Gluten Free Fried Smelts

Both my husband and I have Italian Catholic grandmothers, so we were raised with the tradition of eating fish on Christmas Eve.  Growing up, I always had several fish dishes to choose from, while Mitch's family had at least seven for the Feast of the Seven Fishes.

Both of our grandmothers made fried smelts, a dish we have not had since our last Christmas in Pittsburgh, ten years ago.  This year, while having dinner at Cooper's Hawk Winery & Restaurant on Christmas Eve, we decided that we needed to revive some of our family Christmas Eve traditions, like the Feast of the Seven Fishes.  While we brainstormed all the fish dishes we could cook next year, we decided that we needed to make fried smelts, so we bought some smelts at Lombardi's Seafood in Winter Park on Saturday.

Cranberry Ice Cream Float

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas in our house.  All three trees are up, including our Disney tree, which is full of the Disney ornaments we have collected since moving to Orlando 7 1/2 years ago.

While we were having Thanksgiving dinner in Pittsburgh with my family, I remembered a drink my grandmother used to make at the holidays.  Both my mom and aunt said it contained two simple ingredients - cranberry juice and vanilla ice cream.

Honey & Spice Pumpkin Seeds

I was never a huge fan of pumpkin seeds until I started making a Williams-Sonoma recipe for Toasted Pumpkin Seeds with Honey & Spice.  Over the years, I have made some changes to the recipe, which was included in my Williams-Sonoma Pumpkin Carving Kit.  

We always have plenty of pumpkin seeds, because we usually carve 3 to 4 large pumpkins.  

Palm Sunday Frittata

When we lived in Pittsburgh, we ate dinner at my husband's grandmother's house on Palm Sunday.  Mammaw always made her famous frittata the Sunday before Easter, a dish I loved from the first time I tried it.  When we left Pittsburgh, Mitch wanted to continue his family's traditional Palm Sunday dinner, so we started making Mammaw's frittata.  Over the years, we have reduced the recipe because we are not cooking for a large group, and removed the soppressata, an Italian salami that my daughters are not fond of.  

My husband Mitch made this frittata entirely on his own.  He cuts the salami, mozzarella, and provolone into little cubes, just like his grandmother.  

When I was younger, I never would have thought I would like a savory dish with ricotta, but the ricotta layer is one of my favorite parts of this dish.  

Tonight, Mitch used a dozen eggs.  Last year, I wrote down that he used 15.  The important part is to have enough egg to cover all the other ingredients.  

After an hour in the oven, our Palm Sunday Frittata was perfectly cooked.

We all love this dish so much, I don't know why we don't make it more often.  I guess it makes it a little more special that we only make it on Palm Sunday.  

Palm Sunday Frittata

Ingredients

3/4 to 1 lb mild/sweet Italian sausage 

1/2 lb (8 oz) provolone cheese 

1/2 lb (8 oz) salami 

1/2 lb (8 oz) whole milk mozzarella 

15 to 16 oz whole milk ricotta

12 large eggs - beaten

Directions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  

Cook your sausage, and spread it out evenly in a 10x10 baking dish.  

Cut your provolone, salami, and mozzarella into small cubes, then layer them one at a time in the baking dish in the order they are listed.  

Spread the ricotta out evenly on top of the other ingredients before adding the eggs.  Gently poke the frittata with a knife or fork all over so the egg begins to soak in.  If the egg is not covering the other ingredients well, add 1 or 2 more eggs.  

Bake for 60 to 70 minutes, until nicely browned on top, and the egg is cooked through.  

Serves 6 to 8

Recipe Notes

Use whole milk ricotta, so the ricotta layer is nice and firm.  

I use a 15 oz package of 365 mild Italian pork sausage from Whole Foods, which is labeled gluten free.  I bought an 8 oz package of Polly-O whole milk mozzarella at Publix in the dairy section. So I don't have to worry about cross contamination at the deli counter, I use pre-packaged Boar's Head provolone slices and Bianco D'Oro Italian Dry Salame (7 oz).  I stack all the provolone slices on top of each other, and cut them into small pieces.  You can read my review of Boar's Head products here.  All of their deli meats, cheeses, and condiments are gluten free. 

Mammaw always serves her frittata with a tomato and onion salad, but not being fond of raw onions, I made a tomato, cucumber and feta salad.  I dressed it with one tablespoon of extra virgin olive oil, one tablespoon of white balsamic vinegar, kosher salt and coarse ground black pepper.  

Palm Sunday Frittata is great left over for breakfast, lunch, or dinner the next day.  The leftovers are just as good cold or at room temperature.  

We served this dish a week early because of our upcoming Disney cruise.  It's a meal we did not want to miss!  Mammaw has been making this recipe for at least 70 years, and her mother made it before that.  I hope to continue the tradition of Palm Sunday Frittata for many more decades to come.  

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Bacon & Potato Frittata

Honey & Sage Roasted Pork

I am almost three months late posting this recipe.  My husband and I made honey & sage roasted pork on New Year's Day, continuing my family's tradition of making pork on New Year's.  This was a new recipe for us, and one I will definitely be making again next year.  

I bought this beautiful 7 rib pork loin rack from The Fresh Market.  

My husband and I kicked it up with a board dressing, a technique we learned from Adam Perry Lang's Charred & Scruffed, a grilling cookbook recommended to us by my parents.     

My husband got to use the bamboo cutting board I bought him for Christmas for cutting meat and making board dressings.  It has a convenient drip groove that catches juices.  

We served our pork with green beans, broccoli, and a special rice dressing that I make on New Year's Day. It's made with two varieties of rice, fresh herbs, dried fruit, sausage, apples, and white wine.  It's divine!  

Honey & Sage Roasted Pork

Ingredients

7 or 8 rib pork loin rack

kosher salt & coarse ground black pepper -- to taste

1/4 C honey

1 T fresh sage -- chopped

Board Dressing

3 T olive oil

3 T honey

1 T fresh sage -- chopped

1 T fresh rosemary-- chopped

kosher salt & coarse ground black pepper -- to taste

Directions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  

Season pork loin rack with salt and pepper.  Place in a roasting pan or on a baking sheet lined with aluminum foil.   Roast for 1 to 1 1/2 hours (about 20 minutes per pound) until the internal temperature reads 145 degrees F on a thermometer.  

Combine 1/4 C of honey with 1 T of fresh sage, and brush it on the pork after removing it from the oven.  

While the pork is resting for 10 minutes, make your board dressing.  Place all the ingredients in a pile on your cutting board, and combine them by cutting through them with a knife.  Slice the pork, then turn each piece in the board dressing to coat both sides.  

Recipe Notes

We roasted our pork on a baking sheet with the fatty side up.

I served my pork with my New Year's Rice Dressing (I will try to post the recipe soon), but it would also be great with Garlic Smashed Potatoes.

This recipe was inspired by a recipe for Honey & Sage-Roasted Rack of Pork from The Costco Connection.

July 10, 2014 Update

I made this recipe today using 2 pork tenderloins that were about 2.4 pounds total, and they cooked to temperature in about 30 minutes.  They didn't brown up as nicely as the pork loin, but they were tender, and tasted great.  I adjusted the amount of honey, oil, and herbs I used, because I made much less pork today than I did on New Year's Day.

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Gluten Free Easter Bread

Today is the first day of Lent, so I am starting to think about Easter Bread.  Easter Bread is an Italian tradition.  My husband's Italian grandmother makes it, my Italian grandmother made it, and my mom makes it.  When I was diagnosed with celiac, Easter Bread was definitely one of the foods I missed the most.  A couple of years ago, I started making a Faithfully Gluten Free recipe for gluten free paska, an Eastern European Easter Bread.  The flavor of the bread was amazing, because of lemon and orange zest and juice, but the texture was just a little bit off from the gluten-filled bread I was used to.  After seeing a recipe for Gluten-Free Challah with Apples & Raisins on GF Jules, I decided to combine ideas from both recipes and make Easter Bread Buns.  

Easter Bread Buns

Ingredients 

1/3 C warm water

1 package of gluten free rapid rise yeast (I use Fleischmann's RapidRise)

1 tsp granulated sugar

4 C (520 grams) gfJules Gluten Free Flour

3 T plus 2 tsp granulated sugar

1 1/4 tsp kosher salt

1/2 tsp baking soda

2 tsp baking powder

1 C vanilla yogurt - room temperature (I use Chobani Vanilla Blended Greek Yogurt or  Lowfat Vanilla Stonyfield Farms)

5 large egg yolks - room temperature

1 tsp apple cider vinegar

1/3 C grapeseed or organic canola oil 

1/4 C honey

Zest of one orange and one lemon

1 large egg, beaten (for brushing on top of the buns)

Directions

Preheat your warming drawer on low.  If you don't have a warming drawer, preheat your oven to 200 degrees, then turn it off.  

In a small bowl, mix together the first 3 ingredients.  I proof my yeast on the warming zone of my stove.  If your yeast mixture hasn't bubbled and grown after 5 to 10 minutes, throw it out and start all over again with another packet of yeast.  

Whisk the second set of ingredients, the dry ingredients, together in a large bowl.  

In the bowl of a stand mixer, combine the third set of ingredients, the wet ingredients.  I like to use my dough hook.  Add your yeast mixture, mixing to combine on low speed.  Lastly, gradually add in your dry ingredients with the mixer on low speed.  I usually add a few spoonfuls, mix, turn off the mixer, add some more, etc.  When all the dry ingredients have been added, mix on medium speed for 2 minutes.  

Spray your muffin pan with cooking spray, and scoop a generous amount of batter into each cup.  Mix the extra egg and a splash of water together in a small bowl, then brush it over the top of each bun, smoothing the tops of the buns with your pastry brush.  Place your muffin pan into your warming drawer or oven, cover with parchment paper sprayed with cooking spray, and allow your buns to rise for 30 minutes.  I turn my warming drawer off when I put the buns in.  

After the buns have risen at least slightly, place them in an oven preheated to 350 degrees.  Cook for about 17 minutes in the middle of the oven until nicely browned.  

I drizzle them with a mixture of powdered sugar and half & half.  You could also make a glaze out of powdered sugar and heavy cream, powdered sugar and milk, or powdered sugar and water.  I love to eat my Easter Bread warm, with a little bit of butter.  

You can view our entire Easter menu in my Easter in July blog post.  We serve a lamb roast, homemade white bean hummus, lemon risotto, green beans, and Easter Bread.  

Last Easter, my gluten eating extended family was doubting my Easter Bread was going to be any good.  They all loved my Easter Bread Buns and were disappointed that everyone only got one!  My mom now uses this Easter Bread recipe, because it is so easy to make.  My parents do not need to eat gluten free, so she uses wheat flour.  

If you need to eat gluten free, I recommend using gfJules Gluten Free All-Purpose Flour in this recipe.  It contains expandex, which other all-purpose gluten free flours do not contain.  I doubt that this recipe will work well with any other gluten free all-purpose flours.

March 2016 Update

This year, I used Chobani yogurt and grapeseed oil for the first time, and weighed the amount of flour I used.   My new muffin scoop (heaping) came in handy to portion out the batter, which gave the buns a better shape.  The bread rose much better than it did last year, and with the glaze I made from heavy cream and powdered sugar, I thought my Easter bread buns were the best they have ever been.

My Easter Bread recipe was inspired by a Jules recipe for Gluten-Free Challah with Apples & Raisins. This recipe can easily be adapted to be dairy free by using a non-dairy yogurt.  

Gluten Free Thanksgiving and Fall Favorites

Just let me start off by saying that I love Thanksgiving, and I love the fall.  I always get a little homesick for my hometown in September, as my Facebook friends from Pittsburgh start to post pictures of changing leaves, while I am waiting for 90 degree days to go away.  I look forward to my Thanksgiving dinner more than any meal my family prepares.  When I was diagnosed with celiac, I didn't have to worry about what I was going to eat on Thanksgiving.  That first year, we traveled to Pittsburgh to my aunt and uncle's house, and all my favorites were prepared gluten free for me.  There were no worries with the kosher turkey and mashed potatoes, and my aunt made the stuffing and creamy pumpkin pie with gluten free cornbread, bread, and pie crust.  My family rocks! 

My husband and I have now taken over the duty of preparing my family's Thanksgiving feast.  We have stuck with the family tradition of buying a kosher turkey, which we purchase from Whole Foods.  They are already pre-brined, and they never disappoint.  

My husband smokes our turkey on his Big Green Egg.  We either rub a mix of extra-virgin olive oil, kosher salt, and coarse ground black pepper on top of the skin, or use herb butter on top of and underneath the skin.  

Our smoked turkies are not pretty to look at when they are done, but they are always delicious!  

Thanksgiving wouldn't be Thanksgiving without stuffing.  I make a gluten free version of the cornbread stuffing that I grew up with, though we don't put it in the bird, because that is a big no-no when you are smoking your turkey.  You can view the recipe here. 

On Thanksgiving, I make garlic mashed potatoes.  We peel and cut 5 pounds of organic Yukon Gold potatoes into cubes, and boil them until fork tender.  When they are done cooking, I put them in our stand mixer with a bulb and a half of roasted garlic, 1 stick of salted butter, warm lowfat milk to taste, and 2 teaspoons of kosher salt.  

To roast the garlic, preheat your oven to 400 degrees, cut off the tops, drizzle with a generous amount of olive oil, wrap them up in aluminum foil, and cook until tender/mashable, for about 50 minutes.  

All the ladies in my family are Williams-Sonoma addicts.  They have been buying Williams-Sonoma Gravy Base and Apple-Orange Cranberry Relish for probably as long as they have been available.  Neither product contains any gluten ingredients, but the labels clearly state that these products are prepared and packaged using machines that may come in contact with wheat/gluten.  I don't eat gravy, so this is no big deal to me.  This year, I made a homemade Cranberry Relish that has similar ingredients to the relish my family buys from Williams-Sonoma.  You can view the recipe here.  I chose this recipe because of its ingredients and all the positive reviews.  

This cranberry relish recipe was a huge hit with the adults in my family, and only contains four ingredients - 2 cups of fresh cranberries, 2 organic Granny Smith apples, 1 large organic navel orange, and 1 cup of sugar.  I prepared it in my food processor, pulsing each ingredient separately. 

November 2017 Update - Last year, I made Merlot Apple-Orange Cranberry Relish, the first cranberry relish dish that my daughters have ever liked.  You can view the recipe here. 

For most of my life, I ate apple pie on Thanksgiving because I didn't like pumpkin pie, but then my aunt made a pumpkin pie recipe with cream cheese.  For years, this was the only dessert I made on Thanksgiving.  You can view this amazingly light and delicious recipe for Cream Cheese Pumpkin Pie here.  

I recently made Creamy Pumpkin Pie Bars, using my Cream Cheese Pumpkin Pie filling and Williams-Sonoma Gluten-Free Piecrust Mix.  My family really loved this version, and I didn't have to worry about my crust browning too much.  The recipe is at the end of my Cream Cheese Pumpkin Pie blog post.  You can view it here. 

This year, I made my aunt an apple crostata for dessert.  This free form pie is one of our favorite fall recipes.

The third pie I made is this Chocolate Chess Pie.  It is easy to make, and so incredibly delicious.  I use a Whole Foods Bakehouse GlutenFree Pie Crust, or I make mini chocolate chess pies with Williams-Sonoma Gluten-Free Piecrust Mix.  You can view these recipes here.  

Another great dessert option is gluten free pumpkin cupcakes.  They are moist and delicious, and so easy to make.  

For Thanksgiving breakfast, I might make gluten free Spiced Pumpkin Scones.  They are heavenly! You can view the recipe here.

November 2017 Update - We recently started making apple scones, which my husband said rival my pumpkin scones. 



Another easy breakfast option is my pumpkin waffles made with Cup4Cup Pancake & Waffle Mix.



We have also been loving pumpkin pancakes made with Trader Joe's Gluten Free Pumpkin Pancake Mix.  They are so delicious with some cinnamon honey butter.

If I wasn't so obsessed with Spiced Pumpkin Scones this fall, I would probably be making Apple-Raspberry Puffed Pancake on Thanksgiving for breakfast.  This recipe has been a family favorite of our for years.  Make sure you use a high quality gluten free flour.  Cup4Cup makes this oven pancake puff up much better than any other gluten free all-purpose flour that I have tried.  It can be purchased at Williams-Sonoma, The Fresh Market, or select Whole Foods.

About a month ago, I made Nicole Hunn's Apple Breakfast Cookies recipe.  I froze all the leftovers so we would have some quick breakfast options during the work and school week.  I made this Gluten Free on a Shoestring recipe with Better Batter Gluten Free Flour.  The combination of apples, cinnamon, and oats is perfect on a Fall morning.  You can view her recipe here.  

Acorn Squash with Apples & Cranberries would be a great dish to serve on Thanksgiving, but I already have too much going on, so I make them for my aunt and uncle earlier in the week.  They fly in from Pittsburgh to stay with us now, instead of us going to them.  You can view the recipe here. 

Sweet Potato Pineapple Casserole would be another great choice for Thanksgiving, but in my quest to keep my sanity, I limit the number of dishes I make.  You can view this recipe here. 

Just this week, I made a recipe for Gluten-Free Dinner Rolls by Shauna Ahern, also known as Gluten-Free Girl.  The yeasty smell and taste reminded me of Mitch's grandmother's bread. They were so good!  You can see all my baking tips and a link to the recipe here. 

For the day after Thanksgiving, when you are recovering from your food hangover, I recommend making one of my favorite fall smoothies, like the Blueberry Pomegranate.  

Another great option is my Persimmon Orange Smoothie.  

My Cranberry, Orange, Banana Smoothie is amazing too!  

If you want to take your Thanksgiving leftovers to an all new level, buy a panini press.  I like cranberry relish, stuffing, and turkey on my panini.  Family members have been known to pile on leftover mashed potatoes and gravy too.  You could use store-bought bread, but I made two flat 8" rounds using Gluten-Free Girl's Dinner Rolls Recipe.  You can see how I made the bread here.  

I like to heat my cranberry relish, stuffing, and leftover turkey to room temp before added them to my bread.  A couple minutes in the panini press, and you can see the results above.  It was so incredibly delicious!  My daughters enjoyed their panini with mashed potatoes, stuffing, and turkey. 

November 30, 2014 Update - This year, we made panini on Friday, and turkey noodle soup on Saturday with the rest of our leftover turkey.  The slight smokiness of the turkey was the key reason I liked this soup better than any chicken noodle soup I have ever had.

What are your favorite gluten free dishes to make on Thanksgiving?