Pumpkin Dutch Babies

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• Today is Halloween!!! And in our house that means all things pumpkin and/or orange. All of our meals have something with pumpkin or the natural color of orange in it.
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• On the menu today is pumpkin Dutch babies for breakfast served with persimmons and orange juice. For lunch we will eat carrots and have peanut butter and orange marmalade sandwiches. Dinner is my most favorite! We will be devouring macaroni and cheese (my personal recipe I'm not ready to put online yet.) The only thing is our macaroni will not actually be orange since we do not use cheese that is colored. ;) After dinner we will carve our pumpkins to look silly and head out the door for a fun night of "Trick or Treat".
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• Before the sun came up, I slaved about (not really) in the kitchen to create for Dorthy, Toto and my hungry Pioneer, Pumpkin Dutch Babies. Super easy and quick. Just a few extra steps added to the Dutch Baby recipe. 
• The vote, unanimous, We Loved it!!! Hope you do too!
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• Pumpkin Dutch Baby Pancakes 
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• 1 C. Organic Almond Milk
• 1 tsp Gluten Free Vanilla Extract
• 4 Lg. Organic Range Free Eggs
• 1/2 cup Organic Pumpkin Purée 
• 1/4 tsp. Kosher Salt
• 1/4 tsp Cinnamon
• 1/4 tsp Pumpkin Pie Spice
• 2 pinches of Nutmeg
• 1 C. Gluten Free All-Purpose Flour  ( I used Trader Joe''s Gluten Free Brand)
• 2 Tbsp. Butter
• Maple Syrup or whipped cream and powder sugar

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees and make sure the oven rack 
is in the middle space. Whisk almond milk, vanilla, eggs, 
cinnamon, pumpkin pie spice, nutmeg and kosher salt in a 
medium size bowl. Vigorously whisk in the flour , putting in a 
little at a time until smooth.

Melt 2 Tbsp of the butter in a 10-inch cast-iron skillet over
medium heat until the butter is a light golden brown, and 
remove from heat.

Pour batter mixture into the melted butter skillet. Put the
cast-iron skillet into the oven and bake until  golden and puffed 
up, about 25 minutes, I cooked this slightly longer than the 
regular Dutch Babies since I added another wet ingredient. 
Be careful not to overcook. You don't want dried out egg!

Remove from oven and serve immediately. Serve with maple 
syrup or whipped cream and powder sugar.

Have a Happy and Safe Halloween!

Pumpkin Pie Oatmeal

          Yesterday in the mail my daughter received her monthly subscription of Clubhouse Magazine by Focus on the Family. As she flipped through the pages she came across a recipe called Pumpkin Pie Oatmeal. Bright and early this morning Jordan says, "Mom, please oh please, will you make us some pumpkin pie oatmeal." This recipe of course is intended for the day after Thanksgiving and calls for left over pumpkin pie, which has gluten in it. 

        Sure I can just go to the store and buy a gluten-free pumpkin pie, ready-made at Safeway. Oh, wait, no, no I can't. You’re supposed to take the left over pie, crumble it into your oatmeal and WhaLa pumpkin pie oatmeal. So unless I make a gf one from scratch and then toss it into the oatmeal… well, umm, no, not gonna happen!!! I don't have the time for that. Besides that's a lot of sugar for breakfast!
         Don't get me wrong, I'm crazy for pumpkin pie it is my favorite food for Thanksgiving, okay I love the turkey and gravy too. Oh the gravy, I will save that for another day. Since pumpkin pie is so fantastic, it usually doesn't even make it to the next morning anyways. "Ok I will make you pumpkin pie oatmeal for breakfast," she of course was thinking later in the week. 
          But to her surprise... I went to the pantry to gather all the perspective ingredients. Hooray! I actually had everything I needed. This was one of those days I enjoyed making a recipe on the fly, (don't worry an old lady didn't come and swallow it.) Putting all the ingredients together was simple; making it taste right, was another story. Ummm, crust for the small crunch, whip cream, and the flavor of rich pumpkin pie all wrapped in hot breakfast oatmeal but without all the sugar. After giving it a test I got three thumbs up, hubby didn't have any L. He was in a hurry to get to work. We girls loved it! I hope you do too! Happy Autumn! 
   

Pumpkin Pie Oatmeal
Ingredients:

2 cups uncooked whole oats oatmeal


4 cups Water  (Cook oats as directed)

½ cup Canned Organic Pumpkin Puree

½ tsp. Cinnamon

1/8 tsp. pumpkin Pie Spice

A few pinches of nutmeg

3-4 Tbsp. Brown Sugar  (shh. I only used 3)

½ to ¾ cup Almond Milk

1 cup Organic GF Granola (Pumpkin if you have it)

Whip Cream


Directions: 

Cook oatmeal as directed. (Shh! Don't tell anyone but, I cheat and use the microwave to heat my oatmeal, the stove takes too long.)  

After warming up for about 3 to 6 minutes, stir in all ingredients except for granola and with cream. Heat up oatmeal for another 2 to 3 minutes. When your oatmeal is fully cooked sprinkle on gluten-free pumpkin granola and top
with whip cream. 

The granola gives it a great crust-like crunch and the whip cream makes it really seem like pie!

Enjoy ~ xoxo ~V




















  


  

Valerie's French Toast Substitute

•  Every Saturday morning I get up and make waffles, pancakes, bacon, sausage and cut up fruit in bulk for the up coming week for my family. Two birds, one stone. Working hard today, so I don't have to put a lot of effort into making breakfast during the weekdays, everyone's bellies are full and ready for their day. I mix up my own waffle/pancake mix myself, using about 5 different flours. I don't keep a box mix in the house, because my family doesn't like any of them, except for one brand that cost a whooping $8 a box and only makes about 5 waffles. This morning I set out to make my bulk breakfast, only to find I didn't have enough flour to make even one batch of pancakes. Didn't matter much any ways, I wasn't in the mood for pancakes or waffles, I had a hankering for French toast! 
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•  French toast is my most favorite breakfast of all breakfasts. Of course I love French bread too and miss it very much, (Especially with a good cheese and Salami!)  Making French toast from a left over loaf was the best. With gluten free, there really is no (In my personal opinion,) decent substitute  for French bread or French Toast. In the past I had made French toast with name brand gf breads and homemade gf breads, none of them pleased me, they are so dense, that it is hard to enjoy them. But I do make them for my girls, they like it. "Man!" I didn't have enough bread either. So I thought I give Dutch baby pancakes a try. I scanned the web for recipes, they all call for cows milk, which I don't buy. I also didn't have some of the other ingredients that it called for either. Why my pantry was so bare this week, I don't know? What to do, What to do? Make it up from there! And I did! 
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• After quickly whipping up the ingredients (having exactly 1 cup of gf all purpose flour,) I patiently waited for it to cook. Uncertain how it would taste and even more unsure if the flour would cook through correctly. Ding! I pulled it out of the oven and was amazed how yummy it looked! (That's when I should have taken the picture.) When I tried it, I thought... Wow, super yummy, this taste like French Toast! My family gave it 4 out of 4 stars. Sydney said, "Amazingly Good mom!" and Jordan gave it two thumbs up and mumbled with food in her mouth " Yummy!"
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• Here it is,  my version of Dutch babies, which is now my substitute for French toast. It is also great for my Candida friends, because there is no yeast in them. Hope you enjoy! xoxo~V

P.S. I think next weekend, I'm going to try and make them Pumpkin flavor ;0). Happy Fall!

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• Valerie Dutch Baby Pancakes 
• 
  
• 1 C. Organic Almond Milk
• 1 tsp Gluten Free Vanilla Extract
• 4 Lg. Organic Range Free Eggs
• 1/4 tsp. Kosher Salt
• 1/4 tsp Cinnamon
• 1 C. Gluten Free All-Purpose Flour  ( I used Trader Joe''s Gluten Free Brand)
• 2 Tbsp. Butter
• Maple Syrup 

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees and make sure the oven rack is in 
the middle space. Whisk almond milk, vanilla, eggs, cinnamon and 
kosher salt in a medium size bowl. Vigorously whisk in the flour, a
 little at a time until smooth.

Melt 2 Tbsp of the butter in a 10-inch cast-iron skillet over 
medium heat until the butter is a light golden brown, and remove 
from heat.

Pour batter mixture into the melted butter skillet. Put the cast-iron
skillet into the oven and bake until  golden and puffed up, about
20 to 22 minutes. Be careful not to overcook. You don't want dried
out egg!

Remove from oven and serve immediately. Serve with yummy fruit
and drizzle with maple syrup.

Gluten Free Bakery

One of our Families favorite destinations.....



4290 Stanley Blvd  Pleasanton, CA 94566
(925) 639-9977

My favorite is the Chai Cupcake with Cream Cheese frosting! Yummy!

Homeschooling a Dyslexic, ADHD, Celiac kid. Not So Hard! Continued, our story...

Homeschooling a Dyslexic, ADHD, Celiac kid. Not So Hard! Continued, our story...

 (Continued from May's Archives)

...And from the very beginning I knew there was more than just tears at preschool. I knew she was dyslexic! The roller coaster just got stuck upside down! 

   So you may be asking how could I possibly know at 3 she was dyslexic. We'll let me debunk that fact that dyslexia is just switching your b's and d's around, there is so much more to it than that. Below a few clues are mentioned. For starters we had a hard time with all of the alphabet, numbers and shapes. Colors weren't a problem. 

      Hold on, hold on, let me back the roller coaster a little bit. As a baby she often had chronic ear infections, a runny nose, a gassy tummy, and was very quiet. ( I know those of you that know her, could probably never imagine her as a quiet girl, but she was, unless she was agitated, then she fussed.) She rarely talked actual words. Since my background was in American sign language, I taught her key words that she often communicated with me. It concerned us that she didn't speak, she has a cousin that was born deaf and we thought maybe she could be too, or hard of hearing. So at 15 months we went to an ear specialist and it turned out she needed tubes in her ears. Well, when the doctor completed the surgery, he reported to us that she had more than 6 inches of yucky gunk infection compacted in her ear. He also let us know that she wasn't hearing correctly, because of the compacted gunk she was hearing like she lived under water. (This may explain her fascination with mermaids, LOL!) 

      What does this have to do with dyslexia, well I will tell you. First off,  it put her behind understanding audible language. The first two years of a child's life,  hearing words is so very important. She needed to be gathering words in her word bank, for all of the 15 months, but instead it was only visual information that she gathered,       (Can you guess her learning style?) After her surgery she began to hear, however, if we were to compare her to the average 15 month old she was extremely behind. Words were new to her. After the surgery a "whole new world" opened up to her ;)  She could hear, more important she could hear her own voice. (Our house became a much louder place.) At this point she often said things wrong. We thought nothing of it at the time. We thought is was cute! For example; she often said "whoop cream" instead of whip cream. No matter how often we corrected her, she always said "whoop cream" she still says it, but it's to get daddy's attention to squirt some in her mouth for fun. Clue #1.

      Anyhow, this part of the story alone, should tell the tale of the possibilities that there could be future problems.

      Moving on! So fast forward to preschool drop out, LOL! She spent 1 and 1/2 years in preschool before I pulled her. Even the head teacher, whom we all loved, noticed her lack of abilities that her peers were accomplishing, from letter recognition to cutting and fine motor skills. At home we began the frustrating task of learning our ABC's and 123's. Oh! It only took 2 and 1/2 years for her to get the letters, sounds and to write. Often with tears. Clue #2.

To be continued... must make dinner and other chores, talk to ya later gator :) 
xoxo ~ V

Here are some websites that list characteristics of dyslexia.

37 Common Characteristics of Dyslexia                                                         http://www.dyslexia.com/library/symptoms.htm

Dyslexia: Symptoms & Solutions What is Dyslexia?

http://www.bartonreading.com/dys.html#signs

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Gluten Free Crêpes with a Latin Twist!

Gluten Free Crêpes with a Latin Twist! 

        So in the almost three years of being gluten free, I would have to say I miss my flour tortillas the MOST! Being part Puerto Rican I have a need for my breakfast burrito!!! And frankly it doesn't quite taste the same with corn tortillas! I absolutely hate the GF flour style tortillas, yuck! (Can we say card board!) But until there is a better one out there, I had to find something to get my burrito fix, so I came up with Crêpes with a Latin Twist!


Ingredients:

Gluten-free crêpe mix
Ground sausage ( I used sage flavor)
Potatoes O'Brien (already has bell peppers and onions in it ;) yum)
Cheddar cheese   ( I use dye free, organic to eat, in the picture I used yellow cheese for effect )
Tappatio hot sauce (optional, but necessary on my plate)
Chopped Cilantro

Cook GF ground up sausage, potatoes O'Brien, stir in the chopped cilantro and set aside. Cook your crêpe as directed, add your burrito ingredients including cheese into crêpe, top with more cheddar cheese, cilantro and hot sauce (optional.) Now you don't need to scramble eggs or need a flour tortilla, great substitute if you miss those spanish burritos for breakfast!
Replace , Make, ENJOY!

Gluten Free Erupting Volcano Cake

Gluten Free Erupting Volcano Cake 

see Junes post for directions 

Yes, yes, I know not dye free, I made an exception this time.

Construction

Thank you for your patience, this blog currently under construction as I am new to this blog thing.. And I'm trying to figure out how I can include ADHD, dyslexia, homeschooling, and celiac disease all-in-one blog! Please be patient with me as there is more to come including more of our story and recipes.

<3    Oh yes and if you love the Ramona Quimby books, then our story is for you! Because I have an adventurous, imaginative Romana myself that goes by the name of Sydney!      <3