Gluten-Free Homemade Pizza with Thomas Keller

Complete with grease! YUM

Yes, I do like to pretend that I dine on the regular with Thomas Keller. When in fact, I just try every single one of the gluten-free flour blends that are associated with him (even though it is actually some rad lady who works in his family of restaurants that invented it). So I picked up the latest from Cup4Cup—the pizza crust! So. Damn. Easy.

So easy, in fact, I’m kind of regretting not going crazy on the toppings and instead playing it safe with the standard mozzarella and pepperoni. You can bet in the future I’ll be all arugala and proscuitto and some kind of white cheese truffle situation, because I CAN MAKE GLUTEN-FREE PIZZA, you guys. In my own home. In my own oven. In like, no time.

Yep, feeling pretty pizza-rific today. Thanks TK & Co. So here’s why it rocks so hard.

Explaining “Gluten Is My Bitch” To Every Generation

I love these people

Well, that was a fine howdy doody yesterday at the Celiac Disease Foundation conference. Holy moly, the gluten-haters were out in droves and I got to meet some of YOU guys. My awesome readers and fighters in the crusade against crapping your pants. You. Are. Awesome. See above for some of the awesome, but rest assured there are many more of you. Many, many, more. One of whom brought me this gluten-free churro cupcake that’s only made once a year, on May 5th in Pasadena.

WTF? Amazing. Also, I really need about 20 more of these because I’m now totally addicted. So thanks for that Stef. No, really.

There were, however, a few uncomfortable moments that naturally come when you’re out trying to hock your book called Gluten Is My Bitch: Rants, Recipes, & Ridiculousness for the Gluten-Free. Not to be an ageist, because I’m still chuckling over the septagenarian who screamed in delight when she saw my book and promptly called me a bitch. She was awesome. But between the mom who was shielding her tween from my booth, and the gentlemen who asked me what I meant, exactly, I realized I might have some ‘splaining to do. So I’ve worked it out, by age.

Gluten-Free Madras Lentils & Green Rice in 5 Minutes or Less

You ever have one of those days when you’re like “‘eff you, and ‘eff that, and ‘eff that other thing”? Then you drive two-and-a-half hours home in horrible traffic and you’re like “I have to make ‘effing dinner? ‘Eff that too.” That’s where your Tasty Bite comes into play and saves your evening.

Normally I’m more of a make it from scratch kind of gal, but this whole commuting in LA thing has made me look much more fondly upon the packages at the store. Hence, my frozen brown rice from Trader Joe’s I dressed up to make “green” and my willingness to taste test some Indian food from the Tasty Bite people who sent me a whole box of yumness.

I admit I was not familiar with the Tasty Bite, but after reading a bit it seems like they’re all for the farm fresh, no BPA in packaging, carefully marking and creating the gluten-free, treating their employees right, and general goodness. The Madras Lentils that took all of one minute to heat up was certainly delicious, and I have to say I’m really looking forward to checking out the Satay Partay package, as I’m always ready for both a satay and a partay at any given moment. So thanks TBs, for the grub! As well as the ability to eat in five minutes so I could finally catch up on Game of Thrones.

Here’s how you do that quick green rice situation:

Gluten-Free Corn Dogs Are a Beautiful Thing

Oh yes. These beauties made an appearance in my home this weekend, and I’m trying to figure out a way to justify making these on a regular basis. Homemade gluten-free corn dogs, you guys. CORN DOGS. Now, I just have to find out where I can buy those rectangular cheese bars so I can fry those up as well. Then I’ll be setting up my own Gluten-Free Hot Dog on a Stick booth in front of my house and leaving my day job behind. Because everyone will want in on this action and will drive all over LA to get them, amiright? Or maybe it’s just me.

Either way, we threw down some of this action this weekend and it was super delicious. I found a recipe on Gluten-Free Baking and then came home to realize I had gluten-free corn bread mix from Bob’s Red Mill, so I upended the recipe and it wound up looking, and tasting, yum to the yum yum. The GFB also offered some tips that were incredibly helpful no matter what recipe you’re using.

1. Dry your dogs then roll them in gluten-free flour to help everything stick correctly.

2. Use a very tall glass to hold the batter and then dip the dogs inside and swirl.

3. One tip the GFB had that did not apply to me, was to use tongs and don’t touch the sticks because they’re hot. My skewers were not hot at all. Either way, don’t test that theory by wrapping your paws around the sticks as soon as they’re out of the deep fat fryer.

4. One tip from me, be sure your deep fat fryer is well-filled so the dogs don’t hit the bottom or sides and stick.

5. Last tip: Enjoy the hell out of these gluten-free corn dogs.

How to Cook Gluten-Free Thanksgiving Turkey Two Ways

Okay, so this is chicken. Because how many turkeys was I supposed to make in one month? Really?

Turkey. It’s the elephant in the room, that is actually a bird, that you eat. The least exciting, yet most important, part of your Thanksgiving meal; attention must be paid. Especially for those of us who have the sprue, because turkeys can be easily contaminated with that devil gluten, and you’ll wind up in the bathroom all night long and not because Aunt Sylvia called you a fat communist again during Thanksgiving dinner.

So take care when prepping that hulking bird, and remember two important things:  Always gluten-free your stuffing; and skip the flour for crispy turkey skin. Now, how about you check out two delicious ways to prep that turkey? One of which, is almost like practicing medicine!

The Scariest Gluten-Free Cake Pops You’ll Ever See

“Hi, I’m Bob.”

There are people who make gluten-free cake pops, and people who eat them. As an eater, I made a huge mistake when attempting to cross over to the maker crowd. Huge. It was so tedious, and such a mess of my life, I now hate cake pops. And I have five million of them in my house bringing down the value on account of the total ugliness on a stick. You guys, that one pictured is my best one. You want to see the rest?

“Help us!”

I thought this would be an adorable thing to do with my kids. I even bought a special cake pop pan and followed the directions so I would have perfectly round little balls. Well one thing I did do right — balls. Plus, I used the amazing XO Baking Co. gluten-free cake mix and so they were delicious. I even had the frosting at the ready, but apparently in a cake pop box you don’t need to do that added step.

I even bought the perfect colored melting chocolates, like these -

But apparently you can’t spend your way out of massive failure.

All you’re supposed to do is melt chocolate and swirl the pop around until covered. One, I couldn’t get the butt covered to save my life; and two, I tried to turn a cake pop into Bob from Monsters Vs. Aliens, ghosts, pumpkins, and black cats. I should have just stopped with the half-assed swirling.

Also, you may be wondering what the heck this cereal box is doing in the picture above with the screaming gluten-free cake pops. You see, I followed some cake pop directions that were described as “easy” and attempted to make these cake pops stand up and dry on a box. They toppled over and stuck to the cereal box that I had just emptied in a panic, not helping in the attractive arena AT ALL. I’m not even going to show you the black cats with chocolate chip ears and smushed faces.

I am not, nor will I ever be, a cake decorator. But let’s say you want to give it a try. Here are some ways I messed up, so you won’t have to!

Making Gluten-Free Awesome Out of Guten-Free Meh

Why yes, those bars are gluten-free peanut butter rice krispie treat-like with chocolate chips on top! Which is what I had to do to camouflage some puffed rice cereal that was just not cutting it. I’ll save the “Why do normal Rice Krispies have to be made with barley malt?” discussion for another day, as there are tons of gluten-free puffed rice options out there. It’s just that none of them are very good.

So I’m wondering why I brought these all the way back from Paris -

when I knew they also were barely so-so. I think it was that bug making the crazy eyes at me.

But this is why god made rice krispie treats and had the good sense to add a peanut butter option, people. To dress up the boring! Which is exactly what I did in like five minutes last night. Five minutes at night = a weekend worth of deliciousness. That’s what I call max efficiency. And ohmylord, the smell of peanut butter and marshmallow is intoxicating. Or I just need to get out more. And no, I was not satisfied with only the peanut butter and instead threw some chocolate atop. That’s how flavorless those Riz things were.

You can do it too!

Gluten-Free French Onion Soup For Fall. Hey, Wait a Minute . . .

Or rather, if we had fall in Los Angeles. Which I wish we did, but it’s kind of redonkulous to complain about the weather here seeing as how it’s freaking perfect. But you know what? It’s not perfect when all you want to do is sit in front of a fireplace, look out the window at the leaves changing color, and eat a bowl of French onion soup.  So, see? In this one very specific instance, the weather in LA sucks the big one.

What totally does not suck, is this French onion soup which I whipped up using a gluten-free soup mix because I’m lazy, as well as full-on in the fall spirit. Add some gluten-free bread from this company I’ve been digging, Against the Grain and cover it all up in Gruyère slices like so

Gluten-Free Labor Day Should Include Tacos & Beer

I mean, duh. Quite frankly, every weekend should include this combo and it’s no mistake that the first meal I made when I got back stateside included both tacos and beer, since those were the two things I missed most. But of course finding gluten-free beer that keeps up with the gluten-filled Joneses can be difficult. Meet my new favorite brew, the Off Grid Pale Ale via New Planet. It’s almost totally like normal beer!

Tacos, of course, are not so difficult to enjoy gluten-free, but I did discover something that makes your tacos even more awesome: Stubb’s Green Chile Marinade.

This bit of awesomeness wound up in my mail on account of the gluten-freeness of it, and the fact that the nice people at Stubb’s found my blog. Plus, I used to spend an incredible amount of time at Stubb’s in Austin whether at a show or enjoying their Sunday gospel brunch. So I was already on board with just about anything Stubb’s had to offer.

This New Planet beer? Same kind of thing. I KNOW. I’m the luckiest blogger in the whole world. So naturally I put the two of these things together and had a kick-off in grand gluten-free style for the holiday weekend. Then, I passed right out because jet lag is hard.

So fire up the grill, celebrate America, work, and tacos with this super duper taco toppings that are soooo gluten-free.

Gluten-Free Sweet-Tea Pie is Totally a Thing

Now it is, anyway. Before it was just a thing for the norms. But since I gluten-freed a sweet-tea pie, this totally weird dessert can also be eaten by you, the gluten hater. Here’s how this craziness happened.

After I stopped throwing things and crying, I decided this weekend would most definitely begin to look up if I went to work out with Richard Simmons and had pie. In that order. In another stroke of good luck, I happened to pick up a free download of the latest ebook from Tasting Table at Starbucks, so I had a very enjoyable browse through some recipe porn. The star of that particular show was this, the Sweet -Tea Pie.

Apparently this hot number came from Lucy’s Fried Chicken in Austin, Texas. Where I obviously can’t eat anymore, but surely would have pre-diagnosis had I know this amazingness existed. You guys, there is so much gluten in this original recipe that I paused momentarily as I considered whether all that work was worth it. Then I remembered who I am and that I always have a frozen gluten-free pie crust in my freezer. Win!

So while the original recipe calls for an incredibly complicated chilled pie crust before you even get to the sweet-tea filling — gluten-free kids, just grab one from the freezer. Seriouslys. Let it thaw out, but not warm up and you’re good to go. The crust does not matter when you’ve got 2 1/2 sticks of butter (cubed) as one of the ingredients in this custard pie. This is what that looks like:

Yep, it’s basically a butter pie.

This reminds me a heck of a lot of my Grandma Faye’s chess pie, but fancied up a bit. There is a bit of a tea taste in the back of your mouth after you take a bite, which is super fun and summery. That really is the main difference (other than the process by which it is made) from my grandmother’s recipe. Also, granny did not use 11 egg yolks in her recipe or 2 1/2 sticks of butter. Holy cholesterol, people.

Here’s how you can get your arteries all clogged up and delicious this summer.