Gluten Free Pretzel Bites!

Yet another food you've probably been craving; a good gluten free, chewy, soft pretzel. Here you go!  Necessity is the mother of invention yet again.

Thanks to Better Batter for their inspiration for this Auntie Anne's clone. I halved the recipe because I didn't want to use too much flour in case it didn't turn out. But they were wonderful! This quantity will make one cookie sheet full of pretzel bites...maybe about 25? Just a guess, I didn't count them before we ate them all.

I mixed up this dough and formed the pretzel bites before heading to bed. I put the cookie sheet of pretzel bites into the refrigerator to rise overnight. In the morning I ran the bites through the baking soda solution, and baked them. It was way easier to do it this way, than wait for them to rise.

One final note, I used the Jules flour recipe, but made my modifications to substitute Sorghum and Millet for the rice flour.  You'll see these changes reflected in the link to the flour blend recipe.  I have not tried my recipes with a rice based mix, so if you are using rice, you may have slightly different results. :)

Gluten Free Soft Pretzel Bites

1 1/4 cups warm water

1/2 teaspoon active dry yeast

1 tablespoons white sugar

1/2 teaspoon salt

3 cups Jules Gluten Free Flour mix Flour, plus some for dusting surface

2 cups Warm Water

2 tablespoons baking soda

Instructions
-Put warm water and sugar in the bowl of your electric mixer; stirring to dissolve. Sprinkle the yeast on top and stir again. Let this sit for a few minutes to make sure the yeast is active (you'll see it 'grow' and 'move').
-Add salt and half the flour and beat on high for three minutes. Dough will be very sticky (that is good). Add remaining flour (about 1 1/2 cups) and stir in. Drop it onto a generously floured surface and very gently fold over on itself a few times. You're looking for a dough that you can form with effort, but not one that you add tons of flour to because sticky dough will lend itself to a lighter end product.
-Get a piece of dough the size of a lemon and roll it out into a long roll about 1/2" diameter. Use kitchen scissors to cut into pieces about 1" long. You could also form this into a traditional pretzel shape too; make a U, cross the ends over twice and lay ends back down on top of the U.
-Lay the pretzel pieces onto a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper, cover with plastic wrap, and put in refrigerator overnight to rise.
-In the morning pull the pan out of the refrigerator, turn on oven to 450 degrees and prepart the baking soda mixture.
-Combine 2c water and 2T baking soda mixture in small pan and bring to a boil. Turn heat on baking soda mixture down to medium, and dip pretzels into baking soda solution for about 30 seconds. After dipping in solution, lay pretzels back onto parchment lined cookie sheet. At this point you can brush with egg to get a more shiny pretzel, and/or sprinkle with coarse salt (pretzel salt or kosher salt works).
-Bake in 450 oven for about 10 minutes or until golden.
Enjoy warm with a dip of mustard, or just eat plain. :)

**My appologies for the poor quality picture.  I took it very quickly this morning on a mobile device since the camera wasn't handy.  :)

Making meal prep easier and cheaper

Looking for ways to save money and time?

1. Buy boneless chicken breasts in bulk packs, usually about $1.99/lb.  Grill the entire package at one time.  Then, when cool, slice and put in freezer bags.  Use for grilled chicken salads, or dipping in BBQ sauce for an easy lunch (cheaper than lunchmeat and all natural!), or in any recipe calling for chicken.  Saves time and mess! :)
2. Buy mild Italian Sausage in bulk packs.  Cook the entire package at one time.  Freeze links when cool.  When you need sausage, slice, crumble or use whole.  Cuts down on prep time, and fewer dirty dishes when prepping for dinner.
3. One thing I'm not sure I recommend.....buy a 5 lb bag of onions, chop entire bag and freeze (double bagged or your entire freezer will smell of onion!).  This was quite the experience.  I am glad to have the chopped onion, but the crying was horrible (as I used end of the year, very potent onions). :)  Does save time...but need to compare this to frozen chopped onions you can buy.  Those are amazingly cheap. :)
4. Prepare baking mixes ahead of time.  Cornbread is an excellent one to have on hand.  Mix all dry ingredients into a zipper top bag.  Label the bag with what it is, what needs to be added, and possibly the cookbook page number.  Preparing your own mixes is waaaaaaaay cheaper than buying gluten free mixes.

Little Cereal Boxes for Stockings using GF cereal!

Another idea to make Christmas "normal" for your little allergen-free eaters. :)

When I was little, we always got a little box of cereal and a "belly button" orange in our stocking on Christmas morning. That was the one time we got sugar cereal (besides when we visited Grandmom) so it was really special. We've continued doing that with the boys and they look forward to it as much as I used to. I realized this year that I won't be able to put little boxes of cereal in the boy's stockings. Then, I got a brilliant idea...I'll just make them! (yeah I know, but I credit this part of me to my mom. If 'they' can make it, so can we!) :) So, I found this webpage called Mr. Breakfast.com where you can design your own using their template, and print it out on cardstock. I'm going to scan it in, change it in photoshop and customize it even more. For the boys' stockings I'll buy some gluten-free sugar-type cereal to put in a baggie, which will then be put in the little boxes. I think they'll love them!

GF CF Vegan Bread

Ever since I found this bread recipe, it has been my exclusive recipe. I have started making it in english muffin rings which makes 24 'rolls'. Just perfect for a little boy sandwich.

This recipe is amazing because it doesn't have any rice flour in it. It has high protein and high fiber. It has real bread texture too. Amazing stuff!

I usually mix up several batches of the dry mix and put them into a gallon zipper bag. Then when I need to make bread, I pull out a 'bread mix', add oil and water and we're good to go. This whole recipe makes two loaves, or 24 english muffin ring rolls. You can halve the recipe to make one loaf.

Elizabeth Barbone has the best tip ever in her cookbook (yes, if you don't have it, go buy the cookbook!). To find out whether bread is done or not, use your digital meat thermometer and test the internal temp. Cook to 208-211 degrees F for bread (I go to 205 for rolls when I'm impatient). Amazing! No more guessing and hoping that it's cooked, or worse yet, overcooking GF bread. Thanks Elizabeth!

Here's the recipe:

Mark Engelberg’s Gluten-Free, Vegan Bread
Recipe for 2 loaves—it is okay to halve the recipe if you want to make just one
Note: If you are using a mixer that doesn’t have a great engine, you may want to mix it by hand at the end to ensure it’s all mixed. Since there’s no gluten to get tough from overmixing, you can mix until you’re confident.
In a large mixing bowl combine:
1 1/2 cups millet flour

1/2 cup teff flour

1 cup sorghum flour

1 cup cornstarch (or double the potato starch if you can’t eat corn)

1 cup potato starch

1 cup tapioca flour

4 tsp xanthan gum

1 Tbsp salt

1/2 cup sugar

2 Tbsp active dry yeast (not rapid rise)
Add:
4 tsp olive oil

3 1/4 cup warm water (not hot)
Mix with electric mixer–using paddle attachment, NOT regular beaters or bread hook–for two minutes. The bread dough will be more like cake batter than traditional bread dough.
Two options for the rising:
For the best rising: While mixing the bread, create a proofing box from your microwave. Microwave a small mug or ramekin with water until the water boils. Leave the water in the microwave. Pour the bread dough into two nonstick or well-greased pans. Tuck the loaves into the microwave with the water—the container of water should not be touching the pans. (I have to remove the turntable in my microwave to do this.) Allow to rise until batter extends a bit over the top of the pans–generally 30-50 minutes.
Standard method: Pour into two nonstick or well-greased loaf pans, place on a warm surface (such as on top of the pre-heated oven), and cover with a towel. Allow to rise until batter extends a bit over the top of the pan–generally 50-70 minutes. (Batter should take up about half the loaf pan before rising.)
Bake at 400 degrees for 10 minutes. Remove loaf pans from oven and cover with aluminum foil. Return to oven and bake for an additional 35-45 minutes, depending on your oven. (Insert a toothpick or knife into the center to see if it comes out clean or doughy, if you aren’t sure when you pull out the bread.)
As with most breads, it is easiest to slice if you allow it to fully cool. But who can wait that long? I usually let it cool for a little bit, and then remove the loaves from the pans and place them on a rack to cool more while I slice it up. The bread tastes delicious warm, dipped in olive oil and herbs or spread with honey and ghee. It also works well for sandwiches after it has cooled. If you won’t be eating it within 2 days, after it’s cooled, slice it, wrap it in a couple of layers of plastic wrap, and freeze it. Never refrigerate this or other bread—it will get dry and hard if you do. If you leave the bread on the counter (wrapped), it will be good for all purposes for a couple of days. After that, it will be best used for bread pudding, French toast, croutons, etc.
Enjoy!

• I will post my mix label for this another time. :)

Make your own Baking Mixes

Here's a time saving tip. Make mixes for the foods you regularly eat. It saves time, energy and $$$ making them instead of buying GF mixes from the store. Not to mention they actually taste good. :) I usually mix up GF muffins, cornbread and bread on a regular basis. Occasionally I also mix up brownies, chocolate cake and cookies.

The process I follow is lining up about 6 baggies and measuring out ingredients one at a time into all the bags (ex. flour mix into all the baggies, then sugar into all the baggies, etc.). Then after all the baggies are filled I zip them up and put them into paper bags. To label them, I use mailing labels preprinted with the "wet" ingredients and cooking instructions, as well as a pretty picture (remember 'free' food can be beautiful). I will post the label templates later, when I post the recipes. :)

Make sure you keep track of ingredients as you add them. If I have to measure out 1/2 tsp 4 times (because the 1 tsp has walked off with the kids...) then I make sure to put each measurement in a different part of the bag. Clockwise is a good rule of thumb. It's so easy to lose track when you have distractions!

These mixes are awesome when you have no time to think, or need something fast.