LIFE UPDATE

Hi all.

Update! Things are different in my life now. I quit blogging, got a divorce, fell in love, had a baby, and am moving my life from here at heythattastesgood.com to a new place, where I talk about being a mom, but also post gluten free recipes still. It's new, and a work in progress, and I'm leaving this site here because I stand by my recipes, but my life is different now.

Find me here, from now on:

jillelise.com 

Thanks for everything!

Love,
Jill

Apple cider donut cake

Hi it's fall and this is a delicious cake that tastes like apple cider donuts. This is a good thing for a cake to taste like since I have yet to find a gluten free apple cider donut.

Apple Cider Donut Cake
From Serious Eats made gluten-free

One apple, peeled, cored, chopped up
1 1/2 c apple cider
1/2 c milk
2 1/2 c flour mix
1/2 t xanthan gum
1 1/2 t baking powder
1/2 t baking soda
1 t salt
1/4 t nutmeg
8 T butter
3/4 c white sugar
1/2 c packed brown sugar
3 room temp eggs
1/4 c vegetable oil
1 t vanilla

Cinnamon-sugar
6 T sugar
1 t ground cinnamon
1/8 t ground nutmeg
1/8 t salt

Preheat oven to 350 and grease a bundt pan (I have also successfully made this in an angel food cake pan). Combine cider and apple in a saucepan and cook until apple is mushy, then puree and measure out 1 cup. Set aside to cool. Combine flour mix, xanthan gum, baking powder and soda, salt and nutmeg and set aside. Beat butter and sugars and light and fluffy, then add eggs one at a time, then mix in oil and vanilla. Stir milk into cider mush. Add flour and cider mush alternately, starting and ending with the flour in three additions. Scrape into a pan, bake 45 minutes until a knife comes out clean. Cool in pan 10 minutes, then flip out onto a plate and press cinnamon-sugar mixture into the sides.

summer of

We've been fermenting a lot. There is always one or two jars of something fermenting in the dining room, and garlic sauerkraut is my favorite. This is the easiest thing to do in the world. All you have to do is chop up some cabbage, massage in some salt, mix in some garlic cloves or maybe a chili pepper or something, and let it sit for two week or more. Maybe just a week if you're impatient. 

Sauerkraut

This is a basic recipe, you can add whatever you like. A few carrots, some garlic, ginger, mustard seed, pepper corns, any spices or onions or things you like. My favorite thing to do is to cook kielbasa in a pot full of garlicky sauerkraut with a tiny bit of stock. Yum. 

1 head of cabbage, or two, or three

about a tablespoon of salt per head of cabbage

a head of garlic

maybe an onion if you're feeling like it

Shred the cabbage. I use my Vitamix, Alex does it with a knife, you could use a food processor also. Massage in the salt, squeezing and loving until the cabbage starts to release its juices. Toss in the garlic and anything else and pack into a jar. Now is the creative part! What needs to happen is the cabbage needs to be weighed down somehow. What we usually do is fill up a large gallon bag with water and smoosh it into the jar so there's no air (or good places for bugs to get in). Now you can set your jar somewhere slightly cool to do its thing! Taste it in a week or so and see if its ready. Or leave it alone for a long time. Store in the fridge, I guess.

summer lemon pie

Hi! It's summer. As in, 95 degrees all week summer. I've been craving a delicious sweet cold dessert that's not a Popsicle. I saw this recipe in a magazine and promptly tore it out. I know I saw this all the time, but this is seriously so easy. Three steps, six ingredients, and wow is it good.

First you make a 'graham cracker' crust with smashed up cookies and butter. I use Mi-Del arrowroot cookies, they taste like animal crackers and are something like $3 a bag. That bakes for 10  minutes, then you pour in a 'custard' you've made from sweetened condensed milk, egg yolks, and lemon juice. Once that's cooled, you make whipped cream from heavy cream and a little bit of leftover sweetened condensed milk, and ta-da! A really fancy looking pie. 

Cold lemon cream pie

Recipe from June-July 2013 Cook's Country Magazine

One bag of smashed up gf cookies (about two cups, I use a bag of Mi-Del arrowroot)
4 T melted butter
two 14 ounce cans of sweetened condensed milk
3 egg yolks
3/4 cup plus 2 T lemon juice (I used bottled because come on, its 95 degrees out)
16 ounces of heavy cream
optional - vanilla or triple sec for the whipped cream

Preheat your oven to 325. Mix your smashed cookies with the butter and dump into a pie plate. Tear off a piece of plastic wrap the same sie approx as your pie plate, lay the plastic over the cookies, and smash them  into the shape of a pie crust. Bake the cookie crust for 10 minutes, then remove from the oven. In a medium bowl, mix together the lemon juice, egg yolk, and most of the sweetened condensed milk - save a few tablespoons to use in the whipped cream. When your milk-lemon-egg mixture is all mixed up, pour it into the waiting crust and bake for 15 minutes. Cool completely (you can speed this up by sticking the slightly cooled pie in the fridge). When the pie is cool, make the whipped cream by dumping the cream, a few tablespoons of leftover sweetened condensed milk, and maybe a splash or two of vanilla or triple sec into the bowl of a mixer. Beat for a few minutes until the cream mix turns into whipped cream. Spread all the whipped cream over the pie and serve to your impressed guests or husband.

chicken stock

Do you guys do this? Save all your chicken parts in the freezer to use for stock? This is a great trick.

So here's what you do. Collect chicken pieces in your freezer in a bag and then when you're ready, dump all the frozen parts in a pot with some fresh pieces if you have any (I buy chicken backs sometimes, they're super cheap). Then you half an onion or two, toss in a handful of garlic, a bay leaf or two, some peppercorns, and whatever else you have lying around. Fill the pot up with water and bring to a simmer. Cook for an hour or five, cool, pull out any meat that's left, and strain the stock. Toss all the solids, cool the stock, and skim off the fat. Pour the stock into containers and freeze, or pressure can, or use immediately. 

angel food cake with strawberries and whipped cream

Hi! What's up with you guys? I've been gardening, hanging out with my new chickens and working. Yesterday Alex and I went strawberry picking at a farm near our house. It was hot! 

We picked about seven pounds of them. My favorite thing to do is eat strawberries with angel food cake and whipped cream. 

I posted about angel food cake before, but it was a bunch of years ago. Let's refresh our memories, huh?

Angel Food Cake
Adapted from the Joy of Cooking
1 1/2 c sugar
1 c rice flour mix
1/4 t xanthan gum
1/2 t salt
1 1/2 c egg whites (about 10), room temperature

1 T water

1 T lemon juice
1 t cream of tartar
1 t vanilla
1 t almond extract

Preheat oven to 350. Sift together the rice flour, xanthan gum, salt, and 3/4 cup of sugar and set aside. Combine egg whites, water, lemon juice, cream of tartar, vanilla and almond extract and beat at medium-high speed until the mixture increases 4-5 times in size and holds a very soft shape when the beaters are lifted. Beat in the rest of the sugar, a tablespoon at a time, while mixing on medium high speed until almost stiff. Sprinkle the flour over and fold in, then spread batter in a 10 inch tube pan and bake 35 minutes. As soon as the cake comes out of the oven, turn the pan upside down to cool. 

For the strawberries, hull them and cut them in half. Toss with a tablespoon of sugar or so, let sit for a while so the juices come out. If you're allergic to raw fruit like I am, stick the strawberries in the microwave for a minute or two. 

To make whipped cream, I usually use a Blender Bottle. Put in about a cup of whipped cream and about a tablespoon of sugar and a splash of vanilla or rum, and shake until thick. Don't shake too much or you'll have butter. 

coffee sugar pie

Oh hey guys, what's up with you? I've just been hanging out, making pies. 
Remember when I made sugar pie? Aka my favorite pie ever? I do. I made it today but this time for an adventure I made it with coffee. It wasn't a crazy thing to do, it was awesome! This is kind of custardy and puddingy and sweet and coffee-ey and oh so good. 
Serve this with very lightly sweetened whipped cream. 

Coffee sugar pie

1 c each white and brown sugar
4 T cornstarch
a pinch of salt3 eggs + 1 yolk
1 1/2 c evaporated milk (a 12oz can)
1/2 c strong coffee (I used decaf espresso)
3 T room temp butter
1 T vanilla extract 

Thaw out your pie crust (I use Wholefoods GF pie crusts) and preheat your oven to 350. 
Combine the sugars, cornstarch and salt in a saucepan. Beat in the eggs, then stir in the milk and coffee until well combined. Turn on the heat to medium and cook, stirring constantly, until bubbles and thickening. Stir in the butter and the vanilla until fully mixed, then pour into the pie crust. Bake 45 minutes to an hour, mine took closer to an hour. It's done when it looks a little set when you jiggle it. Cool most of the way and then EAT!