GLUTEN FREE CHILI

My youngest, when she was 19 years old, was diagnosed with a wheat allergy .... this is different than Celiac, that is an issue with the little fingers in your intestines which pull the nutrients from food and mosve it along the tract ... at least that was the way it was described to my daughter - or maybe its just the way she described it to me.

This is an actual allergy, which if she gets even a little bit - say a grain flying through the air - it can put her in terrible discomfort.  
And Benedryl will NOT help ... in fact, most of the time she needs to suffer through ... a massive dose will land her in the hospital while they monitor her.

So, this also means that several foods which we enjoy as a family had to be changed -- and it also educated us on how many products actually contain flour as a thickener.

Chili mix is one of them ... I always made a giant batch and jarred up the extra for quick meals for my in-laws ... and, yes, without thinking I used these chili flavoring packets..

Now, I had to find a new way to make the same stuff ... minus chili packets ... sans most chili powder, even (most use a flour derivative as an anti-caking agent) ... in fact, most pre-canned "Chili Beans" (chili flavored red/kidney beans) use flour in their flavoring mix as well.

I was looking at my canning books - I've got a few - and noticed that very often they would list several of these same ingredients in them as well.

But canning rules say NO starch (other than potatoes and corn), NO rice, NO noodles, etc. so it really threw me for a loop.

But I have figured it aout ... and it cans, er, jars up wonderfully as well.

Here is my Instant Pot version ...

Gluten-Free Chili WITH Beans
Ingredients:
1 Cup Kidney beans, dry
1/2 Cup EACH: Black/Trutle beans, Pinto beans, Great Northern/Navy Beans, or any bean you like (AVOID legumes and split peas) ... Dry.
These measurements are after the beans are "sorted" (check for rocks and/or broken/shriveled beans), rinsed (until water comes off clear), and placed in the pot
1-2 Tablespoons Kosher salt, optional but it really improves the flavor
2 Bay leaves (for extra flavor, we notice when they are not there)

Cover with COLD water enough to cover the beans by at least 3 inches of water.
Pressure cook for 45-60 minutes ... let pressure release NATURALLY (after its done cooking, just let it sit until the "pin" drops)

Drain the beans ...

2# burger
2# sausage
Brown on saute until all pink is gone, but no reason to get it all crisp ... just no longer pink.
1 large onion, diced to preferred size (I like 1/2 inch pieces because I have a chopper, but I used to make them much larger as well)
Toss the onion in with the meat and "sweat it" only do NOT use salt - remember we added it to the beans.

2 teaspoons minced garlic
1 teaspoon black pepper (I'm not a pepper fan, if you want more, go ahead)
and then add the following items:

2 cans tomatoes, dieced
2 cans stewed tomatoes (I like them, if you do not you can add more diced)
1 large bottle of GLUTEN FREE Salsa or Picante sauce (I prefer Mild, but my daughter buys Medium)
12 ounces water (I use it to clean out all the cans/jar and pour into the pot)
The pre-cooked beans.

Pressure cook for 60-90 minutes (depending on how soft you want your beans), again lets the pressure come down NATURALLY ... wait for that pin to drop.

Pull out the bay leaves, give it a stir, and voila!!! 

A delicious Gluten-Free Chili which your family will love as well.

You can even use less water (remember, you MUST have no less than 1 cupt of liquid to make steam, and the beans will absorb some) or you can use the "saute" mode to cook off some of the liquid if you prefer either a thicker chili, or want to use it for a chip dip.

NOTES
This time I did not add the Bay Leaves - I forgot - and we really tasted the differnece in the chili .... since I usually put bay into all my soups and stews, the kids zeroed in on it right away.
Also, I add the Bay leaves during the bean cooking process and leave them in until after the chili is finished so that we can get the full Bay flavoring.

If you chose I do can/jar this up but since I do not have ANY treaining from upper education in this science -- remember, cooking IS SCIENCE - as well as Art ... I do not feel qualified to say anything about it.

I do recommend that you go to the USDA ONLINE Guide to Food Preservation ... you should be able to find it with a quick internet search (I prefer Goodle these days, but Yahoo is a boog one too ... I'm not a fan of Bing, but hubby likes it)

That's it!

Enjoy!

Just remember -- we prefer BEANS in our chili .... you may not ... up here, if there's no beans, then its treated like Taco Meat.

BEAN SOUP

 SURPRISE!!!  LOOK WHO'S BACK!

I am a firm converter to the Instant Pot ... but you can still do this in a traditional Slow Cooker or even a stove top pressure cooker (although, I only know how to use a stove top pressure canner as a cooker)

But I used my Instant Pot ... but if you aren't, wash, pick over, and soak your beans over night - or do the Quick Cook method on the package.

INGREDIENTS/INSTRUCTIONS
1 cup UNCOOKED Navy or Great Northern Beans, raw (hard)
1 T salt (I prefer Kosher Salt)
Enough water to cover by at least 2 inches (cold water is best)

Pressure cook for 45-1 hour, when done let depressurize naturally (just until the top releases on its own)
Drain thoroughly.

Place pot back in cooker, turn on "Saute" mode and add:
1/4 Cup butter
1 medium onion or 1/2 large onion, diced
1 carrot per person, peeled and diced
1 rib celery per person, sliced 
1-2 cups Cauliflower, cut into small flowerets
2 tsp garlic, minced

Saute until onions are soft but not browned.
Add 1 qt broth (I used chicken broth but beef will work as well)
Ham, diced - I used leftovers from Easter
Pepper, to taste
1 tsp. Powdered Mustard
1 tsp garlic, powder

Place lid on, set to "manual" or "Pressure Cook" , set for 1 hour.

You can eat this right away once it gets done ... but I let it rest for 30 minutes while husband and son did outside work.

This amount fed us for 2 days ... and I still have a little left ... I found it still needed a little salt though, but then I used a NO sodium broth ...

We all had seconds, so it must have been good.
=======================================
WHAT NEEDS CHANGING:
~ I would say, add salt ... I added it when I cooked the beans by themselves, but by the time they finished the second cooking they became pretty bland.
~ I would have also shortened the timie for the second cooking ... some of the beans were a tad too soft for my taste, but then I like a firm bean that easily gives but still holds its shape.
~ The cauliflower disappears into the soup, just kind of disintegrates.
~ The color ... its a pretty yucky biege, not sure if its from the beans or the pepper I used.  Or it can be from the chicken broth as well, I guess.

WHAT I REALLY LIKED:
~ The cauliflower disappears into the broth, this means you will be able to get even more veggies into your kids
~ The beans & cauliflower help to thicken the broth just enough for a "stick to your ribs" supper
~ The taste! I haven't had a really good bean soup since I worked at the deli in college ... this was pretty close!

I have never had a soup that uses powdered mustard before ... I couldn't find mine at the time, so I had omitted it ... but I'm betting it would have added a wonderful kick, and gone well with the ham.

Also, Ham broth ... or cooking it with a ham bone in the final cooking time.

This is on my short list of foods for Opening Weekend at the Resort this year.

PYREX vs. pyrex ... YES THERE'S A HUGE DIFFERENCE

 WOW - its been a long time since I've posted on here.

Sorry.

Okay - onto Pyrex ...

I always knew there was a difference in today's Pyrex as compared to stuff from my childhood ...
I remember in Chem class in high school Mr. Glock telling us it was safe to only put the Pyrex test tubes into the flame of the Bunson burners, because they were made to take the heat ... 

And, yes, Pyrex was developed for chem labs! and amde its way into the kitchens of the world.

Here's a quick video (NOT MINE) which explains the difference:

But what it does not say is that the company actually SOLD its domestic division in the 80s or 90s to a comoany in Europe ... at least that was the story I heard ... thus the switch from uppercase PYREX to lowercase pyrex ... 

But this wasn't the only change ...

Cost-wise, the original formula was too expensive to make in Europe, so they figured out a cheaper, but still "viable" version of the product.

The American (PYREX) still uses the original formula but because of the selling of that division, they can NOT sell the better product under the PYREX name for household use.

Sad ...

Now if you have pyrex - while the product is still good, don't get me wrong - you will need to let it come to room temp before going from hot to cold, or from cold to hot ... and according to this video, it sounds like NEVER from the freezer to the oven.

Yes - there have been several stories on You Tube about glassware cracking, or even exploding, when taken from freezer to oven.

READY, SET, STOP

 yeah yeah yeah ... I know ... I should have my Instant Pot up by now, but I don't ... long story ... hoping it will be up and going by .... Aprl

Meanwhile -- I have taken to pre-cooking my ground meats and splitting them up, since most of it is used in crumbled meat pieces anyways.  I know I will have to use them up within 3 months of cooking and then freezing but that shouldn't be an issue in the long run.

Today I did up 10# of meat ...

    5# or so done up in 1/2# packages (total of 10)

    4# or close to it, cooked and then split into 1# packages (total of 4)

    1#, likely a tad more, turned into tonight's supper of salisbury steak, modified for my daughter's Low FODMAP (?) diet ... no onions, but she can have garlic ... total of 4 patties which have, well crumbled.

then on top of all this I decided to cut up and freeze a container of mushrooms I had asked hubby to get for us ... pre-daughter's diet ... I cut them in half and then freeze them - decided not to blanch them since the majority of the time I'm just gonna plop them into a sauce anyways ...

    1# mushrooms, split into 4 1/4# packages

then there was the Mixed Veggies hubby got me ... he bought them at Sam's Club and he got me a HUGE bag ... looked like about 5# of mixed veggies -- hubby will not eat Veg-All because it has lima beans in them (he hates lima beans with a passion!) ... so I was shocked to see him buy such a large bag - I haven't looked to see what exactly is in there but I'm assuming NO lima beans.

I opened the bag expecting to split it into a bunch of 10oz packages ... what I found was SHOCKING - at least for me ... 

Sam's Club has gone the way of CostCo when it comes to their veggies ... instead of being one huge bag of veg, I found it contained 6 smaller bags of veg - but still larger than I can buy at the store.  

So ...

    3 - 24 oz packages of mixed veg

    6 - 10 oz packages of mixed veggies

    1 - package of extra veggies for supper tonight

and that's it.

So it was definitely a "Read, Set, Stop" type of day.

And bitterly cold.

It was -11F for the longest time today, so I tried to use it to freeze my mushrooms and 1/2# packages of meat.  But I found that even after **2 hours**  the MEAT was still thawed, but the mushrooms were pretty firm.

I don't understand it -- I would have thought it would have frozen twice as fast as in the deep freeze ... but somehow, they didn't seem to freeze any faster at all!  hmmmm ... its a puzzlement.

OH MY GOODNESS - "CHRISTMAS" WAS GREAT!!

 WOW!!  That is all I can say ... WOW!!!

My hubby and daughter went all out for me this year ...

Daughter found me a wonderful Tea set = pot and cups WITH saucers! at a local thrift store -- don't judge us, we love a good Thrift (last year she found a FULL tea set, pot, creamer, sugarer, tea cups, saucers for $10!!!!!)

So now I have a tea setting for 4 people ... I've never had that - just the pot, creamer, sugar pot - I absolutely love it 

Hubby and daughter went to WalMart and she talked him into the Ultimate gift ...   for me at least ... 

For the last 2 years I've been using my youngest son's Instant Pot at the resort (Silver Bay Sunset Get=a=way in Luck, WI ... on lovely Bone Lake .... sorry, shameless plug) ... and I fell in love with it

It does everything - even cooks PASTA in 4 minutes, plus pressuring time - and its PERFECT, except the size - I found the 6 quart model to be a little small for me - we feed more than 3 people more than 1/2 the time and they are all adults with BIG appetites 

Well - not sure which was listening, but I got an **8 QUART** Instant Pot!!!

Only have 3 issues - but 2 are easy to fix:

~ it did NOT come with a rack for the bottom - you don't want food sitting on the bottom of the pot because it could scorch

~ Only 1 gasket, and Wal*Mart didn't sell any replacements for this size

These two will be easy to fix - I have a "UFO" steamer which I can use or a few other ways that I've lerned over the years ... and I'm hoping to be able to find another gasket on Amazon, maybe even QVC if necessary (they sell 8-qts too)

the last issue is a bit tougher to solve - that's the inner pot itself.  It is Non-Stick coated == which I'm sure is nice, and I will be able to use it without any problems ... but in the future I can see the non-stick coating will wear off ... but hopefully not for a looooooong time!

I will be doing a separate post on hints & tips I've learned over the last couple years.

Now I need to find room in my kitchen for one more thing!

I have a feeling my slow cookers will have to be put away ... but where do I put those?? 

NOT My Video, NOT MyRecipe ... But Looks Nummy!!!!

CHICKEN & RICE ... VERY SLOWLY

 OK - i know I've said this would be just for Crock Pot/Slow cooker recipes ... but every once in a while I've got to slip in some different ways of cooking .., in this case, just a regular oven.

This is actually a great Slow Cooker recipe as well, however I tend to wait until the last 1/2 hour before adding the rice to the pot ... of course I have only used INSTANT rice for this recipe, I'm not sure when you would have to add regular rice to the slow cooker.

This is a LONG cooking recipe - at least 2 hours in the Conventional Oven ... yup, and then the actual time is based on how long it takes the chicken to cook.

CHICKEN & RICE W/VEGGIES

Ingreadients-

3-4 Chicken thighs (although I've done it with as many as 8 in the slow cooker)

1 can veggies - I prefer Peas myself

1 can Cream of Soup, I like Mushroom but any will do

1 1/2 Cups Instant Rice

1 1/2 Cup liquid, includes liquid from veggie can

Spices of your choice (I used Salt, Garlic Powder, Chicken Seasoning)

8 oz Mushrooms

In pan (or slow cooker pot) mix rice with liquid, spread canned veggies on top. top with chicken - skin side DOWN.  Cover, cook at 400F for 1 hour.

During this hour, I soak my fresh mushrooms in cool water twice, draining them every 15 minutes - being careful NOT to allow any loosened dirt to resettle upon the mushrooms.  Then I slice the mushrooms and soak them twice more, again cool water and changing every 15 minutes.

Now pull the chicken out of the pan, mix the veggies with the rice. spread the mushroom slices over the rice and replace the chicken, skin side UP this time ... again spice your meat - I just used a little salt and garlic powder on this side .. spread the soup on top of the chicken.

Add just enough water to the can to get out the last of the soup, if needed you can add a little extra water to keep the rice moist 

Turn the oven to 425F, and return to oven - only TENT the foil on the pan (that is, don't attach the ends to the pan, just the sides - you could also just  place parchment paper over the chicken as well, do not crinkle around pan.  This will allow the chicken to get some lovely color.

If cooking in a slow cooker, if you want color to the chicken - you will have to transfer it to the broiler for a few minutes (I tend not to, why make more dishes)

*photo to come