Bacon Wrapped Dates

'Ello!! 

Today is apparently a national holiday, I bet you didn't even know it. 

National Bacon Day they say. I saw this statement a couple of times on twitter today, but was unable to verify this information.

I'm feeling very detective-y today, as I finally updated my phone for the first time in like a year, therefore was finally able to start listening to Serial. I love myself a good mystery, and am already obsessed with it. So guys, update your phones. Get the Podcast app, download all of the Serial episodes. Listen. 

You're welcome.

Paleo "Cornbread" without any corn

That title makes sense, right?

Cornbread made Paleo, hold the corn. 

So really it's bread. But its really kind of cake.

Regardless, it's Paleo, it tastes good, and you can lather it in honey-butter and call it cornbread.

Gluten Free Chocolate Chip Pumpkin Bread

This post must be started with a disclaimer.

Every fall, women and children alike (I'm pretty sure not much of the male population is included in this) get incredibly excited for the arrival of pumpkin flavored goods.  The day Starbucks rolls out their pumpkin latte, everyone knows about it whether they care or not by the influx of social media attention. Really....I don't need to see another picture on Instagram of a Starbucks cup. Seriously. Stop it.

They get excited to buy cans of pumpkin and use it in every possible baked good they can think of, eat as many slices of pie as they can fit in their mouth, and light candles with the scent of the favorited orange squash.

The one woman-child that does not give a hoot about pumpkin flavored anything,would be this one right here. Yup. I really couldn't care any less about any of it. Actually thats not true, because saying I  couldn't care less gives the implication that I am indifferent to the whole thing, when in actuality I really quite despise it all. 

I said it, I do not like pumpkin.

I cannot stand pumpkin pie, I do not like the smell, the texture or the taste of any pumpkin goods I've come across. Maybe somethings just wrong with me, I dunno. 

Easy Homemade Gluten Free PopTarts

Once upon a time, Carina and her brain wanted to eat her favorite pizza, of which requires a bag of Gluten Free Mama's pizza crust. This pizza mix you see, is the best that Carina and her brain have found so far in the world, between both pre made and homemade recipes. So, because that mix could no longer be found anywhere in the county; Carina and her brain decided to order a box full off of the internet. However, Carina forgot to use her brain when she placed the order, and instead ended up with a box full of Mama's Gluten Free Pie Crust mix. There was a lot of tears and rude words exchanged between Carina and her brain when this was discovered. 

But all was made right when a new, correct order was placed for the needed supplies.

The only problem was that Carina was now left with several bags of pie crust mix, and therefore needed something to do with them. (and by problem, I don't really mean a problem)

And here we are, with the first recipe to come out of this not so tragic mistake.

Homemade gluten free, dairy free, egg free, nut free, pop tarts. 

Kinnikinnick Bagels and Bread Loaves

One of the biggest trials in being gluten free, seems to be bread.

When someone learns that you don't eat wheat, their mind automatically shoots to bread.

Not the zillion other products that gluten is hiding in, but the one obvious product. If only it were as simple as cutting out one product--being a Celiac would be akin to a low carb diet. 

Not quite folks.

Anyway, this one simple product, seems to also be the hardest product to get right without the wheat.

Too many gluten free breads are hard and dense, and closer to a piece of cardboard then a baked good.

Awhile back, {longer then I'd like to admit ;(} Kinnikinnick sent me a beautiful package, strait from Canada with some of their bread products. Inside the box, was two bagel flavors: plain and blueberry, and two loaves: multigrain and white.

I tested each of these products, and then tested again, and again, and...you get the point. It was some tasty stuff.

Wanna see? Here you go:

Up first, the bagels.

I love bagels. A toast warm bagel topped with strawberry cream cheese, sounds life heaven on a plate to me. Back in the day, when our local sourdough bread company made sourdough bagels-that was true heavenly bliss. I could live off of those bagels. But thats neither here nor there.

Since I could not slather my blueberry bagel in cream cheese, I turned to my closest alternative. Goat cheese chevre. And because I could, I topped in with some warm blueberry compote.

These blueberry bagels, let me tell you about these blueberry bagels. Soft, chewy, with just the righ amount of crispy exterior. A little sweetness, just the right amount of berries mixed in. I think I eat one of these bagels everyday for the rest of my life. I'm not sure how my pants would feel about that, but my tastebuds would sure be happy.

Next on the bagel train, was the plain variety. Is it gluten free? I don't know, I couldn't tell. The package says it is though, and my stomach didn't scream when I ate it, so it must be. Who woulda thought?!

With these plain bagels, I made a delicious breakfast sandwich. This sandwich is everything. I could live happily ever after with this sandwich.

This sandwich, and its images will also be forever ingrained in my mind as I learned of some tragic news while preparing it. While my fingers where snapping these photos, my mind was busy processing a family loss-and once I was done-I ate my feelings full of breakfast food.

and now you know.

{To make sandwich, toast both bagel halves, shmear with butter and top with cooked canadian bacon, a sunny side up egg, and a little spinach to call it healthy.}

Just like the blueberry bagel, it is the perfect texture inside and out. It takes on both sweet and savory flavors with ease, and toasts beautifully. A perfect golden brown, if you will.

You saw savory, lets see some sweet:

Fig butter, have you tried it? My word its good stuff. Its excellent on both the blueberry and plain bagels too :)

So that was the bagels business, now to the bread loaves.

With the multigrain, I made myself a good old fashioned Bacon Lettuce and Tomato sandwich. This BLT may seem like a simple task, as the sandwich itself is easy peasy, but if you have ever made a large beautiful sandwich, only to have its toasted ends crumble underneath the pressure of delicious toppings; you know that its not as easy as it sounds.

I made this lovely sandwich, picked it up slowly-throwing caution to a possible breakage. But my lovelies, my tasty dinner did not fall apart. It stayed perfectly crisp and whole.

Winner-winner BLT dinner!

The Kinnikinnick bread has the perfect flavor, texture and ease of normal "glutenous" bread. 

I always prefer my bread toasted, before and after being gluten free; but I did use this bread once for a super quick peanut butter and jelly sandwich un-toasted. It tasted just as delicious and smooth as it did toasted, not something that I have found to come easy with other gf breads.

With the white bread, I attempted to make a strata.

Every year for Christmas growing up, my mother would make a cheesy strata the night before, for us to eat after opening presents Christmas morning.

It is the most delicious thing, filled with cheese, cheese, and white bread. The only time ever in our lives, when white bread took residence in our home. 

So, for the first time ever, I attempted a strata without the use of cheese. Just veggies, sausage and bread, mixed and baked full of egg. It was good, but not wonderful. Not a recipe worth sharing yet. But, the bread-the bread held up beautifully. It soaked in egg all night, baked in the morning, all without turning to pasty mush. I call that a win.

Kinnikinnick breads are a wonderful addition to the gluten free world, they are fluffy, moist and wonderfully delicious. I would really like to be eating a toasty piece of cinnamon toast right now, but as I don't have any at the moment-go out and enjoy a slice for me, ok?

And check out Kinnikinnick's other products, here.
and see some of my other uses of their other products here and here.

Enjoy!

*while the products review today were provided for testing, no monetary compensation was exchanged. All opinions our mine alone, without further influence.

New and Approved Enjoy Life Chewy Bars

So, a couple months ago I started yet another new job. Between boringness, urgent medical leaves, travel time and crazy bosses, I have been employed by several different medical offices over the years. This new one seems like it might stick though, the best part its in a gastro office. Peoples with stomach troubles, are my people. 

Anyway, why I'm telling you this extremely riveting story, is that while being busy busy at work all day, I get hungry. I am a snacker, I need my mid morning, and mid afternoon snack. Breakfast is not really my thing in the morning, lunch-ehhh. But snack time, I'm all over that.

So what quick and easy snack to I have, basically everyday? Why, Enjoy Life Chewy Bars of course.

They are quick, easy, and dare I say filling. (for a snack bar anyway;)

I wrote a review on these bars a while back, but they have since revamped both their packaging and recipes for these bars. 

During these changes, my local grocery stores where all giving me heart attacks while all the Enjoy Life products slowly disappeared from their shelves. It was majorly stressful guys. Thankfully, the new and improved products have slowly started to make their way back into stores. In fact, I've noticed that most of these new and improved chewy bars, even feature a sample bar of one of the decadent bars. Whoohoo!

But lets get to the new Chewy bars, and my verdict on the new recipes, shall we?!

Cocoa Loco. I am loco for cocoa.

Sorry, had to do it.

This flavors improvement claim is that it has even more chocolatey deliciousness then before. 

When I received these bars, I just happened to have one of the "old" bars on hand, so naturally a side by side comparison was made. Sure enough, the new bars appeared to have more chocolate chips, and had a much more enhanced sweetness to the chocolate bar. 

New bar beat the old bar, hands down.

(not to say the old bar was not good, because it totally was. The new bar was just better ;)

SunButter Crunch was next.

Its claim is that it now features ancient grains.

 Which, I mean-did it not have those before? I don't really know.

I had tried this bar flavor for the first time when I last reviewed these bars. Upon trying them, I declared them my new favorite bar. I don't feel like the bars with the new recipe taste much different. Which is a good thing, because I like them just the way they are.

But yay for ancient grains, right?

Now, the Mixed Berry bars.

This flavor is what I found to be the most improved, hands down.

Previously, this bar had not been my favorite. It was kind of bland, with just bits of berry pieces that kind of reminded my of cough syrup. No longer. 

the WHOLE bar now tastes berry-tastic, and it has plenty of real berry pieces that taste sweet and chewy.

It is also the flavor that all my stores seem to carry, so I'm glad it tastes so good.

Caramel Apple is last but not least, 

I also quite enjoyed the changes in this bar. 

It seems to have a more enhanced cinnamon flavor, and tastes like a wonderful fall day.

Too much?

But really, the bar of the bar has much more flavor, and it still has those perfect little apple pieces.

So my gluten free friends, 

Now you have it. 

Enjoy Life's new and improved Chewy bars, are both new and improved.

Check them out now, at your local grocery store!

And check out the Enjoy Life Website for other products, recipes and coupons!

Also, read my other review on Enjoy Life products, here.

Enjoy!

Pamela's Products Review

Back in the day, when I first started on this gluten free journey, there were only a select few GF brands.  I would wander around the local health food store, which was the only store that carried anything gluten free; and search for those two little words on every package I passed. It was a bit exciting those first couple of shopping trips, trying to spot foods I could eat and buying them all up. Amongst these select food items, where Pamela's Products. I pretty sure actually, that it was the only gluten free flour variety that was available to me at that time. Back then, the products they had in their stock were a small variety of flour mixes, and prepackaged cookies. 

In fact, the Pamela's chocolate cake mix, was the first gluten free chocolate cake I ever ate. Look at me getting all nostalgic over here.

While there are so many other gluten free brands these days, I still can always count on Pamela's Products to provide me with a delicious product. I can also always count on eating an entire bag of mini chocolate chip cookies in one sitting. I try not to buy those anymore.

Because of my deep appreciation to this brand, I was thrilled to receive a package of products to test out for all of you.

The products I will be reviewing today are: Chunky Chocolate Chip cookie, Oat Chocolate Chip Coconut Whenever Bars, Artisan Flour Blend, and the Baking and Pancake mix.

Lets start with the cookies, because you should always start with cookies.

{And don't mind the sad little cookie in the window there, this photo was taken in the middle of a heat wave-thus the melted chips are the fault of my lack of air conditioning, not the manufacturer.}

Cookies are one of the greatest inventions in human history. Thats a fact.

Of all gluten free products, I get most excited over new cookie brands as I pass them in the grocery aisles. And believe me when I say, not all cookies are good. I have had plenty of bad cookies in my time, but this is not one of them.

These chocolate chunk cookies are soft, melt-in-your mouth circles of deliciousness. The cookie is not too sweet, but is filled with large chocolate chunks that are just as mouth melting as the cookie. I mean, it was not just the heat wave that made those chunks so soft. This whole cookie is like a fresh out of the oven experience. 

I may have eaten them for dinner once last week. Maybe.

The other days where reserved for popsicle dinners. 

Heat waves make me eat super healthy.

The next product I tried, were the new-ish Whenever Bars.

This is a product that I have never tried before as they are fairly new and because they have oats.

As most Celiacs do, my stomach struggles with eating oats. I did give in last week to trying some oat filled cookies, with out too much of a problem; so I figured I could go ahead and try these bars without pain and suffering.

And sure enough, no problemo! I'm starting to think maybe this oat problem was all in my head...

The bars I tried, where the chocolate chip coconut. I will advise, if you are not a coconut fan-this flavor is not for you. Go for one of the other three flavors, because this bar is very coconutty. I however do not mind coconut, so this bar was just fine for me :)

What I especially like about these bars is that they have some many different textures going on. Its foremost a soft, almost bread like bar; then there are bits of coconut, oats, and chocolate chips mixed throughout. The bars have a very slight sweetness that makes it delicious, but not too dessert like.

I will definitely be trying the other flavors in the future, as long as the oats and my stomach keep behaving themselves

Next up where the baking mixes; the tried and true Baking and Pancake mix, and the new Artisan cup-for-cup blend.

The cool part of the new Artisan flour blend, is that it is designed to fill in -cup-for-cup- with wheat flour. Meaning, a cup of this flour equals a cup of regular gluten filled flour in a recipe. Which is kind of a big deal if you've ever made a recipe that didn't work out for numerous times until you reached the proper flour adjustment. Its a pain in the behind.

The flour blend also had guar gum blended in, so there is no need to put in an additive such as xanthan gum.

I was really excited about this new flour. I have not tried it yet, and just knew that it would make my life that much easier. 

 *And this is where the downer side comes in, and it is not the flours fault-but purely user error.*

I am used to gluten free flours. I no longer know what the proper texture of wheat filled goods looks like. So my friends, my experience with this flour--meaning the recipes I tried to create with it-where a bust. Again, no fault of the flour. 

The first thing I made with this flour, where some soft pretzels. A snack that I have been craving recently, and a recipe that I wanted to put up on here.

They were a complete failure. 

They started out good though^^^

I have had a hard time making certain breads in the past with GF dough, due to the incredibly sticky texture they have. This dough was smooth and soft, and only slightly sticky. Perfect to work with.

The problem with this recipe,  I believe came in the par-boiling stage of creation; where you boil the pretzels slightly in a water/baking soda mixture before baking. What I ended up with, where pretzels that tasted like pure baking soda. Completely inedible. Although, my nephew did eat an entire one yesterday. I am starting to think that his taste buds can't be trusted...

Next, I attempted to make some monkey bread with this flour. It was good, but a little bit too dry. Which may have been due to the fact that they were completely vegan. But add some icing, and they are perfect!

I am going to keep playing around with this flour some more, and try it in some tried-and-true recipes. I am not giving up on this flour, and I do believe that it will be great; I just have to readjust my baking brain a little bit.

The finer points of this flour though, despite the tragic recipes it was in; it has a great texture, not grainy at all, and no odd flavors. I can definitely see this flour being my new go to in the future and I would for sure recommend it to any newly gluten free bakers.

Last but not least, the Baking and Pancake mix.

It worked out fabulously. 

What do you make with a pancake mix, thats not so cliche and obvious?

Chocolate Pancakes my friends. 

Yep, I did.

Besides that fact that they are chocolate, these little flapjacks are probably the best pancakes ever.

The flour mix is smooth, and moist without any gritty texture or yucky flavors. It contains baking soda and xanthan gum, to save you a couple steps, but it also contains some dairy. I did not have a problem with the dairy, due to the small amount I ate-but those who are highly sensitive should avoid this product.

Which may be hard, when this is staring you in the face.

Go here for a chocolate pancake recipe!

To see more products from Pamela's, and to try some great recipes; click here.
You can also use their handy-dandy allergen chart, to see what products are right for your personal diet.

Enjoy!

(Disclaimer: While the product tested today was provided for review, no monetary compensation was given in exchange for this post. All opinions on this site are my own, without further influence.)