"Spaghetti Squash"

As someone who has grown up on spaghetti and meatballs, I find I need to search for new and exciting ways to have traditional spaghetti now that I don't eat meat. We all know the spaghetti squash trick where you put red sauce on the squash after you use a fork to the squash and it's like spaghetti. Well, I found an alternative. Take regular yellow squash, peel and grate it in a pan. Fry with garlic and olive oil. Then add your red sauce. Cook your spaghetti (I use quinoa because I'm gluten free). Put it all together....it's so good!

Gluten free eggplant bake

Greetings everyone. This is a wonderful healthier version of eggplant parmesan. Thought I'd share:

3 eggs (or egg substitute if you're vegan...you can use all almond milk, too)
3 T almond milk
1 cup Pamela's baking & pancake mix
1/2 cup garbanzo bean flour (for some extra protein for us veggie people..I use Bob's red mill)
2 eggplants (peal skin and slice 1/4-1/2" thick slices)
olive or grape seed oil
1 clove garlic
goat cheese (if you can do cheese, even though I can't do milk, I can tolerate some goat products)
black pepper
gf spaghetti sauce--1-2 jars
2 boxes Ancient Quinoa Harvest spaghetti (or other gf pasta of your choosing)


Preheat oven to 350 degrees. I use a nice heavy cast iron frying pan (extra iron for us veggie people!). Preheat over low-med heat. Add oil and the garlic clove crushed. Beat eggs with almond milk in a bowl. Mix Pamelas and garbanzo bean flour together in another bowl...you may want to add a bit of crushed pepper, too. Take each eggplant slice, dip both sides in egg mixture then flour mixture. Fry slices of eggplant in oil until brown on each side. (make sure pan always has plenty of oil) Put sauce in the bottom of a large baking dish to coat the bottom. Then place eggplant slices in baking dish. You'll probably get two layers. Top eggplant with more sauce and sprinkle goat cheese on top. Cover and bake for one hour. You may want to heat up extra sauce. Meanwhile cook pasta according to package directions. Enjoy!

Gluten free apple pie

Sorry the picture came out a bit dark but this is a delicious gf apple pie hubby made the other night. Yes, I said delicious and gf!!! We used a recipe I found from momcooksglutenfree blog that is a wonderful blog for gf stuff! She had helpful tips to working with the gf dough and I'm convinced it would not have rocked without her advice!!!

Avocado Mayo

If you have a unique diet like me (gluten free, dairy free, soy free, meat free), finding new and exciting things to eat can be fun. So I was thinking back to the days when I could eat an egg salad sandwich and I was wondering how to create that again for myself only a wee bit healthier. I have to tell you I've been on the fence about eggs in general. Recently I've been leaning toward vegan but I still get the feeling that eggs are good for me. So, I've compromised with 'myself' and eat only local organic, free range farm fresh eggs. The woman who provides these eggs uses a special kind of organic feed that allows for colored eggs. Yes, there are even green eggs!! (though I no longer eat the ham!) I've also recently discovered a particular bread made by Udi's which absolutely rocks and made me want to eat bread again! So all that was left to create was a mayo. I can't do that veganaise stuff because it's full of soy. In a raw food book I was paging through there was a recipe for avocado mayo that I tried but didn't like that much so I though I'd create my own. And it's pretty good:

1 Avocado

1 T mustard (I use Annie's Naturals gf)

juice of 1/2 a lime

Cream it all together, combine it with your chopped up hard boiled egg, toast up some udi's and walla, an awesome healthy sandwich. If you want your mayo a bit sweeter you can cream in a date or two, but I like it tart.

Gluten Free Muffins

I developed this gluten free muffin recipe that has lots of protein and tastes good. My guidance has always been to add more protein to my morning food intake and give up the empty carbs. So here it is:

1 cup almond flour
1 cup chickpea (garbanzo bean) flour
1/2 tsp sea salt
1 tsp baking soda
1/8 cup raw cacao powder (I also substitute Navitas twister power protein mix sometimes)

mix together all these dry ingredients and then mix together the wet below before combining wet and dry.

1 egg beaten (instead of an egg I use a substitute that I learned from Terry Walters' "Clean Food" cookbook -- 1 tablespoon of golden flaxseed meal with 3 tablespoons of water...let stand until the water is absorbed)
1/2 cup of grapeseed oil
1/4 cup of honey
1/4 cup of almond milk
5 Tablespoons of agave

combine wet with dry and add chopped fruit of your choice. My favorites are strawberries and blueberries.

Pour into baking cups in a muffin tin.

Bake at 350 degrees for 25-30 min. Makes 7.

As always with gluten free stuff, eat within a few days!

My new favorite thing

As I've mentioned before I stay away from gluten, soy, dairy, caffeine, meat...which really means I eat pure foods. And one of my last addictions to go has been potato chips. I have moved away from the processed ones to the natural ones. But those pesky Angels still have quite an opinion about that. They tell me every time I crave those potato chip carbs I should eat protein instead. And just as they have been all along my food journey, they are right. If I eat protein when I have that carb craving, I feel soooo much better. And the craving disappears. So this week I have discovered the best of both worlds. It has been so much fun to find, try and make new foods and now I have a new favorite one. They are called Baked Lentil Chips. They are made from beans!!! (lentil, adzuki and garbanzo to be specific) And guess what that means!!! They have protein. 4 grams per serving in fact. And 70% less fat than regular potato chips. And they taste really good, too. Although my pallet may be different from yours having had to make so many changes in the name of health and what's right for my body.