A Creamy Sauced Gluten-Free Pasta

Artichokes and a creamy sauce make this pasta pure comfort food.

Dairy-Free Creamy Goodness

This was almost a vegan recipe.

Until I added the bacon.

Non-carnivores, I'm sorry. I couldn't resist. I was standing there (quite innocent!) in my humble little kitchen stirring this velvety dairy-free cream sauce (that I'd just improvised with some leftover sweet potato) listening to my pick-me-up when I'm draggin' 80's playist (Phil Collins, The Church, Suzanne Vega, Tears For Fears, Wham! and Simple Minds) when I remembered the smoky gluten-free and casein-free Sunday bacon Steve had cooked earlier. 

And that, as they say in Guy Ritchie land, was Bob's yer uncle. And speaking of Tears For Fears- I have one quick question. Does everybody want to rule the world? Because to me, it seems like too much work.

For those of you who are fans of my Vegan Mac and Cheese recipe and well acquainted with nutritional yeast- a fab source of those requisite B vitamins and a non-dairy sort-of-but-not-exactly cheesy nutty flavor spike for those us lucky enough to live gluten and casein-free by celiac necessity or neuro-different choice (or hope or, I don't know why it works it just does) you'll love this variation on a vegan cheese sauce theme.

The sweet potato adds body, color, and flavor (not to mention those beneficial beta carotenes). And this sauce- unlike my favorite Cheesy Uncheese Sauce- does not contain any flour. The sweet potato acts as a thickener. Which I suppose makes it more South Beach friendly, too, with less refined carbs (sweet potato is a lower glycemic carbohydrate) if you serve it over low carb pasta or roasted cauliflower.

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Gluten-Free Turkey & Sweet Potato Enchiladas

Gluten-free turkey and sweet potato enchiladas.

Enchiladas, Family Style 

This Friday is just like any other out here in the New Mexico hinterland. There were big-eared rabbits eating breakfast (nibbling spare tufts of grass). A chickadee or two in the junipers. Pink light on the distant mesas. And as far as I know, no scary crush of shoppers at the Espanola Walmart. At least I haven't heard any sirens off in the distance. Truth be told I haven't budged from my casita (and I have no plans to). Nope. It's just another day here, call it what you want. Black Friday is quiet as an empty nest. So I thought I'd share a recipe for leftover turkey and sweet potatoes- a surprisingly tasty combo.

As always, make it as mild or as spicy as your little heart desires.

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Gluten-Free Brunch, Quiche + Fritatta Recipes

The Brunch, Quiche and Frittata Recipe Index has moved to two new pages.

Brunch and Bakery Recipes and Egg Recipes

Thank you.

Gluten-Free Chai Pumpkin Bread with Cranberries

Chai Pumpkin Bread with Cranberries Recipe

Recipe posted November 2008.

Reader Maya gave me the idea to chai it up- with chai inspired spices (thanks, Maya!). If you're not a fan of ginger and cloves, sub your favorite pumpkin or apple pie spice combo or keep it simple and use only cinnamon. Other options include nuts or no nuts, chocolate chips or golden raisins- or both.

Preheat your oven to 350ºF. Lightly oil the bottom of a standard bread loaf pan or 8x10 baking pan and dust with gluten-free flour.

Ingredients:

1 cup pumpkin puree
1/2 cup light olive oil
1 cup packed organic light brown sugar- or 1/2 to 2/3 cup raw agave nectar, to taste
2 teaspoons bourbon vanilla extract
2 organic free-range eggs, beaten, or Ener-G Egg Replacer
1/3 to 1/2 cup apple juice, cider, or orange juice (start with less, add more as needed)
1 1/2 cups gluten-free flour blend (I used GF buckwheat/sorghum/tapioca starch)
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon xanthan gum
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon allspice or cardamom
1/2 teaspoon ginger
1/2 teaspoon ground cloves or more ginger

Add-In Options:

3/4 cup chopped fresh cranberries
1/2 cup chopped pecans or walnuts
1/2 cup golden or dark raisins (I used dark but wished I'd had golden)
1/2 cup vegan chocolate chips- if you like pumpkin + chocolate

Instructions:

In a mixing bowl beat together the pumpkin, oil, brown sugar, egg, and apple juice. Add the dry ingredients into the pumpkin mixture and stir until smooth. If the batter looks too thin and wet, add more gluten-free flour, a tablespoon at a time, to thicken the batter.

Pour the batter into the prepared loaf or baking pan and bake in the center of a preheated oven for 50 minutes to an hour, until the loaf is firm to the touch, and a wooden pick inserted into the center emerges clean.

Cool the loaf on a wire rack.

Slice and wrap each slice in foil; bag and freeze for easy future yumminess. Thaw at room temperature or zap in a microwave till warm.

Makes 8 or 9 slices.

This vegan recipe is blissfully gluten-free, dairy-free, soy-free, and easily egg-free and nut-free.

Karina's Notes:

No Ener-G Egg Replacer? Use 2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder and increase liquid by three tablespoons.

Gluten-Free Apple Cinnamon Muffins

Cinnamon apple goodness- gluten-free.

A classic fall favorite- the pairing of apples and cinnamon. Stir them together in a muffin batter and you have a sweet and cozy breakfast treat that is not only heart warming and soul satisfying but super easy to wrap and freeze. That is, if you don't eat every single morsel first. These little gems would be a fabulous side nosh for Thanksgiving brunch- or a casual supper of Curried Butternut Soup.

It's a gray flannel sky kind of day here in the high desert. Chilly and damp. Steve is watching The Great Escape as I nibble on a warm apple muffin. It's been a historic week. I am still re-viewing on-line videos of our President-Elect with gratitude and awe, thankful that hope, grace and smarts prevailed despite the ugly drumbeat of fear, fueled by prejudice and the age old tactic of scapegoating and button-pushing, appealing, of course, to the lower instincts of our reptilian past. The old and rusty paradigm is giving birth to the new on a collective level. And I feel it in my bones and in the air that I breathe.

I am grateful. Hopeful. And eager to greet change.

It's all good.


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Gluten-Free Pumpkin Pecan Cookies Recipe

 Pumpkin cookies- gluten-free.

Pumpkin Cookies

I'm glad I baked cookies. Your intrepid gluten-free goddess, you see, is a tad under the weather. Well. In all honesty, maybe more than a tad. I blame the shopping cart I gripped and steered in Espanola searching for a butch new spatula-spoon that might actually survive gluten-free batter instead of snapping in half.

I've got a nasty bug.

My defenses may have been a little vulnerable from all the pre-election anxiety coursing through my hyper-vigilant little body. Stress equals not-so-good, so they tell me. But now I can exhale. The epic campaign is over. America chose hope and changed the paradigm of its racial roots forever. So, Sweetcakes.

Smile.

Have a cookie to celebrate.

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Cozy Autumn Rice Bake

Tasty rice casserole with turkey, cranberries, mushrooms and olives.

Here's a cozy autumn casserole recipe with crumbled organic turkey, mushrooms, black olives and tart cranberries. Vegetarians can change out the turkey with gluten-free tempeh, cooked black beans, chick peas, or white kidney beans.

From time to time I become a flexitarian goddess and cook with organic, free-range turkey, beef or buffalo. I chose organic free range turkey for the protein in this family style layered dish, but organic free-range chicken or beef, or even gluten-free tempeh would also work beautifully.

The recipe is an improv, so the measurements are close approximations, but most of you readers are creative cooks who do your own thing and toss together your own improvisations, anyway, right? 

You're my kind of people. 

You can handle it.

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