411 Granola – gluten, dairy, egg and nut free

Store bought granola is too expensive. Store bought granola that is gluten/dairy/nut free is even more expensive, and I have found that the taste is hit or miss.

This is a really basic granola, which happens to be my favorite kind. The last time we made this, it disappeared so fast  I didn’t have time to photograph it. It’s that good.  We like it with milk for breakfast, out of hand for snacking, or layered with fruit and yogurt for a parfait.

I call it 411 granola to remind me of the amount of each ingredient. Truthfully though I usually double this recipe and make 822 granola. It really goes that fast around here.

This is a great recipe for cooking with your kids. Monkey helps me make this all the time.

411 Granola (from Feeding My Kid)

4 cups certified gluten free rolled oats

1  cup coconut oil, melted

1 c. maple syrup

Preheat oven to 300 degrees.Mix the  ingredients and pour onto two baking sheets lined with parchment paper. Bake for 40 minutes, stirring every 10 minutes to keep the outer edges from burning.

After this cools, you can add dried fruit or raisins if you so desire.

Almost Eggless Tropical French Toast – dairy and gluten free

I say “almost eggless” because although the batter doesn’t contain any eggs, the gluten free bread that we use does.  I am still looking for a good, egg free/gluten free/dairy free bread.  This recipe is adapted from the vegan cookbook, The Vegetarian No-Cholesterol Family Style Cookbook. I actually cook from this cookbook a fair amount - Shepherd’s Pie, Teriaki Vegetables with Couscous (we do rice couscous instead), and brownies. I find that because vegan recipes are already dairy and egg free, they can be easier to convert.

Almost Eggless Tropical French Toast (from Feeding My Kid)

Adapted from The Vegetarian No-Cholesterol Family Style Cookbook

2 ripe bananas

1 cup full fat (not lite) coconut milk

1/4 cup pineapple tidbits in juice

dash cinnamon

gluten free bread of your choice

Combine all ingredients except bread in a blender, and blend until smooth. Pour into a pie plate. Dip bread in mixture and cook on a griddle until browned.

Apple Cinnamon Muffins – dairy, gluten, egg free

My three year old son and I are doing a five week parent/child class at the local Waldorf school. One of the kids in his class just turned four, so there was cake. Luckily, the instructor was very thoughtful to let me know ahead of time that the cake would be an apple cinnamon cake.

When I have to make a substitution, I like it to be as much like the original as possible. Here is what I came up with. It is based on the Apple Spice Cake in Carol Fenster’s book, Gluten Free 101. I made it dairy and egg free, and dialed the spices down to appeal to a three year old (the original had ginger, nutmeg, cloves and molasses in it.)

Apple Cinnamon Muffins (from Feeding My Kid)

3 cups gluten free flour mix

2 tsp xanthan gum (omit if your flour blend already contains xanthan or guar gum)

1 1/2 tsp baking soda

1 tsp salt

1 Tbsp cinnamon

3 tsp Ener G Egg Replacer

1 1/2 cups dairy free milk (almond, rice, soy)

2 cups packed brown sugar

3/4 cup Earth Balance spread

1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract

1 cup peeled grated Granny Smith apples

1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Coat a muffin tin with cooking spray.

2. In a large mixing bowl, sift together flour mix, xanthan gum, baking soda, salt, cinnamon and Egg Replacer.

3. Combine milk and brown sugar in a saucepan, and bring to a boil over medium heat. Remove from heat and add the Earth Balance and vanilla. Stir to melt butter.

4. Add butter mixture to flour mixture and mix until well blended.

5. Pour batter into muffin tins. Bake 25 minutes or until they pass the toothpick test.  Makes 18 muffins. Let cool, then drizzle with glaze.

Powdered Sugar Glaze (from Feeding My Kid)

1 cup powdered sugar

1 1/2 Tbsp dairy free milk (coconut, soy, almond)

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

Mix ingredients together and stir to get rid of any lumps.

Buckwheat Oatmeal Blender Waffles

These waffles are super easy. As the name implies, the batter is made in your blender. I have a Vitamix blender that holds eight cups and has a fairly wide base. If you have a smaller blender, I suggest that you halve the recipe when first making it to make sure that your blender would hold the full recipe amount. If your blender has a fairly narrow base, you may need to halve it because all the oats won’t be able to reach the blade to be ground into flour.

As you may or may not know, buckwheat is a gluten free grain, even though “wheat” is in the name. Oats should be gluten free, but they aren’t because of the cross-contamination with wheat during processing. Be sure to use certified gluten free oats in this recipe to make sure that it is gluten free.

I particularly like that this recipe doesn’t require any eggs, making it a more cost effective choice and great for those with egg allergies. Even without eggs, these waffles are moist and yummy. We serve them with Earth Balance spread and pure maple syrup, or with sauteed cinnamon apples.

Blender Buckwheat Oat Waffles (from Feeding My Kid)

2 cups certified gluten free oats

1 cup buckwheat flour

½ tsp salt

2 tsp baking powder

2 ½ cups water

2 Tbsp vegetable oil

4 tsp agave nectar

Place oatmeal in blender and grind into flour.  Add remaining ingredients and blend well. Let batter sit a couple of  minutes to thicken. Blend again briefly. Pour into hot waffle iron.

Makes about 10 medium size waffles or 6-8 large waffles.