Laptop Leftovers

Remember this post I wrote a while back about the Zoe's lunchbox? Well, I love the darn thing so much I bought one for Ayden and one for myself. Of course we each have a different color (to prevent the inevitable fights over which lunchbox belongs to which person); and since red is my favorite color, I purchased this lovely lunchbox in black with red inserts. Oh, and the carrying case? Red and black...too cute!

I'm trying to adhere to gluten and casein free as much as possible. It's not too difficult, since I already prepare all Zoe's food; the only time I find myself in a pinch is when I don't plan ahead. So I'm now being more diligent about doing just that.

Today I had some leftover Pineapple Fried Rice (I went out for Thai food after class last night), salad greens with dressing, some spicy peanuts, and some fresh blueberries. It was delicious, satisfying, and since everything was in moderate portions I felt like I was doing my body good. I'm planning to use this more often; especially on days when I'll be in class till late in the evening. Getting my learnin' on makes me hungry; and after sitting in class for six hours I'm usually ready to chew on my textbooks. That could get expensive.

Shout-Outs

This week Zoe is home on spring break, which means we had a lot of time together to play and cook. Yippee! I made Karina's delicious, made-my-toes-curl, Breakfast Cookies. Words cannot describe how good these are. My kids love them, I love them, even people in our family who aren't gfcf love them. Do yourself a favor: try these cookies. Don't be too surprised if they don't last long in your cookie jar.

My good friend Lynn (of Free to Eat) has a new blog home, Some Foods Are Not My Friends. She's got a recipe this week for GFCF Chex Mix. I remember eating Chex Party Mix at every party my family went to as a kid. Oh, the pangs of nostalgia. Did you know that there is now a Gluten Free Rice Chex? Joy!

I did an interview with Special Needs Parent, a site that covers a lot of information for families with special needs kids. Preciouschild also features a blogger every Tuesday, and yours truly was on deck this week. You can have a look-see at the interview here.

A local reporter who was working on a piece about the head of the local celiac association and gluten-free eating contacted me last week to ask a few questions about our gfcf life. The article can be found here. Mary includes links to a number to great gluten free and celiac resources.

Oh, and in case you missed it Flamenco Dad helped my post a video of part of our show on the blog. Thank you, FD! The video is not the greatest, especially since we had to set it up towards the back of the auditorium. It was great fun working with a pro like my hubby. I'm just an amateur; I do flamenco for fun. But music is his passion; I learn so much from doing these shows with him. Can you tell I'm sweet on this guy?

Images from the Buddhist Temple

This is a photo of the Buddhist Temple we visited yesterday, the Wat Mongkolratanaram of Florida. People from all over the Bay Area come here to enjoy the temple, the meditation garden, the gorgeous view of the river, and the food.

This statue greeted us as we approached the produce market on the temple grounds. We bought lots of wonderful, fragrant ingredients (which I'm already putting to good use).

Here's what I ate for lunch. I know the photo's not pretty, but I was pretty deeply engrossed in my lunch by the time it occurred to me that I should take a photo. It's a VERY spicy chicken with basil over jasmine rice. In the corner there is a fried sweet potato, which had been dipped in a (gfcf) batter that included sesame seeds. Had I known about that method of cooking sweet potatoes, I would have served THAT at Thanksgiving.

Here are some of the folks responsible for the wonderful food we sampled at the temple. Some of the best Thai food I've ever had was made by these kind people.

The Man's Not Gettin' Me Down

For reasons completely unbeknownst to me, I could not access my blogger account yesterday. Thus I was unable to post here in accordance with NaBloPoMo. However, I was not going to let the streak die! Oh heck-to-the-no! So I did post last night on my NaBloPoMo page. You can check it out here. Take that, internet gremlins!

In other news, today Zoe performed at a Christmas tree lighting. I know, they just start doing these earlier and earlier every year. She and her group did a wonderful job, dancing and singing to "Sleigh Ride" and "Rockin' Round the Christmas Tree." I was a proud mama.

Oh yeah, and I haven't cooked a thing all day. What's up with that? Well, I have a great excuse, really. I've been out all day. Yours truly is pooped, so once I get the rascals to bed I'm going to kick back with an adult beverage and watch the boob tube.

The Life Aquatic

Our first day in the greater Atlanta area was full of activity, with lots of fun things to see and do. We spent our day at the Georgia Aquarium, which is now my number one pick for best aquarium I've ever seen. First of all, it's huge! Second, we got to see these lovelies in the photo. They were so beautiful to behold; so graceful, they just glided around their tank looking like they were in flight. And third, the aquarium has a humongous viewing area called the Ocean Voyager Theater, where you can sit and view what appears to be millions of watery creatures in an absolutely beautiful environment. The kids were enthralled by the entire aquarium experience; and Flamenco Dad and I were just in awe of it all.

As I had suspected, our GFCF choices have been a bit limited on this trip. Our hotel has a breakfast selection which has fruit juice as its only GFCF choice. Fortunately for me I brought the banana bread I made earlier in the week. The aquarium had some GFCF foods, mostly salads and fruits. We totally lucked out on the dinner front, though. We had dinner at a fantastic Thai restaurant in Tucker, L'Thai, which is just minutes from Stone Mountain. To top it off the restaurant offers organic and conventionally raised meat, for those who prefer organic. We had a terrific meal, and the staff was attentive and friendly. We feasted on delicious curries and steamed jasmine rice. The restaurant has a large fish tank with koi, and the owner was nice enough to let the kids feed the fish. Zoe and Ayden were thrilled. We are all exhausted, so it will be an early night for us this evening. The kids were out cold by about 8:00, and I'm off to bed now too.

Karina's Cookies

We are in heaven here at Casa de Flamenco, thanks to a recipe I found on Karina's blog. Karina is also know as the Gluten Free Goddess(http://www.glutenfreegoddess.com/) . She is an artist and creator of fantastic, gluten-free vegan recipes. Karina recently discovered that she had even more food allergies than she was aware of, so unfortunately this treat is now off limits to her (oh, the horror!). I'm going to have to try to concoct a recipe suitable for her dietary needs as a thank you for her recipes.

This recipe I found on her site is for Almost Nantucket Cookie Bars. I'm not going to post the recipe here, but here is the link: http://glutenfreegoddess.blogspot.com/2006/11/pepperidge-farm-remember.html. Please forgive me, I haven't mastered the art of linking without having to put the entire url up. I've still got a ways to go there.

But anyway, this cookie is absolutely divine. And it really is incredibly close to those Pepperidge Farm goodies that haven't graced my home in many years. Zoe loved them (even if they do have coconut in them). And as Karina mentions in her blog, they are truly dunk worthy. I didn't even have time to photograph them; I was too busy woofing them down with my husband and kids. So thank you, thank you Karina--the entire Flamenco Family sends many besos!!!