Food senstivities

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Cranberry Muffins

So my allergy kid is causing me to get creative. He’s reacting to…. well lots of things, so everything is suspect right now. No store bought baked goods for us. I would fudge and buy muffins from the bakery once every few months. Since that’s not an option right now I busted out the muffin pans. I haven’t made muffins in, well, years. The King Arthur Flour cookbook gave me a refresher course and then I changed the ingredients based on what he could have.

Ready, set, go….


2 cups flour of your choice (I used All Purpose because that is what he is tolerating best right now)

Scant 1/2 cup sugar

1/2 tsp. salt

2 tsp. baking powder

1 cup fresh ripe cranberries (or berry of your choice)

Combine the dry ingredients and mix the cranberries in until coated with flour. Next, in a separate bowl combine…

1 cup milk

6 egg yolks (or 2 whole eggs)

1/4 cup light olive oil (or oil of your choice) 

Whisk together until combined. Pour over dry ingredients and mix only to the count of 20 even if your batter is still lumpy, that’s okay. The less you mix the fluffier the muffins will be.

Pour into lightly greased muffin cups (I use silicone ones) until 2/3 full. Per King Arthur’s instructions Inpreheated the oven to 500 and then reduced the heat to 400 when I put the muffins in. Cook for 20 minutes.


I used these mini silicone cupcake molds to use my extra batter. I cooked them at 400 for 14 minutes. They are a great size for travel or for the one year old. 

Happy baking everyone!

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Mineral Rich Lamb Stroganoff

I invented a new recipe today. Our son is struggling with foods right now so I’m trying to focus on the things that he tolerates well while getting some good fats, protein and minerals in him. This recipe was a modification of my regular stroganoff recipe adjusted for his current food sensitivities. I added lamb for variety so he has some rotation in his meats, and swiss chard and bone broth for extra vitamins and minerals. I wasn’t sure how it was going to turn out but it was great! Though this is not a great picture, the half empty bowl proves that it was a hit. The bowl was full when we started. The five year old had three servings!

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If you have food restrictions that are different from ours, this recipe is easy to substitute what works for you. Here’s what I used if you want to try it:

1 lb. ground lamb
1 lb. ground beef
3/4 tsp. sea salt
1/2 tsp. black pepper
1/2 cup chopped onion
3 cloves minced garlic
4 cups chopped swiss chard
3 cups heavy cream
2 cups of beef broth or bone stock (see here to make your own)
extra virgin olive oil
2 tbls. all purpose flour
1-1/2 packages wide egg noodles

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First put a pot of water on to boil for the pasta. While you wait for it to boil cover the bottom of your skillet with olive oil. Saute your ground lamb and ground beef until browned. Season with salt and pepper and add the chopped onion and garlic. After about 5 minutes add the chopped swiss chard and cook until wilted. Add about 2 tbls. more of olive oil. Stir and then sprinkle 2 tbls. of all purpose flour (or flour of your choice) over the meat mixture stirring until the oil has absorbed all the flour.Next pour in the heavy cream and stir. When it starts to thicken add the beef stock and stir until combined and heated. Turn off the heat. Cook your egg noodles (or pasta of your choice), drain and mix the noodles, sauce and meat mixture all together.

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Sprinkle with parmesan and crushed red pepper flakes if desired. Eat it up. It’s delicious!

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Bone and Veggie Broth

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Break out your crock pots everyone! Whoever invented the crock pot has my eternal thanks. It makes what I’m about to tell you so EASY. I had a great time at the grocery store today. In part because I only had two of my four children with me which made shopping much easier. 🙂 But, otherwise, I was gathering all the fixins for some DELICIOUS broth. Ahhhh. Mmmmm.

I’m making two kinds – beef and vegetable. Let me tell you how to make your own.

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Beef stock with beef bones, beef marrow, garlic, onions and leeks.

Beef Stock:
Buy about 5 pounds of various beef bones from your butcher. Many stores will have packages set out labeled as soup bones. I bought one package of “soup bones,” two packages of neck bones, and two packages of marrow bones. If they don’t have any out, ring the bell at the meat department and tell them what you want. They can cut it up for you in minutes. When you get home dump all the bones all in the crock pot and add one head of garlic unpeeled and chopped in half, one leek, 1 cup onion quartered, 1.5 tsp sea salt, 1/4 tsp. pepper. Pour cold water over it all and cook on low for 12-18 hours. When cool either strain and freeze or follow my instructions for my favorite way to preserve broth – make your own bullion cubes.

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Veggie stock – beet greens, potato peels, onions with peels, garlic with peels, carrot and potato peelings, and leeks.

Vegetable Stock:
I don’t know why I’ve never thought to do this before but I recently saw an idea online to save all your vegetable scraps in the freezer and when you have a full bag use them to make veggie broth. That’s what I did and it is currently simmering away. Couldn’t be easier. Dump in all your scraps, cover with water, add 1 tsp. sea salt, 1/4 tsp. pepper. In this batch I added potato peelings, carrot peelings and ends, celery tops and bottoms, beet greens, leeks, onion tops and peelings, and one head of garlic with peels. You could really add anything. If you add peelings just be sure that you wash the vegetables before you peel them. I used the bag of veggie scraps from my freezer and just from putting these batches of broth together this afternoon I almost have another full bag in the freezer waiting for next time. I would say that the essentials to veggie broth that make it great are celery, leeks and garlic. Don’t skip the leeks. I buy them just for broth. They make it that much better.

Freeze them for later.
Save those scraps!

I’m going to be spooning this into my meals and the mouth of my kids when they are sick. My allergy kid is struggling right now from some recent food reactions so I’m hoping the extra vitamins and minerals will give him the boost he needs and help his gut heal and get back to normal. The healing properties of this broth can’t be equaled. Plus they are sooooo delicious. Enjoy.

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Quick Breakfasts – Chocolate Quinoa Custard and Homemade Granola

These are cooking in my kitchen. Chocolate Quinoa Custard and Homemade Granola are two quick breakfast options.

Chocolate Quinoa Custard:

140127_0000This recipe is gluten, dairy, nut and sugar free. This recipe contains eggs.

I’ve been making this for breakfast lately. It’s delicious, filling and high in protein. Try it!

Start with 2 cups quinoa. Soak overnight. Drain and rinse. Add enough water to a saucepan to cover the quinoa by about 1/2 inch. Simmer over medium heat for about 15 minutes or until all the water is absorbed, the quinoa is transparent and the little curly tendrils can be seen on the side of each grain. Cool.

Next stir the following into your cooled cooked quinoa.
2 tbls. cocoa powder
2 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. salt
1/4 tsp. cloves

Mixture unset before it goes into the oven.

Mixture unset before it goes into the oven.

In a separate bowl combine
2 cups milk (substitute: goat, almond or coconut milk)
6 egg yolks (or 3 whole eggs)
1/2 cup maple syrup (or 3/4 cup honey)
1 tsp. vanilla

Add the liquid mixture to the quinoa mixture and stir to combine well. Pour into a greased casserole dish and cook at 350 for 40 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean and the mixture is set.

It is best served warm. Add some extra maple syrup to taste and pour some cream over the top. It’s delicious!

 

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Granola:

Everyone seems to ask me for my granola recipe. So here it is. This way I can just tell everyone, “It’s on my blog.”🙂

First mix all the dry ingredients in a large bowl.

6 cups oats (I prefer regular, not quick-cooking)
1 cup coconut
1 cup chopped nuts (You can use any nut you like or have on hand. I usually use walnuts but almonds or pecans even work.)
1 tbls. cinnamon
1 tsp. nutmeg
1 tsp. salt

Stir the dry ingredients until mixed well. Then mix in following.

1 cup mild- tasting oil (whatever you’ve got – coconut (melted), canola, light olive oil, etc.)
1 cup honey
2 tsp. vanilla

Stir well until all the oats are coated. Put in a baking pan with sides and bake on 350 for 20 minutes removing at the 10 minute mark to stir. When you stir be sure that you are careful to pull it away from the sides as the honey burns easily along the edges otherwise. When it has cooled off, stir in 2 cups of raisins. Makes a yummy breakfast or snack.

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Chocolate Quinoa Custard

140127_0000This recipe is gluten, dairy, nut and sugar free. This recipe contains eggs.

I’ve been making this for breakfast lately. It’s delicious, filling and high in protein. Try it!

Start with 2 cups quinoa. Soak overnight. Drain and rinse. Add enough water to a saucepan to cover the quinoa by about 1/2 inch. Simmer over medium heat for about 15 minutes or until all the water is absorbed, the quinoa is transparent and the little curly tendrils can be seen on the side of each grain. Cool.

Next stir the following into your cooled cooked quinoa.
2 tbls. cocoa powder
2 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. salt
1/4 tsp. cloves

Mixture unset before it goes into the oven.

Mixture unset before it goes into the oven.

In a separate bowl combine
2 cups milk (substitute: goat, almond or coconut milk)
6 egg yolks (or 3 whole eggs)
1/2 cup maple syrup (or 3/4 cup honey)
1 tsp. vanilla

Add the liquid mixture to the quinoa mixture and stir to combine well. Pour into a greased casserole dish and cook at 350 for 40 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean and the mixture is set.

It is best served warm. Add some extra maple syrup to taste and pour some cream over the top. It’s delicious!

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For leftovers you can reheat it with a little bit of milk or cream over the stove.

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Got 10 minutes? Homemade Tortilla Chips anyone?

Homemade flour tortilla chips.

Homemade flour tortilla chips.

I don’t buy regular tortilla chips because my children react to the oils that they are made with. So, necessity being the mother of invention, here is the 10 minute method to making your own using the oil of your choice. The key here is being able to coat the tortillas in oil quickly without having to take the time to fry them first.

Start with a package of your favorite fajita (small) tortillas (flour, corn or some other alternative grain). Coat a dinner plate in the oil of your choice (I like olive oil). Remove six of the tortillas and follow these steps. Don’t try to make sense of them by reading it. Just do it and it will flow. It’s really not hard.

Dinner plate coated in olive oil.

Dinner plate coated in olive oil.

1. Take one tortilla and lay it down in the oil.
2. Pick it up and place another tortilla up against the oily side.
3. With the two tortillas stuck together, lay them both down in the plate of oil on one of the dry sides.
4. Pick up the two tortillas again placing a third tortilla up against the side you just oiled.
5. Lay the three tortillas down together again on one of the dry sides.
6. Continue adding a new tortilla to the newly oiled side of your stack until you have used all six of your tortillas.You should now have a stack of six oily tortillas. So, step seven is….

7. Using kitchen shears (or a cutting board and serrated knife) cut your tortillas into quarters.
8. Arrange your triangles on a 12×18″ jelly roll pan or cookie sheet.
9. Sprinkle with salt.
10. Bake on 350 degrees for 10 minutes. Since every oven is different, start checking at the 8 minute mark and again at the 9 minute mark to be sure that they don’t burn. They will go from not browned to burned if you aren’t careful.

Eat up! We enjoyed this with Black-Eyed Pea Salsa on New Year’s Day. These also make yummy nachos as pictured below.

Nachos made with homemade tortilla chips.

Nachos made with homemade tortilla chips.

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Fall Recipes: Pumpkin, Spiced Chai and more…

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“Don’t you just love New York in the Fall?”

Anyone ever see You’ve Got Mail? It may be a cliche one-liner, but there is something special about Fall. The leaves change, the air is crisp, you pull out your favorite sweaters and hats, and curl up on the couch in the evenings with your favorite afghan spread across your lap. Add these recipes to your list of fall favorites. They are delicious and they fit the season perfectly.

Pumpkin Butter

Pumpkin Butter on homemade spelt biscuits

Pumpkin Butter on homemade spelt biscuits

Chocolate Chip Pumpkin Bread
Allergy-Friendly Pumpkin Bread

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Spiced Chai Tea

Christmas Chai Tea

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Quinoa Cornmeal Breakfast Pudding

9.16.13 015 This yummy porridge combines protein packed quinoa and cornmeal to make a delicious and versatile breakfast dish. You can make a whole batch ahead of time to eat on all week. Or make a double batch and freeze half for later.

Start by soaking 2 cups of whole grain quinoa overnight. (Note: I recommend soaking even if your quinoa is pre-rinsed and says ready to cook. It will cook much faster and ensure that there is no residual bitter taste which can happen if not soaked/rinsed properly.)

Drain and rinse in a collander.

Pour the 2 cups of rinsed quinoa into your saucepan and add the following.

2 cups of cornmeal
1 tbls. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. powdered ginger
2 tbls. butter (or coconut oil, or other oil/fat of your choice)
1/2 tsp. salt
2 tsp. vanilla
1/2 cup brown sugar (or honey)

Stir these ingredients together to combine.

Now add enough water to cover the quinoa/corn mixture. Probably about 5 cups.

Cook over medium heat stirring often until the mixture is thick and the quinoa is less white and slightly transparent. Cover and let stand for 10 minutes. Stir in the 1/2 of dried cranberries and pour into a loaf pan or casserole dish. (Note: It is best to store this mixture in a glass casserole dish or steel loaf pan and not in cast iron. Long-term storage in cast iron may cause the cast iron to rust due to moisture. Also, I was running out of cranberries when I made the batch pictured above so there’s not many showing.)

At breakfast time scoop out the serving size that you want and heat with a little cream and brown sugar to taste if needed.

Or you can change things up a bit and cut the mixture into slices, coat with flour and fry in a bit of oil for a gluten-free granola bar on the go.

You can see my other Allergy-Friendly Recipes by clicking here.

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Allergy Friendly: Stir Fry!

Beef stir fry with ginger and garlic.

If you can’t have sesame and soy eating Chinese, Korean or other Oriental dishes is out. Here are some my favorite ways to adapt your favorite Chinese food to make them allergy friendly.

These recipes are free of soy, sesame, egg, dairy, nuts and either corn or wheat.

Start with a pot of your favorite rice cooked according to the package directions (I like brown rice).

Beef Stir Fry:
Next saute 1 1/2 lbs of  your favorite cut of beef cut into thin strips with salt and pepper. Throw a 6 cloves of garlic, 2 tbls. of fresh ginger root into the food processor and process until minced and add to the pan. Now add your favorite veggies – onions and peppers, broccoli and carrots, string beans, etc. Cook until the beef is done and the veggies are fork tender.

Chicken Stir Fry

Chicken Stir Fry

Chicken Stir Fry:
Begin by cutting uncooked chicken breasts into strips and saute with your oil of choice. Chop your favorite veggies – mushrooms, broccoli, carrots, onion, etc. Add the veggies to the pan stirring often. Next, prepare your sauce. Combine 2 cups of chicken stock, 1/4 cup of vinegar, 3 tbls. honey, salt/pepper (to taste), 2 tsp. garlic powder, crushed red pepper (optional). Whisk to combine. Add 2 tbls. of corn starch and stir into the sauce to thicken. (If you can’t use corn starch, then add some extra oil to your meat before you add your veggies and sprinkle 2 tbls. of flour (wheat or spelt) over the chicken. This will coat the chicken and combine with the fat to make a roux which will then thicken the sauce when you add it.) Pour over the meat and continue to cook over medium heat, stirring until thickened.

Click here to see my other allergy friendly recipes.

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The Family Doctor: Keeping those little bodies clean Inside and Out

9.10.12 020Continuing our discussion of food sensitivities, let’s discuss tips and tricks on cleansing your children’s bodies and their environment.

Keeping the INside and OUTside Clean:

Children with food sensitivities seem to have delicate systems. Thus I try to use homemade cleaners, soaps, laundry detergents, sunscreens, bug sprays, toothpaste and remedies so that I can know what they are being exposed to. This way if they have a reaction, I know what the ingredients are and can more quickly diagnose the offending agent. I also try to support their immune systems by giving them Well Drops daily. And when they have a reaction to a food I give them herbs (in tincture form) which helps support their bodies as they cleanse and heal. Herbs like dandelion (cleansing), milk thistle (liver support), yarrow (healing/cleansing), yellow dock (cleansing), catnip (calming/nutritious), and nettle (nutritious) are among my favorites.

More health topics to follow…. What health issue would you like to see discussed?

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Cooking with Garlic Skins.

130705_0000You may have a puzzled expression on your face after reading the title of this post. However, I state it in all seriousness. Recently I’ve stopped peeling my garlic. Yes, you read that right. Now, I don’t do this for everything that I use garlic for. However, when it comes to making broth I’ve started throwing my garlic cloves in peels and all. I was just reading up on how onion peels and garlic peels are high in quercetin which is helpful in preventing allergies and stopping allergic reactions. Since members of my family struggle with this I thought it would be useful to give it a try and stop throwing that precious quercetin away. So, whenever I’m making broth I toss in those cloves skins and all. It saves me a lot of prep time peeling all those little garlic cloves. I do peel and discard the skins when cooking anything that requires chopped garlic, but if you’re going to simmer anything like broth or herbal remedies where you are going to strain the cloves out, try leaving them on. It’s definitely easier and hopefully has added health benefits too.

Do your own research on quercetin. Prescription for Herbal Healing has a good section on it explaining it’s health benefits. And if you have issues with food sensitivities or allergies like our family does, check out my Allergy-Friendly Recipes.

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The Family Doctor: Food Sensitivities

"The Country Doctor" by Norman Rockwell

“The Country Doctor” by Norman Rockwell

Food sensitivities are on the rise. How many of us have a child with a food intolerance? And if you don’t, I bet you have a friend who does. What do we do? The allergists can’t help us since they aren’t actually allergic to anything and finding a pediatrician or alternative doctor who has solutions is like finding a needle in a haystack. So, what’s left? You become the “expert” on your own child and help them as best you can. You are now the Family Doctor trying to provide comfort, promote health and find that elusive balance between protecting your child from offending foods and helping them feel like they live a normal life outside of their restrictions. Continue reading to find out what we’ve done.