Brown Rice Vegetable Risotto

I love risotto.  I have been craving some lately so I went on a search to find a recipe that uses brown rice after noticing that our market carries short-grain brown rice.  I found this great recipe from whole foods and made a few modifications to use items I had in the house and vegetables that we found in-season at the farmer's market.  I used zucchini, carrots, and yellow squash, substituted homemade chicken stock for the vegetable stock, omitted the butter, and substituted Manchego for the Parmesan.  It was really delicious along side our shrimp wrapped in prosciutto.  The kids were excited enough about having their "cheesy rice" (which is what they call risotto) that they were willing to try all three veggies in it and they ended up loving the veggies. Definitely a success!

Gluten Free Pancakes

Ever since I switched to a gluten and dairy free diet I have been missing those Sunday mornings with my family eating something yummy and comforting like pancakes or waffles.  There has been one other time that my husband tried making me pancakes and used and all-purpose gluten-free flour.  They just weren't very good.  Even my husband who will eat just about anything wouldn't touch them.  The problem is that most gluten-free flour blends have garbanzo bean flour in them and you can definitely taste it.

One-Ingredient No-Stir Peanut Butter

My family loves peanut butter.  One of the things we have switched in our quest to eat healthier real foods has been to natural peanut butter.  The main downside to the natural peanut butter you buy in jars is that it separates and then you have to stir it and refrigerate it.  My biggest complaint has been that once refrigerated it can be very hard to spread.  Also to get a good natural, organic peanut butter it was getting quite pricey for us because of how much we go through.  We decided to try to make our own and experimented with different techniques and ingredients.  We tried our meat grinder which eventually led us to the food processor.  One of the great things we learned was that we don't need to add any oil to make this delicious peanut butter.  But by far the best thing was that this peanut butter is creamy, spreadable, and doesn't have to be stirred!  I promise you won't want to buy peanut butter anymore, it's so simple.

No-Fail Quiche

One of my most favorite sections of Food Network Magazine is when they do their mix and match recipes.  These are usually a base recipe that you can decide which ingredients you would like and make it your own.  I knew I would love the May issue when I got it because of the 50 Taco ideas advertised on the front but I was really excited when I saw the quiche recipe.  My mom actually called me to tell me she tried it and is is really fool-proof.