My Instagram Feast

Clockwise from top left: the ever amazing cress (sewn by my even more amazing 3 yo on cotton wool, can’t beat it), a griddled courgette, aubergine, mozarella and tomato salad; good old strawberries and ice cream; pesto and spinach potato salad with carrot, tomatoes and fruit salad for al fresco eating on the grass outside our flat, more potato salad with yummy smoked salmon; home made ice pops – a daily habit at the mo; feta, cucumber, spinach and mint salad with the new Genius tomato and basil pittas – approved, very scrummy cheese and potato pie from Clives at the Allergy and Free From show; and my lazy dinner du jour of pasta, pesto and sugar snap peas – I know I’m a real gourmet!

Chocamole

I know, I know everyone has done a chocamole, but I was intrigued, surely a green fruit mixed with cocoa could not make a thick, creamy and satisfying pudding. It does though. I made a quick portion tonight using this recipe herewith the maple syrup substituted with agave. I’ve been eating it whilst reading the health benefits of avocados, I know, multi tasking pudding eating with web reading, that’s just how I roll.

If this post looks a bit funny it’s because it’s my first complete upload from the app on my phone, fingers crossed it works though.

Cauliflower and Spring Onion Bhajis

Just in case you were wondering, I do write sometimes, look here is some proof!

Marks and Spencer’s Gluten Free Chocolate Muffins

Marks and Spencer’s Gluten Free Chocolate Muffin

Marks and Sparks are doing pretty well at this whole gluten-free lark, I happened to be in need of a little respite in the Croydon branch today so decided to have a little nosey at what one might purchase for elevenses in their Cafe Revive and what did I find? Choice, that’s what.  There were not only these pretty damn delicious and intensely chocolatey muffins, there were fruit cakes, sandwiches and the offer of a wrapped gluten-free roll with their soups.  Yes that’s right, you are not hallucinating, as well as the usual standby of jacket potatoes there was quite a selection of both sweet and savoury offerings for us gluten sensitive coeliacs.  So I salute you M&S, well done, and I think I shall be returning around lunch time next week for a taste of one of the more substantial savoury offerings.

I’ll keep you posted dear readers but in the mean time, what about you?  Found any more new and exciting gluten-free morsels on the high street?  Let me know!

New Costa Gluten Free Bakewell Tarts – Review

I’m getting a bit obsessed by new gluten free products in cafes and was most pleased to see a new addition to Costa’s pretty limited selection of gluten free goodies, I mean everyone loves a brownie and fruit cake is good but sometimes you just want a bit more choice, yeah?

Costa Gluten Free Bakewell Tarts

So when I saw these pretty little tarts I quickly placed them on my tray, paid and headed off to snaffle them in a corner.  They are very cute mini tarts and the pastry is good quality and tasty but unfortunately being so small they lack that real almond kick you get from the frangipane in the bigger versions and sadly they were rather swamped in a thick layer of fondant icing.  So the verdict, well, if you dig icing and pastry go for them but I think in future I’ll be sticking to a bit of brownie with my coffee.

Have you sampled any new gluten free goodies?  Have you tried these? Let me know what you think…

My Instagram Feast

I’ve been between phones this week and am not a happy bunny about the fact I’m still using my old phone over 2 weeks after purchasing my new one but that is something I need to tackle with the dreaded O2 and not bore my lovely readers with, anyways it means I’m a little short on choice of pictures to use but hey ho, it’s still a lil peek into what has fallen into my belly over the last week.

From top left: chicken and chorizo tray bake, my favourite icecream flavour in frozen yoghurt – trying to convince myself I was beeing healthy even though I ate the tub in less than 5 days, amazeball gluten free chinese feast courtesy of my dad on Friday night, beautiful gf afternoon tea from the lovely Tiffen in West Bridgford, a frickin awesome gf double chocolate eclair made again by my most talented father (I’ve only eaten one so far dad, although not sure how long the other one is going to last in the fridge) and these very moreish crisps from Tescos, a rather healthy week no?!

Isabel’s Pizza Dough Mix – Review

I’ve been meaning to write a short post about this wonder mix for some time.  This stuff is pretty much the closest I’ve got to a ‘normal’ pizzeria style base.  Not only that but it also doubles as a pretty awesome flat bread come garlic bread for chowing down with everything from curries to salads or just as a ‘I need carbs, craving doughy things’ snack (you know what I mean right?!).

So below is my gorgeous gluten free pizza with a tomato sauce, mozzarella and chorizo topping.

And just under here is my mouthwatering, lipsmacking, slightly chewy, slightly crispy, buttery garlic flat bread served here with a lentil and aubergine curry and trust me this is going to be appearing more than weekly on my plate from now on.   Once you’ve made the dough you can roll these out and freeze them ready to whack in the oven any time the craving takes you, I stick mine in the ice cube tray to keep them flat.

The mix is made from cassava starch, milk powder, salt and ‘natural flavours’ (whatever that means) and I buy mine from Ocado but if you look at their lovely website you can order online or find alternative stockists.

1 Curry Sauce 3 Ways

So last week I made that chickpea curry here, well guess what, I had some left over sauce and managed to stretch it out into 3 different dishes over the week with leftovers for lunch (I didn’t count the leftovers in the title).   Pretty smart huh? Anyways want to know the details of my genius? (I’ll stop with the sickening over confidence now)

1.  I started with the curry sauce on Sunday and made this lovely chickpea curry, then I portioned off some of that and added the leftovers of my roast into a tub and packed that up for lunch.

Chickpea Curry

2.  On Tuesday night I roasted off some aubergine chunks and boiled some lentils then plonked them all in a pot with half of the remaining curry sauce.  This provided me with dinner for one and a portion for lunch the next day.  For dinner I served it with a garlic flat bread using Isabel’s fantastic gluten free pizza dough mix smothered in garlic butter.

Aubergine and Lentil Curry with Gluten Free Garlic Flat Bread

3.  Then the final dish was a baked egg in curry sauce with peas and a gluten free pitta (or 2).  I poured the leftover sauce into a small baking dish (I heart Falconware!), cracked in an egg and baked in the oven at 200 for about 20 minutes.  Just before it was ready I boiled up some peas, scattered them across and toasted a pitta to dip in.

Curry Baked Egg with Peas and Pitta

So my dear readers, what d’ya think?  Nifty huh? Hope you like it x

My Instagram Feast

I said it would be a regular, so true to my word here is my recent Instagram feast:

From top left: Veggie Thali from Exmouth Market, Rhubarb and Ginger Crumble featured on LiveGlutenFree, veggies ready for Sunday roast, Chickpea Curry featured earlier in the week, 'oops I ate my dinner before taking a picture' - aka too greedy for own good, gluten free pizza made with Isabel's pizza dough mix, curry no 2 with aubergines and lentils and Isabel's pizza dough made into a garlic flat bread, breakfast of Bakery on Main St gluten free muesli mixed with yoghurt and fruit, and a recent supermarket indulgence of Warburtons Blueberry muffins, mmmm...

Recipe for the Gluten Free Rhubarb and Ginger Crumble can be found here.

Chickpea curry here.

If you’d like to see my last Instagram Feast you can click here.

Thanks for reading

Gluten Free on the Go

So I thought I’d have a go at another regular slot and feature some of the gluten free snackage and food products I’ve begun to notice popping up in cafes and highstreets recently.

So we’re going to start with that good old British stalwart, Marks and Spencers.  Now  M&S have been stocking some pretty awesome gluten free goodies for sometime in their food stores, their almond bakewell tray bake is something quite special and they do bread and other offerings too, not totally convinced on the bread personally but its good to know they are trying, right?  Anyway, did you know they had started selling gluten free sandwiches? Yeah? Yes, I know, I’m a bit slow on the uptake here but a couple of months ago I heard about them here and then about a month ago, desperate for a quick reprieve from the wails of ‘I’m hungry’ from my 3 year old, I collapsed into M&S Cafe Revive in Croydon to sate her poor rumbling belly.  And it was just as I was contemplating eating a whole casserole ready meal type affair from the cafe fridge that I saw them, gluten free cheese and pickle ploughmans sandwiches.

Sorry for the crappy picture here, it's a tad dim in the Cafe Revive Croydon!

The sandwich was pretty good, I did leave the crusts (not because I don’t want my hair to go curly!) because they were a tad dry and crumbly.  However the main body of the sandwich was soft and packed with filling, unlike alot of packed sandwiches I’ve had in the past.  So all in all I’d probably buy one again, but I would like to see them in all or at least more of their cafes and food stores, when I went to my parents over the Easter break they weren’t stocking them and so far Croydon is the only M&S I have spotted them in.  Have you seen these sandwiches in your local M&S?  Do you know of any better gluten free sandwich choices on the highstreet?  Let me know…