"Samoa" Cookies

A few months back I saw a great recipe at beautiful Real Sustenance blog: Gluten Free Samoa Cookies. (Grain/Egg/Corn/Soy/Dairy/Refined Sugar Free). Samoa cookies have always been my favorite, dating back to my year as a Junior Girl Scout. If you've ever read the label though, like me, you know that they are not very good for you. So I was very excited to find Brittany's recipe over at Real Sustenance, and saved it for a later date. Check out the recipe here.

I finally had the chance to make these cookies yesterday with a good friend. They weren't exactly like original Samoa, but they were EXCELLENT cookies, even compared with traditional cookies made with wheat flour and butter. We used spring themed cookie cutters - a flower, a tulip and butterfly. If I get the chance to make these again some day, I will just keep it simple with a circle cutter, because the shapes get covered by the blobs of caramel and you can't tell what they are underneath the delicious toppings. The shapes made it more festive though, so I'm still glad we did that.

The caramel is so delicious, the fact that you can't tell these are tulips, flowers and butterflies doesn't really matter!

First, I used Bob's Red Mill Gluten Free Shortbread mix to make the base cookies. It was one of the last grain items left in my kitchen, so it needed to be used up. This made my cookies gluten free but not grain free. However, they are free of soy, dairy and egg.

I made the shortbread cookies with substitutions for the ingredients called for on the recipe on the bag, which called for butter, water and an egg yolk.

I used the new Spectrum butter flavored palm shortening in place of butter or soybean oil shortening, and instead of egg yolk I mixed a heaping tablespoon of golden flax meal with 1/8 cup warm water, into a yolky-textured gel. I had to add water throughout mixing the dough, to get it to the right texture to roll out flat, but they turned out very well - if a bit hard. The golden flecks of flax meal in the white cookies looks pretty.

Once the shortbread cookies were cooled, I made the caramel. The original recipe had several options for each ingredient - what a blessing when you have dietary restrictions! I made it with the following:

• 3/4 cup organic virgin coconut oil
• 1 1/4 cup brown sugar (another item in the small "gotta get rid of this" section of my cupboard!)
• 1/4 cup agave
• half can of canned, preservative-free coconut milk (I LOVE Taste Nirvana!)

I was surprised at how long it took to get the caramel past 200 degrees; it was a stubborn pot that didn't want to boil! But finally after about 30 minutes, the candy thermometer was creeping up and we had our caramel. It was delicious! I think it's pretty neat that you can make caramel dairy-free, and I want to make it again for a special occasion to top coconut ice cream.

For the chocolate topping, we used Enjoy Life allergen-free mini chocolate chips (those things are AWESOME!) and my unsweetened coconut flakes were organic, small shreds from the bulk section of Whole Foods that we toasted on parchment paper in the oven for about 5 minutes

A tulip

It was definitely worth it to finally try out this recipe. I would love to repeat it every year around Girl Scout Cookie time, so I feel less left out. It's good to treat yourself once in a while :)

Happy Spring! Are you as thrilled as I am that it's finally here?!

TJ's Picks, including a Delicious Dairy-Free Dessert!

We got a fun little surprise in the mail on Monday - my mom surprised us with a gift card to Trader Joe's, so we could buy some "goodies" while we are remodeling! So earlier this week Hubs and I headed over there. It was fun! We did a quick but not rushed go-round of the store and filled a basket with an assortment of things, and I got some things to stash away on my new "treat shelf" - it's on the top shelf of the farthest kitchen cupboard, so I have to stretch and reach to get anything down. That's my justification for having treats at all - I have to work a little to get to 'em.

We came home with a full bag of items, including Trader Joe's Gluten Free Ginger Snaps

Black Licorice Scottie Dog gummies

Freeze Dried Strawberries, to snack on or add to cereal

and very tasty Gluten Free (Maple Cranberry) Granola!

(By the way, Trader Joe's has some handy lists available on their website that list their products that fit specific dietary needs, including a five page list of all their gluten free foods. Pretty handy to prevent aimless wandering around the store reading labels for hours!)

Before we went to the checkout, we went through the freezer section quickly (not typically too many options for me there) and I saw something wonderful: Dairy-Free Mochi Ice Cream!

If you've ever had the "regular" Mochi Ice Cream that comes in flavors like green tea, strawberry and chocolate, you know it's good. Chewy rice cake outside with cool, sweet ice cream inside. Well, God Bless them, they have created a dairy-free version made with coconut milk! For less than $4, you get a box of six mochi cakes: two mango, two chocolate, and two coconut flavor. I just had a chocolate one, and it was delightful! If you are allergic to dairy or making the wise choice to cut back on it, try these little numbers. Elegant enough for a couples dinner party dessert, yet simple enough to enjoy while watching TV with your feet up on a Friday night. If you try these, leave a comment letting me know how you like them. I think these are my new favorite special treat :)

No Bake ChocOatmeal Cookies

I have a special place in my belly for no-bake cookies. These ones just took front and center, because they are not only deliciously chocolatey, but also gluten-free, dairy-free, egg-free, and soy-free!

Here's the recipe!
Makes 2 dozen with 5 minutes prep, 3 minutes cook time and 40 minutes chill time.

Ingredients:
2/3 cup maple syrup
1/4 cup coconut oil, melted
5 TB unsweetened cocoa powder
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 cup peanut butter
1 cup gluten free rolled oats (or quinoa flakes)
1 tsp vanilla extract

In a small saucepan over medium heat, combine maple syrup, oil, cocoa and cinnamon. Boil for 3 minutes, stirring constantly. Remove from heat and stir in the peanut butter, rolled oats and vanilla until well blended. Drop by heaping spoonfuls onto waxed paper and chill to set, about 30 minutes.

*I have since made more of these cookies, and I tried adding shredded coconut. Oooh, yum, it made them taste more like Girl Scout Samoa cookies. Yum!

Molasses Cookies!

Well, after my pining for pudding was satisfied with many bowls of chocolate mousse-y goodness, another sweet snack took over my thought life: Molasses Cookies. Haven't had one in a LONG time, because, while I may have my cheat moments/days when the food is in front of me, I don't go out and deliberately purchase foods that have wheat/dairy/soy/eggs/etc. So, I had found and printed this recipe for (GF and Vegan!) Soft Molasses Cookies several months ago, and I've been pulling out my recipe binder staring at it off and on for the past two weeks. Finally last night I got out my beloved red KitchenAid and we made some cookies! These are DELICIOUS. Soft, chewy, molasses-y, sweet. YUM!!!

Here is the recipe, verbatim from The Whole Life Nutrition Kitchen. This makes the second or third recipe I've tried from their blog, and Hubs and I both LOVED. Keep up the good work over there at NourishingMeals.com!

2 cups sorghum flour
½ cup tapioca flour 
1 ½ teaspoons baking soda 
1 ½ teaspoons xanthan gum
½ teaspoon sea salt
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon 
2 teaspoons ground ginger
¾ cup organic palm shortening 
1 cup Sucanat, coconut sugar, or brown sugar 
½ cup blackstrap molasses 
¼ cup unsweetened applesauce
2 teaspoons vanilla
2 tablespoons ground flax seeds

To start, make sure all of your ingredients are at room temperature; especially your applesauce.

In a medium-sized mixing bowl, stir together the sorghum flour, tapioca flour, baking soda, xanthan gum, sea salt, cinnamon, and ginger. 

In a separate mixing bowl, beat the palm shortening, sugar, and molasses together with an electric mixer. Add the applesauce, vanilla, and ground flax seeds; beat for another 60 seconds. 

Add the dry ingredients to the wet and beat together. Continue to beat for another minute or until the ingredients are well-combined and the dough thickens.

Cover bowl with a plate and chill dough in the refrigerator for at least 1 hour (or place dough in a sealed glass container for longer chilling). 

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F and grease a large cookie sheet. 

Remove bowl from refrigerator and form dough into little balls with the palms of your hands. Place each ball on the greased cookie sheet spaced out by about 2 inches.

Bake for approximately 12 to 15 minutes (shorter for smaller cookies, longer for larger cookies). Watch carefully as the cookies can burn easily. Transfer cookies to a wire rack to cool. 

Just a few notes: 

• I was out of sorghum flour, so I used 2 1/2 cups GF flour blend that included sorghum, millet, and tapioca flours instead. 
• The blend contains xanthan gum and baking soda as well, so I cut the recipe amounts in half.
• I have no coconut sugar or Sucanut ((yet!) so I used brown sugar, and DARK molasses.
• Chilling the dough definitely makes for a nicer time rolling the cookies with warm palms, so definitely follow the recommendation in the recipe. I chilled the dough for about 90 minutes.

Pumpkin Oatmeal Cookies (Vegan)

Okay, I am on a cookie-baking spree! It is Christmas time, after all, and now that our kitchen remodel is complete I can't seem to resist the appeal of my beautiful new space for longer than a few days. I keep parking myself at my amazing new (LONG!) countertop, pick out a recipe to test, bust out my shiny red KitchenAid mixer and go to town!

These GF vegan pumpkin oatmeal cookies from The Whole Life Nutrition Kitchen are from a recipe that I found and printed out about a month ago. I had ground the three cups of oat flour they require about two weeks ago and it was staring me down on my counter - plus, Thanksgiving is clearly over, taking pumpkin fanaticism with it. So I buckled down and got these baked in three batches in between shower and getting dressed, hair done and makeup ready for a night out with a girlfriend.

Bowl of cookie dough after the first batch went in the oven

I used parchment paper to line the cookie sheet- my new favorite thing in GF baking

They baked up in 13 minutes on 350F. They don't feel quite the same as a traditional gluten-containing or GF cookie when you test for doneness, but they do get a little brown on the bottom for a visual cue and stay together well - no crumbling.

Almost done...

Cooling... The recipe made over 4 dozen little cookies!

True to the recipe, these are better when cool. I left them on the cooling racks while I went out, and when I got home several hours later they were ready to eat. I had tasted part of a cookie right after they came out of the oven, and honestly felt like I wasted my time and baking ingredients. But when I tried a cookie after I got home, I was pleasantly surprised. They are delicious! They won over my non-gluten free friend too! Always a good sign.

These cookies are on a teacup saucer  (a cute little plate for cute little cookies)

I was worried about them getting too soft, but I have found that they are staying a nice chewy texture without being mushy. If you like pumpkin and want something not-too-sweet and with a high volume of cookies per recipe, try these little golden nuggets. I don't think you'll be disappointed.

*One note: I am running low on coconut oil - sad day! (Some of you will understand why the two pack 54 oz Nutiva Extra Virgin Coconut Oil on Amazon.com is number one on my Wish List!) So, I used Smart Balance Light: Original with Flax "buttery spread." I do have a soy allergy, but because this is a mix of other oils like palm and flax, and it is readily available and cheap for the bulk of Christmas cookies I'm putting out, I bought some. They turned out great considering the thin consistency of the Smart Balance, but I bet the cookies would be even better with coconut oil!

GFCF Egg-Free Soy-Free Sugar Cookies

Yesterday afternoon I had the best time baking sugar cookies with my friend Holly! I've possibly consumed too many cookies in the last twenty-four hours, but you only live once! I'm doing much better on my diet restrictions than I did last year during {Thanksgiving and Christmas}. We made these sugar cookies without gluten, dairy, eggs, or soy, and they taste great! Then we frosted and decorated them just like we did growing up with moms that were into baking. All I have to say about this is: I love baking new allergy-friendly recipes that turn out!

A little sample of the cookies

Here is the recipe:

Old-Fashioned Sugar Cookies (Revised)

Author unknown

1 cup rice flour

3/4 cup tapioca flour

3/4 cup cornstarch

2 1/2 teaspoons xanthan gum

1 teaspoon salt

1 cup sugar

1 cup shortening

1 egg or 1/4 cup liquid egg substitute (*I used Ener-G Egg Replacer)

2 teaspoons vanilla

1/4 cup (or more) potato starch flour for kneading

Colored sugars, sprinkles, or frosting for decorating (optional)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

In a small bowl, whisk together the flours, cornstarch, xanthan gum, and salt. Set aside.

In a mixing bowl, cream the sugar and shortening. Beat in the egg and vanilla. Add the dry ingredients, mixing enough to combine. The dough should form a soft ball. (*At this point, the dough was very crumbly and dry. If you run into this problem, add rice milk in small amounts until moist and workable.) With your hands, knead in enough of the potato starch flour to make the dough easy to handle and roll out.

Working with half at a time, place a piece of plastic wrap over the ball and roll out to about 1/8 inch thickness. Cut into desired shapes and place on cookie sheet lined with parchment paper. (Without it, the cookies stuck to the sheet.) Decorate with colored sugars before baking, or use frosting to decorate after baking if desired. (With this dough you can use all the scraps. Just scrape them together and roll out again. They will not get tough.)

Bake for about 13 minutes, but check for done-ness at 10 minutes. Cool very slightly before removing from cookie sheet. Makes 3 dozen 2 1/2-inch cookies.

More pretty cookies

Here is the glaze recipe:

Basic Icing

1 cup powdered sugar

1/2 tsp vanilla extract (or peppermint, orange, almond, etc.)

Rice milk, fruit juice or liquer (enough to make it desired consistency)

*For chocolate frosting, add 2 Tbs unsweetened cocoa powder

Whisk together sugar (and cocoa if using), extract and milk by gradually adding liquid until the frosting is consistency you need for your cookies. My two bowls (one of white vanilla, and one of pink almond) came out more like a glaze or icing than a frosting. It was very pretty, had a great tackiness for embellishing, and sweet.

Photo credits all to my husband. I especially love this one!

Angels, stars, snowmen... white pearls, sugar crystals... red snowflake plate... I'm in a Christmas mood!

Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies!

As I write this post, the scent of baking cookies is wafting over to my desk from the kitchen. I am baking my first batch of oatmeal chocolate chip cookies since my allergy diagnosis. No wheat flour here, I'm using this GF Sugar-Free Vegan Cookie Recipe from Kim at Affairs of Living blog. Her recipe calls for sorghum, millet, and tapioca flours, which happen to be my new favorite combo. I'm thinking these cookies will turn out delicious!

I had an iron infusion this morning that totally wiped me out, so I spent the morning napping. When I got some energy back this afternoon, first I vacuumed the living room - always an energizing mood-booster for me! Then I decided to get my butt into the kitchen and test one of the many recipes I've been cataloging in my new favorite thing: my Emily-safe Recipes Binder (for lack of a better title?). I have been surfing the blog scene for a few months now, printing out GFCF, egg-free, soy-free recipes to try, and filing them by type of dish. I even made my own cutesy binder tabs out of polka-dot scrapbooking paper. I love this new binder. It's the simplest thing, but it brings me great joy; I know when I pull it off the shelf that I will be able to make and enjoy any recipe in there. Awesome feeling!

Ooh, the timer is beeping! I'll comment on the cookie result later. Happy Tuesday evening to all!
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Okay, here are the cookies! Forgive my very amateur photography skills - comments welcome :)

Cookies and coffee for breakfast

Cute little cookie nuggets!

Needs tweaking: They are rather crumbly. I think it's due to my shortening - it was not soft, so I zapped it in the microwave with the coconut oil to get it to combine. After I added all the oats to the dough, it was pretty crumbly and not wanting to stick together. Before scooping out the first batch, I stuck my hands right in the bowl and warmed the dough. This seemed to help it stay together and was obviously needed after I scooped the second batch without warming the dough, and it was more like granola on the cookie sheet. I warmed the dough by hand again with the third and final batch.

Raves: Overall, a great recipe with delicious flavor. The cookies taste like they have BUTTER! I don't think anyone would be able to tell that these are GF, vegan, and only sweetened with 1/8 tsp stevia powder and 1/2 cup maple syrup! The flavor and smell far outweighs the crumbly-ness flaw. If I had to choose between a dry-ish cookie and a too-moist cookie, I'd pick the drier one. I dislike having cookies that can't even be covered in a container because they'll practically melt - they get too soft! I can tell these cookies are going to do well sitting on the counter in a covered container. I'll definitely make them again, and try to resolve the shortening issue.

For just an hour's work, I have over 30 cute little cookies to enjoy and share this week. I'm calling this a success! :)

GF Russian Tea Cakes

Ok, one more post before bed - something evoking happy memories and hopeful taste buds! I have always enjoyed Russian Tea Cakes at Christmas parties and Christmas cookie exchanges. They are sweet with a delightful crispy bite giving way to a soft, nutty chewiness. And if you're not careful you'll be walking around with white lips :)
It needs a few substitutions to make it dairy-free and egg-free, but this recipe from Betty Crocker (of all places! GF goes VERY commercial...) looks like a simple allergy- and party-friendly Christmas cookie! Follow the link for nutrition facts, to leave a review and more.

1	cup butter, softened
1/2	cup powdered sugar
1	teaspoon vanilla
1	egg
2 1/4	cups Bisquick® Gluten Free mix
3/4	cup finely chopped nuts
2/3	cup powdered sugar

    1. Heat oven to 400°F. In large bowl, mix butter, 1/2 cup powdered sugar, the vanilla and egg. Stir in Bisquick mix and nuts until dough holds together. 
    2. Shape dough into 1-inch balls. On ungreased cookie sheets, place balls about 1 inch apart. 
    3. Bake 9 to 11 minutes or until set but not brown. Immediately remove from cookie sheets to cooling racks. Cool slightly. 
    4. Roll warm cookies in powdered sugar; place on cooling racks to cool completely. Roll in powdered sugar again.