This Weeks Grain Free Dinner Menu

Posted on Apr 5, 2014 in Meal Plans & Ideas

This week I am making a traditional Lebanese lamb stew, a great grain free spinach pie with a crust made from almond meal and linseeds, and as I’m making a lentil stew, I shared my trick for preparing lentils for less, shall we say “digestive reaction/discomfort”.  It’s actually 6 nights of dinners as one night is always leftover night.

Grain Free Living Meal Plan

Posted on Mar 24, 2014 in Meal Plans & Ideas

Meal planning is a very handy organisational tool for the busy and short of time (and aren’t we all??).  I am currently at the stage where I am operating a taxi service for my seven year old with lots of after school activities.  It means that we arrive back home hungry, tired and right at dinner time.

So, herewith the first meal plan (dinners only) for Grain Free Living, with some notes for readers from other parts of the world who are in a completely different season to us down under:

My Top 5 Favourite Grain Free Cracker/Crisp Recipes

Posted on Mar 19, 2014 in Savoury Snacks & Meals

I love a good cracker.  They are great with dips or just to munch on generally.  So after going grain free it was great to realise that there are plenty of grain free options for this handy snack.

Here are my Top 5 cracker recipes, including plenty of nut free options for those who are allergic to nuts or need to be nut free for other reasons (for example in Australia many schools are nut free due to allergies, so you can’t send your child to school with food containing nuts – a challenge for a grain free family that relies on nuts, but the recipes below show it can be done.)

A Grain Free Cookbook Review – The Seasonal Cookbook and a special offer for GFL readers

Posted on Mar 18, 2014 in Recommended - Books I love

When I was recently learning about how to cook with Kale I discovered the grain free blog In Sonnets Kitchen.

Its a great site with loads of recipes and useful tips for cooking grain free and living a healthy lifestyle in general.  Sonnet and I connected again recently when she asked me to look at her ebook The Seasonal Comfort Food Cookbook and review it for the readers of this site.

Grain-Free/Gluten-Free Apple and Pear Sponge Pudding

Posted on Feb 21, 2014 in Cakes, Cookies & Sweet Treats, Dessert

This is a receipe for cold winter nights when a pudding is needed to finish the day.  Its fast and easy to mix together, a great way to use up all kinds of over ripe fruit, or if you are really pressed for time you can even use tinned pie fruit.  This recipe was originally made by my grandmother.  It is very traditionally Australian and reflects my grandmothers English heritage.

I have been refining the grain free version of this dessert for a few years and finally have something that tastes very close to her wheat flour version. 

Links of interest: the food-brain-behaviour connection

Posted on Jan 31, 2014 in Recommended - Websites I Read

I recently came across this link via Mark’s Daily Apple about a mother who has completely eliminated her daughter’s autism symptoms through diet.

(Click here for link to Youtube Video if you can’t see embedded video above)

The Wonder of Kale

Posted on Dec 29, 2013 in Salads, Savoury Snacks & Meals, Smoothies

Kale,  Ahhh, kale. This truly is a “superfood” and a great addition to any healthy diet.  A short article from the Huffington Post outlines why kale should be on our plates here.  If you want to read up more detail about kale, try the Worlds Healthiest Foods article here.  In summary kale is low in calorie and high in fibre, iron, vitamin K, vitamin C, vitamin A, folate and magnesium, among others.  It is full of antioxidants, and is a great anti-inflammatory food.  It also has proven cholesterol lowering benefits.

I always avoided it because the first time I tried it it tasted like tough grass.  Not at all appealing.  Turns out  I was just preparing it wrong.  While it looks much like silverbeet, it does require a little extra finesse.

Grain Free Lebanese Tabouli

Posted on Dec 17, 2013 in Salads, Savoury Snacks & Meals

Tabouli (also spelt Tabbouleh) is a traditional parsley salad with its origins in the Arab world.  There are various versions in most Arabic cultures, and it usually contains burghul, which is a variety/form of wheat or sometimes couscous (also from wheat).  This recipe is adapted to be made grain-free and of course gluten-free from the family recipe from my Lebanese in-laws.  They are from the beautiful coastal city of Jounieh so I guess that makes this recipes as authentic as you can get, as I was taught how to make it by my Lebanese sister-in-laws.