Cooking in cupcake pans!

Have you ever baked your favorite mean in a cupcake pan?  Created something delicious, but made it single serving by using a cupcake pan to bake it in?  Well,  Heather of New York Cupcakes in Seattle and Bellevue, Washington has started a new blog called Cupcake Bettie to chronicle her adventures in baking in cupcake pans!!

She's started with two amazing recipes so far... Pizza and Lasagna!  Both baked in cupcake pans, both look like yummy delicious savory cupcakes!

So make sure you check out Heather's new blog, Cupcake Bettie,  for all kinds of delicious yummies baked in cupcake pans!

Gluten-Free Pizza Crust - My New Recipe

The best gluten-free pizza crust to date. A few tweaks make all the difference.

For years I've missed pizza. Not because there isn't gluten-free pizza available. It's out there. You can find it if you look hard enough. Take a gander in the frozen food aisle of your favorite natural market. Snoop around in the dairy case, next to the gluten-free bagels. You might even hit pay dirt at your local pizzeria. Especially if you happen to live in Arizona (Picazzo's gluten-free pizza is by far the best pizza joint fare I've tried). So yeah. There are choices.

Problem is, most gluten-free pizza sucks.

It's usually big on the chewy aspect. Or cracker crisp dry. With not much flavor. Yawningly bland. Certainly nothing to brag about. I mean, you wouldn't eat it if you didn't have to. You know what I'm sayin'? It's just that after years of pizza deprivation some of us are desperate for a decent slice. I'll try anything.

Twice.

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No-Knead Pizza Dough (The Remix)

When I posted the no-knead ciabatta bread video last January, I had no idea it would become one of the most watched, most commented-on, and most loved recipes on the blog. So it came as a little bit of a shock when the no-knead pizza dough, which used the same basic technique, did not garner the same outpouring of love.

Many thought it was just too wet, sticky, and hard to work with. Personally, I didn’t have an issue with it, but that's because I have lots of experience, and I know how to use extra flour and a light touch to form the pizzas without any major problems. Unfortunately, for most viewers that was not the case.

So I went back to the drawing board. This new and improved version is less sticky and much easier to work with, yet still produces a very nice pizza crust – flavorful, tender, with just the right amount of chewiness.

Of course the most important feature has not changed – you still don't knead it. There are plenty of websites out there that will explain, in excruciating detail, why exactly this works, but long story short, the tiny amount of yeast grows and ferments very slowly, and it's this long rising time that allows for the gluten strands to form.

Anyway, whether you tried the original no-knead pizza dough recipe and struggled with it, or you are attempting this for the first time, I'm confident you will be very happy with the results. Enjoy!




No-Knead Pizza Dough Ingredients:
2 oz whole wheat flour
16 oz all-purpose flour
*about 4 cups total
1/4 tsp dry active yeast
1 1/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp sugar
2 tbsps olive oil
1 1/2 cups warm water, if possible, use bottled water as chlorinated water can retard the yeast growth
cornmeal as needed
Note: Rising times will vary based on the temperature. It should probably go at least 14 hours to develop enough gluten, but could take as long as 24 hours to double in size.

Pizza / Deshi Veg Pizza /Pizza without oven

Deshi Veg Pizza/Pizza without oven

Friends FRIDAY dinner is always good because it is staring of weekend so enjoy to start weekend with pizza.............this is friday chef dish..............................Make pizzas of your choice with these tasty toppings.

Ingredients
6 ready-made pizza bases
4-5 tbsp butter
250 gm tomato puree
3 onion, chopped
3 green chillies
2 cloves garlic
2 tbsp sugar
2 pinches oregano
1 tbsp oil
Salt to taste
For the topping
2 capsicums finely chopped
1 onion finely chopped
100 gm finely chopped cabbage
½ tbsp cumin seeds (optional)
1 tbsp oil
Salt to taste
3 small cube cheese

Method:
Step 1: Remove the skin of garlic and cut the green chillies and place with onion inti mixer bowl.

Step 2: Make a paste with help of mixer.

Step 3: Heat the oil in kadhai in law flame.
Step 4: Add garlic onion and green chillies paste in it.

Step 5: Stirring for two minutes.

Step 6: Add the tomatoes puree and mix well.

Step 7: Add the sugar, oregano and salt and cook for 5 minutes. Remove from the heat.

Method for making topping:
Step 1: Take little oil in another pan.
Step 2: Add cumin seeds and fry for few seconds.

Step 3: Add the finely chopped capsicum and cook for 2 minutes.

Step 4: Then add finely chopped onion and cook for while.

Step 5: When onion becomes soft then add chopped cabbage in it.

Step 6: Add salt to taste and cook in medium flame until they become soft.

Step 7: Turn off the flame and take it side.
Method for making pizza with oven:
Step 1: Take a thick pan or doss maker and grace with little butter.
Step 2: Take ready made pizza base and place over the law flame of pan.

Step 3: Cook for a minute and turn into another side and spread the ready tomato onion material over it.Step 4: Topping with cabbage capsicum and onion material. Add butte in sides of pizza if needed.

Step 5: Place the pizza into another plate and cut into pieces.
Step 6: Sprinkle the grated cheese over ready pizza.

Step 7: Serve hot with pizza sauce.

You can also add most common toppings are boiled corn, panner, and mushroom as par our taste. Also add more garlic and remove onion whatever our choice of taste.

You Can't change your destination overnight, but you can change your direction overnight...Happy Weekend to all my FRIENDS!!!

A Vegan Basil Mint Parsley "Pesto"

A lip smacking raw vegan pesto. Yep. You heard me.

We're getting so close to our departure now I can taste it. The house is swept and cleaned, boxes and bags are packed. Anticipation is hanging in the desert air. You can almost hold it in your cupped open hands. The hardest part will be trying to sleep Saturday night. I told Steve, If it's 3 AM and we're lying side by side in the dark listening to the whir of the ceiling fan, just waiting, can we get up and go? Why not? he responded.

This earned him some extra bonus points.

Not that he needs any. His bonus point status is pretty high to begin with these days. We've had an exciting week. I'm so proud of him. His first script sale, an independent movie titled The Canyon just released its first trailer. If you'd like to catch a sneak peek at the movie, see The Canyon trailer here. You'll see why I fell in love with Yvonne Strahovski and Will Patton when we visited the set.

So what does all this California dreamin' taste like? I decided it tastes like basil and mint with a bite of parsley. 

Green. Earthy. Alive.

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Gluten-Free Pizza Flatbread with Roasted Vegetables

An easy gluten-free pizza flatbread topped with roasted veggies.

I've been offering up picnic food recipes this week because we're eating easy picnic style here in the final countdown phase of leaving for our summer adventure in Los Angeles. Only four remaining stacks of books to box, a tilting fence of wet paintings to frame, and the all important decision of which t-shirts, pots and kitchen power tools to pack stand in the way of our coffee fueled departure early next week.

I am reminded of the opening scene of A Walk on the Moon where Pearl and Lilian Kantrowitz are cramming the family car with colanders and tablecloths and onions and potato peelers. Kitchen stuff for their summer cabin in the Catskills. Such a production this is. Planning ahead for gluten-free snacks on the road (chocolate cupcakes are a must, and popcorn) and an easy microwavable supper for the hotel in Arizona (I'm thinking I'll freeze some of my favorite Mac and Cheese). We still don't have a rental lined up. And the storms knocked out our Internet this week. I'm lucky to be on at all tonight.

So yours truly has been running out of steam by cocktail hour, whipped not only by the attention-to-detail process of organizing two lives and shedding old stuff, but by the monsoon season thunderstorms growling across the Chama River in the afternoons, sending wind and rain and howling coyotes up the mesa. And knocking out our web access.

So forgive me if I have not responded to a comment or a question. I haven't been on-line much. Or participated on Twitter. I've been a total social network slacker stranded out here in the wilds. Cooking up flatbreads and Buckwheat Chocolate Chip Cookies between rinsing out empty shampoo bottles. Thinking of you.

Hoping you're having a wonderful week!

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How To Make A Vegan Pesto

Vegan pesto is all about the herbs and nuts. You won't miss the cheese.

Making pesto is not an exact science. It's intuitive. And lucky for us- easy as pie. You can whip up a vegan pesto from any combination of herbs, nuts and oil that your little heart desires. You can use cilantro or basil. Or both. Or try a light and fresh combo of mint , basil and parsley. Choose pecans or walnuts. Or traditional pine nuts. Even hazelnuts.

Dairy-free sauce never packed so much flavor.

Pesto adds a big flavor boost to all kinds of recipes. Stir it into tomato sauce  just before serving. Or plop a dollop into a bowl of Italian soup. Add a spoonful to stew. Schmear some on croutons,  gluten-free toast and grilled cornbread. It's a fabulous base for pizza toppings.

You can also add pesto to roasted potato wedges and grilled vegetables. Stir it into polenta- or spread it on wedges of broiled polenta. It dresses up rice and risotto, pasta, noodles, and even grilled tortillas. It kicks up salad dressings and hummus.

For flexitarians, pesto is a bright, herby accent for grilled salmon, shrimp, and fish.  Not to mention, egg dishes. Pesto and huevos is a match made in ovo-lacto vegetarian heaven.

So even if pesto is considered passé by some, an eighties foodie fad gone by...do we care?

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Gluten-Free Buttermilk Flatbread- Easy as 1-2-3

The easiest gluten-free cracker-flatbread ever.

There are days when keeping a Gluten-Free Pantry Quick Mix in your cupboard can come in handy. Yesterday- as the flannel grey sky spit snow at us out here in the high desert- a certain gluten-free goddess had a casita full of men to feed- including those devilishly handsome amigos of mine, Joey and Will. So Joey and I collaborated in my tiny blue tiled cocina and whipped up some tasty gluten-free comestibles.

He made his fabulous Kicked Up Rockin' Guac. I made some hummus spiked with cilantro pesto. We served up an array of crudities, organic blue corn chips and salsa, chicken salad (from Will), my Pecan Crackers, jalapeno-stuffed olives, and my freshly made basil-pecan pesto with a spur-of-the-moment improvthat is a cross between a tender cracker and a tasty flatbread.

And I'm also thinking, Dear Reader, this dough might make for a delicious and fast gluten-free pizza crust.

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Gluten-Free Beer (and a pizza crust recipe)

After five years of living strictly gluten-free, I can honestly tell you, Dear Reader, there are very few things I still miss from my pre-celiac diagnosis. From melty chocolate brownies to delicious gluten-free bread, I've managed to recreate and reinvent many old favorites.

But there is an archetypal pairing I do, indeed, miss. It's a simple want. Nothing fancy. And it's not some precious, tiny cuisine perched on a plate with a few stingy drips of - insert latest food infusion fad - trying to pass as art. Nope.

It's pizza and beer. A slice with a cold one. That's what I want. That's what I miss.

Well, guess what? One half of my burning desire has been quenched and this humble gluten-free goddess couldn't be happier. I am pleased as proverbial punch to report on the new sorghum lager now available from Anheuser-Busch, called Redbridge - Babycakes, it is beer-tastic! I had my doubts, I'll admit (being part Irish, who can blame me?), but when I read about Redbridge beer over at the NFCA website, the photograph alone made my mouth water. Come to Mama! I had to find some. I looked everywhere, but no store in Santa Fe carried it. Bummer.

Imagine my delight - when visiting our son, Colin, in Los Angeles - I stumbled upon a six pack of Redbridge happily chilling away amongst dozens of off-limits brewskys in an LA Whole Foods. Dude. I was stoked.

Later that very night I rustled up some easy - but tasty! - nachos and cracked open my first beer in five years. It did not disappoint. It did not taste “gluten-free”. In fact, when Colin - who is not celiac, or gluten-free - knocked back his first sip, he declared, “This tastes just like beer. Just like the real thing.” And I, ever the U2 fan that I am in my part-Irish bones, answered, “Even better than the real thing”.

Over at my cool and chic gluten-free home girls' blog aka The Celiac Chicks, I learned the proper way to pour a Redbridge. Pour the beer into a glass so that it smacks the bottom of the glass. This releases carbonation and produces a perfect foamy head. I did this last night, and, indeed, it does! (Thanks, Kelly!)

Next? Now that the Santa Fe Whole Foods is finally carrying Redbridge in their beer section, I gotta create that perfect gluten-free pizza crust recipe to go with it. And now that I have the beer, Dear Reader, it’s cake.

Here is the recipe I'm going to try - sent in by Lydia. The good news is - it is egg and dairy free.

Lydia's Gluten-Free Pizza Dough

Karina, here is my recipe for GF pizza crust. If you're not crazy about xanthan gum, perhaps you could use guar gum, or one egg white instead. I think it tastes like the crusts of old I used to eat, and I've only had compliments from gluten-eaters.

In a measuring cup, proof:

1 cup warm water (following temp. directions on your yeast package)
1 package dry, active yeast
1 tablespoon sugar

Whisk together in a bowl and let it sit for 5-10 minutes as the yeast proofs and begins to foam.

In mixing bowl, combine:

2-3 tablespoons olive oil
1 teaspoon each: dried basil, oregano, rosemary, and crushed red pepper (optional)
1/2 tablespoon apple cider vinegar
1-2 teaspoon salt
1 scant teaspoon xanthan gum

Add the proofed yeast mixture. Stir to combine.

Add:

2 1/2 cups gluten-free flour*

Mix the dough by hand for 2-3 minutes. Let it rest as you oil a pan and sprinkle cornmeal on top of the pan (to prevent dough from sticking).

Drop the dough onto the pan and using wet or oiled hands, flatten and spread the dough evenly to the thickness you prefer. (This usually covers a 10x13-inch baking pan.)

Allow the dough to rest while you pre-heat your oven to 425 degrees F.

Pre-bake the pizza crust for 10 minutes.

Add sauce and toppings. Bake for an additional 10 minutes or so, until the crust is done and the toppings are heated through and bubbling.

*Lydia's Gluten-Free Flour Mix is:

3 parts white rice flour
3 parts brown rice flour
2 parts potato starch
1 part tapioca flour

She notes: If you use a pre-made gluten-free mix, I would recommend not using one with leavening (baking soda, baking powder).

Thank you, Lydia! This recipe will be (mucho) appreciated by our readers.