Gout throws a monkey wrench into things....

Last month I had a gout attack. The doctor explained how gout is a form of arthritis. (I didn't know that; I knew it had to do with a build up of uric acid, but that was about it.) When I got home from Doctors on Duty, I started research on gout, and I learned that many of the foods I had recently been eating contained purine, a substance that can cause gout in various joints. Foods high in purine include cauliflower, mushrooms, asparagus, and spinach.I'd been eating a lot of tomatoes, spinach,mushrooms, and bell peppers, as well as using chili peppers. Also, even though I know I shouldn't I'd been eating some regular potatoes! Other foods one is to avoid include organ meat such as liver, shell fish including lobster, crab, and shrimp. I'd been enjoying shrimp and crab shortly before the attack.

This month I went to my regular doctor, and I explained to her about the gout attack. She now wants to do several tests for rheumatoid arthritis, autoimmune diseases and the like. In doing more research on arthritis I rediscovered something I'd read many years ago: nightshades are not helpful to your body if you have arthritis.

Last week I decided to go on a one month experiment to determine whether that's true for me or not. After doing my three month guinea pig experiment on myself two years ago and learning that indeed grains and legumes do hinder the absorption of iron, calcium, magnesium and zinc, I know it's best to find out for myself if there is any truth in the claim. Interestingly enough, I've noticed that after only a few days of not eating any nightshades, there is no more residual swelling in my left hand and wrist--there was last week when my doctor examined me. I also am not as achy all over as I was before stopping the nightshades.

Sigh...so, I've been learning to be even more thoughtful in what I eat. A friend asked me on Sunday what is left to eat if one doesn't eat any grains, legumes, or nightshades. The answer is lots! I haven't cut out meats; I've read that some people with arthritis tolerate chicken better than turkey. I pay attention to whether or not I'm in pain, and I take note of what seems to make a difference.

Oh yes, the doctor who diagnosed the gout also said to avoid fructose because there has been research that indicates that can be a trigger. I'm careful with that anyway, but now I'm even more careful.

It's been over a year since I last posted!!

I knew some time has passed since I last posted, but didn't realize it's been a whole year!!

What's new with me? I've read more material about eating grain/gluten free, so that hasn't changed. However, authors don't always agree to what's best when one has diabetes and celiac. Well, for celiac, most people do agree: DON'T EAT ANY GRAINS! I don't so that's a non-issue with me. The biggest issue has to do with my blood sugar. Questions about fructose and various sweeteners abound for me. I use some sugar in some recipes--I usually reduce the amount from what the recipe calls for. However, I've been avoiding the artificial sweeteners and the alternative ones in favor of using honey and maple syrup. But, some people say to avoid those and use raw stevia. I haven't tried that yet. I'll have to do more research to find out how to substitute it in recipes I've already altered.

I still use blanched almond flour, almond butter, and/or almond paste in my baking. They work great and have a more neutral flavor than coconut products have. Last week I bought some So Delicious Coconut Milk Egg Nog. It tasted pretty good, but one does taste the coconut.

I'm thinking about trying to be even more serious about eliminating sweeteners, but at this point I'm just thinking about it and not doing anything about it.

One thing that concerns me was that gout attack I experienced a few weeks ago. My left wrist and hand were involved, and the pain was awful. The doctor said that purines in foods like cauliflower, asparagus, mushrooms, spinach, all fish and meats, and beer can be the culprits. He also said that fructose is suspected as being a culprit. Just before I had gout I'd been eating a lot of cauliflower, mushrooms,spinach, and liver. I don't drink beer any longer because it's brewed from grains. Now I'm being careful with the vegetables that are rich in purines.

Sometimes it becomes rather daunting trying to figure out how to eat to be healthy!!

Grain-free Thanksgiving!

This year I prepared my Thanksgiving dinner over the course of several days. I wasn't home to eat it on Thanksgiving day, but I wanted all my favorite dishes, and experimented with a new one. My Thanksgiving feast included a free-range, organic roast turkey, Brussel sprouts in cheese sauce, Danish red cabbage, Guy Fieri's whiskey glazed sweet potato and apple casserole, and a crustless pumpkin pie. I also had Trader Joe's cranberry-orange relish, which I buy every year.

I made the Danish red cabbage on Monday after school as well as the pumpkin pie without a crust. After school on Tuesday I baked the turkey and made the Brussel sprouts with cheese sauce. On Wednesday morning I made Guy Fieri's recipe for the bourbon glazed sweet potato and apple casserole. Each individual dish came out perfectly! On Thanksgiving I had a feast at a friend's house and didn't eat any of the food I'd prepared. Today I ate a complete meal, and the plate was very colorful!

This morning I cooked the carcass of the turkey and made a nice soup, adding carrots, onions and celery to the broth once it was made. I enjoyed that for lunch.

I don't recall what I made last year for Thanksgiving, but I had just started going grain-free at the time and a lot of it was a struggle. Now, I have many favorite foods which are grain-free, so it's not very much of a struggle. Visiting family or friends for Thanksgiving dinner can be a bit of a challenge since there are a number of traditional dishes that I cannot eat. However, as I have said to many of my friends over the year, I haven't starved yet! There's always food I can eat.

Making/Using Blanched Almond Flour

Several months ago I blanched a lot of whole almonds and put them into the freezer. Today I turned them into flour. It took very little time, in fact, it took less time than it did to turn the blanched almond slices I bought at Trader Joe's into flour. It is counter-intuitive! I fully expected that it would take longer (more seconds) to turn the whole almonds into flour than the almond slices. Wrong!

Now I have more blanched almond flour to use in making delicious banana-nut muffins and other goodies.

An interesting discovery in all of this is that muffins and other baked goods made with blanched almond flour heat up perfectly in the microwave. The texture doesn't change and isn't ruined the way baked goods made from wheat flour is.

I did order a whole case of almond paste from the American Almond Products company. I didn't trust myself to make it correctly, and I have many recipes that call for almond paste. I made a batch of "kransekage" cookies the other day. These are amongst my favorite treats. I want to make a almond paste chocolate torte again for the holidays. I tried it last year and it was delicious. There are also recipes for frangipane that requires almond paste.

The adventure continues!

Catch up time!

So, I just published my latest recipe fine, but now I want to share what's been going on lately. First of all, I saw my doctor last week, and she's still very pleased with how I'm doing. My bloodwork is OK, my blood pressure is perfect, and so is my weight. She's going to keep me at the lower dose of the diabetes medication, which is good.

My A1c was up a bit from what it was in May, but I told her I've been enjoying a lot of the summer fruits--peaches, nectarines, grapes, strawberries, and the like--as well as some fruit juices, so she attributes that small increase to that.

My iron count has improved a bit, but was still low. I confessed that I hadn't been taking the iron pills like I was supposed to all the time (hardly ever, if truth be known), so now I'm to take two pills a day for three months... I hope it works!

In terms of cooking and eating, I keep figuring out new things to do and have found a new place to eat.

In May my doctor wanted to try out the grain free spice cake I make, and last week she told me how delicious it was and thanked me for the recipe.

In August a friend introduced me to a wonderful tri-tip salad that a local barbecue place makes. It's addictive, and I've been back several times since!

I've been mixing cottage cheese with a couple eggs and scrambling that for breakfast. That mixture along with a grain-free banana nut muffin will keep me filled for hours!

I've also been making what I call a meat pizza. I make a mixture of ground beef (grass fed and finished), with chopped onions, bell peppers, oregano, basil, thyme, tomato paste etc., pat that into a pyrex pie plate, sprinkle smoky grated cheeses on top, and bake it at 350 for 35 minutes or so. It tastes great along with a salad or veggie of your choice, and it's totally grain-free.

Besides fruit for dessert, or spice cake or grain-free chocolate chip cookies, I have found that Trader Joe's has some good grain free ice cream. (Imagine ice cream having to be labeled gluten or grain free!) Santa Cruz Organics makes a fabulous chocolate-mint sauce that's grain/gluten free. Many gelatos are grain-free, as are many sorbets, but be careful to check the labels.

That's it for today!

Holy Cow, it's been more than a month since my last post!

I've just finished making grain-free cheese crackers. They are delicious, and I'll make them again and again!

I used the smoky cheese blend of grated cheeses from Trader Joe's rather than just shredded cheddar cheese. I love the flavor of the smoky cheeses. The one thing I didn't do correctly was roll the dough thin enough. The recipe said to roll it until it was 1/16 of an inch thin, but I didn't manage that except on the edges. Next time I'll be sure to do that because it's necessary.

One thing I did add to the recipe was a light sprinkle of salt on the crackers before they were baked. It makes them a little more Cheez-Its like.

In order to correct my mistake of not rolling the dough thin enough, after I cut the crackers apart, I baked them again for ten minutes at 310 F in order to crisp them up. (The parts that were thin enough baked up nice and crisp to begin with.)

Here's the recipe:

2 1/2 C blanched almond flour
1 C grated smoky cheeses (cheddar or a cheddar blend)
1/4 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. baking soda
2 eggs
3 tbsp. grapeseed oil

Preheat oven to 350 F

Whisk together eggs and grapeseed oil, then pour that into the already combined dry ingredients. Work it to make a nice dough. (It's not sticky.)

Take out two baking sheets. Then cut three pieces of parchment paper the same size as the baking sheets.

Divide the dough in half.

Roll out one piece of the dough between two pieces of parchment paper. Roll it until it is only 1/16 of an inch thin.Remove top piece of parchment paper. Score the dough into the size crackers you want (1"x1", or 2" x 2"), then slide the parchment paper onto a baking sheet and bake the crackers until golden in color. (12-15 minutes or so)

Repeat with second piece of dough.

You can lightly sprinkle the dough with salt before baking if you like.

Not exactly reinventing the wheel...

Last night I decided I wanted to recreate an almond tartlet kind of thing that I used to buy at Deluxe Foods. It was sort of like a muffin, but not exactly. It had almond paste in it, but of course it was made of flour.

I have two different recipes that I thought of combining to make what I wanted, but then I wondered what I would find if I entered the words: "moist", "dense" "almond" and "tartlet" on google. What came up were lots of different recipes for moist, dense tartlets, most made with lemon or chocolate. Then I saw one for an almond cake. I checked the recipe and thought, "Aha! I can alter this recipe and perhaps it'll come out the way I want it."

This morning I made the experiment. I changed the recipe from using regular flour to almond flour, and from using sugar to using agave nectar. Instead of baking it as a cake in a springform pan I baked them in a muffin pan. Instead of sprinkling the tops with sliced almonds and sugar, I just used sliced almonds. I also cut down the baking time.

I like the results. They are nice and moist, and the flavor is good. Here's the recipe:
Ruth's Almond Tartlets
Preheat oven to 350 F
In one bowl combine
3/4 C melted butter
3/4 C agave nectar
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 1/2 tsp almond extract
1/2 tsp salt
1 1/2 C blanched almond flour

Depending upon the size of the muffin cups, fill 10 of them with the batter, then sprinkle the tops with sliced almonds.
Bake for about 30 minutes until golden brown.
Let cool in muffin pan for about ten minutes, then turn out onto cooling rack to completely cool.

I may continue to experiment. This is the one for today!