We just got through our first Thanksgiving gluten free. I need to give a shout out to the amazing extended family with whom we spend this holiday. All of them played along with our gluten free demands without the slightest complaint. In the end it was actually incredibly, and unexpectedly, easy. A total of two items from the dinner and dessert menus combined contained gluten, and neither of them would have interested The Boy anyway: the stuffing (it’s got sausage and The Boy is basically a vegetarian), and the Rum Cake that is doused in so much uncooked rum the three year old declares it disgusting anyway.
I also have to give a shout out to a couple of the amazing products that we used to get us through the holiday. The first one is Bob’s Red Mill Gluten-Free Cornbread Mix.
What a great product this turned out to be. While I’m always partial to homemade over mixes this one was moist and cakey, distinctly tasting of corn, and holding together like a champ instead of becoming a crumbled mess. In fact, despite me warning everyone that it was going to be a gluten free meal the cornbread went over so well it didn’t even occur to several people that the cornbread wasn’t a traditional wheat flour base.
Next up were some outstanding biscuits. We’d experimented earlier in the week with some biscuits that tasted pretty good to me and to The Boy, but they didn’t rise and looked a lot like hockey pucks. He ate three for breakfast with butter on them, but his sister couldn’t be persuaded to accept them. I was not to be deterred though, and bought another brand to try. These came out light and fluffy and as biscuity as a biscuit could hope to be. I think The Boy ate 4 of them as his Thanksgiving dinner AND his sister ate them too. That my friends, is success!
The brand is 1-2-3 Gluten Free and since the biscuits turned out this well I’m going to be searching out, and experimenting with, their other products also.
In the meanwhile, I’m going to be making a batch of pancakes tomorrow morning with Bob’s Red Mill Gluten Free Baking Mix… I’ll let you know how they turn out. This will be my fifth attempt at GF pancakes. Neither The Boy, nor his sister, have given me the green light on any previous batches. But we still move ever onward.
Sounds great. It would seem that GF has really taken hold. While shopping for Thanksgiving dinner, I noticed many products with GF on the label. Thank goodness.
That’s so fantastic! I’ve been noticing all the gluten-free products lately too. I’m so glad it’s getting easier to cook for food allergies!