Book of Yum

When we decided to buy a house in California, we knew that fruit trees often came with the deal. Honestly, it seems like around here you would have to go to some effort to find a house without at least an apple or lemon tree on the property. True to form, our house came with apple, apricot, plum, avocado trees, and then a hearty volunteer branch of a persimmon tree that drapes from our neighbor’s yard into our back yard garden. The persimmon and avocado tree delighted but confused me by bearing their fruit in winter. Last year persimmons found their way into smoothies,streusel topped persimmon muffins, and even a flaming persimmon pudding (cake). This month I have been a little under the weather with family colds, and I’ve been working on my dissertation research too. But last night I got into the holiday spirit and made this scrumptious persimmon cookie spiked with all my favorite spices, pecans and raisins too. Ohhh it was good. And they were good for breakfast, too. Oh, c’mon, they have fruit and nuts- really, they are like a (sweet) granola in a cookie, so it isn’t that shameful to have them with a morning americano, right? Right?

Here are some more gluten-free cookie recipes:
Gluten-free Vegan Carrot Raisin Un-Oatmeal Cookies
Vegan Gluten-free Quinoa Peanut Butter Monster Cookies
Gluten-free Nutmeg Shortbread Flat Cookies
Grain-free Low-processed sugar Chocolate Pecan tollhouse PIE recipe (ok, inspired by a cookie!)
Healthy Gluten-free Gingerbread Cut Out Cookie Men

So much for dieting!

Gluten-free Dairy-free Spiced Persimmon Cookie Recipe Dessert  Alternative Grains  American

Ingredients 1 cup peeled persimmon, pureed 1 teaspoon baking soda 1 cup +2 tablespoons brown rice flour(or sorghum) 1/2 cup almond flour 1/2 cup +2 tablespoons tapioca starch 1/2 cup brown sugar (or coconut sugar) 1/2 cup white sugar 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon 1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg 1/4 teaspoon ground cloves 1/4 teaspoon ground allspice 1/2 tsp salt 1 beaten egg 1 cup chopped pecans or walnuts 1 cup raisins 1/2 cup melted palm oil shortening, vegan margarine or butter (I used shortening) Directions Preheat oven to 375F. Cover a baking sheet with parchment paper and reserve. Whisk your baking soda into the persimmon puree and reserve. Combine your dry ingredients from brown rice flour through spices and salt. Stir in persimmmon puree. Fold in your beaten egg and then your nuts and raisins. Pour the melted shortening over the dough and stir to combine. Scoop out small spoonfuls of dough (a full regular spoon or a scant tablespoon works well) onto your prepared baking sheet. Bake for 12 minutes or until cookies are baked but still slightly soft. They are very tender when first baked but firm up as they cool. Notes I used about 2 ripe hachiya persimmons for this recipe but I think any nicely ripened persimmon would work. The pictured cookies were frozen first, and then baked. The first time around, I used the room temperature dough and they spread out more, which looks a bit prettier. Either way they taste great! You can freeze the dough and bake later in a preheated oven at 375F. Just add a few minutes on to the baking time. I usually throw my dough into a quart ziploc freezer bag and label with baking instructions and recipe title. However, when you cut off the cookies you get funny block-shaped cookies then. I recommend you freeze them in a tube shape or freeze them on wax paper in spoonfuls just how you’d like to bake them for the prettiest cookies. Freezing cookie dough gets rid of some of the graininess of gluten-free flour and also results in a fatter cookie. This recipe is also good baked straight out of the bowl, but we like the flexibility of freezing the leftovers so we can have fresh cookies any time we want.

Rating:  9 Original Source:  Inspired by online gluten recipes but my original creation. Please do not replicate without my permission. Recipe ID:  1581 Added:  December 3, 2011 Last Modified:  December 4, 2011

This year I finally managed to host a real gluten-free vegetarian recipe carnival. I got to know some wonderful new gluten-free bloggers and get inspired by their creative approach to hosting a vegetarian Thanksgiving.

After all the madness of hunting for recipes, planning out a menu and shopping for the ingredients, I started to think about what Thanksgiving meant. Sometimes being a gluten-free food blogger with a fear of hunger breathing down my neck (due to the possibility of no food that I can eat in a given situation), I can get pretty hung up on the food part of it. But Thanksgiving is also about family, and it is a time to count all of the blessings in your life. I am very blessed. Although we can get hung up on the stresses of everyday life with jobs, studies, and daily chores, The DH and I (with Toddler Yum) make it a priority to have fun together as a family. Some of the memories we’ve made together have been some of the happiest I’ve ever had. Even simple things like taking my kid trick or treating on Halloween have been joyful experiences thanks to my DH and the intrepid Toddler Yum.

Thanksgiving has been no different. Of course I am finding that you have to give up some of the control in the kitchen with a toddler underfoot. Yes, she will get into the ramekin of dairy-free pumpkin pie and dive in thumbs first. (By the way Alisa, the recipe got a big thumbs up.) And yes, she wants to help at the worst moments sometimes, and can cause more chaos than I ever imagined. But Toddler Yum is also so much fun, and watching her develop into a real, imaginative, spirited person with opinions makes the holidays even better. This kid loves Halloween, and costumes, and saying “Trick or Treat.” And today for Thanksgiving, she loved saying “Happy Thanksgiving” and holding her plate for a piece of Daddy’s turkey (no the DH and Toddler Yum are not veg) and gobbling up spoonfuls of Mommy’s homemade cranberry sauce. And we loved watching her do all of those things. Honestly, I can’t wait to experience Christmas with this new Toddler Yum, who tells us “I’m a KID” and plays and talks and thinks like one more every day.

My Menu for Thanksgiving turned out about like I thought it would.

Main dish: Portobella Mushroom Stuffed Acorn Squash topped with my favorite Gluten-free Nutritional Yeast Gravy.

Side Dish: Gluten-free, Vegan homemade French Bread

Side Protein Dish: Vegan Homemade baked beans cooked in slow cooker and pressure cooker.
*This one actually gave me some problems because I combined two types of beans (black and red) from two different bags and the black beans refused to cook in the slow cooker. I think they may have been old. I started them first thing in the morning after soaking them overnight and the beans were consistently crunchy for ages and ages until finally I pulled out my pressure cooker and pressure cooked them. Fie on you, Slow Cooker cookbook that told me beans would only take 3-4 hours.

Side Dish: Duchess Potatoes (made to be dairy-free with the new Earth Balance Coconut Spread and Coconut Milk).

Side Dish: Elana’s Brussel Sprouts with Chestnuts

Side Dish: Frozen Peas (Not Gourmet but the DH loves it)

Sauce: Homemade Orange Apple Cranberry Sauce

Desserts: 2 Kinds of Dairy-free Pumpkin Pie. I preferred Alisa’s egg-based filling to my vegan filling, I have to say. I also made some Apple Pie using one Whole Foods GF Bakehouse Crust and one Manna From Anna crust.

There is this kind of hokey but cool Raw Foods Cafe called Cafe Gratitude that has locations in Berkeley and in the Cupertino Whole Foods. They make it a practice to ask patrons what they are grateful for, as they take their orders. It is embarrassing, but a good question, especially on Thanksgiving. What are you grateful for?

This is the closing post for my Gluten-free Vegetarian Event. I hope you have enjoyed it. I was planning on posting a recipe, but I just didn’t think it made much sense since all of you who celebrate Thanksgiving are probably all cooked out. I will update the first page to reflect all of our latest recipes and posts, so it will hopefully serve as a resource for others for later holidays. I hope you all had a wonderful gluten-free thanksgiving!