Gluten free pork congee

This recipe is:

• Gluten free
• Dairy free
• Egg free
• Yeast free

I'd never come across a recipe like this before. Naturally gluten free, pork congee is like a wet risotto, but with asian flavours. And it's really, really more-ish. As I sit here writing this, I've eaten far too much. But I do so love feeling totally stuffed. :-)

Gluten free recipe: Pork Congee

400g brown rice
2 star anise
4 spring onions (scallions), sliced
Good inch of ginger, sliced
4 litres chicken stock (if you don't have that much, just add boiling water as you go along)
1 tblsp peanut oil
2 garlic cloves (crushed)
1 tsp grated fresh ginger
500g minced (ground) pork
White pepper
60ml gluten free soy sauce (tamari)
Sesame oil (to drizzle on finished dish)
2 more spring onions, sliced to garnish

Boil the rice in the chicken stock with the star anise, 4 spring onions, sliced ginger. Bring to the boil then simmer for half an hour, stirring occasionally.

Heat the oil in a frying pan and add the garlic and grated ginger - fry for 30 secs or so. Add the mince and fry for 5 minutes.

Remove the star anise and ginger from the rice. Add the mince and simmer for 10 minutes. Season with white pepper. You can let people add their own soy sauce, sesame oil and chopped spring onions.

I suggest you make about half as much again as you normally would, because people will eat tons of this stuff. I'm looking forward to the leftovers fried up for lunch tomorrow. Pork Congee - Gluten free heaven.

Gluten free bacon & leek soup recipe

This recipe is:

• Gluten free
• Dairy free
• Egg free
• Yeast free

Here in Scotland the nights are drawing in, and it's soup season again. For the next 6 months. This gluten free soup recipe is quick and tasty, so you can whip it up even if you've forgotten to prepare your soup in advance.

Gluten free bacon & leek soup

4-8 rashers bacon - can be streaky or back
3 medium sized leeks
2 pints / 1 litre stock - best if real chicken stock but cubes will do
2 bay leaves
3-4 inch sprig rosemary
Couple handfulls gluten free pasta (spirals or macaroni)
Olive oil

Fry the bacon in a little olive oil until browned. Add the leeks and continue to fry over a medium heat for about 5 minutes until the leeks are softened. Add the stock and herbs, bring back to the boil and simmer for 15 minutes. Add the gluten free pasta and continue to cook until the pasta is done. Season.

This is a hearty and filling gluten free soup that you can make in half an hour.

Posh nosh for a Wednesday - Gluten Free Spaghetti with Roast Chicken, Pine Nuts and Lemon

This recipe is:

• Gluten free
• Dairy free
• Egg free
• Yeast free

Usually we roast a chicken and don't do anything fancy to it, because we're in a rush to get in the oven so it's ready at a reasonable time. But tonight we made the effort to plan ahead and had Gluten Free Spaghetti with Roast Chicken, Pine Nuts and Lemon.

3lb free range chicken
1 garlic bulb, cloves seperated
4 tablespoons olive oil
1 tablespoon fresh thyme
2 bay leaves
1 lemon, halved
500g gluten free spaghetti e.g. Schar
2 tablespoons dried cranberries, chopped
1 teaspoon finely grated lemon zest
50g pine nuts, toasted
1 handful fresh basil and flat leaf parsley, roughly chopped
Salt and Pepper

Preheat the oven to 200oC.

Rinse the inside of the chicken. Stuff the cavity with one half of lemon, the garlic cloves, thyme and bay leaves and finish with the second lemon half. Place the chicken in a roasting tin, and drizzle with the olive oil and season with salt and pepper. Cook the chicken according to the exact weight (about an hour)- the juices should run clear or when a meat thermometer reads 87oC in the breast area.

Meanwhile, cook the pasta according to the manufacturer's instructions.

Pour the juices from the chicken into a pan. Remove the garlic from the chicken cavity, and squeeze the pulp into the juices. Add the cranberries, lemon zest and simmer over a low heat.

Remove all the meat from the chicken, and shred into bite sized portions.

Combine the chicken, pasta, sauce, pine nuts and fresh herbs and season to taste.

Baby wasn't too keen on this one - the pasta soaked up the juice and although very tasty it was quite dry. I defrosted a little hidden vegetable pasta sauce, added that to baby's food, and it was scoffed more readily.

Brainstorming gluten free food ideas

Coming up with gluten free food ideas used to be a major pain for us - and since my discovery of my food allergies it has just got worse.

But we discovered that we're both happier when the ideas for gluten free food are in place ahead of time, so now we do meal planning well ahead of time. And the funny thing is, life in general is not only less stressful when the next gluten free meal is planned, but the act of planning meals itself is really enjoyable.

Planning gluten free food ideas

How does the saying go "fail to prepare and you pail to frefare" or something. Hey, that almost makes sense.

Mmm... anyway, all we do is get out 4 or 5 cook books, grab a cup of tea each and start turning the pages. The rule is - if I can eat it, we have to make it. That gets round any faffing and ensures you make new and interesting gluten free meals. We have other rules like red meat only once a week and fish as often as possible, but there's no reason why you should give a monkey about that.

Once the meals are chosen, we write on front page of the kitchen pad the gluten free recipe name and add the ingredients to the shopping list. Then, whenever someone hits the supermarket, the gluten free meals are shopped for and ready to be whipped up come 5pm. (Any later and the baby goes off at the deep end).

The moral is, gluten free food ideas should not be left until the last minute, unless you want stress, disappointment and ultimately, divorce.

Gluten free bacon & cabbage recipe

This recipe is:

• Gluten free
• Dairy free
• Egg free
• Yeast free

What do you do for a gluten free tea when you've only got cabbage and bacon in the fridge? Why, make gluten free bacon and cabbage of course!

Gluten free bacon & cabbage

Serves 2

8 rashers of streaky organic bacon sliced into 1cm wide strips (I say organic because then you can be sure the pig was treated well, and not kept in a concrete pen all its life - ok, point made)
2 cloves garlic, crushed and chopped
6 leaves sage (fresh if you've got it), roughly chopped
Handful basil, roughly chopped
1 savoy cabbage, sliced into about 1cm thick strips
Pine nuts
Olive oil

How to make it...

Put a good couple of glugs of oil into a large frying pan - be generous because you want enough to coat the cabbage with. Add the bacon and sage and fry fairly hard for 2 minutes - you want the bacon to get a bit of colour.

In the meantime, boil the cabbage in a little water (you can just have water in the bottom of the pan and the cabbage will steam - with a lid on of course). 3 minutes should see it done - you want it still to have bite. Drain.

Put the pine nuts on to toast in a dry frying pan - careful they don't burn - I always forget about them until I'm reminded by the 'very toasted' smell. You want them a light brown.

Add the cabbage to the frying pan with the chopped basil, turn the heat up high and stir for a couple of minutes. Grind over some black pepper and serve onto warm plates. Sprinkle the pine nuts over the top.

And there you have it, what to do for a gluten free tea when all you've got is bacon and cabbage. Oh, and pine nuts. And garlic. Oh you know what I mean.

Gluten free quinoa flakes? Warning! 'The Health Store'

Quinoa flakes are great for making quinoa porridge , a warming, filling gluten free breakfast.

But beware, not all quinoa flakes are gluten free, even if they look that way.

When I wrote the above recipe for quinoa porridge, I wasn't aware of the gluten content, but the next day I had dermatitis herpatiformis (DH) on my hand.

(I'm like a human gluten test kit - if I have gluten, I get DH, so I know when I've been poisoned - pretty handy really - geddit?)

Anyway, I checked back on my food diary, and I noticed that I had unexplained DH after a few days eating my homemade quimby bars, which as the name suggests include quinoa flakes.

And so proof positive - the quinoa flakes I had (brand: 'The Health Store') were not gluten free. When I looked the packet didn't actually say 'gluten free', which I should have checked. And of course with any milled product (i.e. flakes) you need to check they use a gluten free mill. So now I'm on the lookout for truly gluten free quinoa flakes - if you know of any, let me know!

Update: A friend called 'The Health Store' and was told that wheat is used in the same area as their flakes are manufactured. The Health Store does not mark their products with a warning, although they are not marked gluten free either.

Oooh, gingery leeks

This recipe is:

• Gluten free
• Dairy free
• Egg free
• Yeast free

Gluten free recipes for leeks are hardly hard to come by, but this is particularly tasty. We rustled it up because my mum (also gluten free) was up at the weekend with some of the produce from her prolific patch, which included a giant leek.

Gingery leeks are really easy. Firstly, wash your leeks well, then cut into about 4-inch (1o cm) lengths. Cut lengthwise into strips about1/2 to 1 cm wide.

Take 1/2 inch of ginger and cut into thin strips (as thin as you can get them), then fry them very gently in a little olive oil. You don't want to colour them, just soften. After 3 or 4 minutes, put in the leeks and cook for a couple of minutes, stirring a lot to coat with the flavoured oil.

Then add a little lemon zest (1/2 tsp) and the juice of half a lemon and a little water, put the lid on the pan and steam very gently for 20-30 minutes. Check every now and again to make sure you have enough water. Grind on a little black pepper and you're away. Gingery leeks, great with fish, and gluten free as the day they were born.

Actually tasty brussel sprouts

This recipe is:

• Gluten free
• Dairy free
• Egg free
• Yeast free

If my Mum's reading this, she'll never believe it. At the age of 35 I've finally managed to enjoy brussel spouts. Since I was old enough to know what tastes bad, Christmas dinners have been marred by my wrestling with the brussel sprout spoon, with final negotiations usually resting on 3 brussel sprouts. These would be swallowed whole with a mouthful of something to mask the taste.

But no longer. I've found a gluten free recipe for brussel sprouts that is actually nice. And that can only be good news, because I've found out that sprouts are very good for you too. Which makes sense because they fit the old rule about stuff that tastes bad being good for you... er... and stuff.

Yeah, anyway here's the recipe:

1 lb (1/2 kg) sprouts -the smaller the better (they're sweeter)
1/2 inch fresh ginger, cut into thin strips
Clove garlic, crushed and roughly chopped
A little zest and juice of 1/2 orange
Gluten free soy sauce (tamari)
Olive oil
Black pepper

Take any yellowed leaves off the sprouts, chop off any stem and slice in half. Fry the garlic and ginger very gently in a couple of tablespoons of oil for 5 minutes, then drop in the sprouts. Fry them gently for 5 minutes, then add a little water and cover. Boil/steam for 5 or 6 minutes, then drain and add the orange zest, juice and gluten free soy sauce. Heat through then let them sit for a few minutes.

Grind a little fresh pepper over and enjoy, yes actually enjoy, tasty gluten free brussel sprouts. Unbelievable eh mum?