Oliebollen (gluten free, egg free, dairy free)

Oliebollen are a Dutch New Year's Eve tradition, but for years I've done without because a gluten free, egg free, dairy free version simply didn't exist. I minded but didn't think I could do anything about it.  Finding ways to make traditional recipes Joy-friendly was a challenge, especially when the traditional recipes were written in a language other than my own.  But this year, as my brother and cousins and husband went to Grandpa's house for oliebollen, and Littlest Brother and I stayed home (He can't have wheat either), I decided I would give the recipe search one more try.
I've discovered that by searching for vegan recipes I can find recipes that are egg and dairy free, even though I am by no means a vegan! (bacon wrapped dates are on the menu for later tonight) So I searched for a vegan Oliebollen recipe, and found one.  A few tweaks, and it was also gluten free.  An hour later, I was enjoying fresh Oliebollen, complete with corn-free icing sugar.

and the recipe...
Ingredients:
1.5 cup all-purpose gluten free flour
3/4 tsp xanthan gum (omit if your flour blend already contains it)
1/2 tsp salt
2 TBSP sugar
4 tsp active dry yeast
1 tsp cinnamon
1 cup raisins
1.5 cup warm (120-130*F) water (Hint: warmer than a baby's bottle, but not as hot as a hot shower)
1/2 tsp lemon juice
oil for frying
powdered sugar

How it works:
1. Mix all the dry ingredients together.
2. Add the warm water and lemon juice and mix until well blended
3. Cover with a tea-towel and set in a warm place to rise for 45 minutes.
4. Heat the oil for frying.  You want it really hot.  We used our little deep fryer, though you could also use a pan with an ample amount of oil in it.
5. Spoon the batter in small amounts into the hot oil.  When one side is cooked (browned), turn the Oliebollen over to cook the other side.
6. Set on paper towels to drain.
7. Enjoy with powdered sugar

Allergy Friendly Lasagna

My determination to make tomato-less tomato sauce the other day was fueled mostly by the fact that I had been invited to a lasagna lunch after church on Sunday (which I ended up not going to). There was no way I was going to just eat salad while everyone else ate lasagna. It was just not going to happen. And to make lasagna, I needed to make tomato-less tomato sauce first. Then I could make allergy friendly lasagna free from gluten, wheat, dairy, egg, tomato, and any other nasty stuff.  There is soy in this recipe, so if you can't do soy, I'm sorry.  I can't keep everyone happy.

Now for the Joy-Friendly lasagna "recipe"*:

In one container mix: browned ground beef, tomato-less tomato sauce, spices (I use basil, oregano, marjoram, rosemary, and thyme), and sauteed peppers and onions.

In another container mix: 1 package (12oz) firm tofu, a variety of daiya cheese

Have ready: oven ready rice lasagna noodles, extra tomato-less tomato sauce, spinach, extra diaya cheese, vegan parmesan topping, a 9x13 pan

Get started:
Spread a layer of mixture 1 (meat mixture) in the bottom of the pan.
Put a single layer of lasagna noodles over it.
Add a layer of spinach
Top with a layer of mixture 2 (likely all of it, unless you have a really deep pan)
Add a layer of noodles spread rest of the meat mixture over the noodles add sauce to cover any exposed noodles
Sprinkle with diaya cheese top with vegan parmesan topping stick in the oven and cook according to the directions on the noodle package.

Enjoy your lasagna.

It tastes even awesomer than it looks.  I'm not the best food photographer.

*I'm not sure I can actually call this a recipe because I don't actually measure anything.  I just guess and go with what looks good. 

4.5 out of 5

It's not very often that I give a restaurant 4.5 out of 5 stars, but it happened Friday.  My mom arrived just as I was finishing class on Friday and we headed to Grand Rapids to meet my cousin for lunch.  The drive was horrible.  We hadn't had much "weather" all winter and then sure enough as mom is driving into Holland we get an icky icky storm.  Go figure. My cousin had recommended that we stop by a little place called "Marie Catrib's", so I'd googled the the address and that's where we headed.  It was a little crowded in the store, so we had to wait a moment and then we were seated at a cozy table (we could have waited longer and sat less cozily, but we're all family and have been even cozier before).  The waiter brought the menu and I began to look over it.  I saw some information about gluten free bread and the next time the waiter came back we inquired further into it. The initial screening on all four types of gluten free bread came back positive. I had choices. I probably should have inquired further, but I didn't want to jeopardize anything, so I took a bit of a leap of faith.  I actually cried as I looked over the menu and realized I had choices.  Lots of choices.  I ordered a roast beef sandwich without the cheese and without some sort of sauce that had way too many vowels in it because the sauce was not Joy-friendly.  The sandwich came and I just looked at it. Here was an honest to goodness sandwich, made in a restaurant, that was safe for me to eat.  I didn't look at it long before I dug in.  It was delicious. Phenomenal.  I even got to get up and look at the dessert  case, but passed on desserts because they didn't have an ingredient list handy and Marie was at the doctor and couldn't be reached.
The service was excellent, the food was delicious.  The only thing that would have moved this restaurant from a 4.5 to a 5 would have been to have ingredient lists handy so I could have thoroughly checked things. I really wasn't supposed to have that many carbs at that point in time (I'm still paying for that!), but if I get a chance to go there again, carb restrictions or not, I'm going!

Please Listen

To those of you who work in food service, whether high end or fast fast food, to those of you who cook for other people, to those of you who share food with anyone, whether it is for a price or free.  Please read this.
If someone asks you what is in something.  Please tell them.  Tell them everything.  If you don't know, tell them that. If they are taking the time to ask, the probably have a good reason.  They aren't just trying to be annoying or steal your secret family recipe.  So tell them.  Don't leave things out because there is a just a "little bit" of it in there or because you don't usually put that in there.  Be open and be honest.
If someone asks you to leave a specific ingredient out, for example cheese or croutons on a salad, please listen. They are trusting you.  Don't assume they want it left off just because they are picky.  Sometimes that might be the case, but not always. If they say no croutons and you forget and put them on, don't just pick them off.  Make a new salad.  Same if they say no cheese.   Sometimes it's a matter of life and death.
Think I'm exaggerating?  Mom and I stopped at a place where traditionally we've been able to get "Joy-friendly" food to eat.  I was tired and hungry after an afternoon of wedding dress shopping and also crashing from too many carbs at lunch, so I needed carbs to prevent the grumps from taking over the rest of the evening.  We went through the drive through.  Mom ordered and three times stated that we wanted no cheese on the salad.  No cheese. The person taking our order repeated it back to her.  No cheese.  We got our meal and I opened my salad and began to eat.  I spit most of my first bite back out.  There was cheese on the salad. It was dark so I hadn't seen it.  Mom took the salad back in and complained. I took my first two doses of benadryl and a dose of ventolin. They remade the salad and we continued home (maybe 5-10 minutes).  Shortly there after I took my third and last permissible dose of benadryl.  Followed very quickly by an EpiPen.  The next three hours were spent at the hospital while they tried to stabilize me and observed me.  One bite is all it takes.
So if you are giving food to anyone, for any reason, at any time.  Please, listen to them.  It could change their life.

My Bread, Their Bread

Every Friday I celebrate communion with 4-year old M.  M is well aware of the importance of communion and can even say most of the words of institution.  Every Friday during chapel at seminary she sits on my lap.  During the singing and the meditation she wiggles a little bit and plays with my medic alert necklace and the ring I wear around my neck, but when the Great Prayer of Thanksgiving starts, she is all eyes and ears.  She starts to quiver with excitement as she mouths the words of institution along with the pastor who is presiding that week.  As we wait our turn to go forward to receive the elements, I review with her why we take communion and what the bread and the juice represent.  She knows the answers. And then comes the most awkward question of all: my bread, or the other bread?
Here at WTS we have two offerings for communion bread - there are two beautiful loaves of challah bread and then a little plate of gluten free communion wafers.  When the pastor is doing the words of institution, it is the challah that he or she picks up and breaks.  It is the challah that is held up for everyone to see.   In fact, the little plate of gluten free wafers is not picked up or touched at all.  In all honesty, I'm glad that the gluten free wafers aren't handled, especially after the egg-coated challah is handled.  That would quickly become an allergy nightmare and instead of celebrating with M I 'd be being rushed to the hospital (egg causes swelling in me upon contact.  We haven't challenged it with ingestion, but it would not be good).  But the two bread communion leads to a little bit of theological unrest and no small amount of confusion for the littlest of our brothers and sisters.
Today, when I asked M if she wanted my bread or the other bread, she very seriously told me that "the other bread' (my bread) wasn't really bread, just crackers.  She put into words, the words I hated to think.  That somehow, my bread, the GF wafers were separate.  I know cognitively they are not.   They are just as much the body of Christ as the challah is.  However, there is a degree of separateness when we have two communion breads.
I wish we could all be united in communion.  So far, it's happened once.  I cried that day, the day when we all took gluten free communion together.  I wish it could happen more.  Because that would be wonderful and then I wouldn't have to ask M which bread she wanted.

The Food

Every Celebration needs good food and since my excitement levels and the amount of baking I do are correlated, there was a lot of baking done for this celebration

An overview of the table before I started carrying things outside.  Not pictured are the cheese and cracker plates, including both store bought crackers and homemade crackers.

Fruit Bowl with cantaloupe, watermelon, peaches, blueberries, raspberries and strawberries.  Everything except the strawberries was fresh from the market. 

The baked goods tray: Blueberry millet mini muffins, Spongecake mini muffins, Marmorkuchen (marble cake), chocolate chocolate chip cookies, fudge brownies, coconut chip bars, and maple date cookies.  I also made lemon-lime squares but they didn't hold up well enough to serve.  All of the baked goods were "allergy friendly" to a large extent.  The Marmorkuchen contained soy and the bars and brownies contained traces of soy since I used a soy based shortening to grease the pan.  Other than that, everything was free of the top 8.