Chicken Chowder with Rustic Gluten free bread from New Cascadia Traditional bakery

Fall and winter in the Northwest bring a lot of grey and rainy days, days where you stay indoors and  enjoy warm hearty foods. 

I was out running errands with my mother, she has vertigo from an injury in a car accident and as a result can't reliably drive, so I often drive her when she needs to go out. We were on the east end of town which rarely happens, so we stopped at Lingonberries Market. If you haven't been there you should go. The entire store is Gluten Free, from dry mixes and flours, to beers and freezer Items, Lingon berries has a great selection of yummy food, and it's ALL gluten free. I went to pick up some staples in my pantry but I noticed their fresh bread rack that was stacked with  loaves of bread, muffins, and pastries from different local gluten free bakeries. The rack had a few items left on it (it was later in the day) and a Rustic Baguette caught my eye.  

I've gone to New Cascadia Traditional bakery in Portland before, Mr. Beam took me as a surprise one day, I had a cinnamon roll and enjoyed the sticky sweetness on my fingers after I ate the whole thing in a few bites, it was delicious and so were the bagels we bought for using at home that week. 

I mean LOOK at that beautiful loaf! nice and crusty on the outside and soft and chewy on the inside. It is one of the most beautiful loaves of bread I've seen AND it's gluten free :) 

It was mine the second I saw that beauty, I began dreaming of what all I could do with it and what was for dinner that night.

Chicken... I had chicken that needed to be used. Not only that but I had chicken broth that needed to be used up as well, I had been planning on having soup that day or the next, it was all ready for me.

Remember those chickens I butchered last summer? We'll one thing I learned last year is that when butchering an older bird it's really only good for boiling, the meat is on the tough side, so those chickens have been making the BEST homemade chicken broth ever. After boiling the meat  falls off the bone and is great for soups, casseroles, or tacos.

I made what I call Chicken Chowder. It's a lot like making stew but with chicken. 

The run down;

*Chop Leeks or green onions and garlic, saute them in the  empty soup pot with a little butter or oil.

* Add chopped up chicken

* Add in the chicken broth

* Add the peeled and chopped up carrots, potatoes, and celery. (add more water/broth to cover everything if needed, I had so much broth I didn't need to)

* Bring to a simmer and add spices, I love adding ground coriander and some celery seeds along with my salt and pepper.

*let the flavors merry and enjoy

 I took the bread, cut it in half length wise and smothered it in butter, on one side I put some slices of provolone cheese and then popped it in the oven on broil. It got nice and bubbly on the top and the butter melted nicely into the bread and got crunchy.  

See I remembered to take a picture before eating it! You should be proud of me, I was thinking how much you guys would appreciate another  picture of that bread .

gluten Free Valentines day cake

Valentine's Day is just around the corner, I can't believe its almost here. Last month I did a test run for a Valentines cake. Originally I was going to make them cupcakes and try that marble trick so they would be heart shaped but I didn't have any cupcake liners, so I just made it a round cake, maybe next week I'll do the cupcakes.

I've been trying to stay away from over processed foods and color dyes and I had a great idea to substitute some water in the recipe for  beet juice to give it a more festive color, I remember some vegan recipe's doing that and thought it would be worth a try.

I had some white cake mix on hand and the eggs are from my chickens, seeing as I was coloring the cake anyway I kept the yolks (if you take out the yolks and only use the whites you get a whiter cake).

I love bob's red mill mixes for when I'm not feeling like experimenting with my own mixtures, I try and keep some in the pantry for those lazy days. This definitely had been one of those days, I just wanted to eat the cake, not make it.

I juiced my beets and added water to get the remaining amount needed for the recipe, totaling 1/2 cup, the other 1/2 is oil.

My sister helped me with the cake and loved the contrast in colors.

My pans prepped with wax paper on the bottom. (new spring forms I got for Christmas)

And with the batter added. Now that is some awesome color! It looked like something in Willy Wonka's chocolate room, I loved it!

But sadly it didn't last, it's still a nice pink/red, but if you look closely you can see it's speckled that way, the color didn't uniform the cake or 'dye' everything.

I made a cream cheese frosting (because I love cream cheese frosting) and topped the cake. It's really just cream cheese, powdered sugar and a splash of milk, simple and delicious (at least if you like cream cheese).

After cutting a slice you can see how little of that beautiful color is left.

It still was festive and tasty but not what I expected, I'm going to play around with it next time, or maybe put the beet juice in the frosting... and make it a chocolate cake, yummy...