... but it's real.

[Love Story, Taylor Swift]

Gluten Free recipes, part 1 of 2

I love- LOVE- my husband.

As most of you know, he recently found out that gluten causes horrible lesions on his skin.  I mean, he knew about the lesions, he just didn't know they were because of gluten.

Because I love my husband, I chose to make our kitchen gluten free.

At first it was exciting- new, different life.  Food was a foreign object, all fresh and interesting and different.  Who'd ever heard of sweet sorghum flour?  Not this one.  I discovered polenta and creative ways to replace sandwiches- like putting all of the sandwich ingredients in big, organic, leafy lettuce and making tasty crispy wraps.

But then... then things got ugly.  The raved about local gluten free pizza was... ick.  I mean, everything was good but the crust.  I miss my favorite Oroweat Oatnut bread.  The gluten free mix for our Sunday-brunch-tradition pancakes (yay for having church at 5pm!) is flat and has weird texture.  And gluten free noodles?  Blech.  They always end up either too chewy or too mushy and nasty.

I just want a piece of pizza.  Normal, full on wheaty-crusted pizza.  A piece of Oatnut bread toast.  Normal ol' Krusteaz mix pancakes.  And noodles- good, tasty whole-wheat noodles.

I've been feeling a little sorry for myself, if you can't tell.  Making the gluten sacrifice for a loved one sounds noble, really, it does, but it's not so glamorous.

That said... here are some really tasty things I made in recent weeks, stuff that reminds me that gluten free doesn't have to mean gross. I'll keep adjusting my attitude and remembering that I love Jesus, I love my husband, and gluten isn't that important.

Though, to quote a comedian I heard this week, "I tried gluten free bread at Thanksgiving.  I don't know what gluten is, but apparently it's DELICIOUS!!"

Loved that, and Jason busted up, too :)

Anyway- the foode!  Enjoy!

#1 Polenta Casserole

We went to a potluck for church recently (not church wide... our church isn't all cheeseball like that!  It was for a small ministry within the church that we're a part of) and I brought this to ensure that my J baby would have something to eat!

It's loosely based on this recipe , though I did a lot differently.  Here's a pic of the ingredients I used:



If anything is missing, sorry!  So here's what I did- I browned up some chicken Italian sausage.  I added onion and garlic, chopped up the two zucchini and put 'em in, and then put in the marinara sauce and spinach. On the side I boiled water and made the polenta according to the linked recipe.  That's actually the only way I followed that recipe, actually!  I put the goat cheese (it was about half the container) into the polenta to create a tasty creaminess.  I mixed the polenta and marinara together, topped it with some cheddar, and then baked it at 375 F for about 20 minutes.

It was delicious!  Not like "good for gluten free", but actually GOOD.  Me gusta :)

I'll post recipes 2 and 3 in the next post; I'm prewriting it (today's December 23 but I'm anticipating being gone for Christmas) so I'll have it post tomorrow, the 28th, in the morning.  Hopefully I'll get home safely tomorrow night and I'll be able to post a quick "we're home and we're safe and warm!" message upon arrival!

Hasta, kids!