Proud Papa Seth. Look at that grin!
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I was craving some pancakes the other day so I decided to see what I could mix up to satisfy that craving. This worked great. I think buckwheat is going to be one of my favorite flours, because everything I have made with it so far has tasted really good.
Buckwheat Pancakes
3/4 cup buckwheat flour
1/2 cup corn flour (use rice flour if you are corn free)
1/2 cup tapioca flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 cup buttermilk powder
1 egg
1 cup(more or less) water
3 TBLS melted butter or margarine
Mix all dry ingredients in a bowl. Add egg and water and mix well. The batter should be pourable. Add the melted butter and stir in well. Pour onto a hot griddle and cook until bubbles appear. Flip over and cook on the other side.
Now if I just had some blueberries to go with this….
Another week, another day off, and Jim and I were driving through the countryside again looking for scenic wonderment. I am here to tell you we found it, just a few miles down the road in Maryland. Before we came up here to work, we never knew Pennsylvania and Maryland could be so beautiful. Everywhere you go around here your eyes are rewarded with beautiful sights, and today was no exception.
The first place we went was to a little restaurant on Hwy 16 in Fairfield, Pennsylvania called Our Place Cafe. They have not been open long. Today was the second time we ate there, but we both had the same thing that we had the last time. Jim got a cheesesteak sandwich and I got Crab Fries. Crab Fries are french fried potatoes with crab meat, bacon, and cheeses on top. They serve it with a yummy scrummy sauce that has Old Bay seasoning and horseradish in it. OMG! I am going to be making these at home sometime soon!
After we left there, we took the first left turn off of Hwy 16, just because we had never been down that road. It turned out to be a dead end road, but here is a picture I took along that road:
After we got back to the main hwy, we took another left turn where there was a sign pointing to a roadside market. The market we found at the direction of that sign was fabulous. The farmer guy was out in the front watering a trailer loaded with fall mums for sale:
Inside the market we found so many choices it was hard to choose, but we wound up buying eggplant, green beans, two ears of silver king corn, a tiny little cantaloupe that was about the size of a large softball, but it smelled soooo good.
Back at home, I made eggplant parmesean, steamed green beans, and fresh corn on the cobb in the microwave. I cut up the little cantaloupe, and that was dinner.
Here is the recipe I used for the Eggplant Parm:
2 medium eggplants
1 egg
1/3 cup milk
1/2 cup of your favorite gluten free flour (I like Tom Sawyer or Gluten Free Pantry)
salt and pepper to taste
olive oil
1/2 a 26 oz jar of your favorite spaghetti sauce (I used Classico Sweet Tomato Basil)
1 1/2 cups shredded mixed italian cheese
Peel the eggplants and slice 3/4 inch thick. Salt generously and let set for about 20 minutes, then rinse well. Put the egg and milk into a bowl and mix well. Put the flours, salt and pepper into another bowl and mix well. Dip the eggplant slices into the egg mixture, then into the flour mixture, coating well. Fry in olive oil in a skillet until browned. Place the fried eggplant slices in a casserole dish in one layer. Pour the spaghetti sauce over, then sprinkle the cheese over. Bake in a 425 degree oven for 20 minutes. Let sit for at least 5 minutes before serving.
This is sooo good served with steamed green beans and corn on the cob. It is gluten free. If you are allergic to eggs, you can leave them out and just use the milk. Sorry, we were too hungry to take pictures of it before we ate it all up!
I recently found a neat place, called The Leftover Queen Forum. The subtitle for the website is “Where foodies come together to meet, greet, and share ideas.” It is a fun place, with food bloggers from literally all over the world as members. If you look over to the right on the sidebar of this blog, you will see a list of links to Foodie Blogs. There are many good food writers there, so if you’re hungry and need some ideas or recipes, check them out.
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I am still trying to create the perfect gluten free cornbread. This is the version I tried last night, and Jim gave it two thumbs up:
Buckwheat Cornbread
1/2 cup buckwheat flour
1/2 cup tapioca flour
1/2 cup corn flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1 1/2 tsp baking soda
1 1/2 tsp salt
1 1/2 tsp xanthan gum
1 egg
1/3 cup powdered buttermilk
1 cup water
Mix all ingredients well, and pour into an iron skillet that has been heating on the stove with olive oil. Bake in 425 degree oven for 25 minutes.
This was very good served with butter, along with yet another version of bean soup.
Today’s Bean Soup:
1 bag dried baby lima beans
3 stalks of celery, chopped
1 medium onion, chopped
4 fresh tomatoes, skinned and diced
8 oz frozen shoepeg corn
1 smoked ham hock, skin removed, and meat cut up in chunks
salt, pepper, and garlic powder to taste
Place dried beans in a pot of water and bring to a boil. Boil for five minutes. Meanwhile, place all other ingredients in crock pot and turn on high. Pour hot beans and water into crock pot and cook for several hours.
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My mom will be 80 years old in November. In October of 2005, she almost died when she had a ruptured diverticuli. Her doctor took her in for surgery at 5:30 on a Friday afternoon and saved her life. In March of this year, she had surgery again, this time to reverse the colostomy she received in 2005.
She called me a couple of months ago to tell me that her recipe for stuffed cabbage was selected as recipe of the month for the Greystone Power monthly newsletter. Two ladies from the electric company came out to her house and took a picture of her holding a head of cabbage. Yesterday I received a copy of the newsletter in the mail from my sister. So, for your viewing enjoyment, here is my Mom and her stuffed cabbage recipe. It is gluten free, so enjoy if you can eat beef and tomatoes: (click on the picture for a larger version)
Have you ever been to a wine tasting? I have too. But, have you ever been to a garlic tasting? I had not until today.
One of the girls I work with at Granite Hill Camping Resort told me about a place nearby called Hacienda Shiloh.It is an herb farm near Gettysburg. They have 23 different kinds of garlic there. Jim and I drove over there today after breakfast. The short drive to get there was a treat in itself, a twisty mountain road through the forest, where we had to slow down to keep from hitting a huge deer that lept across the road in front of us.
At Hacienda Shiloh, there is a gift shop, the garlic barn, a greenhouse, and of course, the gardens.They have flowers and herbs growing everywhere. Of course it wasn’t as beautiful as it could be because we have been in a drought here, but still, it was fabulous.
Our first stop was the gift shop. They have tons of dried herbs for both medicinal and culinary uses.Garlic jelly, garlic powder, minced garlic, garlic pesto, garlic granules, garlic cookbooks, and garlic utensils. If is has to do with garlic, you can get it there. After we looked around in the gift shop, we walked down past the vegetable garden to the garlic barn, where they had all the different kinds of garlic hanging up to dry. The nice lady (I can not remember her name, dang it) broke off cloves of several different kinds for us to taste. We both liked the Italian garlic best, so we bought a bunch of it.
We also got some garlic scapes, which are the tiny little bulblets from the flower that grows out the top of a garlic plant. 
I had never even seen anything like them before. She said you take them home and pinch them off of the flower heads, and store them in a zip lock bag in the refrigerator. Sprinkle a few in a salad for a burst of garlic flavor. Yum!
As we were walking back to the gift shop to pay for our purchases, I happened to see some chard growing in her vegetable garden. I asked her if she would sell me some of it, and of course she did. She got our her scissors and cut me a handful of it, both red and green. As she was cutting it she told me she has fresh herbs, too. So, I got her to cut me some fresh basil, my favorite herb.
Back in the gift shop, I rounded out my purchase with a Autumn Cranberry Rub and some Mushroom Sea Salt.The Autumn Cranberry Rub has cranberries, orange zest, rosemary and sea salt. She recommended rubbing it on chicken or fish. The Mushroom Sea Salt has powdered oyster, boletes, porcini, shitake, and woodear mushrooms. I can not wait to try it.The last thing I picked out was four sample sizes of herbal teas. All of the things I bought came to $16.10. What a deal!Oh, I forgot about the little bag of shallots, too.
When I got home with all this stuff, here is whatI made for dinner:
1 chicken breast, skinned, deboned, and cut into bite size pieces
20-25 cloves of garlic (I sliced some and left some whole)
2 shallots, diced
1 bunch of chard, washed, and cut up (I cut up some of the more tender stems, too) olive oil salt and pepper to taste
Heat the olive oil in a skillet. Add the garlic and shallots, and sautee until tender.Add the chicken and stir fry until the chicken is done.Meantime, steam the chard in the microwave for about three minutes. When the chicken is done, add in the chard and sautee about 2 minutes.Serve over gluten free spaghetti or angel hair pasta.
I usually make this with broccoli, but since I had the chard, I used it instead. Oh MY God!Delish!
The lady at Hacienda Shiloh said she will ship anywhere in the country. She is working on getting a website. If you would like to have her product and price list, write to her at:
Hacienda Shiloh 327 Knox Road Gettysburg, PA 17325-7243
Or send her an email at casagarlic @ superpa.net.
There is a blog tag thing going around, and while she didn’t actually tag me, Karina at The Gluten Free Goddess threw down the gauntlet when she invited anyone who wanted to join in the fun to do so. So, in the spirit of fun, here are my 8 Random Things About Me:
1.I also curse like a sailor. Well, what do you expect, I grew up in a house full of truck driving men. All the male members of my family are truckers. And if they weren’t truckers, they were in the Navy. So, there ya go.
2. I used to BE a truck driver. Well, technically, I still am, because I drive a four door Ford F-250 diesel pick-up truck. But, what I mean is that I used to drive a truck delivering freight to make a living. Yes, it WAS a Dodge Ram pick-up truck with a camper shell on the back, but it WAS a TRUCK and I DID deliver freight all over the United States in it.
3. I was once frisked by the Secret Service while I was wearing a bathing suit. Just ask if you want the details.
4. Here is a picture of me with the only “celebrity” I have ever met.
5.I live in a travel trailer and work at campgrounds and resorts.
6. I am diabetic and gluten intolerant. My husband has a thyroid condition and can not eat beef. So between us both we lick the platter clean, hahaha.
7. I was a Girl Scout leader and Service Unit Director for 8 years while my children were growing up.
8. I am from the south and everyone knows it as soon as ah open ma mouth ta speak.
I am not tagging anyone, but if you read this and want to do it, feel free.
