cocoa into melted butter. Stir in sugar. Add eggs one at a time, stirring well after each. Stir in vanilla. Add flour, xanthan gum, and salt. Stir in chocolate chips.
Grease the bottom of a 9x13 pan. Pour in batter. Bake for 25-35 minutes.

As good as OREOS?

Made by Kinnikinnick, as supposedly as good as Oreos. (Hmmm, seems pretty unlikely, BUT Kinnikinnick does a GREAT job on flavour!) And usually, this kind of thing is not only out of our budget, but also NOT the kind of snack I would buy for the kids.
However, we have a birthday coming up, and the birthday boy would LOVE "cookies and cream" ice cream. So, I am going to order a package of these, and maybe the vanilla flavor as well. But, it's a surprise so don't tell him!

Gluten Free Recipes that WE like!

This is a place for me to post our favorite gluten free recipes. Send me yours and I will post them here too.