Hello All,

I joined Pinterest in the Fall of 2012 and wasn't sure how it worked.  Found it to be kind of redundant.  But then that Christmas I found my use for Pinterest...recipes.  90% of my Pins are food related and use it every week to Pin new recipes, make my meal plan and grocery list.

People often ask me to share recipes, and I tell them to follow me on Pinterest.

I started to get organized when I would Pin a new recipe I would place it in my "New Recipes to Try" Board. Once tried I would move to another Board to keep it for later reference.

My other obsession besides food is wine.  I can't remember exactly the point in my life when I became a wino...but food and wine are a huge part of my life now.  I love to cook and I love to cook with wine.

I am sure my Pinterest Boards will keep evolving into a combination of these 2 entities.

My Recipes Board has 126 Pins; Wine 115; New Recipes to try 114; Exercises 135...now you know where my interests lie.

My newest Board is Smoothies, which will be my experiment for the upcoming week.  I will post 5 or 6 different smoothie recipes next weekend based on different proteins, fruit/veg base and liquid bases!!!

In the mean time following me on Pinterest and/or Twitter:

https://www.pinterest.com/shanmysoccer/

https://twitter.com/ShanMySoccer

Every Sunday I try and not only make a Meal Plan for the week ahead, but prep as much food as possible.  This ensures I stay in track, not only with eating but with budget as well.  But I am a firm believer in a balanced life, so I don't eliminate foods (other than gluten) from my diet and enjoy healthy, balanced meals.

Below is a my Meal Plan for this week. All recipes can be found on my Pinterest Page https://www.pinterest.com/shanmysoccer/.  I hope to get some new followers on this blog and my Pinterest account.  Will be posting more recipes, workouts and fun activities in the upcoming weeks.

	BREAKFAST	LUNCH	DINNER	SNACK
MONDAY	Steel Cut Oatmeal with Berries	Chicken Detox Soup	Sweet Potato & Black Bean Quesadilla & Green Salad	Apple Carrots, Cucumber & Hummus
TUESDAY	Steel Cut Oatmeal with Berries	Chicken Detox Soup	Roasted Pepper, Spinach & Mozza Stuffed Chicken	Apple Carrots, Cucumber & Hummus
WEDNESDAY	Steel Cut Oatmeal with Berries	Chicken Detox Soup	Vegetable Frittata Bake	Apple Carrots, Cucumber & Hummus
THURSDAY	Steel Cut Oatmeal with Berries	Chicken Detox Soup	Leftovers	Avocado Toast with Cottage Cheese and Tomatoes
FRIDAY	Steel Cut Oatmeal with Berries	Chicken Detox Soup	Cedar Planked Salmon & Steamed Vegetables	Apple Protein Shake
SATURDAY	Protein Shake	Avocado Toast with Cottage Cheese and Tomatoes	FREE
SUNDAY	Gluten-Free Waffles & Berries Turkey Bacon	Protein Shake	Honey Sriracha Chicken

Vegan Fall Vegetable Curry

Welcome back to my Blog!!

Over the next 6 months my posts may evolve from Gluten-Free, to cross-country experiences, to more wine related posts.  For the next month I will focus on what has been going on in the Gluten-Free world over the past 2.5 years.

I love Fall :)

Fall is a beautiful time of year and I am trying to soak up as much New Brunswick Fall as this will be my last one here for awhile.  

This time of year, with the cool evenings, I crave warm comfort food.  And I recently invested in a Slowcooker.  I have been craving a savoury curry since last week.  Today I decided to focus on all the beautiful fall vegetables we have here.  And since I wanted that to be the star of the show, I decided on a vegetarian curry.  Carrots, Onions, Celery, Sweet Potatoes, Parsnips...and some beans for protein.  I used a blend of spices to create my own curry mix and blended those with a can of stewed tomatoes and a can of coconut milk (light).  This didn't come from any recipe, just some things I threw together.

I am not a vegan, however I think it is important to experiment with different types of food styles.  I have friends who are vegan, so I incorporate vegan cooking into my repertoire so I can have recipes when I entertain, go to potlucks or to share.

Recipe:

Sweet Potatoes
Onions
Carrots
Parsnips
Celery
Canned Bean Medley
Lite Coconut Milk
Canned Tomatoes
4 to 5 Cloves of Garlic
2.5 tsp Tumeric
1 tsp Garam Masala
2 tsp Curry Powder
1 tsp Cumin
Pinch Red Pepper Flakes
1/4 tsp Cayenne
1 tsp Salt
1 tsp Pepper
1 tsp Olive Oil

The result:

Delicious and savory.  I do like my curry a bit spicy, so next time I would add more red pepper flakes or cayenne.  Or I would even try some fresh chilies!!!  Regardless it had lots of flavour and was very soothing...exactly what I wanted on this cold raining fall evening.

Red Wine Selection: Wolf Blass Red Label Shiraz Cabernet 

Dessert: Lindt Excellence Dark Chocolate with a touch of Sea Salt

Swiss Chalet Rotisserie Channel

Rice Pasta: Rediscover Pasta!!!

When I was first told that I was celiac my first thought was “Oh no, I can’t eat pasta anymore”.  Pasta for me was this amazing comfort food.  I never ordered it in a restaurant because I could always make a much more delicious sauce with all my favourites in it; everything from Sausage and Pepper Penne to Seafood Sun-dried Tomato Alfredo.   Pasta was not something I ate every week, maybe once a month I would make a yummy savoury dish to indulge in.  But celiacs’ can’t have pasta, right?  Wrong!!!  Rice pasta to the rescue.  There are many different brands of rice pasta on the market.  The two brands I have tried are:  PC Organics Brown Rice Pasta and Pastariso Organic Brown Rice Pasta.  There are other gluten-free pastas on the market with corn or quinoa, but I have only tried the brown rice variety.

Some people argue that brown rice pasta is healthier than the whole wheat variety.  For those non-celiac’s who have the choice I have added the nutritional information of both varieties for you to choose.

Nutritional Facts
PC Organics Brown Rice Pasta	CATELLI Healthy Harvest Whole Wheat Pasta
91 gram serving	85 gram serving
Calories                                330	Calories           310
Fat                          2g (saturated 0.4 g/trans fat 0g)	Fat                   1.5g (saturated 0.4 g/trans fat 0g)
Cholesterol         0g	Cholesterol         0g
Sodium                 0g	Sodium            0g
Carbohydrates  70g (fibre 3g/sugar 1g)	Carbohydrates 62g(fibre 8g/sugar 4g)
Protein                                 7g	Protein            12g

Nutritionally both rice pasta and whole wheat pasta are very similar.  If you are not celiac, it will come down to personal choice.

Brown rice pasta is slightly more expensive then whole wheat pasta.  This is due to production and consumption. 

I have served rice pasta to people without letting them know the difference and they were unable to tell the difference (even kids). 

The biggest difference between brown rice pasta and whole wheat pasta is the cooking process.

Here are some tips I have discovered while cooking brown rice pasta:

• You need to use more water then whole wheat pasta.
• It helps to use some oil in the water while cooking
• You must stir brown rice pasta more often while cooking then whole wheat pasta to prevent sticking.
• You must immediately rinse with cold water when done to stop the cooking process.
• Rice pasta should only be used in a salad when eating immediately; it does not keep its consistency very well.  Also, you may need to add more dressing when using in a pasta salad.

I will post some pasta recipes soon :)  Enjoy!!!

Sunday Morning Cinnamon Rolls

One of my indulgences in the past was a warm and gooey cinnamon roll with cream cheese icing.  Since discovering I am Celiac, these treats have been hands-off.  I looked at gluten-free recipes online and they seemed very complicated with lots of steps and ingredients.  Someone forwarded me this link to another blog with a gluten-free cinnamon roll recipe.  While I used the base of this recipe I made a big changed, which was a gamble.  I bought a gluten-free all purpose flour at the Bulk Barn and substituted the potato starch and corn starch for the same amount of flour.  They turned out AMAZING.  I also used my own cream cheese icing recipe instead of the glaze.


Cinnamon Rolls
Serves 8 

INGREDIENTS
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
1/4 cup sugar
2/3 cup of almond milk, room temperature
1 packet quick rising yeast (about 1 tablespoon)
1 egg
1/4 cup canola oil
1 1/2 cup gluten-free all purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
2 1/2 teaspoons xantham gum
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

TO SPRINKLE ON BOARD COVERED WITH PLASTIC WRAP
1 - 2 tablespoons sugar

FILLING
2/3 cup brown sugar
1 1/4 teaspoons cinnamon
1/3 cup chopped nuts - optional

CREAM CHEESE ICING
1/2 cup cream cheese, room temperature
1 cup powdered sugar
1/4 cup unsalted butter, room temperature
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

DIRECTIONS
Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

In medium bowl, combine shortening and sugar. Mix well. Measure milk and add yeast to milk. Whisk well to fully dissolve.

Add milk/yeast to sugar mixture. Add remaining ingredients. Mix very well, being sure to remove all lumps. Dough will be quite soft and sticky.

Take a piece of plastic wrap and lay it out so it covers a 13 1/2" x 13 1/2" square. Sprinkle sugar on the wrap. Lay ball of dough on top of that. Then pull out another sheet of wrap and gently lay over the dough. Pat the dough down into a roughly squarish pancake. Lift the top wrap up and then reposition it. Use a rolling pin to roll out the dough in between the two layers of wrap. Occasionally you'll have to lift and reposition the wrap because it gets "stuck" under the edges. You might have to occasionally flip the whole thing over. Make sure that when you're done you've got ABOUT a 13 1/2" x 13 1/2" square of dough.

Remove top piece of wrap. Combine filling ingredients. Spread evenly across dough's surface. (Original recipe poster suggested leaving about a 1 1/2" sugar free edge because when you roll the dough all the sugar shifts and fills this in; otherwise all the sugar spills out).Use the bottom piece of wrap to lift the edge of the dough and start to roll it up forming a long cylinder. Start with the sugary edge, which will be the center of your roll and roll toward the sugarless edge. Cut off or trim up the irregular ends of your "log". Then cut into 8 or 9 slices of similar size, about 1 1/2" wide. Place rolls into a pan.  If using a glass pan, grease.  I used my baking stone with high edges (Pampered Chef)

Bake approximately 20 minutes, until tops are lightly browned.

Combine icing ingredients into a bowl and blend. Spread over rolls once they have cooled slightly.  Enjoy licking the beaters and bowl :)

Person who wrote about this recipe included this note: These are lovely with coffee in the morning. They're very light and fluffy - not too heavy or dense. I've also discovered that you can make these the night before and stop short of baking them. Wrap them up in their pan or glass dish and leave them in the fridge for the night. The next morning you can take them out and bake them and they come out just the same! I've found that this is a great thing to bring to a friends house for brunch. I just pop them in their oven - and you've got a great GF contribution and you know there's no cross contamination!

I have included a picture of the cinnamon rolls before icing so you can see the colour of the rolls out of the oven and post icing.  I will re-iterate these are fantastic.  While they are gluten-free, they are not fat-free and will be reserved for special occasions.  I am very excited that I am no longer cinnamon roll deprived.

Saturday Afternoon Snowshoe in Marysville

I am not a winter sports person, but took up snowshoeing a few years ago to help me get outside, stay active and prevent cabin fever.  Since we have had a lot of snow in Fredericton this winter, some friends and I decided Saturday afternoon would be a great day to go out snowshoeing with our dogs.  We started out by the Marysville Bypass and went up into the mountain bike trails.  We spent about 2 hours on the trail (approximately 8 km).  It was a beautiful afternoon and the dogs loved it.  I also took this opportunity to try a pair of Nordic Walking Poles while snowshoeing.  They helped tremendously going up hill, and when breaking trail that had fresh snow.

Here is the equipment I used:

Snowshoes:  Tubbs Women's Xplore21 Snowshoes
Nordic Walking Poles:  Louis Garneau Helium Nordic Walking Poles Nordic Walking Poles

The most important items I had on Saturday were my base layers.  While it was cold outside we still worked up quite a sweat.  And since your skin can not breathe properly when wearing your outdoor gear, base layers help to wick that sweat away.  Any dri-fit base layers will work.  Anything that is non-restrictive and comfortable.  The best part of all this fun in the snow was the hot chocolate after :)  Thanks Tracey, Lee, Shannon and Jason.  Oh, and thanks to Jersey, Maverick and Kikapu.  Hopefully we will see some of you out on the trails before the snow melts.

Here is me, Jersey, Maverick, Shannon, Kikapu and Tracey.  The boys were trailing behind.


I also have to mention the supper I made that evening.  Grilled rib eye steak (which I bought locally from the Boyce's Farmers Market and is hormone and antibiotic free), with sauteed mushrooms in a balsamic reduction.  Smashed potatoes and roasted zucchini, eggplant, onions and peppers.  I served this with a Las Moras Malbec.