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raisinably delicious gluten free trail mix

Snack it to me: Raisinibly Healthy Snack Mix

This post is part of Snack It To Me – recipes for my favorite snack mixes. The posts are: Fairy Berry Gluten-Free Trail Mix, Sour Patched Gluten-Free Trail Mix, Cherry Cordial Gluten-Free Snack Mix, Mango Lassi Trail Mix, Apricocious Gluten-Free Trail Mix, Raisinably Delicious Snack Mix, Happy Endings Trail Mix, My go-to prepared snacks.

Raisins are a point of contention in my family. Well, between me and my sister they are. She, so very wrongly, believes that raisins have no place in anything. Not oatmeal cookies. Not Irish soda bread.

I think she might be an alien. Or at the very least adopted. There is no way such a raisin hater can be related to me.

You see, I am on the right side of this disagreement. The side where those little boxes of raisins were never a disappointment when they showed up in my halloween bucket. And I think they make a great addition to any boring cereal – they can help keep me from feeling the need to add sugar to plain chex.

Don’t worry though. I added some chocolate in there for you non-raisin fanatics. Or for those of you who think they are equally important in life.

raisinably delicious gluten free trail mix

Raisinibly Delicious Gluten-Free Snack Mix

Author: Mary Fran Wiley
Prep time: 5 mins
Total time: 5 mins
Serves: 6
This is a loose template meant to inspire you to create your own trail mixes and to help keep you from getting that hangry feeling (being so hungry you are angry) when you are out and about without a safe restaurant in sight.
Ingredients
  • 150 grams (about a cup) raisins
  • 50 grams (about a half cup or a generous handfull) dried goji berries
  • 50 grams (about a half cup) unsweetened dried coconut flakes
  • 50 grams (about a quarter cup sunflower seeds
  • 75 grams (about a half cup) good quality dark chocolate chips
Instructions
  1. Measure all ingredients in a large bowl and mix to combine. Store in a sealed container for up to a month.
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apricocious gluten free trail mix

Snack it to me: Apricocious Snack Mix

This post is part of Snack It To Me – recipes for my favorite snack mixes. The posts are: Fairy Berry Gluten-Free Trail Mix, Sour Patched Gluten-Free Trail Mix, Cherry Cordial Gluten-Free Snack Mix, Mango Lassi Trail Mix, Apricocious Gluten-Free Trail Mix, Raisinably Delicious Snack Mix, Happy Endings Trail Mix, My go-to prepared snacks.

apricocious gluten free trail mix

Ladies and gentlemen, this is Snack mix number 5.

A little bit of Apricot in my life,
A little bit of Almonds by my side.
A little bit of Chocolate’s all I need,
A little bit of mixing’s what I see.
A little bit of fruit dried in the sun,
A little bit of munching all night long.
A little bit of trail mix here I am,
A little bit of you makes me your fan!
Snack mix number five.

It has long been public knowledge that I have terrible taste in music. You are lucky there wasn’t a Backstreet Boys song that worked here, because then I might have tried to re-write the whole song and not just the chorus that I am sure is now stuck in your head. (It’s been in my head since I wrote “Snack mix number 5 is here.”)

Apricots are a persnickety fruit. I have bought them one too many times at the grocery store, excited because they are finally in season, only to get home and be disappointed because they are mealy or, even worse, bland. You know the moment when you take a bite and you have the heartbreaking realization that the fruit tastes like a shadow of itself? Yeah. I really hate that.

Which is why dried fruit is great. All the delicious apricot-y goodness is concentrated into a little pocket of joy. Add some almonds and a wee bit of white chocolate for good measure and you, my friend, will not be hangry when you get stuck on the CTA when they are rerouting your communte and messing with your dinner schedule. Instead, you will queue up an episode of Doctor Who and munch away, pleased with yourself for being a grownup and thinking a head. (You don’t need to tell anyone that you forgot that it was buried in the depths of your purse, your secret is safe with me).

Someday soon this flavor combo might be reincarnated as a cookie. Or a muffin. But for now, instant gratification is what it’s all about.

Apricocious Snack Mix (A gluten-free trail mix)

Recipe Type: Snack
Author: Mary Fran Wiley
Prep time: 5 mins
Total time: 5 mins
Serves: 4
No volume measurements are here because these are meant to be imprecise and easy. Either add each ingredient to the same bowl while it is on your kitchen scale, or just go ahead and wing it. With these ingredients you can’t go wrong.
Ingredients
  • 150 grams (3 handfulls) dried apricots
  • 150 grams (2 handfulls) almonds (I used blanched, but you can use roasted and salted here for a sweet & salty take on this mix)
  • 75 grams (really this is how much you want – i wanted one piece of chocolate for every 2-3 apricots) white chocolate callets or chips
Instructions
  1. Place a medium mixing bowl on a kitchen scale and tare (zero) it.
  2. Add each ingredient, weighing as you go. This recipe doesn’t need you to measure them out first.
  3. Mix to combine.
  4. Store in an air-tight container for up to one month.
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gluten free trail mix mango lassi

Snack it to me: Mango Lassi Trail Mix

This post is part of Snack It To Me – recipes for my favorite snack mixes. The posts are: Fairy Berry Gluten-Free Trail Mix, Sour Patched Gluten-Free Trail Mix, Cherry Cordial Gluten-Free Snack Mix, Mango Lassi Trail Mix, Apricocious Trail Mix, Raisinably Delicious Snack Mix, Happy Endings Trail Mix, My go-to prepared snacks.

After an interruption for surgery involving my spine, Snack It To Me is back. And it is back in a big way.

I transferred to U of I as a junior, and was on my third college. (Apparently fashion design classes do not transfer to other schools as they do not apply to real world skills, so I went to community college to cram in some lost credit hours). I was a junior living in a dorm filled almost entirely with freshmen and the rest were either RAs or seniors who would be graduating in December.

Transfer student orientation was miserable, and none of my high school friends had gone to UIUC. And except for a cousin, I was on my own. And those first few days on campus were rough. Ugly cry yourself to sleep rough.

But then I met Sid.

sid and mary fran

Somehow, despite radically different cultures and polar opposite favorite hobbies, we became fast friends. He eventually worked his way to BFF status, and is still one of my first calls when I have big news (even if we live half a world apart now).

Sid is the reason this recipe exists.

Food was always central to our friendship. It started with grabbing dinner in the dining hall together when we could. Lunches on campus when we could squeeze them in. And two years of my home-cooked Sunday dinners when we both moved out of the dorms. Some weeks it was the only time our schedules worked out for us to see each other.

We have learned a lot from each other over the course of our friendship. I dragged him to his first American football game (we lost) and made him sit and watch the Bears in the Super Bowl. I fed him his first Irish soda bread and my mom’s famous tomato and rice soup.

He is the one who introduced me to Indian food (he also introduced me to Korean and Middle Eastern cuisine), something I probably never would have tried on my own. He is the one who talked me into trying new things every time we would go to one of the many curry places on campus. The one who got me to try a mango lassi the first time.

A lassi is a yogurt and mango dring that is creamy and just sweet enough. For me, it was love at first sip. (Joy the Baker has a recipe for a mint and cumin lassi that looks out of this world).

With that, I give to you Mango Lassi Trail Mix. The idea for this mix is, sadly, not all my own. I had a similar combination from Graze (more about them in another post), and was thoroughly disappointed when they discontinued it. So, I just had to make my own.

gluten free trail mix mango lassi

Gluten-Free Mango Lassi Trail Mix

Recipe Type: Snack
Author: Mary Fran Wiley
Mangoes and yogurt are a match made in heaven.
Ingredients
  • 75 grams roasted sunflower seeds (a good handful and a half)
  • 50 grams yogurt covered nuts (about 30 yogurt covered almonds were used in the photographed version)
  • 50 grams dried mango (chunks are best, but the flatter kind kan be roughly chopped into strips, as it is here)
Instructions
  1. In a large mixing bowl, combine all ingredients. Adjust amounts to suit your taste – I really love yogurt covered anything, you might really love mango. Take this and make it your own.
  2. Store in a sealed container for up to one month.
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HAWMC Day 20: Burnout

I am attempting the Wego Health Activist Writers’ Month Challenge. A post each day in April. So, now that I told you I am going to do it, I oughta follow through, right? Today’s prompt is to write about burnout. What does it feel like? What are your burnout triggers? What gets you OUT of the pit of despair when nothing is going your way?

In college, before I was gluten-free, my friends all knew that if I was studying for a test there would be cookies. If I had a long day at work, there would be brownies. If I had a fight with MammaCakes, there would be a cake.

When I went gluten-free, I turned to knitting to unwind. It was a little better for my waistline.

But, then I learned how to bake gluten-free. And my brownies didn’t taste like beans. My cakes weren’t gummy. And there was joy in baking again.

The magic of butter and eggs. Sugar. A small army of flours.

The soothing nature of stirring and whipping. Whisking. The motions of the kitchen.

So, if you are suffering from burnout, I offer you my tried & true burnout cure, brownies. I have my base recipe memorized, and they are endlessly adaptable. And you just need 1 pot and 1 pan.

Brownies are the best.

Gluten-Free Mexican Spice Brownies Gluten-Free Espresso Brownies Gluten-Free Strawberry Brownies

My favorites are Gluten-Free Mexican Spice Brownies, Gluten-Free Espresso Brownies and Gluten-Free Strawberry Brownies.

Snack it to me: Cherry Cordial Snack Mix

This post is part of Snack It To Me Week– a week full of recipes for my favorite snack mixes. The posts are: Fairy Berry Gluten-Free Trail Mix, Sour Patched Gluten-Free Trail Mix, Cherry Cordial Gluten-Free Snack Mix, Mango Lassi Trail Mix, Apricocious Trail Mix, Raisinably Delicious Snack Mix, Happy Endings Trail Mix, My go-to prepared snacks.

Chocolate should be a food group. And, in my professional opinion, it should be the base of the pyramid.

I mean, it is full of anti-oxidants and theobromine. It has been purported to do everything from boost your mood to decrease your appetite. Small studies have found that it is good for your heart, your skin and for diabetes prevention.

I even read that it can help make you smarter.

That is a whole heck of a lot of promises for any food to deliver on.

And to think something healthy was lurking in my love of desserts.

I am pairing it with dried cherries and coconut flakes today for a gluten-free trail mix that is a great sweet treat for the 3pm blues. Or the 10am blues. Or a last minute conference call. We can call this an all-occasion snack. But only if you don’t skip the chocolate.

cherrycordial

Snack it to me: Cherry Cordial Snack Mix

Recipe Type: Snack
Author: Mary Fran Wiley
Prep time: 5 mins
Total time: 5 mins
Serves: 4
This recipe was inspired by one of my day’s favorite treats: chocolate covered cherries. Those intensely sweet sugar-asked cherries died bright red and dipped in chocolate.
Ingredients
  • 100 grams high-quality chocolate calets (they look like slightly larger, flatter chocolate chips) or your favorite brand of semi-sweet chocolate chips
  • 100 grams dried cherries
  • 50 grams unsweetened dried coconut flakes
Instructions
  1. Weigh out ingredients and stir to combine in a medium mixing bowl.
  2. Store in an air tight container at room temperature for up to one month.
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Sour Patched Gluten-Free Trail Mix

Snack it to me: Sour Patched Trail Mix

This post is part of Snack It To Me Week– a week full of recipes for my favorite snack mixes. The posts are: Fairy Berry Trail Mix, Sour Patched Trail Mix, Cherry Cordial Snack Mix, Mango Lassi Trail Mix, Apricocious Trail Mix, Raisinably Delicious Snack Mix, Happy Endings Trail Mix, My go-to prepared snacks.

Life has been missing a little bit of its sparkle lately. Things that used to make me happy are just sort of there. My hands don’t want to knit anymore. My lips have been having a hard time remembering how to smile. My heart has started to feel a little heavier. I think I might have a case of the mean reds. 

“The blues are because you’re getting fat, and maybe it’s been raining too long. You’re just sad, that’s all. The mean reds are horrible. Suddenly you’re afraid, and you don’t know what you’re afraid of. Do you ever get that feeling?” – Holly Golightly

Yes, Holly, I do.   And I needed some cheering up, so I thought putting sunshine in a jar might help.

Sour Patched Gluten-Free Trail Mix Today’s gluten-free trail mix is just that. Sunshine and childhood all bottled up. Dried pineapple is intensely sweet and chewy. The coconut flakes are just crunchy enough. But the real star of this mix is the glodenberry. Also called the  Cape Gooseberry or the Inca Berry, they are native to South America. They are both sweet and tart, just like some of my favorite candies – without all the chemical junk. They are supposedly full of bioflavonoids, vitamin A, betacarotene and anti-oxidants. They even contain a bit of protein. (The internets call them a superfruit. I call them candy.)

Snack it to me: Sour Patched Trail Mix

Recipe Type: Snack
Author: Mary Fran Wiley
Prep time: 5 mins
Total time: 5 mins
Serves: 4
The star of this mix is the [url href=”http://www.sunfood.com/food/incan-golden-berries.html”]goldenberry[/url]. If you can’t get your hands on those, dried sour cherries would work in their place.
Ingredients
  • 100 grams dried pineapple, roughly chopped (volume wise, this was just about a cup)
  • 100 grams dried goldenberries (volume wise, this was also about a cup)
  • 30 grams dried, unsweetened coconut flakes (this was about a quarter cup or a small handfull.
Instructions
  1. Weigh out ingredients and stir to combine.
  2. Store in an air-tight container for up to a month.
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gluten-free fairy berry snack mix

Snack it to me: Fairy Berry Trail Mix

This post is part of Snack It To Me Week– a week full of recipes for my favorite snack mixes.

My desk has two drawers, a shoe drawer and a snack drawer. I might be a snack food junkie.

shoedrawer

Well, sort of.

Living gluten-free for 7 years, I have learned to never take access to safe food for granted. Every time I go out to a new restaurant, there is a snack in my bag of some kind. Sometimes it is a granola/protein bar. Sometimes it  is a snack mix. Sometimes it is a box of crackers and a packet of almond butter. But there is always something. And often several somethings.

Having an easy to grab and delicious snack on hand is incredibly important for kids and adults.

snack it to me preview

 

This week, I am going to share 7 snack mixes that are endlessly adaptable, take less than 10 minutes to throw together. And above all are delicious. My goal is to rid you of that hangry feeling that can happen when you are out, hungry and there isn’t a decent gluten-free option in sight. (There is no GORP – good old raisins and peanuts for those of you that never went to Girl Scout Camp – on this list, I want show you just how fun snack mixes can be.)

They include:

  1. Fairy Berry Trail Mix
  2. Sour Patched Trail Mix
  3. Cherry Cordial Snack Mix
  4. Mango Lassi Trail Mix
  5. Apricocious Trail Mix
  6. Raisinably Delicious Snack Mix
  7. Happy Endings Trail Mix

And, once I have shared my recipes with you, I will share my favorite pre-made gluten-free snacks.

gluten-free fairy berry snack mix

I have admitted more than once to you that I often eat like a four year old. I love purple food. The more colorful the cereal, the happier I am. And I can never turn down fruit snacks.

So, I made you this mix.

This is not your ordinary trail mix. There are no nuts. No candy. No pretzels. No flashbacks to leaky tents and mosquito bites.

It appeals to my inner child (hence the name – what four year old girl doesn’t love fairies?). It is sweet and a little chewy. There are lots of little pieces to pop into your mouth. Bright colors.

And it appeals to the grown-up that I am trying to be. Jam packed with anti-oxidants and vitamin c. The sweetness of the cherries and blueberries is balanced by the tang of the goji berries. There are no artificial colors or refined sugars.

Enjoy!

Snack it to me: Fairy Berry Trail Mix

Recipe Type: Snack
Author: Mary Fran Wiley
Prep time: 5 mins
Total time: 5 mins
Serves: 4
Dried berries are like nature’s candy. Buy fruit without added sweetener – the naturally occurring sugars intensify as the fruits dry and additional sugar is not needed. Also, feel free to use this as a template for your own creations. Dried strawberries could be awesome here so could cranberries. Let your imagination run wild!
Ingredients
  • 50 grams dried blueberries
  • 50 grams dried cherries
  • 50 grams dried gogi berries
Instructions
  1. Weigh out and combine ingredients.
  2. Store in an air-tight container for up to one month.
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A spring in my step : Honey Lavender Ice Cream

Yes, darlings, I have been over-sharing a bit lately. Or just sharing. Spreading some awareness.

But awareness is exhausting. I need a break from telling you so much about myself. Because, soon, you are going to know me better than I know myself.

And, besides, it is spring. It even momentarily was get a pedicure and dig out the sandals weather here in Chicago.

So, I dug out some spring flavors and the ice cream maker. And I made you a treat.  Read more

HAWMC Day 8: My body is ridiculous

I am attempting the Wego Health Activist Writers’ Month Challenge. A post each day in April. So, now that I told you I am going to do it, I oughta follow through, right? Today’s post was to write about the animal that represents your disease.

My disease is no animal. Allegorically or not. I tried to tie it to food. To animal crackers. To a fable or proverb. Anything.

And then it hit me. I suffer from creepy dashboard pig.

dashboardpig

(Yes, I took this picture in my sister’s car. And, no, she probably will not be super pleased that I am making this analogy.)

Please, just hear me out.

My body is ridiculous. It doesn’t do what it is supposed to. Some nerves think that every signal should be a pain signal. And not just any pain signal. Intense stabbing, searing, burning pain.

My body is ridiculous. It hates pants. It hates gentle breezes. And it really, really hates anything that is different than the minute before.

My body is ridiculous. There are some days. Some precious days. Where the pain calms down to a simmer. When I can hope that those nerves have just had enough. When there is dancing and and being silly.

My body is ridiculous. It requires a battery pack, a remote and supplemental wiring to make it through.

My body is ridiculous. The disease has no purpose. There is no battle to be won. No invading microbes to be beaten. No warnings it needs to pass on. The disease isn’t there to take over or to change things. And yet, it stabs and slices. It burns and burns.

My body is ridiculous. It can’t seem to make the CRPS realize it has overstayed its welcome. Like that creepy dude you went to dinner with. The one who kept extending the night.

My body is ridiculous. And the best analogy I could find was a wiggling pig dashboard ornament. A ridiculous beast with a giant knife. Existing only for stabbing and slicing. Hanging around like the creepy dude who didn’t get the hint.

 

gluten-free jammie dodgers

Ratio Rally: Shortbread (Gluten-Free Jammie Dodgers)

This post is part of the Gluten-Free Ratio Rally, a group of gluten-free bloggers inspired and empowered by Ruhlman‘s Ratio and started by Shauna at Gluten-Free Girl. We get together each month and post many different takes on the same theme. This month that theme is Gluten-Free Shortbread and the rally is being hosted by Meaghan from Wicked Good Vegan.

Come along, Pond.

It has been a while since my last contribution to the Ratio Rally, and I can’t be happier to be back. With a pot of coffee, twelve jammie dodgers and a fez.

I might be excited because I am letting my nerd flag fly just a little bit. I can’t begin to tell you how long I have been planning to make these – it has been since I found out that the rally this month was for shortbread. Because shortbread meant an excuse to make a gluten-free “jammie dodger”. A british sandwich cookie that has a jam filling. They are buttery, just the right about of crumbly and crunchy.

A cookie for a grown up who likes the charm of a sandwich cookie but with the simple sophistication of a shortbread. Ok, and a cookie for your next gluten-free Doctor Who marathon.

For those of you who are not as awesomely nerdy as I am, the BBC sci-fi series Doctor Who has featured these cookies as the current incarnation of the Doctor’s favorite cookie, they even stood in for a self destruct button for the Tardis, his time machine/space ship, in one episode.

So clearly, I, as a proud nerd, had to make some. Having never had the real ones, and not being to able to ever have them, all I know is that these cookies seem to fit the descriptions of Jammie Dodgers that I could find. A shortbread cookie with a jam filling.

Done.

gluten free ratio rally logo

Shortbread is easy: 1 part sugar, 2 parts butter, 3 parts flour. And you can experiment from there. My ratio is a little different, but only because I bumped up or down amounts to get them to be even with the way butter is sold and to have an even cup of sugar (just in case you are still using your old fashioned measuring cups…shame on you!)

You can find the full list of this month’s participants at Wicked Good Vegan.

gluten-free jammie dodgers

Gluten-Free Jammie Dodgers

Recipe Type: Cookie
Cuisine: British
Author: Mary Fran Wiley
Prep time: 30 mins
Cook time: 17 mins
Total time: 47 mins
Serves: 24
Ingredients
  • 460 grams (4 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature
  • 200 grams (1 cup) sugar
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 2 teaspoons vanilla bean paste
  • 680 grams (5 cups) gluten-free all purpose flour blend*
  • 2 1/2 teapsoons xantham gum**
  • Strawberry or rasperry jam
Instructions
  1. Cream together the butter, sugar, salt and vanilla bean paste until it is just blended.
  2. Add the flour in 2 batches, scraping down the sides of your mixer after each addition.
  3. Stir in the vanilla bean paste.
  4. Refrigerate the dough for about 30 minutes. About halfway through this time, preheat your oven to 350 degrees.
  5. Lightly flour a surface and roll the dough out and cut into 2.5″ circles. On half of them, cut out a small circle or heart.
  6. Pop the cut out cookies on cookie sheets into the freezer for 5 minutes before baking.
  7. Arrange about a half inch apart on a cookie sheet lined with parchment and bake for 12-15 minutes.
  8. Cool on a wire rack.
  9. Spread the half the cookies with a scant teaspoon of jam and then top with a cookie with a hole cut out of it to make a sandwich.
Notes
*This recipe will work best with Cup4Cup Gluten-Free All Purpose Flour. You may use Jules Nearly Normal or Better Batter flours with good results. Do not use a baking mix such a Pamela’s or Gluten-Free Bisquick. **Xantham gum only needed if it isn’t in your all-purpose blend, the suggested blends already include it.
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