Gluten Free

Picca-Bots – A Chocolate Chip Cookie Story

Ever since our granddaughter was a toddler, she has had an affinity for polka-dots. She found them everywhere: on clothing, gift-wrap paper, ribbons and on wallpaper. Her excitement when finding ‘picca-bots’ was so contagious that we were constantly searching as well. This endearing term has stuck around our family ever since. She was two years old when I was testing recipes for a cookbook, and she was ‘helping’ me in the kitchen with some Chocolate Chip Shortbread cookies when she blurted out that the cookies were ‘picca-bots.’ My initial thought was to name the little cookies Dalmatian cookies, but as soon as she said it, I knew that the name for these cookies would always be “Picca-Bots” – and the rest, as they say, is history.

A closeup of a Picca-Bot: A chocolate Chip Shortbread cookie | urbnspice.com — Picca-Bots – A Chocolate Chip Shortbread Cookie

These delightful little cookie poppers are, enriched with white chocolate and butter in the polka-dotted dough (they are essentially a shortbread cookie). Since Picca-bots are made with only a few ingredients, make sure that they are of the highest quality (white chocolate couverture, excellent butter and pure vanilla). As these cookies are very rich, I have developed the recipe with this in mind and utilize my smallest cookie scoop. I know that you will love these dainty cookies!

…

Chicken, Millet and Spinach Appetizers

By Denise Pare-Watson

We all have a repertoire of appetizers that we make year after year. These recipes are family favourites that we look forward to making and sharing. Sometimes, it is nice to change things up a bit. This recipe for Chicken, Millet and Spinach Appetizers was developed because I was looking for a way to incorporate lean ground chicken into a lighter first course or appetizer. The final result was this recipe for Chicken, Millet and Spinach Appetizers – a delicious, attractive and lean recipe.

Millet was chosen as an ingredient in this recipe for several reasons – it binds well with the delicate texture of the ground chicken and it is also gluten-free and inexpensive. Millet is an ancient seed that one-third of the world uses in their diet because it is rich in iron, B vitamins and calcium. The chlorophyll from the spinach and parsley tints the ground chicken mixture to a unique green colour. This makes the appetizers a colourful addition to the holiday season due to their garden-fresh appearance. I encourage you to try this delicious appetizer – not only for the holidays but all year around.

…

Gluten Free Pate Brisee

By Denise Pare-Watson

As a pastry chef, Pâte Brisée became one my favourite go-to pastry recipe because of its buttery, flaky texture. I use this pastry to make all types of pies and tarts. This pastry adapts well to gluten-free, hence my sharing of this Gluten-Free Pate Brisee. You can prepare this pastry using an electric mixer, or by hand using a pastry cutter. One of the benefits of making this pastry is that you can use it right away – not the usual case for typical pastry doughs because most need to be refrigerated before you can use them. You will find that the results are excellent as the pastry holds up and browns well in the oven, which is commonly an issue with many gluten-free pastries.

Gluten Free Pate Brisee tarts | urbnspice.com

Gluten Free Pate Brisee Mini Pickle Pie

Refer to my links for creative ways to use this gluten-free pâte brisée such as Pickle Pies or Australian Meat Pies, or even the Ultimate Maple Butter Tarts. I use Bob’s Red Mill 1 to 1 Gluten Free Baking Flour for my gluten-free baking….

Shortcrust Pastry

By Denise Pare-Watson

One of my favourite doughs for meat pies, tarts, hand pies or meat turnovers is a Shortcrust Pastry because of its sturdy, crispy and buttery characteristics. When a pastry is eaten out of hand, a sturdier, leaner pastry is most suitable. In this post, I will guide you through how to make a shortcrust pastry. I also include a gluten-free option. The tips and techniques provided will simplify the overall process to inspire the chef in you.

Skip to Recipe

…

Turkey Mushroom Jarlsberg Burger – A Blenditarian Recipe

By Denise Pare-Watson

Burgers can be made with any ground meat and can be seasoned to provide a unique flavouring. Even though it is fun creating your own favourite burger using ground beef, it is always interesting building a burger using ground poultry, which has a lighter taste and is more easily digested than an all-beef burger. Ground turkey is a good choice as it easily absorbs additional ingredients, which in turn allow it to make a flavourful burger. With that in mind, I have developed a recipe for Turkey Mushroom Jarlsberg Burger.

Turkey Mushroom Jarlsberg Burger

Have you ever tried a cheese infused turkey burger? Cheese is an effective way to add moisture to a ground turkey meat mixture. Ground turkey can taste quite bland and actually become dry when cooked if care is not taken to enhance the flavour and texture of the turkey with ingredients such as aromatic mushrooms, onions, garlic and cheese. Jarlsberg cheese is known for its mild, nutty taste and also its excellent melting properties which compliment ground turkey extremely well. In this recipe, I use Jarlsberg cheese in the meat mixture as well as a topping for the cooked Turkey Mushroom Jarlsberg Burger. You will enjoy this delicious burger! Try it!…

Blenditarian Hamburger Soup

By Denise Pare-Watson

Blenditarian Challenge Series

Everyone has their own favourite soup recipe, whether brothy or thick and chunky. My favourite at this time of year is the thick, wholesome variety. This Blenditarian Hamburger Soup is all of that and more. My version is chock-a-block full of mushrooms, aromatic vegetables and also includes lentils and barley for a hearty bowlful of comfort food – a complete meal in a bowl.

To backtrack a bit: Blenditarian.Com has initiated a monthly challenge for anyone to incorporate their Blenditarian approach into interesting and fun themed dishes. Just to clarify for my readers, a Blenditarian is “one who believes the mighty, meaty mushroom makes meals more delicious, nutritious and sustainable.” This approach stretches ground meat with finely chopped mushrooms to create a flavourful and more nutritious dish. The theme for the March Blenditarian Challenge is to cook up a “family favourite” dish and include ‘The Blend’. For this reason, I am sharing my recipe for Blenditarian Hamburger Soup, which is our family favourite.

Skip to Soup Recipe

Skip to Print Recipe

Skip to Savoury Meat, Mushroom and Vegetable Blend

…

Creamy Roasted Garlic Dressing

By Denise Pare-Watson

I traditionally have made garlic salad dressing for Caesar Salads. As much as I enjoy making Caesar Salad Dressing from scratch, I wanted a develop a versatile and easy-to-make dressing that could be used as a dressing, or a dip, or a spread or an aioli. This Creamy Roasted Garlic Dressing is made with mayonnaise as the base ingredient and with the addition of a few ingredients, you can create a flavourful and versatile dressing. It is convenient to have on hand in the refrigerator for a multitude of purposes, which are outlined below under the “What Else Can I Do With This Recipe?” section of this post.

Skip to My Recipe

Roasted Garlic Dressing can be used for a multitude of dishes

The first essential step in making this dressing is roasting the garlic. I will share with you how to pan roast garlic cloves to make your own roasted garlic puree. This process is much simpler, less messy and yields far more roasted garlic puree than oven roasting whole heads of garlic. CHEF TIP: The garlic oil that remains from pan roasting garlic cloves is a very useful bonus item….

How to Make Homemade Maple Molasses Caramel Popcorn

By Denise Pare-Watson

CULINARY HISTORIANS OF CANADA 150 FOOD BLOG CHALLENGE SERIES

Prelude: I am a proud Canadian. When the Culinary Historians of Canada (CHC) invited food bloggers to participate in the “CHC Canada 150 Food Blog Challenge”, I knew that I wanted in! What a great way to celebrate and honour Canada’s 150th birthday by featuring a different Canadian dish or discussing a topic which reflects on what it means to be Canadian. For October, the Culinary Historians invited bloggers to post about all things autumnal, including the special foods we associate with Thanksgiving, Hallowe’en and other festivals. The first thing that came to my mind was the treats that my Mom would prepare for the trick or treaters at Hallowe’en. The neighbourhood children knew that my Mom would be giving away some type of special homemade treat like colourful popcorn balls, candy apples, fudge and the ever-popular bags of Maple Molasses Caramel Popcorn, commonly known as Cracker Jacks.

Skip to Recipe

Maple Molasses Caramel Popcorn

When I was a child, homemade Hallowe’en treats were the norm. We lived in a small village in the country where children worked very hard to earn their Hallowe’en treats as most of the houses were spaced quite far apart. I loved helping with the preparations for Hallowe’en. My father grew some of the biggest and best pumpkins in the area in his large vegetable garden. We set aside a day to carve pumpkins, which became a neighbourhood event with the local kids. Our large front porch was decorated festively with corn stalks and all our jack-o-lanterns. The best part for me was helping to make all the Hallowe’en treats!…

Vegetable Tian – Gluten Free, Grain Free, Refined Sugar Free

By Denise Pare-Watson

CHC CANADA 150 FOOD BLOG CHALLENGE SERIES

I am a proud Canadian. When the Culinary Historians of Canada invited food bloggers to participate in the “CHC Canada 150 Food Blog Challenge”, I knew that I wanted in! What a great way to celebrate and honour Canada’s 150th birthday by featuring a different Canadian dish or discussing a topic which reflects on what it means to be Canadian. For the month of June, CHC invited food bloggers to share stories and recipes that relate to farmers’ markets, farm-gate stands, dockside fish purchases and other examples of purchasing food directly from the source. Vegetable Tian is my Farmer’s Market inspiration.

Skip to Recipe

Vegetable Tian using tomato, zucchini and eggplant

Some of my best food memories from my childhood were close to home in our market size vegetable garden. Every day, we would grab our shallow oblong basket called a trug and carry it to the backyard to pick fresh carrots, potatoes, tomatoes, lettuces or whatever was ripe at the time. Eating fresh-picked produce is a true pleasure to your taste buds.

I live in a produce paradise called the Okanagan Valley where Farmer’s Markets and wineries abound. For example, when I go to the farmer’s market or the roadside stands, the Sweet Strawberry Tomatoes, or the Savoy Cabbage is always irresistible. The vibrant colours and a wide variety of seasonal vegetables can represent that day’s inspiration. I enjoy making a Vegetable Tian with fresh young zucchini, tomato and eggplant. A tian (le tian) is a type of gratin dish. It is made by thinly slicing vegetables and layering them in a shallow earthenware dish and slow-baked until the vegetables are tender and flavourful. The hidden bottom layer of the tian is caramelized onion, which not only provides amazing flavour to the dish but also a stable foundation on which to lay and shingle the sliced vegetables.

Farmer’s Market vegetables

…

Read More »

Power Sauce – Hidden Greens for Kids of Every Age

By Denise Pare-Watson

Kid of a Chef Series

Kid of a Chef gave me this recipe concept for Power Sauce on a recent visit. Her reasons for making this sauce are simple: as she laughingly says, she has three kids (one adult and two wee ones) who are not enthusiastic about eating their greens. Hence, this brilliant method of hiding greens in a delicious pizza sauce.

This is what she wrote about her Power Sauce: “I made it to hide greens from the boys in the house. They are all carb-hungry and are more likely to eat the pizza crust than anything else. Even if they pick the pizza apart, they still get the veggies. I also put the ground power greens in shakes, or use the sauce as a dressing for sandwiches or a panini instead of mayonnaise.”

Power Pizza ready to eat

Power Sauce has excellent flavour – it is the best pizza sauce that I have ever tasted. While I find most pizza sauces too sharp, this sauce is perfectly balanced. Kid of a Chef freezes the ground greens and uses the frozen greens to make delicious smoothies and shakes. She made a strawberry shake while we were there and the little ones were asking for ‘more shake please, Mommy, more shake.’ Her version of the Power Shake had banana; frozen strawberries; some of the frozen ground power greens; yogurt; protein powder, vanilla, and milk to thin out the shake consistency, and a little maple syrup if needed for sweetening. When she covertly adds a little more ground greens to the shake ingredients, the boys call it Leprechaun shake.

The Power Shake: strawberry, banana, ground power greens, protein powder, vanilla, a little maple syrup, yogurt and milk.

POWER SAUCE

CHEF TALK: The key to making Power Sauce is the use of organic greens, which are available at most grocery stores. The greens that I used were a blend of baby spinach, baby kale and baby red and green Swiss chard. You can also use arugula or any other of your favourite greens. Both my daughter and I pre-roast garlic cloves and freeze them for use in everything, including the Power Sauce recipe that follows. The sauce is gluten free, dairy free, grain free, refined sugar-free, egg free and nut free. My herb garden is currently flourishing, so fresh basil, oregano, rosemary and other fragrant herbs make their way into the Power Sauce.

For the purpose of this post, I made a gluten-free thin crust pizza shell (I will post the recipe for Super Thin Pizza Crust soon). You can use any of your favourite thin crust pizza shell or flatbread. The recipe makes over 2 cups (500 ml) of sauce.

INGREDIENTS:

For the Power Greens:

Yield: 1 lb. of organic power greens = 3 cups of ground power greens

1 lb. assorted power greens (spinach, arugula; kale, chard, etc.)

For the Power Sauce:

Yield: 2 1/3 cups sauce/ 575 ml

1 cup ground power greens
2 – 156 g (6 oz) cans of tomato paste
1 clove garlic, minced (or 2 pre-roasted garlic cloves)
1 teaspoon Kosher salt or sea salt
1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper
1 teaspoon dried oregano or Italian Seasoning
1/4 cup water
1 Tablespoon olive oil

For the Power Pizza:

Yield: 1 – 14″ large pizza (10 -12 pieces or 4 – 6 servings)

1 pre-baked large thin crust or gluten-free thin crust pizza crust
1/2 cup – 1 cup Power Sauce
Toppings of your choice: I used pre-cooked, diced bacon and thinly sliced mini portobello mushrooms
Shredded pizza mozzarella, as needed (about 2 cups)
Salt and pepper to taste

METHOD:

For the Power Greens:

Place the greens in the bowl of a food processor and grind finely. There should be approximately 3 cups of ground greens when you are done. Utilize immediately or place the ground greens in a sealed bags in 1 cup portions and freeze.

For the Power Sauce:

Place all of the ingredients for the Power Sauce into the bowl of a food processor and blend to a smooth consistency. You should have approximately 2 1/3 cups (575 ml) of sauce. Taste for seasoning and adjust to your preference. Use immediately or store in the refrigerator for up to one week. For longer storage, freeze in 1/2 cup to 1 cup portions.

For the Power Pizza:

Spread 1/2 cup to 1 cup of Power Sauce to cover the large pre-baked pizza crust. Sprinkle with your favourite toppings and bake at 425°F/220°F for 10 to 15 minutes or until hot and bubbly. Enjoy!

Here is the visual shown in step-by-step photographs:

Power Greens: a blend of chard, kale, spinach | urbnspice.com

Power greens are a blend of greens: arugula, spinach, kale, chard, etc.

The Greens are stuffed into a food processor and ground finely | urbnspice.com

Power greens are stuffed into a food processor and ground finely to use in smoothies or made into Power Sauce

1 lb. of power greens make 3 cups of ground greens | urbnspice.com

1 lb. of power greens equals 3 cups of ground power greens

Use the greens immediately or freeze the ground greens in one-cup sealed container

Power Sauce, rich and healthy with power greens galore

The Power Sauce is spread onto a pre-baked pizza crust and topped with your favourite toppings

Power Pizza is almost ready for the final baking | urbnspice.com

Power Pizza is almost ready for the final baking sprinkled with favourite toppings

Power Pizza baked, melted and ready to eat

Enjoy a slice of Power Pizza

More Ideas using Power Sauce:

Gluten Free Flatbread served in small wedges as a small plates offering

Gluten Free Flatbread using Power Sauce and a few select topping ingredients

Panini spread inside and served with Power Sauce | urbnspice.com

Power Sauce is spread inside a panini as well as served alongside as a condiment

Power Shake is another way to use the Ground Power Greens | urbnspice.com

A Power Shake is another great way to use the healthy Ground Power Greens

There is really no limit how you can use Power Sauce (and power greens). Just to mention a few uses: use it on hamburgers; as a topping on meatloaf; serve with charcuterie plates; serve alongside toast and scrambled eggs; and any place that you would use mayonnaise.

You Might Also Enjoy these ‘Hidden Vegetables’ Posts by UrbnSpice:

Gluten Free Rock Star Veggie Burgers

Australian Meat Pies

Make it your Own Burger

LEARNING TIPS:

Please CLICK the link above to access my UrbnSpice LEARNING TIPS, which are listed alphabetically on the Learning Tips blog post under the following subheadings:

Oven Temperature Accuracy
The Simple Spatula
Blooming
Parchment Paper
__________

If you try this recipe using Power Greens to make Power Sauce or Power Pizza or Power Shakes, please come back and leave me a comment below with your feedback.

You can find me on social media (see links below) – just be sure to tag @urbnspice and #urbnspice so I am sure to see it. Enjoy!

Denise Paré-Watson

The Urbnspice Chef

Follow me on Social Media:

Urbnspice Facebook Page – If you like what you see here, please LIKE my page. I would love that – thank you!

Urbnspice is on Twitter

You will find lots of fun boards on Pinterest

I am also on Instagram

Original content here is published under these license terms:		X

License Type:	Commercial

License Abstract:	You may read the original content in the context in which it is published (at this web address). You may make other uses of the content only with the written permission of the author on payment of a fee.

Original content here is published under these license terms:		X

License Type:	Commercial

License Abstract:	You may read the original content in the context in which it is published (at this web address). You may make other uses of the content only with the written permission of the author on payment of a fee.

Original content here is published under these license terms:		X

License Type:	Commercial

License Abstract:	You may read the original content in the context in which it is published (at this web address). You may make other uses of the content only with the written permission of the author on payment of a fee.

Original content here is published under these license terms:		X

License Type:	Commercial

License Abstract:	You may read the original content in the context in which it is published (at this web address). You may make other uses of the content only with the written permission of the author on payment of a fee.

Original content here is published under these license terms:		X

License Type:	Commercial

License Abstract:	You may read the original content in the context in which it is published (at this web address). You may make other uses of the content only with the written permission of the author on payment of a fee.

Gluten Free

Blenditarian Challenge Series

CULINARY HISTORIANS OF CANADA 150 FOOD BLOG CHALLENGE SERIES

CHC CANADA 150 FOOD BLOG CHALLENGE SERIES

… Read More »

Kid of a Chef Series

POWER SAUCE

…

Read More »