baking

Cashew Blender Bread

Hey, y’all.  🙂

I meant for this post to go up on Valentine’s Day but somehow scheduled it for March 14th instead.

So happy belated V-Day.  🙂

Hope it was everything…every single one of you…wanted it to be.  🙂

I’ve been busy working on my business which picked up hugely 😉 this month.

Still eating super boring so I don’t have much to share on that front.

Over the weekend we met Sister B for lunch and I did have some delish dry rub ribs but forgot to take pics.

I’m also busy with the resistance project. So proud of the work we’re doing. 🙂

Ok, y’all if you’ve got a high power blender you’ve got to try this.

I had this recipe on hold for months because I was completely skeptical.  But it really does work.

I wasn’t willing to commit to a larger amount of cashews than this so I just made a small loaf pan and used these measurements:

5 oz cashew nuts soaked in cold water for about an hour

1/4 cup plus 1 tbsp cold water

1 egg

1/2 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp salt

1/4 cup tapioca flour

Soak cashews for an hour. Drain and rinse.  Add nuts and water to high power blender and blend on high until completely smooth.  I had to use the tamper with mine to help get it going.  I blended for probably about 2 1/2 – 3 minutes on 10.

Once it’s completely smooth…and I do mean completely…add everything else and blend on high for about a minute.

Pour / spread in pan and bake at 325* for about 35 minutes. Cover with foil if it’s browning too quickly.  Then kick the temp up to 375* and cook 5 – 10 additional minutes uncovered til golden brown.

This was soft and bendy and delish. It didn’t taste like nuts at all. That’s just cooked down strawberries with a few drops of liquid splenda as a mock strawberry jelly.  My first PB&J in ages. 🙂

When I try this as a regular size loaf I’m going to triple the recipe.  I’m still kind of scared of trying a big loaf though because that’s a lot of nuts wasted if for some reason structurally is not strong enough to hold up to the weight of the amount of nuts needed to fill that large of a pan without sinking.

 🙂

Progress pic…

Taken last week.

Ok that’s all for now. Y’all have a great long weekend and I’ll see you soon.  🙂

 

 

 

Lesson Learned + Cherry Christmas Cake

Hey, y’all. 🙂

Did you have an awesome Christmas / holiday?

Things were kinda blah here.

First, the week leading up to Christmas I had to take Mama B to the ER late one night. It was all kinds of drama that led to us having to leave before she could be seen because the ER Dr at our Podunk hospital wasn’t covered under her insurance. If you know me in real life and live in our town…don’t go to the local hospital unless you’re like 110% sure you’re dying. Drive to SL or V and see some decent nurses / doctors.  There was this one nurse there that must be the sister of Satan (and that’s being nice). And believe me…she’s already been reported.  So anyway thankfully the urgent care at her regular Dr’s office was open super early the next morning. She got seen 1st thing and her temp was 104. The Dr. said if she’d waited any longer it would have been really bad.

So she was sick and then Sister B got sick and wasn’t able to come home. We ended up meeting her for lunch on Christmas Monday but she’s still not feeling all that great.  Feel better soon, SB.  🙂

We still celebrated Christmas.  It just wasn’t the same as if everyone had been healthy.

Made the real kolaches and pigs for the rest of the fam.

Used the roll dough I wrote about in this post to make me some celiac / paleo safe pigs and prune kolaches. These actually turned out really well. And they held up in the icebox too. I’m so impressed with this recipe.

Usual Christmas Tex-Mex meal. (Tamales / Enchiladas / cheese rice / beans).

So are y’all starting to practice y’all’s Russian. 😉

About that cherry rum cake.

Unreal.

I made my regular rum cake recipe using gf Jules of course (you can use any rum cake recipe) and for all of the water (just the water) in the cake and drizzling sauce I subbed cherry juice from a jar of maraschino cherries.  I drained the cherries really well and pulsed them in the food processor then dried them even more on paper towels and added them to the mix. I left everything else the same.  Mama B said this was the best cake I’ve ever made. 🙂

Amen.

My fav Christmas presents (so far)…a Rubik’s cube and a Salt Life sign / decoration for the back fence (it needs to be dropped down a little bit).  We’re starting to decorate the back fence with old vintage and cute signs.  When Rubik’s cubes were first a thing I got one for Christmas and played with it for hours on end. They had all those retro toys out for Christmas this year and it was one of them.  My other fav won’t come until sometime next week.  I’ll share when it gets here.  🙂

 🙂

A progress pic. Left pic was Christmas 2004 (in the middle of a 4 year lupus flare) and right pic was the day after Christmas this year. White bar across chest = no bra. Also…while my stomach is in no way flat that is not a bulge it’s the way the white shirt bunched up.

So…about the title of this post.  I took 4 days off plan for the holidays and while it was worth it in some ways it was horrible in others. In about 48 hours my pain level went from around a 4 to a 24.  My face bloated up.  I was itching like crazy.  It was awful. I had planned to stay off plan thru Monday (because we were meeting SB for lunch that day and it was a road trip) but I went right back on plan after Christmas day lunch.  It took a good full 3 days for my pain level to get back to somewhat manageable.

Lesson learned.  I just cannot jump on and off from no sugar / grains (even with celiac safe ones).  I have to find ways to make this livable.  And that’s what I’m going to do. I’m going to figure out ways to make things I like so maybe I won’t miss them as much.  I did it when I had to go gluten – free.  I’ll do it with this too.  And of course I’ll share along the way. 🙂

Had to go out for lunch on Tuesday.  Saltgrass.  Caesar and Prime Rib. Forgot to take a pic of the steak but I cleaned the plate so you know it was delish.  This was a perfect back on plan meal. 🙂

Normally I wouldn’t post something with that many curse words in two sentences but I saw this and it is just so fitting right now.

Ok. That’s all for now. Y’all have a great / safe New Year’s Eve / Day weekend and I’ll see you soon.  🙂

 

 

 

 

 

 

Orange Cake 100 days and Birthday Wishes

Hey, y’all. 🙂

First…Happy Birthday to Sister B. The best sister a girl could wish for.  I hope you have an awesome day.  🙂

So…

I did it, y’all. 🙂

100 days.

No grains or sugar for 100 days and no dairy for 50 days. 🙂

I’m pretty proud of myself. It’s been rough in some ways but super zen in others.  It was the weirdest thing.  I didn’t have any inner debate with myself over trying this.  In late August I really did just wake up one day and say to myself “enjoy Labor Day and then you’re doing this grain free  / sugar free thing for a while”.  There was no way I could have given up the dairy right from the start.  It’s what got me thru that first month.  But I’m so glad I eventually tried getting rid of it too.

The whole point of trying this was to try to help my autoimmune inflammation. It’s helped a lot but I’ve just got so much of it raging in my body that it’s going to take a lot longer.

I’m planning to stick with this for as long as I can.  Hopefully this is now a lifestyle change but I learned a long time ago to never say forever.  It’s a one day at a time kind of thing and today…I am still all in.  🙂

Before / current. Before was August and current was this weekend.

Logo from the shirt in the current pic.  You can never have too many y’all Christmas shirts.  😉

Remember that caramel I wrote about last week? That’s what it looked like in action.

I read about this orange cake where you boil 2 oranges for 2 hours then..

Throw the whole oranges peel and all (chopped into chucks) into the food processor and process to mushy.

Add 2 cups almond flour, 4 eggs, 1 – 2 cups sugar (I used xylitol), 1 heaping tsp baking powder and process til well blended.

Bake at 350* for about 45 minutes.  I glazed it with a ghee / xylitol reduction.

It’s kind of pound cake-esque. I loved the flavor and the texture was good but I did have a reaction to the acidic oranges.  If not for that I’d totally make this again sometime.

In that caramel post I wrote about using Ideal brand xylitol / splenda sweetener.  I switched over to this for the cake along with some added liquid splenda and that’s going to be my new mix.

Quick side note…a reader reached out and wanted to know how I can claim to be staying below 25g carbs / day when using xylitol. The answer to that is that I don’t count sugar alcohols at all. I’ve tested my blood sugar after eating them and they have zero effect on me. For example an hour after a piece of that orange cake my blood tested at 80.  Two hours after it tested at 78.  (I’m not diabetic but someone in my house is so I just used their testing machine to test it out. I also did it when I decided to allow the occasional potato.)  Anyway…that’s just how my body works.  You have to know your own body before you decide not to count sugar alcohols.  As I’ve said many times though…you do you and don’t worry about me.  🙂

Ok that’s all for today. Hope y’all are having a great week. 🙂

 

 

 

 

Thanksgiving Hodgepodge

Hey, y’all. 🙂

Did y’all have a nice Thanksgiving weekend?  Do a bunch of shopping?

We had a good one.

And I did it, y’all.  I stayed 100% on plan. No grains, sugar or dairy.  🙂

If you’re not spatchcockin’ your turkey you don’t know what you’re missing. 🙂  This was the best turkey I’ve ever had in my life.  SO moist and juicy.

Don’t y’all wanna know how that bible study class went down.  😉

2016-11-24-12-55-20

2016-11-24-13-22-12

I made the Parker House rolls from Every Last Crumb and they were really good. I couldn’t believe something made with almond flour could be that soft.  Highly recommend this one (but trust me…add some salt to the dough).

Made the ‘cornbread’ recipe in Danielle Walker’s Against All Grain Celebrations and then gave it to Mama B to make some dressing for me. Everybody else had regular dressing but she takes my Mema’s dressing recipe and makes a celiac safe version for me.  Last year I was able to have real cornbread but since I’m not doing any grains right now I had to try something else. It was good. Not great…but then my Mema made the best dressing in the world 🙂 so it’s kind of hard for nut bread to live up to that.

Blurry pic of my plate. Turkey, dressing, roll and green bean cass.

Everybody else had regular green bean cass but since I’m not doing dairy I had to make something safe.

Enter…

My new favorite thing. 🙂 Follow Your Heart vegan cheese.

Now let’s be real clear here…I will never eat vegan. 

I mean this is Texas after all. 😉

But cutting out dairy has changed my life and I’m determined to keep it up.  I miss it A LOT  though so in order to stay strong with cutting it out I had to find something to keep me on track. I tried several other brands and they were horrible…not to mention expensive.

GO VEGGIE was the worst of the worst.  I tried it and was almost ready to give up then I found the Follow Your Heart at Whole Foods. I was like ok if this Follow Your Heart doesn’t taste good either then a dairy free life just isn’t for me.

Thankfully it was good.  It doesn’t melt as smoothly as I wish it would but the taste is great and it completely hits the ‘I need some cheese right this minute’ spot in my head.  Also let me add here that I’m only eating the ones labeled “New”. They don’t have any soy. I can’t speak to any of their other products but the new cheese slices are excellent.

I keep a bowl of cashew cream in the icebox at all times.  It’s so versatile.  It’s just soaked cashews, water and salt pureed til completely thick, smooth and creamy. I’ve used it in protein shakes, to make ‘sour cream’ and…as the ‘cream of chicken’ to make my green bean cass.  I took a little bit of cashew cream and mixed in some chicken broth base and then heated it up with some of the Follow Your Heart cheese til it melted then added the green beans and baked as normal.  It was my second favorite part of the meal after the turkey. 🙂

Everyone else had regular desserts and I attempted a safe one for me but it wasn’t good enough to blog.

Overall I was very happy with my totally on plan holiday meal. 🙂

I’m not sure what I’m going to do about Christmas. I’m leaning towards taking the day off and just eating regular stuff but we’ll see.  I said from the beginning I just wanted to make 100 days and then reevaluate so that’s what I’m going to do.  14 days to go.  🙂

Got the decorations up. Decided to do an all red, white and green theme this year. Thank you, CA for my beautiful poinsettia tree skirt quilt from Hawaii. I love it so much.  And you.  🙂

Ok that’s enough for today.  Y’all have a great week and I’ll see you soon.  🙂

p.s. don’t forget Giving Tuesday today.  🙂

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Key Lime Pie

Hey, y’all. 🙂

Hope y’all are well.

I’m finally feeling better. Finally finished all the antib’s for the staph infection. Those things were rough on the stomach.

So this week I made…

…a pizza. Using gfJules of course. I used my recipe and her flour (but her pizza mix is really good too). Ps. it didn’t shrink up…I just didn’t make enough dough to fit that size pan.

 😉

I’m totally sick of the Colin Kaepernick flag / anthem junk but I’m feeling better so let’s pause for a little rant shall we…

Some people are so focused on the symbolism of a piece of colored fabric that they’re (purposely of course) ignoring the very real issues inspiring the protest. People are DYING right here. Right here in this great country…not in war…RIGHT HERE.

Just because this is the greatest place in the world doesn’t mean we can’t be BETTER. We don’t get to rest on greatness when MILLIONS of people in this country are being disenfranchised (and worse) every.single.second of the day. MILLIONS…African Americans…Hispanics…Muslims…the LGBT community…women…it goes on and on and on. We’re supposed to be better than this. But as usual instead of bothering to listen to the very real problems they change the topic and start whining about a piece of fabric or screaming about the military.

Are some people seriously so cognitively challenged that their brain can’t entertain two separate topics at the same time? You know…it IS possible to be angry about cop murderers while still supporting the GOOD cops. It IS possible to support those who join the military while still abhorring war. You CAN love this great country and still want us to DO BETTER.

For the record…I put my hand over my heart every time I hear the national anthem even in my home when there is no one around. But if you have a reason for not doing that yourself…then I totally support that too. Because THAT is what this country is SUPPOSED to be about. Not forced assembly or sing – song time. Oh and Ps number 2: The flag belongs to ALL of us. Not just the military.

Oh one more thing then I’ll move on…ya know what I find a kazillion times more offensive than someone choosing not to stand / sing? All the people wearing flag do rags and tube tops. A sight which can be seen every single week at white trash conventions all over the country…aka Nascar races. Funny how it’s totally cool for them to disrespect the flag by putting it on their bodies while chugging / spilling who knows what all over it.  But whatevs. Garbage in garbage out, y’all.

Weight loss tip for the long weekend. 😉

Speaking of…do y’all have big plans?

Here’s another recipe perfect for squeezing out these last few weeks of summer.

1 cup flour (regular or gluten free…I used gfJules). 1/2 cup sugar. 6 tbsp soft butter. 1 egg yolk. 1 tsp vanilla. Beat for about 2 minutes. Double or triple as needed.

Baked about 8 minutes in the convection oven.

Key lime pie filling.

Layered like banana pudding in individual bowls. I forgot to get a pic of the Whipped Cream and garnish on top.

So have y’all seen this Margaritaville Key Lime Pie filling? It doesn’t claim to be gluten – free but the only questionable ingredient is modified food starch…which they don’t specify the origin of…but no one in the Texas Girl household reacted to it so I think it’s  just corn.

Anyway…when I was growing up I lived on the Texas Gulf Coast and one of our family fav restaurants was a little shack right on the water and right across from the Naval Base. They had the BEST key lime pie. I still dream of that pie. This was the closest taste to it I’ve ever had. I don’t know if you’ve seen a lot of KLP recipes but almost all of them use Sweetened Condensed Milk. Which if you know me you know I’ve been known to drink out of shot glasses. 😉 So I love that taste…but not in Key Lime Pie.  I’ve always known without a doubt that the KLP that haunts my dreams didn’t have it in it. After tasting this I’m even more convinced. Another thing they used was a butter cookie shell. I was going to do that…thus the cookie recipe above…but I didn’t end up with enough cookies to make a pie shell so I decided to do individual servings layered like banana pudding. They were perfect.

Anyway…this was really good and our Walmart is clearancing the pie mix right now.  If you like KLP I highly recommend giving this one a try. They also have a coconut pie mix. I picked it up too and will maybe try it this weekend.

Y’all have a great / safe long weekend and I’ll see you soon. 🙂