Homemade Gluten Free Meatballs

Sometimes you just need comfort food. You survey the contents of your fridge for what you can eat or make. This exact event lead me to meatballs. 

So easy, so delicious and so diverse. You'll need:

• 1 lbs-ish ground beef. I used extralean.
• Half an onion chopped as finely as your tears can stand.
• 1/4 cup-ish GF Breadcrumbs. I used Kinnickinnick
• 1 egg
• 2 tsp chopped garlic or 2 cloves garlic.
• Parsley to taste
• Salt & Pepper to taste

Pre-heat oven to 400F. As mentioned, chop onion as finely as you can. My eyes watered a lot so mine was not that fine but certainly did the job. Put everything into a bowl and mix really well. No special order. Dump. Mix. Now get a cookie sheet or flat pan of some sort. You have two choices:

1. Scoop a heaping tablespoon. Roll in hands. Put on cookie sheet. Or...
2. If you are squeamish like me and the thought of handling raw meat make you feel ill, use your cookie dough scooper! See where I professed my love here -  honestly best $13 ever spent.

Once you have that all put in oven and bake for 20-25 minutes, or until cooked all the way though. Serve as a main or appie with some sauce (I made a honey garlic sauce from scratch like a boss), in sauce with spaghetti. Really, however you want.

The Fanciest Indian Food I've Ever Had

I don't know if any of you have noticed this before, but I am very fond of Indian food. Very fond. And my favoritest places to have Indian is in an authentic hole in the wall. My husband however, is not fond of Indian food. Very not fond, with the exception of dosas and kati rolls. So I was excited when he suggested taking me to a Michelin star Indian restuarant in TriBeCa, Tamarind.

It's a nice upscale place. The restaurant had lots of lovely touches, my favorite being their logo stamped into the charger plates and the light fixtures.

They were also very accomodating with my dietary restrictions. In addition to not eating gluten, I also do not eat seafood or any 'cute' animal (no lamb).

To start my husband and I shared the murg malai kabab (chicken kebab - pictured top) and Tofah E Zameen (Paneer/cheese based dish - pictured right). Both were amazing. I'm actually craving the paneer now sitting here writing about it. The cardamom really made the dish. 

For my main I decided to go with a classic, something I could benchmark against - Chicken Tikka Masala. I've eaten chicken tikka masala more times than I could count, and is an easy go to for me. It was the best I've had. The spicing was at the perfect level, and chicken was cooked perfectly and obviously of good quality. 

It was definitely more than most Indian restaurants,  but the excellent dining experience with exceptional service make it worth the splurge. I'm excited to go back!

Gluten Free Beauty | Guerlain Le Top Coat Gel

An aside from all my talk about food. A while ago I posted about gluten free makeup and a post about affordable (and fun) gluten free lipsticks. Since beauty is my other hobby, I'd love to write about it more on my blog - so here we go!

It certainly doesn't hurt that I felt inspired.

So if you did read my post about gluten free makeup, you may have gotten that I stick to gluten free for anything I may accidentally ingest (or at least I try to). Thankfully nail biting is not a habit I picked up, probably a result of my germophobia, so gluten free nail varnish is not an ultimate concern for me, though most of my collection is gluten free. 

The result! Color is Casting Call,
note Sephora by OPI is on reduction!

But for you gluten intolerant and celiac non-nail biters / varnish addicts like myself, I have a suggestion for you: Guerlain Le Top Coat Gel. Gel top coats are all the rage (Nails Inc, Dioer and Julep also have them in Sephora). I tried them all in shop the other night and decided I liked the application of the Guerlain and the finish. Certainly an investment bottle, but the way I saw it I don't always use top coat, I've had the last bottle (OPI) for almost two years and there is still a couple of applications in there. I have emailed Guerlain to inquire the gluten free status, as I know their normal varnishes are gluten free, however I have not received a reply, so note I haven't get confirmed it's GF status, and if you are a nail biter I may not recommend it for you (I will update once I receive a reply).

*Update: I received a reply from Guerlain and it is gluten free - so safe for celiac nail biters too!*

Well worth the investment though! It goes on beautifully. It dries quickly, which I was somewhat surprised by as you essentially pack it onto your email. In terms of durability I would rate it an 8 out of 10. I am fairly tough on my nails, as well they are weak/bendable so chips usually occur within 2 days, this polish lasted 4 before it chipped at the gym. When it did chip though it was big chips. Removal was also easy with 100% acetone, which again was suprising just based on the amount of product I applied. 

We certainly have a winner with this one, and I easily consider this a must have!

Happy 4th of July! Now Have a GF Hotdog!

Macy's fireworks from the roof of my building last year.

Happy Independence Day! I hope you are enjoying the day with friends, family, fireworks, and hopefully a good old fashioned barbecue!

If you are looking to cook up some gluten free hot dogs, I have a couple of suggestions:

• Applegate Farms: organic gluten free hot dogs. Yum!
• For the New Yorkers: Nathan's Hot Dogs are also gluten free. FTW!
• Gluten free hot dog buns are generally awful. Udi's makes an adequate hot dog bun, though I find it fails quickly and if you have them dry like I do, they fall part.
• Schar makes them as well - I have bought some but haven't had them yet. Typically heated Schar products are decent though so fingers crossed!

How are you celebrating the holiday?

New Obsession: 4food

After being on my 'to try' list for what felt like ages, a few weeks ago I finally went to try 4food with one of my friends in work as it's just a few blocks from us. 

On the day we went they had some sort of promotion going on and were doing email opt-in, promoting their loyalty card... they have the social component of their business. Working for a company in the digital marketing space, we were both pretty impressed. 

They offer a pressed rice bun, and also note the gluten 'allergy' when you are ordering. Gluten containing items are also clearly noted on their menu. My first one I had with swiss cheese, avocado and a turkey burger. I didn't get a scoop, not knowing the burger patty is ring shaped for said scoop... however it was really good.

The actual bun is literally sticky rice pressed together. It holds up nicely, although when I did go back and had a scoop I found it was very slippy/messy to eat. I am a big fan though and while I won't go all the time, I will certainly be back with some sort of frequency.

Easy Dinner - Parmesan Risotto with Meat Sauce

If you have been reading my blog for a while, you'll know that I love meals that are 1. easy to make and 2. make multiple servings, hence reducing my overall need cook. This makes risotto one of my favorites.

Using this recipe as a template for the risotto, I used:

• 2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
• 1 cup rice (whatever was in my cupboard, it was some fancy one that even noted it was ideal for risotto ftw).
• 1 quart low sodium organic chicken stock
• Dash of Pink HImalayan Sea Salt
• 1/4 cup Parmesan Cheese

Heat oil over high heat in a large pot, then add rice. Fry for a moment, then add chicken stock and salt. Bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer. Once almost all the stock has absorbed, add parmesan cheese. Mix and complete cooking. 

The sauce was easy. I already had some homemade tomato sauce in my fridge. I also cooked a chicken breast and shredded it. As a side note this was the first time I have ever shredded meat myself and thought it was good fun. I heated up the sauce, added the shredded chicken and simmered about 10 minutes.

Top the risotto with the sauce. Serve with a salad for a nice serving of vegetables. I also had toasted bread as I absolutely love having bread with my risotto. 

What is your favorite kind of risotto?

Homemade Chips & Guacamole

Everytime I go to my local organic grocer, I buy avocados. I heart avocado. But for as much as I love them I only them so many ways, so they tend to over ripen before I get to them. 

But this last time was different - mostly because I decided I wanted to eat guacamole. I did have the necessities on hand, however I did not have any tortilla chips. I did have soft tortillas. So I thought why not go for it and make both!

Tortilla Chip

If you have soft tortillas use those. If you are a rockstar you can make your own. On this occasion I was not a rockstar. I used about 10 tortillas You'll also need:

• About 1 tbsp oil of your choice (I used extra virgin olive oil)
• 1/2 lime
• Sea Salt
• Chipotle Chili powder.

First, preheat oven to 350F. Cut the tortilla into 8 (half, half x2, half x4). Lay out on non-stick baking sheets (cookie sheets work nicely). Sprinkle, spray or lightly brush with oil and lime juice combined, then dust on sea salt and chipotle powder every so lightly. Bake for about 20 minutes, if using more than one sheet it will be more like 30-40, and you should swap racks half way through. Keep an eye on to ensure they don't burn.

Guacamole

For the guacamole:

• 2 ripe avocados.
• 1 tomato
• 2tbsp lemon juice / juice of one lemon
• 1/2 onion
• parsley and chipotle powder to taste

Cut the avocado and tomato into small squares. Chop onion finely. Juice lemon/add lemon juice and spices. Mash. I use a potato masher since I have a little Manhattan apartment so all equipment must 'multi-task'. Enjoy with your chips! Should be good a couple of days in the fridge. 

PS: Guacamole is also awesome on turkey sandwiches. Just sayin'.

Happy Canada Day!

Photo taken in Charlottetown, PEI

As a ex-pat living in America, I just wanted to give a shout out to my home and native land, Canada. Happy Canada Day, I hope all my friends, family & readers up north have a fantastic celebration today!

I myself will be in Canada next weekend, and am looking forward to having poutine (gluten free of course). I usually have to make it at home, but if you know of a GF poutine in or around Montreal, please leave it in the comments!