Wheat Free Zucchini Bread

I happened upon this version by accident.
Hubby has been bringing home LARGE zucchinis from work.  Apparently a few people are bringing their extras (you know how zucchini can overtake everything in your garden) and then leaving them out for others to enjoy.  We have been enjoying them, for sure.

I made some zucchini bread for us and then needed to make a loaf for our #2 daughter who needs a wheat free diet.  The recipe I normally use makes 2 loaves and since I was messing around with a recipe I didn't want to possibly waste 2 loaves if it didn't turn out, so I used another recipe I had but had never made before.

Here it is:
Sorry no pictures but I forgot and they all got eaten.

Wheat Free Zucchini Bread
Mix together:

• 2 beaten eggs
• 1 1/4 cup sugar
• 1/2 cup oil

Add:

• 2 1/2 cups WonderFlour (this is not a GF flour, but you could substitute your AP GF flour instead)
• 2 tsp. baking powder
• 3/4 tsp. salt
• 1 tsp. cinnamon
• 1/4 tsp. ground ginger
• 1 tsp. Xantham gum
• 2 cups peeled, seeded, shredded zucchini

Mix well.  Spoon batter into greased loaf pan.  Bake at 350 for 50-60 minutes.  Makes 1 loaf.

I turned these into zucchini muffins for my daughter instead of a loaf since she is the only one eating this version.  That way we can freeze them and she can grab one when she wants. It makes about 21 muffins (filled 3/4 full) and I baked them for about 30 minutes.

Notes:

• WonderFlour is a combination of equal parts spelt, brown rice, and pearled barley ground into a flour mix.  You can order it online, but I grind my own.  I buy those items bulk at my local Whole Foods Market.  You can call ahead and they will order 25# bags, for example, and then you also get a 10% discount for ordering bulk.
• The first time we made these muffins I used applesauce instead of the oil and the taste was fine as was the texture.  
• I normally use stoneware pans and find that I have to bake my items a bit longer than the recommended baking times.  Usually an additional 10-15 minutes on loaves.  Maybe 5 more minutes on the muffins.

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The original recipe had additionally:

1 tsp. lemon peel

reduced cinnamon to 1/2 tsp.

1/4 tsp. orange extract (optional)

1 cup chopped walnuts (optional--which I am usually the only one at my house that wants nuts in the bread)

and then obviously no Xanthum gum and regular AP flour

Hot Fudge Cake Recipe--GF and dairy free version

This is one of our most favorite dessert recipes and it is so easy.  We've had to tweak it some with our daughter's food intolerances, but since this has few items we have to alter it makes a good dessert recipe for all of us to enjoy.

Hot Fudge Cake
from Taste of Home magazine.

Ingredients

• 1 cup all-purpose flour  (we have used GF All-purpose flour, WonderFlour***, brown rice flour, and Sweet Sorghum Flour all with good results)
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 6 tablespoons baking cocoa, divided
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup 2% milk (have substituted with both soy and coconut milk)
• 2 tablespoons canola oil
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 cup packed brown sugar
• 1-3/4 cups hot water
• Ice cream or whipped cream, optional (Don't use for those with dairy issues, or use dairy free substitute)

Directions

• Preheat oven to 350°. In a large bowl, whisk flour, sugar, 2 tablespoons cocoa, baking powder and salt. In another bowl, whisk milk, oil and vanilla until blended. Add to flour mixture; stir just until moistened.
• Transfer to an ungreased 9-in.-square baking pan. In a small bowl, mix brown sugar and remaining cocoa; sprinkle over batter. Pour hot water over all; do not stir.
• Bake 35-40 minutes. Serve warm. If desired, top with ice cream. 
• Yield: 9 servings.

Nutritional Facts1 piece (calculatd without whipped cream and ice cream) equals 253 calories, 4 g fat (1 g saturated fat), 2 mg cholesterol, 171 mg sodium, 54 g carbohydrate, 1 g fiber, 3 g protein.

Originally published as Hot Fudge Cake in Taste of Home April/May 1994, p37

NOTE:
***WonderFlour is not GF, only wheat free, but it can be made on your own by combining equal parts spelt, brown rice, and barley.  I mix it all up together in a large bowl and then run it thru my electric grinder.  You can order the flour online, but it is super easy to do by yourself.

Tomato Soup for food allergies

As Emily wrote about earlier last month, we all are having some changes occurring in our respective lives.

A couple things for us includes:

• Two new vehicles this year, unplanned on both accounts.
• Hubby's new job which after working from home since last August has greatly increased his work commute.
• This change of job may also include a move down the road....but not right away.
• Oldest daughter getting her driver's license--both great and scary all at the same time.

However, the most stressful for me has to do with our #2 daughter.  She has a wheat intolerance that we've known about for at least a year now.  Removing wheat from her diet improved her lifestyle for awhile and then last Fall sometime she started complaining again.  Recently I took her to a naturopath (because the pediatrician wasn't as helpful as I'd like) where we had some blood work done and the results came back that she also has a dairy, egg, and peanut issue too.

I have to say that after dropping her back off at school after that appointment and then browsing through the grocery store to see what kind of options she'll have, I went back out to my vehicle and cried...and called my mother.  I felt like dealing with the wheat issue was a piece of cake (yeah, punny) compared to this new diagnosis.

It was a temporary meltdown on my part, but right now I have a love/hate relationship with food because of all of this going on with my daughter.  I think that is normal.  I'm pretty sure I'll get over it, because we sort of went thru this when we discovered the wheat issue--denial, anger, acceptance, etc. all those grieving steps.

Anyway, the saddest part about all this for me, thinking of my daughter, is that she will eat anything, and likes about everything, and here she can't have all these things.  That is probably a huge blessing too, because I'm not sure any of my other kids would have as many options as she has because of their food "pickiness".  We're working through it and she is being a good sport as we try new recipes and I figure out a new way of cooking for my entire family, because I am not making a couple different things every night just to make everyone happy.

She and I have a shared love of tomato soup.  Regular canned soup, i.e. Campbell's, has wheat in it--if you didn't already know that.  Gluten-free canned soup is expensive, and really neither one is as good as homemade.

I found this tomato soup recipe from The Chew--one of my favorite shows to watch.  I made it the other night night and it was delicious.  #2 ate hers with some Glutino pretzels and was super happy with it.  I've been eating the leftovers for lunch.


pic from The Chew

Recipe changes/details:

• I used 4 pints of my own canned tomatoes
• Substituted rice milk for the cream.
• And didn't use as much garlic as the recipe called for.

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Down the road I'll probably be sharing some things here and there with what we are doing to make her life better and some things that I've learned or I am doing to switch up the diet.  There are certainly lots of websites and books out there to help us out.

Here are a couple helpful books I found at our local library.

• Allergy-Free Desserts by Elizabeth Gordon
• Allergy-Free and Easy Cooking by Cybele Pascal
• The Ultimate Allergy-Free Snack Cookbook by Judi and Shari Zucker
• Allergy-Friendly Food for Families

Kidswithallergies.org