Oatmeal Cookie

I am training for a Triathlon. It takes place in May, up on Bainbridge Island. I have been training really hard to do this thing. In the mornings, before training with my trainer, he has me eat a pretty hearty breakfast. It's quick, easy and full of protien and complex carbs that a trainee could use. 

Here's his recipe:

Prepared oatmeal

Organinc Maple syrup

Organinc 1% milk 

Peanut butter

I use Trader Joe's rolled oats. They are g free and easy to make

I know, you were expecting some organic, all natural peanut butter. Nope...just reduced fat Skippy

I love this maple syrup.

Prepare the oatmeal as directed. While it's still hot, I add in the milk, maple syrup and a big spoonful of peanut butter. Stir until well mixed. I call this the oatmeal cookie as it tastes just like a cookie! Super yummy and healthy! Provides me with enough energy to burn 600-700 calories with my trainer over a period of an hour and a half. 

Enjoy!

A Trader Joe's Inspired G Free Cookbook

One day I was at Barnes and Noble looking for heart healthy cookbooks for my father-in-law. He had recently had a heart attack and needed to change some eating habits. While searching for the perfect cookbook for him (yes I found one: Betty Crocker's Heart Healthy Cookbook), I stumbled across a G free cookbook based entirely on Trader Joes:

How cool is that?!? I like Trader Joes. It's Whole Foods without the expense...although nothing replaces the awesomness that is Whole Foods. I purchased the book and set off to pick out some meals. 

The first one I tried out was their tacos. Pretty tasty. A little spicy, but yummy. This meal was hubs approved.

The next one I tried was the Honey Mustard chicken. This was pretty fantastic. The hubs really liked this one. I used all organinc products that I found at Trader Joes, Raleys and Costco.

The hubs made a side dish to go with this: 

Organic zuccini that has olive oil, garlic salt and cheese on it. Th then BBQ'd it. Delicious and healthy!

Pretty yummy!

The last meal I made from this book was Paella. I love paella. It's a Spanish dish that is pretty hard to mess up. You can add all sorts of things to it. 

This is the first time I made paella not using my special paella pan, so that felt weird. But the meal turned out really good! I need to make some more things out of here. They have breakfasts, lunches, dinners, desserts and side dishes! All items in the cookbook can be found at Trader Joes. It's a really cool book. Some of the items are easy to make and some, not so much. Be sure to read the recipe all the way through.

Enjoy~

The Return of the Pancakes!

I love finding new G free safe items! I really enjoy pancakes, but going g free had taken that away...until now!

Once again, I am cruising around my favorite grocery store, Raleys...yes I am one of those weirdos that actually likes to grocery shop. I sometimes like to wander around the isles and see what new items have been added. That is how I found this gem. Krusteaz is a delicious pancake and waffle mix to begin with, but now they have made a gluten free option!

My hubs enjoys pancakes too, so I bought a box and decided to make us pancakes one Sunday. 

So far it smells and looks like regular pancake mix.

Here goes nothing...

So far they are responding like normal pancakes. I am hopeful! And yes, they smell delicious!

So far so good..

The mix yeilded quite a few pancakes.

The anticipation is mounting...

The verdict is in...These things are AMAZING! They taste just like the regular ones! Even the hubs approves! So excited to get pancakes back! I highly recommend Krusteaz G free pancake mix! 

A Dessert that is Actually Healthy and Delicious

Some say dessert is the whole part of dinner. I like some desserts, but I don't live for them. We had recently had dinner at some friends and she had made this amazing dessert. She was very sweet to share the recipe with me, so I will share it with you.

Easy Berry Cobbler:

you will need: 

4 ramikens

Almond Flour

Almond slices

Coconut oil

Organinc Maple Syrup (Trader Joes has a great one)

Cinnamon

Nutmeg

1 lemon

Organic berries of your choice. I used organinc raspberries, blueberries and black berries

Fill the 4 ramikens 3/4 of the way with berries. Cut the lemon into 4s and squeeze each wedge over the berries.

Combine:

1 cup of almond flour

1/2 cup of almond slices

1/4 cup of melted coconut oil

1 tsp organic maple syrup

1 tsp cinnamon

pinch of nutmeg

Stir the almond mixture and spread evenly over the ramikens. Bake at 375 for 30-40 minutes or until the crust is hardened and carmel brown. Let it cool and eat! 

This recipe has no added sugar, no gluten and is completely delicious!

Hawaiian Meatloaf

Some people cringe at the word meatloaf. I admit, I do too sometimes...However, I have a fantastic recipe from my grandmother. She's no longer with us, so when I do make this dinner, I feel like she is looking down on me and smilling.

For successful meatloaf that is reatively healthy, I like to use the meatloaf pan. I bought this one at Macy's. Its a pan with holes in the bottom that sits in another pan so the grease can drain out. I also use ground turkey instead of beef.

Recipe:

2 pounds of lean groud beef or turkey

1 cup of pineapple chunks, drained (save some of the juice though)

1 chopped onion

1 cup of ground up crakers

1/2 tsp salt

1/8 tsp of pepper

3 Tbs of soy sauce

Sauce:

3 Tbs catsup

3 Tbs brown sugar

1 Tbs mustard

1 Tbs of pine apple juice

Preheat oven to 350

mix all ingredients, except the sauce in a bowl and place into pan. Mix sauce and spread evenly over the loaf. Bake in oven for 45 minutes or 50 if using turkey.

I really love this recipe. When I had to go g free, I hadn't been able to make it. Untill now...

Here's how I made this recipe g free friendly:

I used these crackers instead of the saltine crackers

I used g free soy sauce by Kikkoman. This is wonderful as it tastes like the original. 

I sautéed some brocolini in grass fed butter and garlic to have with dinner. So yummy and surprisingly healthy.  

Enjoy!

Mr. Cheese-O's

I love to snack. Especially as of late. I am in a triathlon next month which means I have seriously upped my workouts, which means my hunger has increased too. Being g free has made snack options a bit more challenging. I am not a huge fan of fruit and I have a serious love affair with the potatoes. I need a healthy, tasty option that is filling too. 

One day at my favorite grocery store...Raleys...I was getting lunch meat for the hubs. I saw on their counter, packages of Mr. Cheese-O's. I had not seen these before. They aren't located anywhere else in the store other then the deli counter. So I grabbed one of the cheddar flavors and one of the Tuscan herb flavors. 

This interesting looking snack boasts healthy, taste and g free. We will see about that. I took the cheddar ones with me on a road trip with the hubs. I got hungry and tore into it. The smell that greeted my nose was a familiar one...smelled like Cheese-it's! I was hopeful as this is a 100% quinoa and ancient grains snack. I popped one in...oh my gosh! Cheese over load with some garlic. A nice crunchy snack. The  pacakge says 2 servings per bag, but each serving was 75 calories. Healthy and delicious! 

The tuscan herb reminded me of crutons. They were ok, but I highly recommend the cheddar flavor. You won't be sorry.

Alfredo with Chicken and Asparagus and it's Safe!

I am a huge fan of pasta. I am even a bigger fan of quick, easy and tasty pasta! One day whie par-rousing the g free isle at Raleys, I came across a gem...

Items needed:

1 packet of simply organic pasta

1 package of tinkyada brown rice linguine

1-2 organic chicken breasts, cubed

1 bundle of organic asparagus

grass fed butter

organic 1% milk

shredded paresian cheese

minced garlic

garlic salt

olive oil

salt and pepper if desired

Add butter, milk, parmesian cheese and stir! Sweet! How easy is that? I like to kick things up a notch. That's how I roll. So, enter in oganic chicken and asparagus and garlic...perhaps some bacon bits too? Bacon makes everything better. 

First I saute the chicken in olive oil with minced garlic. I like to buy the garlic already minced and in a jar. Makes life so much easier!

Once the chicken is cooked, I put it in a bowl and set it off to the side. Next up, organic asparagus. I cut the aspargus and add it to the pan I cooked the chicken in. I like to saute my asparagus in olive oil with, of course, garlic and I add a pinch of salt.  I don't like asparagus mooshy...so I cook it until it's slightly tender, but mostly firm. For a gas stove on medium heat, its around 6 or 7 minutes.

While the sauting of things is happening, be sure to fix the pasta. I have tried a few brands of pasta, including the quinoa pasta. Meh. I have found this gem...

 

They have a lenguine pasta that I use for the alfredo. I was currently out, so I used their spaghetti pasta. Just as delicious. The thing I really like about this pasta is that the pasta does not turn into moosh the next day...and it tastes great! The hubs said it tastes like the real deal. As a non-g free person, it has got to taste great or he won't eat it. Me either for that matter.

Back to the asparagus...once it's cooked to your desired firmness, add it to the cooked chicken and set of to the side.

I use the same pan for the sauce as I used for the chicken and asparagus. It not only adds flavor to the sauce, but it's less to clean up. 

For the sauce: I use organic, 1% milk, grass fed butter and shredded parmesian. Follow the directions on the packet. After the cheese is melted, I add the chicken and asparagus, some more garlic and bacon bits if I have any in the house. Stir till everything is heated through. 

After draining the pasta, immediately serve.

Super tasty, super quick and super healthy. Bonappetite 

 

Gluten Free App

Going gluten free is currently all the rage. Which really helps those of us with a real problem with it. The celiacs, the intolerances and the allergies have gained a huge advantage with this becoming a fad. The fad has spread to the app world. Finally...

I was googling to see if there were any g free friendly Chinese restaurants and this popped up. It's a free download from Apple's App Store. 

You can select options for your search. Hit go and...

There's a list that pops up with all the places that have gluten free options. This is so awesome! Makes my life much easier to find safe places to eat. It's location based too, so when I'm traveling, it will find places near me that I can eat at! 

I highly recommend getting this app. 

Finally! Chinese food for the G free!

I became gluten free in August of 2014. So I am approaching my 1 year anniversary. With that said, I haven't had Chinese food in that length of time as everything has gluten in it. Right down to the soy sauce. If I wanted Chinese food, I had to make it myself. Trader Joe's offers some delicious gluten free options...as in over half the store is gluten free. There's also a g free soy sauce that Kikkoman makes. 

It tastes like the regular one. I would take this with me when we would have Mongolian or sushi. 

Ok, you're wondering about the Chinese food. My grandparents were coming into town and I asked them where they wanted to eat. My grandma said she wanted Chinese food. Oh great. The one food set that is so not gluten free friendly. Until now.

I got this amazing app...Find Me GF. I will post about this next. Anyway, I was scrolling through the list of g free friendly places to eat and up popped PF Chang's. PF Chang's stated that they had a gluten free menu. So I told my grandparents to meet us there. 

I like PF Chang's. Their atmosphere is pretty cool. They sat us, handed us the menus and then I saw it...

A full page of delicious, g free options. We got the lettuce wraps for an apetizer and I ordered the Singapore noodles. Oh my gosh! So delicious and g free! I can't wait to go back and try out their other options! Oh and yes, they have a great happy hour too! 

I highly recommend PF Chang's for the delicious g free food! Thank you PF Chang's for giving me back Chinese food.