Harvest Time Equals Baking Time With Pears and Apples

I love this time of year in Sacramento. We get tons pf produce year round but in September it is the best time for apples from Apple Hill, just above Placerville, California, and pears from Courtland, California. Although the weather here has been in the upper 90's and often times triple digits I found that I could not resist when I went to the Farmers Market this weekend. The apples and pears were abundant and all I could think of was baking with them. The aroma of cinnamon, brown sugar together with butter and pears and apples is enough to make me completely wild! I purchased so many pears and apples that I was forced to create two dishes with the majority of them. First I made pear and apple muffins for the next morning's breakfast and then I made pear and apple crisp for tonight's dessert.  Although I will say that both Michael and Autumn could not wait for breakfast the next morning to sample the muffins.  The aroma that wafted through our home was absolutely incredible!!

Gluten-Free Harvest Pear and Apple Spice Muffins

2 eggs

1 cup milk

1/2 cup butter

3 cups diced pears and apples

3 cups Amy's cake flour mix (see recipe below)

1 cup brown sugar

4 teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon xanthan gum

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon ground cloves

1.2 teaspoon ground nutmeg

Whick together eggs, milk, and butter until blended completely.  Stir in diced fruit.  Combine remaining ingredients in separate bowl.  Add dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and stir just until blended.  Do not over mix.  Let batter sit for 20 minutes in order for the batter to soak up the pear and apple flavor.  Pour batter between 19 and 20 greased muffin cups and bake at 400 degrees for 20 to 25 minutes, until golden brown on top.  Serve warm with cinnamon-sugar butter.

PEAR AND APPLE CRISP

FILLING

3 pears, peeled and chopped into bit-size pieces

3 apples, peeled,and chopped into bit-size pieces

2 teaspoons cinnamon

2-3 Tablespoons lemon juice

4 Tablespoons to 1/4 c. white sugar or turbinado sugar (to taste)

2 Tablespoons to 1/8 c. brown sugar (to taste)

2 Tablespoons (more or less) GF Flour mix - depending on juiciness of the apples

CRISP TOPPING

6 Tablespoons butter, slightly softened

1/2 c. GF quick oats, roughly ground almonds, walnuts, or quinoa flakes

1/4 c. Featherlight flour mix 

2 Tablespoons white sugar (to taste)

2 Tablespoons brown sugar (to taste)

optional: ground cinnamon (1 tsp) and freshly ground nutmeg (1 tsp)

INSTRUCTIONS

Preheat oven to 375*F. Peel and chop pears and apples into small pieces.  Put into a medium bowl and sprinkly with lemon juice. Mix. Add sugars, flour and cinnamon. Mix together very well. Pour into medium (for thin) or small (for deep) baking dish. Put softened butter into the same bowl where you mixed the apples. Add oats (or other option), flour and sugars and “squish” together well until crumbly. Pour and crumble over apples in baking dish evenly. Bake for 23-30 minutes. Cool slightly before serving (5-10 minutes).  Serve over all natural GF vanilla ice cream.

Amy's Gluten-Free Cake Flour

This is simply a slightly altered version of Bette Hagman's Featherlight Rice Mix-with less tapioca, to prevent a bouncy texture when baking cakes.

For 9 cups:

3 cups rice flour

3 cups cornstarch or arrowroot

2 cups potato starch

1 cup tapioca starch

3 tablespoons potato flour

Bette Hagman's Featherlight Rice Mix

1 part white rice flour (or brown)

1 part tapioca flour

1 part cornstarch

Potato flour (not starch), 1 teaspoon for each cup of other flour

For Nine Cups

3 cups white rice flour (or brown) If 3 cups tapioca flour

3 cup cornstarch

3 tablespoons potato flour

Cinnamon Sugar Butter

4 tablespoons butter

1 teaspoon cinnamon

2 teasppons sugar

April 17th Michael's (My husband) 42nd Birthday!!

For my husband's 42nd birthday, as always I asked what he would like for his special birthday dinner, and he surprised me with his answer. He decided that he wanted BBQ'D tri-tip steak, but not with our usual Korean marinade. He wanted a garlicky, wine, olive oil and herb vinaigrette marinade. With that he requested smashed baked potatoes with butter, and buttermilk, and steamed artichokes with garlic, lemon and butter. This is not is every day meal since he comes from a family with very high cholesterol, and he himself is constantly battling his cholesterol numbers. So we thought it would be a special treat for his birthday. The meat was oh so tender, juicy, and flavorful. The smashed baked potatoes were creamy, with a yummy potato flavor that was not washed out as if we had boiled them, and they were not as rich as one would have thought either. For dessert I had fixed him a Banana-Chocolate Custard Tart. Talk about decadence! It was a banana pie taken to the extreme. The meal was delicious and filling an dso Autumn and I could only take a bite of the Banana-Chocolate Custard Tart. Even Michael was saddened that he could not have a larger piece of his birthday dessert. To make up for it he has been able to have a nice slice of it almost every night for a week after his birthday.

Many of you know that our entire household is gluten free. While the fact remains that Michael is not Celiac or gluten intolerant, he does live in a household with two others who are (Myself and our daughter Autumn). So I always tease others and say he is a Celiac by virtue of living with two others who are. Plus, if he wants to eat, he must eat gluten-free. Michael decided early on that it was much easier for me as the chief cook and bottle washer to only have to prepare one meal for the family and on the plus side it ended up so much less expensive for us. He has even learned to cook a few gluten-free dishes as well. For the most part our cooking hasn't changed that much, aside from breads and pastas and of course baking. We do have to be hypervigilant where and with whom we eat. We have to know what is on every menu and make sure that there is not a chance of gluten in the food or in it's preparation. But all of the delicious flavors and incredible textures, with a yummy side of visual appeal are all still there.

Michael seemed to really enjoy his birthday dinner, his decadent dessert and his gifts for his new (new to him) "Spider" scooter. He got his rear view mirrors replaced and he received a cool looking helmet and a very functional scooter trunk for the back. Autumn wants him to get a new seat at least for her because she says his seats are worse than the one on her bicycle. So not as pleasurable a ride as she would like. But she never turns down a ride. Do you want to hear something funny?! Michael finally had to fill up the tank on his scooter for the first time and it cost him a whopping $2.50. Mr. Frugral was truly in heaven! All recipes can be viewed on The Gluten Free Fox search engine.

Monday, April 20th, 2009, Pork Saltimbocca

Although I am Puerto Rican, I love to dabble in other cultural delicacies. I decided to make Pork Saltimbocca with a lemon and white wine cream sauce with asparagus served over fettuccine. I am told Saltimbocca which is Italian, means that it is so flavorful that it jumps in your mouth. I love that concept. If I had it my way I would want all of my food to jump in my mouth. Not because it is still alive but because it has such incredible taste. While this dish sounds difficult don't let it's name fool you. It is not all that difficult to recreate. I took parts of this recipe from Rachel Ray and "Everyday Italian" with Giada. Of course I had to make the recipe my own with little additions here and there, and I also needed to make it gluten-free. With all being said and done this was not too difficult a task. While this recipe calls for pork and Giada from Everyday Italian makes hers with veal, you can make this with chicken and fish if you'd like. Being Puerto Rican we tend to use a great deal of pork. This was a godsend as now we can add yet another pork dish to our repertoire. Here is the recipe (with gluten free changes to follow):


Pork Saltimbocca with White Wine Sauce


http://www.rachaelrayshow.com/food/recipes/pork-saltimbocca-white-wine-sauce/
http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/everyday-italian/veal-and-lemon-saltimbocca-recipe/index.html


Instead of using wheat flour as requested in this recipe by Rachel Ray, I use either my Featherlight flour mix by Bette Hagman, or the all purpose flour mix by Annalise Roberts. Both

are delicious and you can't even tell the difference.

The next item I use in this recipe to make it gluten-free is Tinkyada Pasta. I prefer the brown rice fettuccine, but feel free to use whatever pasta you like. I also love the taste of the sage and

tend to use more than one leaf per slice of pork. Plus, I have found that an entire piece of prosciutto is the perfect amount per slice of pork. I also put sea salt and pepper to taste in the flour to give the pork a little more flavor. Remember not too heavy on the salt since there is quite a bit of salt in the prosciutto. Once all the prep work is completed this recipe is fairly quick to make and is absolutely deelish!! This is easily a week day meal. The flavors are an incredible taste treat for your tongue and tummy!! My family cannot get enough. I hope you will enjoy it as well.