Manicotti - gluten-free/dairy-free/vegan

Success!!!! My Gluten Free/Dairy Free Manicotti were a huge success on Christmas day! I used a flour blend mix by Annalise Roberts but I would think you can use any you like. Her blend recipe is available on her website here. The recipe for my GF/DF Manicotti is as follows:

Ingredients - shell

1 cup gluten free flour
1 1/4 cup water
9 tbs whipped silken tofu (or three eggs)
1/2 tsp xantham gum

Ingredients - filling

1 package silken tofu (16oz)
1 tbsp Vegan parmasean
1 tsp dried basil
1/2 tsp garlic powder
1 egg (optional, if making vegan leave out and do not adjust)

Ingredients - other
1/2 cup of tomato sauce (I don't eat a lot of tomato so you might need/like more.)
cooking spray (as needed)

For the shells: Add the flour and xantham gum to a large mixing bowl. Add the whipped tofu (or beaten eggs) and water then stir until blended smooth. The batter should be runny and if it is not, then add a little more water until it is.

Heat a small 5" frying pan over medium heat (oil if not a non-stick pan). Add a small amount of batter to the pan and quickly tilt the pan so the batter evenly covers the entire bottom of the pan in a thin layer. Cook about 2 minutes until the top of the batter is dry, then flip carefully using a small spatula and cook the other side. Set aside to cool and repeat until you are out of batter. (Note: it may be helpful to place the finished shells on wax paper so they don't stick together.)

For the filling: Combine all of the filling ingredients in a mixing bowl and stir (I use a spoon) until combined and resembling ricotta. Do not over stir or the mixture will turn into goo.

To assemble: Spray a baking pan with cooking spray or coat the bottom with tomato sauce.

Hold a cooled shell in the palm of one hand and with the other hand spoon about 3 tablespoons of filling lengthwise across the center of the shell. (I used the serving spoon that came with my flatware - it appears to be the right size for me.) Flip one side and then the other over the filling until you have a mixture filled tube. Flip the tube over (so the folds are on the bottom) and place carefully into the baking pan. Repeat with the remaining shells and filling.

Cover the manicotti with your favorite tomato sauce. (Since I avoid too much tomato, I sort of just brush them with sauce.)

Bake uncovered at 350 degrees for 45 minutes. (Option: if you want, you could cover with shredded vegan mozzerella cheese after baking and broil until the cheese is melted. Watch carefully while broiling as the cheese will quickly burn and blacken if left in too long!)

This recipe makes approximately 10 manicotti but is easily scaled up.

Don't worry if the first couple of shells are disasters, they take a little practice before you get the exact right amount of batter in the pan and get the hang of tilting to spread the batter.

A very successful Christmas Day!

Ok, so I'm two months late with this post but it has been bouncing around on my ideas list for a while. Christmas day worked out great!

First off, after trying gluten free/dairy free manicotti a couple of times, I got them right for Christmas. I'll post that recipe soon. I made way too many (there were 30 for dinner, but my aunt made plenty of the gluten/dairy variety. My father, one uncle, and one cousin avoid dairy so I made enough for all four of us with plenty of left overs (and boy there were). I had also made another batch of Grandma Cookies (sour cream cookies) that were better than last time but still not right.

Now for the best part. My aunt set up dinner buffet style. Everything that anyone brought that was gluten and dairy free (veggies, meatballs, fresh ham, a chicken dish, the gf/df manicotti, etc.) were on one table and everything with gluten and dairy on the other! Perfect, not a worry of anyone swapping spoons, etc.

Since I had made a substitute manicotti for the one thing on the menu that I really couldn't eat, I felt that I was eating the same meal as everyone else. I know, it is a bit silly but psychologically it really does make a difference.

I really consider myself lucky for how accommodating my family is, especially considering the horror stories I hear at support group meetings and read in some other blogs.

Now I've just got to figure out what I'll make come Easter!

Chicken and Rice (Arroz con Pollo) - adventure

Wow, you'd think this wouldn't be so difficult.

Sunday night I thought I'd make Chicken and Rice with some boneless chicken thighs I had in the freezer. I've never made it before but figured it couldn't be that difficult. I searched through some cookbooks and then online and surprisingly enough could not find a recipe for Spanish Chicken and Rice. And I note Spanish here because I did find plenty of South/Central American recipes but not a one from Spain. How can you tell? Well, there are two easy give aways. Rice in Spain is a medium grain variety. Now granted, I don't expect anyone to go to the expense/effort of importing rice from Spain but there are substitutes and short grain rice is easy enough to find (and much closer than long). So if the recipe called for long grain rice it was out. Secondly, Chicken and Rice does not include tomato sauce. It's referred to as "pasta" sauce for a reason - namely it doesn't belong on rice!

Anyhow, armed with some bits of ideas from different recipes and having watched my cousin make Paella a number of times I gave it a shot . . . and missed. In hindsight I made a number of missteps:

1) I cooked the garlic and onions first, then browned the chicken. When I started I figured I would get the flavor of the onion and garlic in the chicken if I cooked them first. In practice, I had to remove them from the pan to keep them from burning while the chicken browned. I added them back in with the rice but by that point I think I missed infusing the flavor into the rice. Oops.

2) I added the saffron to cold water. I used to add boiling water to saffron strands and then use the liquid (removing the strands). I've since found one can grind the saffron in a mortar and pestle for the same effect, however it looks like you still have to use hot water for that bright yellow color. I added it with the water immediately after the rice. I used more than I would have with the strands method but the dish was fairly tan in the end.

3) I skipped the beer and Rioja my cousin usually adds to his paellas (I've got some Bards Tale). Not sure how much this was missed but the dish lacked a bit of flavor.

So, I'll have to try this again sometime. Next time I'll be sure to have some green pepper on hand to add with the onion and garlic. I'll also look to correct my three gaffes above.

Overall it wasn't a bad meal, it just wasn't what I set out to prepare when I started!

Pigs-in-a-Blanket (Disaster)

Back over Super Bowl weekend I had contemplated making Pigs-in-a-Blanket to take to a Super Bowl party my cousin was throwing. I searched the internet for a suitable gluten and dairy free recipe and came up with nothing. I did manage to find one dairy free recipe and was going to try it with a 1-to-1 substitution of a GF flour blend. Well anyhow, after making Guacamole and some Bob's Red Mill brownies, I just ran short on time and decided to skip them especially since the party's hosts were making regular Pigs-in-a-Blanket.

I finally got around to trying to make them this weekend and boy am I glad I didn't try them Super Bowl Sunday! For starters, I hadn't really read the recipe and this one, while claiming to take 25 minutes of prep time (at the top), actually require 25 minutes of prep time spread out over two hours as the dough was proofed and proofed again!

Finally, I was ready to start and rolled out the dough between two sheets of wax paper. I quickly realized I had not added enough flour when the dough stuck to both the top and bottom sheets. I ended up scraping it off the wax paper, then rolling it around the little cocktail franks in my hands constantly adding more GF flour mix to keep it from sticking (too much). As you can see from the photo, some of my earlier ones (on the left) had too much dough and (due to forgetting to add Xanthan gum) sagged a bit around the franks. Most of the later ones (on the right) ended up having pretty narrow bands of dough.

Overall, they tasted ok although the 'blanket' portion was a bit hard. I suspect this hardness could have been due to me cooking them in a toaster oven instead of a regular oven but I'm not sure. I had some as a snack late Sunday night and ate the rest (reheated in the microwave) for lunch on Monday. The dough was softer after being reheated.

I debated calling these an adventure rather than a disaster but after all the trouble I don't think I can even begin to save the recipe, but will instead have to start from scratch trying to put one together. It was certainly a nice treat after 3 years without, but at this point not worth the effort!