A Good Run on Recipes

Gong Xi Fa Chai..Happy (Chinese) New Year.  We have a day off of school today, and our family is spending a lot of time just relaxing.  It's been nice to have a long weekend, eating supper leftovers and the last of the Christmas baking.  Although we've had a lot of chocolate and Christmas treats, there's always room for just a little more.  We've also been finishing off some of the best recipes I've tried yet this last year.  Flourless chocolate cake is still on the top of my list, but there's a new topper that I found on another blog.  It's Fresh Cranberry Sour Cream Streusel Cake from justpinchme.com, and although that recipe uses wheat flour, I substituted a popular flour mix that I got from the "Cooking For Isaiah"cookbook. After following the very specific instructions for a "fluffy cake",  I ended up with a DELICIOUS cranberry cake that didn't even hint at gluten free.  Note:  what a treat it was to find a kilo of tiny, frozen cranberries at a grocery store in Jakarta.  I picked up some frozen raspberries, too, and we've been eating like it's summer in Canada almost every day since!

The other to-die-for recipe that doesn't taste at all like the dry, crumbly cookies I often end up with is Land O'Lakes gluten free chocolate chip cookies.  Another great treat that looks great in a glass cookie jar on the shelf, tastes great, and freezes well.  

Finally, hallelujah for a gluten free pie crust recipe that actually works.  All my life I have loved to make pies, starting with the little jam tarts that I'd make with my mom's pie crust remnants, to freezing up to 12 autumn apple pies for the winter months when my kids were little.  For months after my diagnosis, I put off trying to make a pie, and when I finally attempted it, my pie flopped.  Thankfully, since then I have found a recipe for Pie Crust on gfzing.com that has worked for me, and tastes wonderful.  It's flaky and isn't mushy on the bottom when I make a fruit pie.  I even tried it as a chicken pot pie crust and breathed a sigh of relief when it came out beautiful.  My greatest achievement was when I found some HUGE frozen blackberries (when I found the cranberries) in Jakarta, and made my husband his traditional blackberry pie for his 45th birthday.  We have had to settle for cake these last few years, and so the berry pie was a wonderful treat.  He was even able to perform our "only with blackberry pie" tradition of licking the dessert plate clean.

It's good to start the year with good news, and my good news is that I don't have to follow the advice of a well-meaning friend, who suggested I find a new hobby.  Instead, I've turned my hobby around and found a way to make it work.  I'm thankful for people who share their recipes online, and hopefully one day I'll have more delicious recipes of my own to pass on.

Thanks for reading.