Colorful Late Summer Salads

As summer comes to a close we are given the last great opportunity to enjoy fresh seasonal late summer fruits and vegetables. Soon our vegetable and fruit options will be somewhat limited to what keeps well in cold storage or those hearty winter vegetables we all know and love over the cold winter months. But let’s not close the door on summer yet, most of us still have a month or so left of warm weather. While the weather remains warm and the produce abounds, brighten up your dinners or lunches with some beautiful, flavorful salads. These salads incorporate unusual pairings of fruits, meats, cheeses and nuts and the end result is a salad bursting with flavor and color! For your next salad, add some variety with one of the following late summer salads:

Mesclun with Watermelon, Feta & Toasted Pine Nuts

Asian Cucumber & Tomato Salad

Avocado & Mango Salad

Fresh Cherry & Prosciutto Salad

Grilled Pepper, Corn & Onion Salad w/Balsamic Vinaigrette

Romaine Salad with Oranges & Strawberries

Mixed Greens with Nectarines

Watermelon & Strawberry Salad

Freezing Gluten-free Food

Many families and busy working singles struggle with lifestyles that make cooking every night difficult and substantially more difficult when having to cook gluten-free. It would be great to have a list of gluten-free food that would freeze well and that one could be assured would taste great when re-heated.

There are foods that generally freeze well such as rice dishes, pasta dishes, stews and soups.

When freezing cooked meats and poultry, prepare the recipe as usual, except undercook the meat. The meat will cook to some degree again when you warm it up and can get overdone if it is cooked all the way initially.

We have had tremendous success freezing cakes, brownies and cookies. In fact, we recommend that you freeze cookies before you bake for the best results.

Gluten-free cookies baked from frozen dough will amaze you! They are perfect in looks, texture and taste! And they rise just like they should, instead of spreading out into flat disks.

We aim to please, and here is a list of gluten-free meals that you can cook when you have time for those occasions when you don’t:

Entrees

Arroz con Pollo w/Steamed Tortillas (Freeze the dish and steam the tortillas just before serving)
Enchiladas Verde
Curried Chicken
Baked Chicken w/Orange Juice
Puerco Verde
Beef Stroganoff
Louisiana Meatloaf
Orange Soy Chops
Asopao de Pollo (Chicken Stew)
Chicken & Meatball Fricassee
New Orleans Chicken Jambalaya

For Children

Corn Dogs
Chicken Nuggets
Spaghetti w/Meatballs
Macaroni & Cheese
Chocolate Peanut Butter Squares
Perfect Peanut Butter Cookies
Flourless Chocolate Peanut Butter Cookies

Desserts

Blueberry Ice Cream Cake
Chocolate Raspberry Squares
Decadent Brownies

GF BBQ Sauces & Rubs

What separates a good barbecue from a fabulous barbecue? Delicious sauces and rubs! The flavor of any meat, fish or vegetables can be greatly enhanced by marinating, using a rub and or basting with a sauce towards the end of the cooking process.

The terrific news is that all homemade marinades, rubs and sauces are easy to make and easy to make gluten-free.

Barbecue sauces can be made with a limitless combination of ingredients to produce traditional to very uncommon flavors. Although there are probably a million different formulas, there are five different groups of ingredients that combined together will produce delicious barbecue sauces; tomato ingredients, sweet ingredients, sour ingredients, liquids or flavorings and spices. We have a simple formula that you can use to experiment an develop your own signature sauces:

• 4 cups of tomato ingredients
• 1 cup of sweet ingredients
• Up to 1 cup of sour ingredients, add a little at a time to taste
• Up to 1/4 cup liquid or flavoring ingredients
• 2 Tablespoons chili powder
• 1 Tablespoon black pepper
• Up to 4 teaspoons spice ingredients

Directions:

Combine all ingredients in a small saucepan. Bring mixture to a boil and reduce heat and simmer for 30 minutes; stirring occasionally. Season to taste.

Ideas for Ingredients:

Tomato ingredients

• Gf Catsup, tomato paste, tomato sauce

Sweet ingredients

• Gf brown sugar, honey, molasses, maple syrup

Sour ingredients

• Vinegars, lemon juice, grapefruit juice, wine

Liquids and flavors

• Fruit juices, jellies, gf hot sauce, mustard, soft drinks, gf soy sauce, gf chicken and beef stock, water, Worcestershire sauce

Spices

• Allspice, basil, cayenne, celery, chervil, chili powder, chipotle powder chives, cilantro, coriander, cumin, dill, dry mustard, fennel, garlic, ginger, lemon, lime and orange zest, marjoram, mint, nutmeg, onion, oregano, paprika, parsley, tarragon, rosemary, sage, savory, salt, thyme, etc.

Be sure you right down your formulas so you can recreate your favorites!

Rubs are a combination of sugars, salts and dried spices and peppers. The prepared rub mix is ‘rubbed’ all over the meat you are going to grill or BBQ prior to cooking. For meats, we like to apply the rub generously about 4-6 hours before cooking. For fish, we apply the rub sparingly and just before cooking. Sauces can be basted on over rubbed foods or the rub can provide the flavoring by itself with terrific results!

The formula:

• 1 cup sugar ingredients
• 1 cup salt ingredients
• 1/3-1/2 cup paprika
• 2-4 Tablespoons chili powder
• 1-2 Tablespoons pepper
• 3-4 spice ingredients, up to 1 teaspoon each

Directions:

Blend all ingredients well.

Ideas for Ingredients:

Sugars

• Brown sugar
• Maple sugar
• White sugar

Salts

• Kosher salt
• Garlic salt
• Onion salt
• Celery salt

Spices

• Same as for sauces

You can’t go wrong by following the general formulas and you’ll come up with special sauces and rubs of your own!

Delicious Summer Pies

Enjoying a slice of pie is the perfect ending to a delightful summer meal. Many people with Celiac think this is a forbidden pastime…well, think again. Making delicious gluten-free pies your whole family will enjoy is just within your reach.

The obvious challenge is the crust. Our solution to this problem is turn to the people who already have developed a great pie crust…The Gluten Free Pantry. The Gluten Free Pantry’s Perfect Pie Crust is absolutely delicious and virtually indistinguishable from the gluten variety. It is very simple to prepare – a little difficult to transfer to the pie crust, however if you are making a single crust pie, it is not critical if it doesn’t lay in the pie pan perfectly the first time. If it happens to rip, just piece in the dough until it forms an even layer along the bottom of the pan (no one will even know!). Poke holes in the bottom of the crust and bake at 400 °F for 10-15 minutes or until the crust is lightly browned. Let cool before filling.

If you prefer not to use a traditional pie crust you can also use a cookie crust with great results as well. Try our Chocolate Hazelnut Cookies as a great base for a cookie crust. We have also had great results with Pamela’s Shortbread Cookies. Just simply place the cookies in a food processor and pulse until finely ground. Add about 1 tablespoon of canola oil and pulse until blended. Press cookie mixture into a greased pie pan and fill with your favorite filling.

Make your summer dessert menu complete with one of these delicious pies:

Fresh Strawberry Pie
Mixed Berry Pie
Chocolate Chip Ice Cream Pie
Peach Pie
Blackberry Sour Cream Pie
Blackberry Crisp Pie
Chocolate Velvet Pie
Banana, Chocolate & Coconut Cream Pie

Gourmet Pizzas

Over the years, Glutenfreeda has spent many hours in the kitchen trying to perfect gluten-free pizza. Part of the difficulty with pizza is that everyone has their own idea of what perfect pizza is. Some like thin, crisp crusts and some like thick crusts. But the one thing that all pizza lovers have in common is that they want a pizza crust that doesn’t taste gluten-free!

Making Pizza dough:

Through hours of experimentation we have developed a pizza crust recipe that tastes like the real thing. It has a wonderful "non-gluten" free taste and comes out with a crust that is neither thin or thick…but rather right in the middle. Here is our basic pizza crust recipe:

Pizza crust:

Ingredients:

• 3/4 cup warm water (105-115°F)
• 1 Tablespoon sugar
• 2-1/4 teaspoons dry active yeast
• 2 cups gf flour*
• 1-1/2 teaspoons kosher salt
• 1-1/2 Tablespoons olive oil
• Extra olive oil for forming dough

Directions:

In a small bowl combine warm water, sugar and yeast. Stir and proof for about 5 minutes or until foamy.

Mix gf flour and salt in work-bowl of a heavy-duty mixer fitted with a paddle.

Add 1-1/2 tablespoons olive oil to proofed yeast. Pour yeast mixture into flour mixture and mix on medium speed for 6-7 minutes. The dough should be soft enough that it somewhat adheres to the sides of the bowl. If the dough appears to be too stiff, add more warm water, about 2 tablespoons at a time until it softens up.

Turn dough out onto a greased pizza pan. Drizzle dough with olive oil and rub your hands with a little olive oil. Press dough into an even layered circle, creating a little lip around outer edges. If it starts to stick to your hands rub your hands with a little more olive oil.

Cover pizza crust with plastic wrap and let rise in a warm place for about 20 minutes.

Preheat oven to 400°F. Bake pizza crust for 7 minutes. Remove from oven (keep oven on). Top with your favorite sauce and toppings. Bake for 20 minutes or until the cheese (if using) has melted and is lightly browned in spots.

*We used The Gluten Free Pantry's Country French Bread flour mix for the gf flour in this recipe. To purchase this product please click here.

If you would rather create your own flour mix we have tested the following gf flour combination with great results:

Pizza gluten-free flour mix:

• 1-1/2 cups brown rice flour
• 1-1/2 cups white rice flour
• 2/3 cup potato starch
• 1/3 cup corn starch
• 2 teaspoons xanthan gum

The Toppings:

After your crust has baked for the original 7 minutes, it is now time to get creative. Sure you can opt for the American favorites such as Hawaiian or Pepperoni, however some of the best pizzas are those that are topped with great foods that compliment each other or perhaps even contrast each other (for example, sweet & spicy, or salty & sweet). My favorite thing to do with pizza is raid the fridge for leftovers. One of the best pizza’s I’ve had the pleasure of enjoying was made from leftover filet mignon, ricotta cheese, basil and fresh tomatoes. You can also look outside of the "pizza box" and experiment with different sauces…you don’t always have to use a red pizza sauce. You can use a white sauce, pesto, or you can eliminate the sauce altogether as we did with our Mesclun Pizza and have the highlight of your pizza be the toppings!

It’s OK to take off the Domino’s hat and discover some new and exciting flavors that could turn a safe standby meal into a gourmet meal you’ll treasure.

To get your creative juices flowing, here are some wonderful pizza recipes developed by Glutenfreeda:

Pizza with Beef Tenderloin, Ricotta, Basil & Tomatoes

Mixed Pepper Pizza with Feta

Pizza with Pancetta, Onions, & Red Pepper

Mesclun Pizza

Ricotta, Sun-Dried Tomato & Artichoke Pizza

Sausage, Pizza with Caramelized Onions & Fontina

Pizza with Beef Tenderloin, Ricotta, Basil & Tomatoes

Enjoy!