The best allergen free cake I've tasted! Carrot Cake with Lemon Icing

Yum!

It was my birthday last week and I wanted to have a cake and I wanted it to be yummy. I'd discovered a recipe on this blog and this blog a while ago that I'd passed onto a friend but not tried myself. She tried it and said it was great and so I set about making it for my birthday (my husband would have liked to make it but I had more time than him so I was happy to). Here's what I did:

Carrot Cake
2 cups gluten free plain flour (I used FG Roberts brand - NB it has soy in it for those concerned) 
1 cup of white sugar
1/4 cup brown sugar
1/2 tsp of salt 
2 tsp of gluten free baking powder 
1/2 tsp of bicarb soda 
2 tsp of cinnamon 
3 cups grated carrots 
3/4 cup of canola oil 
1/2 cup of orange juice
1/2 cup of raisins (I think I might leave these out next time but they are better than sultanas I reckon)
1/2 cup shredded coconut (I don't think dessicated would be as nice for texture)

Preheat oven to 180 degrees Celsius. Grease a square or round pan with canola oil and line the base with baking paper cut to size (I think it would come out easily anyway but I wasn't going to risk it!).
Mix all the dry ingredients together then add the carrots, oil and orange juice. Mix with a wooden spoon until well combined. Fold in raisins and coconut. Pour mixture into cake pan and cook in oven for about 45mins or until a knife in the centre comes out clean. My oven is so slow it took a lot longer.

I also made an icing for it which I kept separate in order just to drizzle over the slices so I could freeze the rest of the cake more easily.


Lemon Icing
1 freshly squeezed lemon
3/4 -1 1/2 cups of gluten free icing sugar (depends on the juiciness of your lemon really!)

Make it up to your preferred consistency. I left it as a drizzle. The icing is quite sweet and the cake is very nice without it but the lemon flavour adds another dimension to the flavours and makes it look pretty.

I am going to make it into muffins next time. And I'm going to be looking out for more vegan recipes that I can adapt to be gluten free as well.

Missing chocolate no more

I am a lover of chocolate. When I am on a dairy/gluten/egg free diet while breastfeeding I miss my chocolate. I don't particularly love lollies/candy and they don't particularly hit the spot after dinner. Also a lot of the soft lollies (like snakes/jelly babies etc) have wheat starch in them. So, when I saw this at the supermarket I grabbed it - mint chocolate is my favourite as well! This is delicious! You can slightly taste the "soy-ness" of the chocolate but the mint helps cover it well while not being overbearing (another brand of allergen-free mint chocolate tends to be a bit crazy on the mint). I now feel I can keep up the dairy-free part of the diet quite easily with this as a treat every now and then. All I have to do is make sure I don't eat it all at once...

Snack Search

I did the grocery shopping today for the first time in a little while. My husband has been braving the Saturday supermarket rush since the little Miss was born - what a legend. My aim (as well as getting our weekly food) was to find some yummy and healthy snacks for me. Since I am breastfeeding I am super hungry and especially because a wheat and dairy free diet tends to have a higher Glycaemic Index - you get hungry quicker! I bought quite a few things but here are two that I have tried since coming home and think are great:

Freedom Foods Ancient Grains Super Bar

photo from here

You can tell it's good for you but the syrup makes you feel like it's a treat. Miss 3 also tried it and wanted one for herself (I told her she could have one when she's older and so she decided it would be when she was 4!). A box of 6 cost me $4.39 which is expensive but if you consider how much a chocolate bar costs (oh if only I could have a chocolate bar!), it's actually good value.

Woolworths Macro Free From Moroccan Pumpkin Dip
I do love hommus but to have another option is exciting! My friend from church told me about this range, so I looked out for it and chose this one. I had it on some rice cakes with lettuce (from our vegie patch!), cucumber and tomato for lunch. Delicious. I'm looking forward to trying the avocado one - it could work well with tacos or something when I can't get a good avocado.

The quest continues with Sweet Potato Fries

Well, I went off dairy a week ago and even after 5 days there wasn't much difference in her rash. It was a little better but we were also using hydrocortisone cream and serious moisturisers on her so that it didn't get too awful. So 2 days ago, I went off wheat. And already it is looking better. I was hoping to not have to go off wheat since Miss 3 is back on wheat these days (although more on that in another post) but it looks like wheat might be the main culprit for Miss 0's reaction at the moment. So I have been seeking yummy lunches and here is one easy and delicious recipe that I'm enjoying this week that I got from Bill Granger's 'Every Day'.

Sweet Potato Fries (serves 1)
1/3-1/2 sweet potato (depends on its size and your appetite), peeled and cut into batons
a generous shake of paprika
a little shake of cayenne pepper (your preference as to how much heat you want really)
salt (again, to taste)
a couple of tablespoons olive oil

ready to go in the oven

Preheat oven to 230C. Toss the batons in all the other ingredients. Place on a baking tray in a single layer and bake, stirring occasionally, for 30min or until golden brown. Bill recommends serving with lime wedges (which I am trying today and it is great!). I used to like them with mayonaise but that's out at the moment...

I'm no food stylist and I have a new baby so you are just going to have to cope with these pics - they were super yummy and filling though and that's what counts :)

PS - sweet potatoes are also known as kumara and yam depending where you live

A couple of products we are enjoying

Potentially the tastiest cupcake we've made.

Icing and Sprinkles certainly make it more exciting!

Just like Cheerios! Well, almost.

We purchased these from Allergy Train's website. Eggs are suggested for the cupcake mix but we just used the equivalent of No Egg.

Popcorn Chicken

mmmm popcorn chicken

I was inspired by this post by Our Gluten Free Family a while ago but it has taken me a long time to manage to do it. Here's my recipe for Popcorn Chicken. Enjoyed by adults and kids but definitely only a 'sometimes food'!

Serves 6
500-600g chicken tenderloins
salt
pepper
1/2 cup corn flour (maize not wheaten - check ingredients carefully)
1/2 cup potato flour (I think potato starch might work better, but this was fine)
1 teaspoon Morrocan Seasoning (this has wheat in it - so I would do a combo of spices for wheat free)
a shake or two of garlic salt
rice bran oil for 'deep' frying

Salt and pepper the tenderloins and sprinkle with some of the flours, cover and refrigerate for 30mins. Chop the chicken into 1cm cubes (approximately).

Mix all the dry ingredients plus some more pepper in a shallow dish. Toss the cubes of chicken through the flour and ensure good covering. This takes a while because the meat is so small (you can cut it bigger but make sure you cook it appropriately).

Heat oil in a pot (I used my cast iron pot and had the oil about 2-3cm deep) and when it sizzles around a piece of chicken, it is ready. Cook chicken in small enough lots so that the pieces can cook evenly and not be crowded. The flours don't colour very much so take them out when they are coloured and the chicken is cooked. Remove chicken to paper towel on a plate. Tenderloins tend to cope with overcooking better than chicken breast.

Serve with vegies or a healthy green salad (you will appreciate the health even more!!) or just as a hot snack for a party etc. The kids enjoyed the leftovers cold the next day.

Tip: Lower the chicken pieces into the hot oil with a heat resistant utensil. This will avoid splashing of hot oil.

Pizza Bianca

Miss 2's pizza bianca

This is an entree pizza that my husband and I love, especially when it was made at a fabulous Italian restaurant in Perth that we used to visit. Pizza bianca means white pizza so it basically means no tomato sauce. We make this version (not as skillfully!) at home regularly on a small pizza base and we make a separate one for Miss 2 and these serve as a starter (not the whole meal - not enough vegies for us! It's more of a garlic-bread-type side).  We use the normal base recipe (sometimes we add the chia seeds) and then here is what we put on top:

olive oil
garlic thinly sliced
fresh rosemary, removed from stalk (we have some in our vegie patch - it's so easy to grow - but you can use dried)
Salt

Drizzle the olive oil so that it is generous but not leaking off the sides, place your preferred amount of garlic slices and rosemary on top and then season with salt.

Place in the oven and cook until garlic is cooked and pizza is looking pale golden. Yum!

Guest recipe: Muesli (Granola) Bars

If only I'd waited while it cooled - it was still yummy

It's been a while since we've had a guest recipe but here's another from my good friend. Her children also had to avoid soy as well. Muesli bars are often a source of nuts or traces of nuts and they are unbelievably expensive too! Here's one you can make at home that everyone will enjoy.

180g Nuttelex (dairy free spread)
1/2 cup sugar
2 1/2 cups rolled oats
1 cup each of dried apricots and dates – chopped
1/2 cup plain GF flour
1/3 cup pepitas
1/3 cup sunflower seeds
1 egg equivalent of no-egg (Egg substitute)

Place Nuttelex and sugar into a small saucepan and stir over a low to medium heat until Nuttelex has melted and the sugar has dissolved, set aside to cool slightly. In a large bowl, mix oats, apricots, dates, flour, pepitas and sunflower seeds. Make a well in the center of the dry mix and add the cooled butter mixture, egg and vanilla.

Stir until well combined. Spread evenly into an 18x28 greased tray and press down firmly, bake for 25-30mins at 180 degrees or until golden brown. Then allow to cool and slice into fingers.

We didn't have pepitas so added puffed amaranth instead. We also halved the recipe so it didn't fill the tray but it still worked. I reduced the amount of apricots and added in sultanas instead because we try to avoid sulfites. I was a bit keen and took the slice out before it cooled and it all fell apart so I encourage you to be patient - I think it will cut better if you wait! :)

Hot Chips & Chicken Salt - Red Rooster & McDonalds

Having fun with a birthday treat earlier this year :)

I have been meaning to blog about this for a while because last year we went to Red Rooster for hot chips and, after it taking a very long time for them to find the ingredients of their hot chips and chicken salt it then turned out that it had gluten in it. So we went back to our safety zone of McDonalds fries (download the food sensitivity table or look at the ingredients list)

However, I thought I would check the nutritional information again and looks like they no longer have any allergens in them. So whether or not the information I got first was right or not, you can now know that their chips and chicken salt are free of gluten, dairy, egg, soy, peanuts, treenuts and all other main allergens. Nice to know that a more solid potato chip is available.

Read more about hot chips and which other ones have allergens here.

Sultana and Oat Cookies

I think these are the best allergen-free cookie I have made so far. Crunchy but slightly soft inside. Yum!
I adapted this recipe from Taste.com.au.

The amount below made 14 cookies. You can easily double the mixture:

65g dairy free spread
1/4 cup caster sugar and brown sugar mixed together (about half and half)
1/4 tsp vanilla essence
Equivalent of 1 egg using No Egg
1 cup gluten free self raising flour
1/2 tbsp soy milk
1/3 cup rolled oats
1/4 cup sultanas
another 1/2 tbsp soy milk

Preheat oven to 180C.
Add sugars and vanilla essence to the dairy free spread and mix with electric mixer until creamed. Add egg replacer and mix until well combined (takes a little bit of time).
Sift in flour, add the first bit of soy milk and stir until combined well.
And in oats, sultanas and the rest of the milk and combine.
Roll into balls, place on baking paper on a baking tray and then press down with your fingers or fork.
Bake in middle of oven for ~17 mins or until golden. Mine took 17mins :)

Popcorn when travelling

Normally I like making my own popcorn but it's a bit of a hassle on holidays so we buy Coles butter or lite butter microwave popcorn. It's only allergen is soy (so fine for us!) an it is quite tasty. We prefer the lite for health reasons and the salt is a little overwhelming in the butter version anyway. So that's what we will have for a snack this long weekend while we are here near the beach. Have a great long weekend those of you who have it - are you doing anything special?

Banana Muffins

I know they are expensive, but when you have kids with allergies, you just have to bite the bullet to ensure your children eat well and are full and healthy. So after a short hiatus, my common sense, and a desire to support the Queensland farmers, means we are back on bananas, although slightly less often than normal.

I make this healthy tasty (normal flour/milk) muffin all the time for my son. He loves them. Yesterday I gave them a go with gluten free flour and soy milk. Even I thought they tasted yummy and I can't stand banana (and don't particularly like GF flour either...!).

Here's the GF recipe:

Rice bran oil for greasing
2 overripe bananas (I had to put them aside especially!)
2 tbsp Honey
1 1/2 tbsp Rice Bran Oil
3/4 cup soy milk
1 1/2 cup self raising gluten free flour
1 tbsp psyllium husk

Preheat oven to 200C. Grease 9 muffin pans in a muffin tray with oil.
Mash bananas in a bowl with a fork. Add oil, honey and milk and mix well. Tip: if you do oil first and have a squeezey honey (ie don't need to scoop into honey) the tablespoon you use will be oily and the honey will slip out easily!
Add the flours and mix together quickly with a spoon. Don't overmix - lumpiness is fine in a muffin mix.

Divide mixture into muffins pans and bake for 20mins or until skewer comes out clean.

The muffins freeze well.

Baby Mum Mums

Photo from here

Another blessing for babies with our sort of allergies - Baby Mum Mums are a rice rusk that softens easily and is a great little snack. They say that they are for children over 1 year of age but I gave them to Miss 2 quite a bit before that and, as always, kept an eye on her while she ate. She still enjoys them now. You can get 3 types in local supermarkets - Original, Vegetable (it has carrot and spinach powders - I figure it's worth choosing that one even if the amount of vegetable is minimal) and Banana. Read more about them here.

Vanilla bean biscuits

I adapted this recipe from The Australian Women's Weekly Allergy-free Cooking for Kids book.

125g Nuttelex
1/2 cup Gluten Free Icing Sugar
1tsp Vanilla Bean Paste (or 1 vanilla bean)
1 1/4 cups plaing GF flour

Place Nuttelex in a bowl and sift icing sugar into it. Put vanilla bean paste (or seeds) into the bowl. Beat with an electric mixer until light and fluffy. Stir in siften flour in two batches (just not all at once really).

Knead the dough on a floured surface until smooth. Shape the dough into a log (diameter as big as you want the biscuits to be). Wrap in clingwrap and put in the fridge for at least 30mins.

Preheat the oven to 180C. Line baking tray with baking paper.

Cut log into ~1cm slices. Place slices on trays about 2cm apart. Bake for about 12mins or until they get a little golden. Cool on the trays.

And as for the recipe book itself. Now that I own it and have looked through it, it's only ok. Unfortunately they separate the allergy free recipes - so it would help if your child was only allergic to one of the egg, dairy or gluten. But for my girl needing to miss all three, I still have to do almost as much substitution as a normal cook book. Lots of great kid food ideas though.

Corn Chips for Nachos

Nachos are so easy. And since my discovery of Mission White Corn Tortilla chips, I feel a bit better about giving them in a meal to my children! They have 310mg/100g sodium whereas the Doritos Original I was using beforehand have 435mg/100g. So they still are a 'sometimes' dinner but are a bit better for us when we do have them.

Here's my recipe from last year.

Yummy Broadbeans?

I'm not that keen on broadbeans normally but these are fabulous. They are crunchy so not for children who aren't able to chew crunchy things well yet. But so delicious! And despite the brand name, there are no nuts in their processing plant at all so there are no concerns about even traces.

Easter time

Photo from here

As we get ready to remember Jesus' death and resurrection at Easter time, it becomes all too obvious that my daughter will miss out on the sweet treats that Easter tends to bring with it. We normally prepare for Easter using Resurrection Eggs with the kids and this year my daughter will be old enough to sit and listen to the short bible readings. Last year we gave my son a mini chocolate egg as he sat and listened so this year he is looking forward to the same. I think that sultanas might be the way to go with my daughter since I don't think she will be that keen on faux-chocolate. Still, just in case, I have found some eggs that are made with rice milk and are even fair-trade so I will blog about them when they arrive and we've tried one.

In the mean time she will be eating Choices' Hot Cross Buns to celebrate Easter. Yummo!

Scones from the pantry

The one at the back wasn't done with the cutter since it was the leftover dough - you can't half tell!

I can't remember where I got this recipe from but I have just substituted allergen-free ingredients, added xantham gum and it worked well and they were very tasty with jam.

3 cups GF self-raising flour
1 tsp xantham gum (powder)
80g dairy free spread
1 cup soy milk

Add dairy-free spread to flour and Xantham Gum and rub in until bread-crumb-like. Add milk and stir until dough formed. make into a ball with hands and then flatten out. Cut out with scone/pastry cutter and place together/touching on baking tray (I use baking paper as well). Brush with milk if you like and then put in the oven for 15-20min. Keep an eye on them in case my time is different for your oven. I found that they didn't really go golden in that time but were obviously cooked. Maybe they could have gone for longer. I had hungry kids to feed!

Makes about 15. I divided the recipe by 3 and made 5 because I knew we wouldn't get through 15 and really scones should be eaten fresh.

Yoghurt

 photo from here

Soy yoghurt is an essential part of my daughter's calcium intake. She has it every night, as long as she has eaten enough of her dinner (vegetables specifically - she's such a carnivore!) because, apart from milk, it's her only big calcium product in her diet. Click here for other calcium ideas.

We currently use Soy Life Yoghurt, either vanilla or blueberry. You can get mango/apricot but she didn't like it. They come in 2 packs and tend to last us 4 nights. A tub is 26% of Recommended Daily Intake for Calcium. The other option is Kingland Yoghurts (not a great website unfortunately) that come in a 4 pack. They are good but not as economical for us at this stage.

Choices Muffin Premix Review

 Choices Bakery have a muffin premix and so my daughter and I made them yesterday to take to a morning tea with a friend. You have to add milk (we did soy), oil (we did rice-bran), egg replacer (or 1 egg), and your favourite flavour - we added dates and a bit of brown sugar.

They turned out really well - popped out of the tins easily and had a great cake-y texture and a pretty nice taste. The other 2 year old we visited ate 4 mini muffins and wanted more! My daughter, it seems, only likes the muffin top... hmmm.

We might try blueberries in it next time!