FRESHLY ROASTED CASHEWS

I purchase raw cashews and roast them myself to make sure no gluten gets into my nuts. I have found the flavor to be SO.WONDERFUL! The aroma of freshly roasted nuts is like no other! It is VERY easy to do! 1 lb. raw cashews. Spread cashews on a jelly roll pan. Lightly drizzle with Olive Oil. Use a good high quality brand. Sprinkle liberally with a good high quality full bodied salt. Stir to make sure all cashews are lightly coated with oil and salt. Place on middle rack in preheated oven at 275º. Let roast for about 15 min. Stir well and place back in the oven. Repeat every 5 minutes after this stirring each time until nuts turn a golden brown and give off a wonderful aroma. When finished, pour nuts onto paper towels to absorb excess oil. Store in a zip lock back after they have cooled. We used nuts in a lot of our cooking. They add a wonderful crunch to make up for a loss of crutons in a salad, or they add zip and flavor to a simple rice dish. Overall, they are good for you and roasting them yourself makes them even better!

Beautiful Roast and Carrots

This is just the easiest recipe ever!

1 large chuck roast Salt, dill, garlic, to taste. I just sprinkle liberally and don't really measure. Sorry for you measuring folks. :) 1 cup water. Place roast in crock pot, season and add 1 cup water. Cook on high for about 5 hours. Add rainbow mini carrots. Turn to low and cook until roast is fall apart tender. Another 2 hours, and carrots are tender. Everybody LOVES this meal! It can also be served with the horseradish sauce I mentioned in my brisket recipe below.

The Best Brisket ! and Sauce

I don't know about you but I LOVE Smoked Brisket!

I'd like to share what we do to make FALL APART MELT IN YOUR MOUTH BRISKET! We try to get a brisket that is around 18-20 lbs. Generously salt the meat, but nothing else. We have a smoker and use various woods, but we like using pecan or oak. We get the smoker going and keep a steady temp right around 200ºF. We typically start it around 3:00 in the afternoon and then at around 10:00 p.m. We remove it from the smoker and place in in a large, sturdy foil pan. Seal it tightly with heavy duty foil.
Place a pan of water in the bottom of the oven, and then turn the oven on to 180º. Place the sealed pan of brisket in the oven over night. When you wake in the a.m. there will be the most beautiful aroma! At around 8:00, remove the brisket from the oven and check it. You should be able to gently wiggle the pan and the response of the brisket will be almost like a "jello" movement. If you can easily put a butter knife into the brisket, then it is done. Keep sealed for about an hour until you are ready to slice it up. We slice it into serving sizes and wrap individually so when we get it out it is enough for a 2 person meal. It is delicous EVERY time! Alot of folks like BBQ sauce, but for many of us who do not like to add sugars, (even though this blog is FULL of recipes with sugar! LOL....Here is a great and friendly sauch that goes well with brisket or even roast. Horseradish Sauce 1 cup of sour creme 1/4 cup prepared horseradish ( I prefer to use a brand called Silver Spring) It is available in the refrigerated section in Walmart.) 1/2 tsp salt 1/4 tsp dill weed Stir all ingredients well and serve! It is truly wonderful! GF! And Delicious!

GLUTEN FREE NIGHT SHADE FREE TAMALES

I don't know about you but I LOVE tamales.  I grew up in Southern California, and loved the tamales we would eat there.  I honestly have not tasted a great tamale in years!  That is until now. :)

Tamales are famous for having hot chili peppers in them, but this recipe will not use hot peppers. If you like them and can have the pleasure of using them, add them!  But for me, I can't, and many folks can't.
So here is a recipe just for you!

I love the texture of these tamales.  I have worked hard to make this recipe just right.

4 cups masa harina
21 oz broth from pork loin cooked in a crock pot. * if you don't have enough add beef broth
2 teasp baking powder
1 1/2  tsp of salt
1 cup lard
1/3 cup olive oil
1 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp white pepper
1/4 tsp black pepper

Mix all ingredients together with a mixer until the dough is soft and spongy. You don't want it too moist or too dry.

2 lbs pork loin or favorite meat cooked in a crock pot.  (Add 1 to 2 cups of water when cooking)
season meat with ground cumin, pepper, salt, garlic powder, onion powder, parsley, cilantro,
(All to taste)
I season some when cooking, but after the meat is cooled, I shred it and season it to taste.

You will need to soften corn husks in water for several hours.

Drain the husks,  spread dough on husk making room at the bottom to fold up for steaming, and enough room to roll tightly together.
(see photo)

Place in steamer in large stock pot.  Do not let water touch the tamales.  Tamales should be standing upright, or slightly leaning, but do not over stuff the pot.
Wet a towel and place over the tamales.
Cover with led and steam.  Add small amount of water every 15 minutes.
Steam for 1 hour.

The tamales should be firm but not hard to the touch, and come out of the husk easily.

Serve plain or with your favorite topping.

White Chocolate Peppermint Pecans

Erika challenged me to come up with a new recipe.  It was really easy to make this one!

You just need Pecans, white chocolate and Peppermint Oil.  I used YL peppermint Essential oil and it just took 3 drops.  If you like a much stronger peppermint flavor, you can use more, but we thought this was just right; not too little and not too much.
The Chocolate was Ghirardelli White Chocolate Melting Wafers (12 oz)
I used more pecans than necessary. If you want a thicker coating, I'd use 3 cups of pecans. If you want a lighter coating, like what I did, use as many pecans as you want. :)

If you are making gifts, you can dip each pecan individually for perfect coating.  I just put all of them in the bowl and made sure they were coated well.  But you must separate them quickly!

Gluten Free Fabulous Apricot Almond Cake

This is my all time favorite cake, and I am not a cake lover at heart. :)
This was a huge hit at our 4th of July, Independence Day Celebration so I'm glad I wrote
the recipe down from my head onto paper!
I have the instructions and ingredients written in 3 separate sections.

1. Cake
2. Filling
3. Frosting


Apricot Almond Cake

For Cake:

1 cup Almond Meal Flour
1/4 cup Tapioca Flour
3/4 cup Brown Rice Flour
1 Tsp Xantham gum
1/2 Tsp Salt
2 tsp Baking Powder
1 tsp Baking Soda
1 1/2 Sugar 1 Tlb Vanilla Extract
1 tsp Almond Extract
1/2 cup milk
3/4 cup Melted Butter (1+ 1/2 sticks of butter)
4 Large Eggs

Combine dry ingredients and stir to mix well.
Add, milk, butter and extracts to dry ingredients
and mix very well.
Add one egg at a time and mix each egg well.

Pour batter into oblong cake pan
I use 13x9x2

Bake in preheated 375º oven for about 30 minutes
or until golden and cake tester comes out clean.

Cool cake.  When cake is FULLY COOL, cut in 1/2
and place each half separately in heavy foil and freeze.
When cake is frozen.  Remove from foil and cut cake 1/2's
through the middle.   You will now have 4 layers.

For Filling:

Meringue
GF Apricot Jam

Make a Meringue and bake it until it is firm.
You can do this in the a.m. or the day before.

3 Egg Whites  (room temperature)
1/2 tsp Almond Extract
1/2 tsp Vanilla Extract
1/2 tsp Creme of Tarter
Dash of Salt
3/4 cup Sugar

Mix Egg Whites at high speed until it starts to get
fluffy and white.
Add Creme or Tarter, Salt and extracts.
Add Sugar 1/4 cup  at a time blending well.

When STIFF peaks form  you are done mixing.

place parchment paper on jelly roll pan and either
spread a thin layer of merengue onto pan, or drop by
spoonful onto pan. 
(you will not use all of the meringue, so if you drop by spoonful
you can use the other for meringue cookies. :)

Place meringue into preheated oven at 375º and TURN OVEN OFF!
Leave meringue in oven until meringue is crisp or even overnight.

When you are ready to work with the cake, crunch up meringue into small pieces.
Spread apricot jam on frozen layer of cake and sprinkle liberally with meringue.
Add next layer and repeat until all layers are together.

For  Butter Creme Frosting

1 LB of Butter (slightly softened but not too soft.)
2 cups of Powdered Sugar
2 tsp Vanilla Extract
1 tsp Almond Extract.
Slivered Almonds

Mix butter sugar and extracts until fluffy.

Frost cake covering all layers and sides.
Generously cover with Slivered Almonds

Place cake in refrigerator and serve cold.

If you like this recipe, please drop a comment!

Gluten Free Buttermilk Biscuits

I have wanted a good biscuit for such a long time.  In fact, I was longing for one.
Well, on the way home from the grocery store I was mulling over in my mind how to make a good biscuit.  And it came to me.
This recipe just popped into my brain!  And so we wrote it down really quick, tried it, and it was WONDERFUL!

They are tender and moist!

So here is the recipe, fresh from my brain. :)


Butter Milk Biscuits

PREHEAT oven to 400º
grease cup cake pans (mini or not) well

In a bowl mix
1 cup brown rice flour
1/2 cup tapioca flour
1 1/4 tsp salt
1 tsp xantham gum
2 tsp baking powder
1 Tlb sugar (optional)

add

1/4 cup cold butter

use a pastry blender and make sure the butter gets
very well blended into the flour mixture.  We did it until it was totally

blended in.  (about 5 minutes)


Add 1 cup of buttermilk.

The dough will be soft but not runny....


Form into balls by or drop by large spoonful into cupcake pans
Bake at 400º until they start to turn slightly golden on top.

I believe it was about 10 minutes.  Do not overcook.


We served them with butter or gluten free sausage. 

Oh, it was wonderful to taste biscuits again!

Another variation:
We made them tonight for dinner, adding 1/2 cup shredded cheddar cheese,
1/2 tsp garlic and then before baking drizzling the tops with garlic butter.
They were wonderful and tasted like the "Cheddar Bay" biscuits that are available
at Red Lobster.

If you use this recipe please drop a comment and tell me if you enjoyed them!