gluten free

gfJules Muffins + Catching Up

Hey, y’all.  What’s up in your part of the world?

I took a little post holiday…holiday. 🙂

Sister B got me some white dishes for the blog.  No way will I ever give up my beloved red plates for eating but white is so much better for blog pics. Thanks, SB. 🙂  That was our New Year’s day meal.

PMS meal on the go. 😉  Have y’all ever had those f’real milk shakes from Stripes?  I needed something safe-ish on the road and tried one.  I say ‘ish’ because a couple of their flavors involve cookies and I’m not clear on the cleaning situation between purchases. All I can say for sure is I got vanilla and there was no other flavor mixed in (like from the previous persons purchase) and I didn’t react to it at all. For some strange reason they include buttermilk in the vanilla version. As you can imagine it gives it an odd after taste.  I’d try f’real again but I’d try a different flavor and make sure it didn’t have buttermilk because that’s just gross.

Have y’all ever seen a three kings cake that looks like this?  I hadn’t.  Our HEB had these for three kings day.  Gluten FULL obvs so I didn’t buy it.

But speaking of…do y’all celebrate the 12 days of Christmas?  The 12 days following Christmas.  We do.  Everything stays up til the 6th.  Thanks for teaching us that, Mema. 🙂

New shades.  Love ’em.  Thanks so much. 🙂

Only one quick random today…

Making a Murderer. I really think the take away from it should be that we can’t trust one single word coming out of that particular police department or prosecutor’s office.  Maybe Avery did kill her. Maybe he didn’t.  The docu is too one-sided to judge that.  But after you see and hear what they did to his at the very least cognitively challenged nephew how can you trust ONE thing coming from police and prosecution?

So look what the UPS fairy delivered.  I should probably come up with something better to call UPS deliveries since the UPS delivery person is a guy. But anyway…Friday he showed up with this package. gfJules mixes I’d ordered during her holiday sales.

First up…

Muffins.  I used her recipe on the box…yeah I know shockingly I actually followed a recipe. 😉  So I won’t put it here but that’s mix, eggs, banana, sour cream.  I also added cinnamon and vanilla.  Cinnamon and vanilla are like condiments. I can add them and still claim to have followed the recipe. 😉

Cherries.

Trying to show that these have actual tops and are not flat like most gf baked things. The ones that look smaller just have less dough…see the pic above of the raw dough before baking…plus I also didn’t smooth the tops at all before baking.  I’m not a food blogger anymore so I don’t have to clean that countertop off for pics. 😉

Cherry Banana Muffins. In maroon and white paper of course. 🙂

These are without doubt the best gluten – free muffins I’ve ever made or eaten.  No exaggeration. There was not one sunken muffin.  Not one.  And the crumb was super moist / soft.

I have zero connection to gfJules. I’ve purchased every single bit of the flour and mixes myself.  This flour is legit.  Go getcha some. 🙂

I’ve got that big scleroderma specialist appointment on Thursday.  I’ve been waiting for 3 + months.  I’m scared but also ready to know what’s going on.  I may or may not be taking a bus to this appointment.  Wish me luck.  🙂

See ya soon.  🙂

It’s been a while so let’s Motown Monday it today. 🙂

Homemade Hot Chocolate

Hey, Y’all how’s your Tuesday going?

Hope you had the best holiday weekend. 🙂

We did our usual Tex – Mex fiesta.  That’s my sad plate. 🙁

One of my fav gifts.  🙂  Have y’all seen these coloring books for adults?  Supposedly it’s supposed to help you zen out.  Surprisingly it does kinda work.  I didn’t realize it was that big of a deal until I wanted some different coloring pencils and Hobby Lobby told me they’d been sold out for a couple weeks.  Even Amazon is backordered til late January (for the wax pencils).

My favorite gift…

Every year Papa B gives us each a fun or silly gift that he picks out without Mama B’s help. 😉  Sometimes they are super crazy but this one…is perfect.  Thanks, PB. 🙂  I collect pigs.  It says Barnyard Diva on the front and Raised in a barn and proud of it on the back. 🙂

So…I have this new mug and need something to put in it. 😉  What’s a girl to do?  Make some homemade hot chocolate mix of course.

1 1/2 cups dry milk

1 1/2 cups powdered sugar

3/4 cup cocoa powder

1 cup white choc chips

1 large box chocolate pudding mix

Have y’all seen that recipe?  You food processor dry milk, cocoa powder, powdered sugar, white chocolate chips and this wasn’t in the recipe but I added a large box of chocolate pudding mix til all powder-y and almost smooth.  The chocolate chips don’t completely break down but they melt quickly when you make up the hot chocolate.  Then when you want to make a cup of hot chocolate you mix 1/3 cup of the mix with 1 cup boiling water.  This is definitely a keeper.  The reason I added the pudding mix is because normally when I make hot chocolate I use more than a little heavy cream to make it thicker.  I can’t have anything really heavy or rich right now but still wanted a thick hot chocolate.

The latest in my ongoing testing of gfJules gluten – free flour.  Look at those bubbles. 🙂  I’m really loving this flour.

Randoms

  • “A perfect storm of errors” ? That’s how we’re describing the MURDER of a child now? Disgusting. That poor mother. Hell is too good for these authority figures a$$holes running around MURDERING kids. Way too good.

 

  • Ya know…the last time I checked you can’t just walk into a police station…tell them you want to be a cop and have them respond by handing you a gun and a badge.   Y’all are supposed to be highly trained individuals. If the only way you’re able to take down a TWELVE year old child is to shoot him…well you just completely suck at your job and need to take a seat while someone more qualified gives it a try.

 

  • Newsflash media covering political candidates…unless you were in the room when something happened nothing you say is fact. I don’t care how good you think your sources are…it’s still nothing more than the information those who WERE actually in the room or wherever want you to share. Stop it. Stop acting like what you say is the be all end all.  And those of you giving too much informational power to one person or group of people?  Y’all need to stop that too. 😉

  • Am I the only person in the world who thinks Star Wars is the dumbest thing ever?  Ok maybe not ever but y’all know what I mean. I don’t get it at all.

 

  • Have y’all watched this documentary…Soaked in Bleach?  It’s about Kurt Cobain, a PI and Courtney Love.  Apparently Courtney hired the PI to find Kurt after he checked himself out of rehab.  The PI didn’t believe anything she said and after Kurt’s death he started investigating it as a murder instead of suicide. I’d always thought the ‘Courtney killed Kurt’ stuff was just distraught fans who couldn’t accept the suicide. This docu totally changed my opinion.  I still can’t quite wrap my head around how someone as drugged up as she was at the time could have orchestrated a murder but the ‘evidence’ the PI presents in this docu is just way too much to ignore.  I’m not saying I 100% think she did anything I’m just saying the docu makes me question everything I used to think about it.

Ok that’s all for today.  See y’all soon.  🙂

 

 

Merry Christmas

Hey, y’all.  🙂

How was your Christmas Eve Eve?

Just kidding. I’m totally in the Christmas spirit. 🙂  Bottle not needed…but totally appreciated. 😉

Presents are (mostly) wrapped. 🙂

Not kidding about this one at all.  We had the air on 65 earlier today.

Since we last met…

More baking

Candied Cherry Christmas cookies.  I make these every year.  This year I used gfJules flour and this dough was unreal.  I seriously would have been happy with just a bowl of dough. 🙂

My Mema’s pots and pans out on the stove plus sugar-y butter-y prunes?

That’s right…it was Christmas Kolache making day. 🙂

That’s Papa B helping me roll the pigs. He was so proud and wanted me to take a pic. 🙂

Those were all real wheat.

I played around with some gluten – free dough for me but it didn’t turn out.

So I did this with it…

That’s right I said to myself, hey you don’t have nearly enough to do today why don’t you make some scratch puff pastry? 😉  LOOK at those layers.  That’s all gfJules flour.  No weird added ingredients just straight up flour, sugar, salt, milk, yeast and butter.  I rolled a few hot dog wieners to test it out. Plus I filled a couple little squares with the left over prunes.  I have some dough left over in the freezer that will hopefully soon become the crust for the chicken pot pie I’ve been craving.  I’ll let y’all know how it turns out.

I really can’t say enough good things about gfJules so far.  I’m liking it a lot. I don’t know what has changed with cup4cup or if it’s just something that changed with my taste but since having to go back to gluten – free for good something just tastes off with it. No matter what I’ve used it in…it’s made me gag.   I was torn between trying a few different gluten – free flours and so far I’m really glad I decided to give this one a try.

Made some more peppermint cookies.

Took Mama B to pick up the Tamales.  Test tamal in the car of course. 😉

Finished the night with my second fav Christmas movie…Love Actually.  🙂

Just a little reminder for dealing with difficult people this weekend. 🙂

Merry Christmas. 🙂  Y’all have the best day if you celebrate…or a great / safe weekend if you don’t and I’ll see ya next week. 🙂

 

Baking All The Time

Hey, y’all. 🙂

How’s the countdown to Christmas going in your part of the world?

Over here it’s been lots of…

First I did a blind flour taste test with the fam. Testing out gfJules and comparing it to my beloved cup4cup. I’m impressed. It’s made some good eats. 🙂

This…

Became this…

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Gluten – free Irish Soda Raisin Bread  (using my own recipe)

Then this…

Became Eggnog Cookies.

Didn’t get a finished pic. Sorry. They were baked then filled with eggnog icing and topped with red / green Christmas sprinkle shapes.

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Then this…

Martha’s Pate Brisse

Became this…

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Gluten – free Pecan Pies

Then this…

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Became this…

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Doesn’t that look like an alien face?  Or that gross salmon patty / cracker concoction our mom’s used to make with that grody canned salmon that had bits of bones and stuff that looked like eyes.

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Mama B’s side of the fam, do y’all remember how Meme always had King Leo peppermint sticks long before you could get them everywhere?  Now they have the Peppermint bits for holiday baking. I was so happy when I saw them. 🙂

I wasn’t even planning on making peppermint cookies but had to add some to the to-do list as soon as I saw the peppermint bits.  It ended up being a good decision. These are the best new cookies I’ve made in ages.  And they were actually a mistake.  I accidentally used much less flour than I’d planned on using so they became these crispy almost lace type cookies.  They were such a hit I’ve already made another batch.  I know I said I wasn’t going to put a bunch of recipes here but I’m gonna put this one at the end of the post.  Y’all know the drill from the old blog…recipes after the music.

Randoms

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That’s gluten – free y’all.  Look at the fold on that tortilla (it’s wrapped around my hand). I used gfJules flour and it made the best gluten – free tortilla I’ve ever had.  I used my own recipe.

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Gluten – free holiday cupcakes from Gigi’s. That peppermint mocha one (red – pink icing) was unbelievable. This was the first time I’d ever tried their gluten – free cupcakes.  Call me a fan.  🙂

Running around wearing leggings as pants. 😉  Aren’t those adorbsies?

  • So Ted Cruz doesn’t understand that the Princess Bride is about open hearts and love?  The fool who stood on the senate floor reading Green Eggs and Ham while trying to stop a vote on universal health care?  Y’all know…Green Eggs and Ham….the book with the message of not hating on something until you’ve ya know…actually given it a chance.  I doubt that horrible man has actually read his child a bedtime story…ever but in the unlikely event he has he’s either too dumb to understand the message in a pre school level children’s book or…oh never mind there’s really no other explanation for that.  So yeah…totally not surprised he doesn’t understand Princess Bride either.

 

  • Note to Kyler Murray (former potential future Texas A &M quarterback) The amount of bullsh.. people are willing to put up with is always always directly related to how good you are at your job or life or whatever.  Sure you were a pretty good high school football player. Guess what?  This state is FULL of dudes sitting around their garages telling stories about being pretty good high school football players.  No big deal.

 

  • Note to his dad Kevin Murray if the stories are true and you seriously told Aggie boosters they should treat you the same way longhorns treat Earl Campbell?  When I get thru dying laughing…it’s not hard to see where your petulant child got his overrated sense of entitlement.  Not hard at all.  Y’all don’t let the door hit ya.

All day…e’ry day, y’all.  🙂

That’s it for today from my little corner of the internet.

See y’all soon with more baking.  🙂

White Chocolate Pudding Peppermint Cookies

Ingredients

2 sticks room temp Butter

3/4 cup Brown Sugar

1/4 cup granulated Sugar

1 (3.4 oz) package Hershey’s White Chocolate Pudding

2 large Eggs

2 tsp Vanilla

320g Flour (about 2 1/4 cups loosely packed)

1 tsp Baking Soda

1/2 tsp Salt

1 bag White Chocolate Chips

1 cup Peppermint Bits  (or any crushed peppermint)

 

Directions

Ok first some notes…these are extremely temperamental. Don’t try these if you don’t have the patience or the time to baby them.

They are really thin and crispy.

They spread A LOT and you need to take them out of the oven while they’re still a little soft. Let them firm up about 3 – 5 minutes and then carefully get them off the pan and onto a cooling rack where they should finish firming up.  Mine stuck a little both times…using different well sprayed pans.

They are totally worth the effort though. 🙂

All I did was…

Put all the dry ingredients plus chips and peppermint bits in a bowl.

Made a well and added butter, eggs and vanilla.

Then mixed it all with my hands.

I used the smallest cookie scoop and left plenty of room between each cookie.

Using that small scoop half the recipe made about 35 cookies.

I baked them 8 – 10 minutes on 325* but my ovens run hot so I have to lower temps all the time.

Know your oven. 🙂

Again I want to reiterate that small scoop of dough spreads out to a regular cookie size when baked.

 

Also…I didn’t make these using a cup measure.  As always I weighed out the flour so I can’t say how it will turn out using cup measured flour. But if you keep it loose and don’t pack the flour it should be ok.

I made one batch using  cup4cup and another using gfJules.  Both worked great. I think I liked the Jules best though.

Just Checking In

Hey, y’all.  How’s your week before Christmas going so far?

Did y’all do Wreaths Across America for your loved ones?  We (my immediate fam) did it for Pappy.  You just get the wreath.  Papa B added the flag and I added the Poppies.  It’s such a nice program and I’m glad we did it this year. We’ll definitely keep doing it in the years to come.

Tried these gluten – free donuts.  Wish I would not have tried them.  They were awful…and that’s being kind.

Tried these gluten – free fish sticks.  They’re a keeper.  The only thing I wish Ian’s did differently was use a finer ground corn meal.  They use a coarse ground and it’s a little hard on the mouth feel.  But I’ll still buy more.

Y’all know I’m a hard core Gucci girl but what in the world is this supposed to be?  Gucci, I think y’all need to conduct a surprise drug test for your designers.

In my ongoing health saga…this is what my chest currently looks like. 🙁  Apparently I’m having a reaction to some of my new meds but they don’t know which one.  SO I have to stop them then reintroduce them one at a time once this hive situation clears up.

Got this new gfJules flour and plan to put it to use on some holiday baking starting today.  I want to take a second to say how amazing their customer service is. They had some shipping issues with my order and Jules’ husband went out of his way to make it right.  I think he’s like the CEO of the company or something like that and he personally got the problem fixed.  I know I said I wasn’t going to turn this into a recipe blog and that’s still my plan but I will definitely share pics of what I make and let y’all know how I like it.  I’m not giving up on Cup4Cup at all just wanted to try something different…with hopefully a little different texture.

That’s all for today.  Hopefully I’ll be back in a few days with some Christmas treats.  🙂