Indian Latkas

So this recipe was born out of a total KITCHENFAIL!!11!! but the end result was amazing none the less.  I had started out trying to make samosas, but as I've previously chronicled, baking and I were not on speaking terms when this recipe came about.  Gotta get creative.  These were the filling for samosas, revamped.

I have been told by several of my chosen friends that calling these latkas is a stretch, mostly because of the peas.  Whatevs. I do what I want.

Indian Latkas

3 sweet potatoes
1 onion, thinly sliced and diced
1 1/2 cups of frozen peas
EVOO
1 tablespoon of butter
3 cloves of garlic
1 tablespoon curry powder
1 tablespoon mustard seed (start with a tsp if you don't want these to be spicy and keep tasting/adding)
1 tablespoon coriander / cilantro

Chop potatoes into small cubes.  Cover with water and bring to a boil, checking every 5 - 10 minutes to see if you can spear the potato easily with a fork.  When you can and the potato is just about falling apart, pour potatoes into a strainer.  Mash with the back of a large fork. and set aside.

Add butter and onion to a large skillet. After about 2 minutes, add garlic and sautee until fragrant.  Add all your seasonings.

While the onion finishes cooking, add in the peas to defrost (which takes under a minute) and sear a bit. When peas are thawed and onion is sufficiently softened, add the contents of the pan (scraping the yummy bits off the bottom) to your potato mixture and blend well.  Taste and continue to season until you get it right.  I added more coriander and curry at this point.

Preheat your oven to 400 degrees.

Brush EVOO on two cookie sheets.  Add heaping (and I'm talking HEAPING) tablespoons to your greased cookie sheet. Flatten with the back of the spoon.  Drizzle with EVOO and bake until browning. Flip over to brown the other side, pushing down a bit with a spatula and drizzling again with EVOO when you flip.

Perfect global addition to any holiday party menu.  Serve with a blend of goat cheese and sour cream, sprinkled liberally with cilantro. Mmmmmmmm.

Baking: Revisited plus THREE cookie recipes

I write this triumphantly.  I give you... COOKIES !  Baked with gluten free flour (sweet rice flour or white rice flour, to be exact, I know the recipes say white rice flour, but I swear I had sweet rice flour. Whatever.).  That taste delicious.  In that mix we have peanut butter cookies, butter cookies and sugar cookies. All delightful and exactly what I've been craving of late.

Sugar Cookies (perfect for cutting out into pretty shapes!)

( I used the two egg whites that are left over from this to make coconut macaroons - recipe to follow)

 

1. Beat until creamy

            1 stick + 2 tablespoons of butter or margarine ( earth balance margarine works fine for dairy free)

            1/2 cup of white sugar

             teeny pinch of salt

2. Add and continue beating

             2 egg yolks

             1/2 teaspoon lemon peel

             1/2 teaspoon vanilla

3. Add 1 1/2 cup white rice flour and mix

 

Refrigerate dough for a little while so it firms and makes rolling easier. If you have it, roll this out on parchment paper sprinkled with white sugar.  

 

Bake at 350 degrees for 10-15 minutes and cool in the pan for five minutes before removing.

 

Basic Cookie Dough (you can do so much with these...)

 

Preheat oven to 400 degrees ( if your oven is as terrible as mine... 375 might suffice).

 

Mix-

1 stick + 2 tablespoons of butter or margarine

1/2 cup white sugar

pinch of salt

1 egg

1/2 teaspoon of vanilla

1 1/2 cups of  white rice flour

 

You can make a drop type cookie by rolling the batter in sugar before baking - use  parchment paper.

or

You can sprinkle sugar on  parchment paper and roll the dough out and make cut outs that beg to be frosted.

or 

You can add 1/2 cup of chocolate chips and mix in the batter. Then  drop by teaspoonfuls on parchment paper and bake.

 

Bake for about 10 minutes  and check.  I let them cool a minute or two before removing  from the parchment paper. 

 

Coconut Macaroons

 

Whip 2 egg whites and 1 teaspoon vanilla ( or almond if you have it) until frothy.

 

In a separate bowl mix 1 and 1/3 cup of coconut (flake or shredded), 1 cup sugar, a pinch of salt and 3 tablespoons of white rice flour.

 

Optional - add 1 and 1/3 cup of mini chocolate chips as you combine the two bowls.

 

Bake at 325 for about 20 minutes. 

Shout out to my cousin Lisa for dropping the peace sign in the above picture. Nothing more hood than baking with Grandma.

UGH and other tales of gluten free baking.

I have had it, friends.

The holidays are practically here.  I need to bake some cookies.  Except the last three things I've baked have been capital A Awful. With my family's annual cookie baking fest happening at my Grandma's house this weekend, I feel resigned to watching them bake delectable treats while I pout.  I'll help, mostly because I find baking cathartic if nothing else. But I need to figure out GF baking and FAST.  Not even because of the holidays.

There are few things I love more than surprising someone I love with freshly baked cookies.  I recently started tackling cupcakes to great success too.  All of this has halted come August when my celiac diagnosis was revealed.

I did have ONE attempted recipe turn out great.  But it was formulated specifically for the Bob's Red Mill GF All Purpose Flour Mix that I keep on hand. Is this the only way to do things?  I see baking recipes that literally have 4 or 5 different types of flour.  Hiiiii - I live in New York City.  I barely have space to store wheat flour, GF flour and xanthan gum, let alone 5 different types of flour.

What is a city celiac to do?

To keep things from being totally bleak, I give you the ONE recipe that turned out well.  Not so sticky it adhered itself to my food processor. Not drier than a dessert despite how much liquid I dump in. This recipe yielded some delicious cookies.  Icing recipe follows.

Bob's Red Mill GF Sugar Cookies: http://www.bobsredmill.com/recipes_detail.php?rid=122
(for some reason the recipe won't copy/paste aaand I'm lazy.)

Perfect Sugar Cookie Icing:
(The amounts below should leave you a little extra making the above cookies.
For cupcakes or a cake - double it at least. More is less when it comes to frosting!)

2 cups confectioners' sugar

1/4 cup butter or shortening

2 - 3 tablespoons milk or half and half

1/2 - 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

food coloring if needed

Bust out your hand mixer and go to town. Voila.