sweetie101282

This isn't pumpkin pie-like, but it's pumpkin!

I used the Namaste Spice Cake Mix and added in a generous cup of plain canned pumpkin puree to the batter and then baked according to directions in a 9 x 13 pan, it came out great!

Tasted just like pumpkin spice bars.

For the dairy eaters top with cream cheese frosting, to die for!

Maybe people have been using too much pumpkin - I'll try it this weekend and report back...

Hi there! I was just visiting Chicago a couple weeks ago, staying right downtown for a conference. You should check out Lou Malnati's Pizza... I think it's near Illinois and Wells. Anyway, they will make for you an authentic Chicago-style pizza with no crust! Chicago style pizza is famous for having a solid layer of sausage at the bottom, so they just use that as the bottom instead. Plus the waitstaff was so awesome. Definitely check it out if you're in the mood for pizza but beware, the gluten-free pizza option is a bit pricier than the rest.. I think my medium-sized pizza + glass of wine came to around $28. Good luck!

I've been married for 7 years and have been on the pill most of that time, except when pregnant or breastfeeding. For anyone worried about using it for birth control, I got pregnant 2 times while on the pill. This was all before I knew about going gluten-free and celiac. It now makes sense why it might not have been so effective for me. I'm now on the patch - just to make sure! ; )

I hope this Seasonal works for you and things are better soon!

Ok, I am officially freaked out... when you hear back from your doctor will you please post her response?? Thanks!

Amy

I had noticed this as well. I was wondering (along these same lines), the Nestle hot cocoa mix also says "gluten free" on the package. It lists "modified food starch" as an ingredient. Is this a contradiction, or is modified food starch sometimes okay?

It's not necessary to worry about modified food starch in most cases, especially products made in the US. Food starch can mean many things but in the US it typically is referring to cornstarch, sometimes tapioca. If this product flat out says "gluten free" I wouldn't worry about it unless I saw a contraction like "wheat starch" listed. The company is taking a big enough risk by listing that on their label to not be certain of that fact. Hope this helps!

Actually, I think you best check on those paper towels, I don't think they would contain flour anymore than the toilet paper. It's possible that there is a tiny amount in the glue that they use to make the cardboard roll the paper towels are on, but it's not likely to have flour in the towels themselves.

Good point, It looks like the Clan Thompson info may not have been updated recently...perhaps we should seek out a more current list from them... pray for me as I sit on hold for the next 10 hours lol :-)

oh holy cow.......just one more thing to worry about, not only STICKY BUNS but weevil infestation of our toilet paper.............EWWWWWW!!!

ugh..I think I just puked a little....

Anyways..back to this whole paper products thing...I can't tell you how surprised I was to figure out that PAPER TOWELS have been a major glutening factor for me. I would always get sick after having fried foods, but I always blamed a "crummy" kitchen, or maybe contaminated oil. The thought that it could have been one of the many Georgia Pacific towels makes me sick (we always remove excess oil from fried foods like french fries, fish, onion rings, etc by blotting them or setting them on a stack of paper toweling)..I trusted paper towels so completely! Somehow, I feel like I should have known about this so I must ask the question...what else am I missing? I don't really worry about things like shampoo or toilet paper because I wash right after I use these products..but what about other things like facial tissues, etc? I've also wondered sometimes about what all goes into water softening machines (somehow the WATER at work makes me sick every time), etc... Anyone have any other ideas of "in your face" type things that we could be missing?

Amy

p.s. if you're looking for those rice wrappers and you're in Michigan... Meijers has them in the ethnic foods aisle...great to have on hand and fairly inexpensive..Yes, you can have egg rolls again!

Yup, it was the liquid - sold in the fridge section.. I'm not sure if they'll have that flavor around anymore though since the holidays are over :-(

Sidebar- the food co-op next door is GREAT! I used to love going over there and grabbing fresh fruit etc on my lunch. The selection isn't that great, but they sometimes have great deals on my favorite item....Amy's Mac n Cheese!

A word of caution on A Piece O Cake... they do their baking on Tuesday for Pickup on Wednesday so if you drive out there on a Tuesday you will be sadly disappointed. You will also be disappointed if you expect to go there and have items ready to pickup, they are strictly made-to-order: place your order by 10:30 tuesday for pickup anytime on Wednesday...

I haven't been on the site too much recently so this may be old news, but I recently bought one of the Holiday coffee creamers that Coffeemate put out (I had the pumpkin spice). Right on the label in a section called "good to know" it says Gluten Free! What a stride in the right direction! I will certainly continue shopping with a company this willing to recognize our needs (and our buying power!). Drink up, coffee lovers :-)

Amy

Actually, the twinkies were added after I left last Dec., I haven't had the pleasure of trying them..according to Linda they're awesome. (If you'd like a sneak-peek of their goodies, Linda and Stan are the hospitality hosts of the Michigan Capitol Celiac Support Group; which means they often bring something to share at the monthly meeting (I think it's the last tuesday of the month)). You could probably call APOC to find out the next meeting date, should be around Jan 23rd. 517 333 6881.

Well today is your lucky day, because I had the Gluten Free pleasure of working at A Piece O Cake once upon a time...

APOC is actually a wedding cake business - mainstream upscale wedding cakes...HOWEVER - The owner, Linda, found out she had Celiac Disease and so they found a small niche doing some gluten-free baking. It's ONLY by special order, orders must be received by (this may have changed, call them to verify) Noon tuesday to be available for pickup on Wednesday. They don't have a bakery case for walk-in sales so don't waste the trip if you don't have your order already placed...

Their bread is some of the best gluten-free bread you can get (Moist, airy, EXCELLENT just baked; but keep refrigerated for extended shelf life), however it's baked in small loaves (which is why you get 4). They base everything by the batch (i.e. - I batch of dough could be split into 2 small loaves of bread and 18 or so breadsticks (I recommend the garlic cheese, omg yummy)). Their cookies taste truly authentic to non gluten-free - snickerdoodles, choc chip, pb....very delicious.

On another note, the highly sensitive should exercise a little caution because this is a shared facility -gluten-ey wedding cakes are also baked there. But I know when I was there keeping the gluten-free supplies/mixers/pans etc separate and clean from the other supplies was very important.

On a final note; Yes, their cakes are expensive...but you have to realize you're ordering cakes from a high-end cake shop. They're used to getting upwards of $15 an hour just to decorate a regular birthday cake! But they realized that gluten-free people aren't the same type of clientele that they normally deal with so they actually did cut the price down on the gluten-free cakes. With that being said....I have no comment on the $75 cookie tray... ;-)

If you have any other questions, please let me know!

The last time I checked Mongolians website there were only 2 of their new sauces we could have; the lemon and the spicy buffalo. Just make your plate and then tell the waiter that you have an "allergy bowl." They will take it to the back and cook it in a clean skillet. I just ate there last week..no problems.

you can get 4 lbs. of white rice flour at meijers for under $3 in the ethnic foods aisle.

Ok, you can stop looking! :-)

We do gluten free baking at the bakery I work at and we follow two basic rules for converting regular recipes to gluten free..

If it's a cake, use Bette Hagman's featherlite mix

If it's a cookie, use Connie Sarros flour mix

Connie's is:

2 1/2 cups rice flour (white)

1 cup potato starch (the lighter starch, not the heavier flour)

1 cup tapioca flour

1/4 cup cornstarch

1/4 cup bean flour

3 teaspoons xanthan gum

Honestly, I can't tell the difference when I use this mix to make our many cookie varieties.. including snickerdoodles, chocolate chip, peanut butter, and sugar. In fact, I tend to eat the dough just like I used to before my Celiac days began. Hope this helps. I know there are a lot of different flours involved, but mix it up and store it in a cool dark place and it will keep for a long time.

Good luck and if you can't find a good recipe to convert, send me an email and I *might* part with the information..hehe

Ciao

Mimi

Ok, so last time I went to Changs I ordered the Cantonese Chow Fun and got the small stick noodles so I asked to speak to the manager b/c last time I had the fat noodles. He told me that if you EVER get anything other than these small stick noodles, send it back. It will not be gluten-free.

I was pretty ticked too b/c when I went and got the fat noodles they looked totally gluten-y so I double checked and of course they told me it was fine. So I guess my advice to to always check with the management if you have a question about your food. It seems just checking with the waitstaff isn't good enough...

Mimi

Time once again for my infamous 2 cents... lol

Worst gluten-free products

*NU world Amaranth Snack Crackers.. any variety. If you can imagine eating dead grass, then you already know what they taste like. bleh.

*Ener-G bread...any variety. Hard, Dry, Indigestable. nuff said.

*Pastariso or Quinoa noodles...give me Tinkayada anyday!

And for the best..

*Amy's gluten-free Macaroni and Cheese, heated in the oven. Yowza thats good!

*Chicken Bryan from Carrabbas...I could cry just thinking about it..especially when we take our gluten-free breadstix for them to heat in their brick oven. mmmmmmmm

*A Piece O' Cake gluten-free Snickerdoodles and Almond Cake...can't even tell the difference!

If you have the time, you can make the meat for gyros (lamb traditionally) yourself. Go to foodtv.com and search for Alton Brown's gyro recipe. It's kind of an involved process but if you're up for the experiment go for it. You'll also find a recipe for the delicious cucumber dressing that goes on it on the same website. Hope that helps

Mimi

Hi christie

I use flours from the asian market all the time..so much cheaper! I found a 4 lb bag of rice flour for 2 bucks..doesn't get better than that! What i do to make sure they are ok is rinse them thoroughly with hot water before cutting into them. This does 2 things. 1) makes sure no holes are in the bag that wheat flour may have seeped into and 2) rinses off wheat starch/flour that may have gotten onto the package because all these flours are stored right next to eachother.

Buying at the asian market is really great for newly diagnosed people who dont want to invest in large quantities of gluten-free flours yet... you can buy a 16 oz package of, say, potato starch for less than 70 cents.

Hope this helps

Amy

Hi!

I have seen people use 2 gluten-free choc. chip cookies as the "sandwich" part before. I thought, duh, why didnt I think of that?? lol

enjoy

Amy

just a couple:

You've ever stunk yourself out of your own bedroom

Your roommates give you a dirty look every time you leave the bathroom

All your family has a supply of gluten free flour in their cupboard

Your little sister starts to yell at people for "double dipping" into the mayo jar

sorry.. 2 more cents...

you could actually try using the funnel instead of the ziploc bag or try using a plastic ketchup bottle. You will have lots of control when piping out your funnel cake design... GO NUTS!

Hello there!

Be forewarned, I haven't actually tried this but I can't see why it wouldn't work...

Try making Bette hagman's batter for cream puffs (From Gluten-Free Gourmet). Instead of making puffs and baking the dough, pour it into a ziploc bag and heat some oil to 350 for deep frying. When ready to go, snip off enough of one corner of the bag to pipe out a nice stream of batter. Use this makeshift piping bag to pipe overlapping circles into your oil. Fry each "funnel cake" until golden brown on each side. Make sure you don't overcrowd the fryer, I'd probably only do 1, 2 max at a time. Top with your choice of cinn-sugar, or powdered sugar.

A couple of hints:

I KNOW there is a thread on here that contains Bette's recipe for cream puffs, it should be in this same recipe category, maybe about 1-2 months back.

Make sure your batter isn't really runny. When her recipe is made right it has a nice almost firm texture. If its still kind of soupy, you need to mix it longer. If that doesnt work, try again with less shortening then called for in the recipe.

As I said, I haven't tried this yet (although I intend to). I saw on "Good Eats" (I'm a food network fanatic) that you can use regular cream puff batter this way to make funnel cakes so I'm crossing my fingers it will work for us too.

Anyway if you have some free time perhaps you'd like to try this experiment. If not, I'll let you know in a few weeks when I have the time!

ciao

Amy

To help you out, make sure you take them seriously when they say to incorporate the eggs well. I just did a half-@ss job doing it the first time and they were NOTHING like a cream puff (although, the result turned into something I now use as a hot dog bun..go figure!). Add 1 egg, then turn your mixer up to high and let it beat for a least 30-45 sec's before turning it back down to low to incorporate the next egg. For an easy filling, I made the packaged Jello custard mix found by their puddings at the supermarket. Does anyone know a recipe for the white cream filling found in regular chocolate eclairs? I always preferred the cream to the custard but I haven't had any luck finding a recipe. Anyway..good luck!

Amy

If you like those cookies you'll be happy to know if you grind them up in the food processor they make the BEST gluten-free "graham cracker crumb" crust you'll ever taste. Yum yum! I've used them for a cheesecake crust and a lemon meringue pie crust. Enjoy!

Amy