We’re halfway through the month, and I’ve kept it gluten-free. Even when eating out, there’s almost always a viable option or two (or more). And since we moved last week, there were a number of eating-out nights.

Logan’s Roadhouse was easy — a nice steak, with grilled veggies and a crouton-free salad. Plus all the free peanuts you can eat.

We discovered a brand-new location of the sandwich chain Jimmy John’s near the new place. I’d heard about them before, but there weren’t any in Washington, and the nearest Florida location was many miles away. We tried their “unwich” (all the sandwich fillings, wrapped in lettuce leaves and then wrapped in paper so you eat it like a burrito). Fantastic! My only problem is that they don’t have pickles as sandwich toppings. They have cucumber slices, which isn’t the same thing at all, and they have a full dill pickle as a side. Next time, I may ask them to slice a pickle and put it on the sandwich. That would be perfect.

We also discovered a salad place, Greens & Grille. It’s a local two-spot chain where they make a salad to your specifications, then throw on some grilled meat. It’s tasty, but it has its problems. Number one is that a salad can run you over ten bucks. Number two is that the place is really cold, with metal chairs. Shiver! Hopefully it’ll be more pleasant in the summertime, but when the outside temperature is mid-40s and the indoor feels maybe ten degrees higher, it’s not a pleasant dining experience.

But my friends, I haven’t been completely low-carb while I’ve been gluten-free. We did Fuddrucker’s one night, and I got my burger without the bun … but with those awesome wedge fries. We also went to Moe’s (one of many burrito places, and the closest thing Florida has to the magnificent Taco Del Mar) and I had a naked burrito bowl — all the fillings, but without the wheat tortilla. That means rice, beans, and even corn chips.

I will admit, I’m burned out on eating out for a little while. It doesn’t help that a couple of days ago, I had some upset stomach issues that I’m pretty sure were food-related. That’s no fun. But our new fridge (and much larger freezer) are now stocked with meats, meats, meats, cheeses, meats, and some fruit and veg.

So healthwise, how is gluten-free January treating me? Just fine! Besides the stomach upset, my energy levels have been normal, and I’ve been relatively free of any bloating or gas (even after eating beans and rice). My weight, which I maintain between 130-133, has been bouncing around from 130.4 to 130.8 the last few days. Even with me eating the occasional potatoes, rice, beans, and corn.

File this one under both gluten-free and low-carb.

I can’t believe I haven’t posted this soup before. You know how there are some recipes you make all the time, and love, and you don’t even have them written down because you know them so well? This is one of those. So I’m going to give approximations on things like spices, since I’m used to just dumping in what looks right.

This soup originated as an actual jambalaya recipe. But when we went low-carb, we couldn’t do the rice part anymore. So I tried it without the rice, and it’s still just as awesome. I’m sure there are some jambalaya-ish things I’m leaving out (chicken, for one, because I’m just not a big fan) but since it started as jambalaya, the name remains for me.

This is the first big thing I’m cooking in my new kitchen. So much room! I got my mise-en-place all ready, then had to take a panorama photo of everything. My shorty soup pot, herbs and spices, some canned goods, and some chopped fresh stuff. Onward!

2 tsp olive oil
1 6-pack beef brats (or the sausage of your choice)
1 medium onion, diced
6 stalks celery, diced
1 Tbsp chopped garlic

2 tsp chili powder
1 tsp thyme
1/2 tsp black pepper
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp basil
1/4 tsp parsley
1/4 tsp garlic powder
2 bay leaves

1 can tomato sauce
2 cans/1 tetra-pak beef broth

15-20 raw shrimp

Heat up the oil on medium, then toss in the brats. I chop the sausage into little half-moons; I think that’s a nice size for a soup spoon. Let the brats render out some of their oil.

Toss in the onion, celery, and garlic. Let it reduce down some. Then throw in all the dry spices. I made educated guesses on the amounts for all of these, except the bay leaves. Those are easy to measure. If you’re nervous, go with half of my stated amounts, then taste and add more. I just eyeball and taste, eyeball and taste. You could also toss in some cayenne pepper, or some smoked paprika, or even some Tabasco for a little extra kick. I like to do a little shake of the garlic Tabasco. Next, add the liquids: two cans of broth, one of tomato sauce.

I used the larger tomato sauce can, which is 15 ounces. You could also do two of those little 8-ounce cans. The cans of beef broth are 14.5 ounces each, or you could do the 32-ounce box. It’s all close enough.

Let it simmer. It could simmer for 10 minutes, or an hour. Up to you.

But whatever you do, make sure the simmering is watched over by a quartet of tiny luchadors.

A couple of minutes before you’re ready to serve, add the shrimp. I get the raw tail-on ones from Coscto, thaw them in running cold water, then chop off the tails and cut the shrimp into 3 or 4 pieces. Again, nicely sized for the soup spoon. They only take three or four minutes to cook in the bubbling broth, then you’re ready to serve.

We do big ol’ mugs for soup. This really hits the spot on a cold day! Depending on bowl/mug size, you can probably get 5-6 servings out of this batch. Which means at least a couple of delicious soupy lunches later in the week.

I’m taking part in Gluten-Free January, a little grassroots project that is actually something I’d been thinking about trying to put together myself. I wanted to challenge friends to try just one month gluten-free to see how much better they could feel. This makes it easy, since someone else has already set up the framework.

I eat mostly gluten-free already, because it turns out that gluten can be one of the main triggers for a Crohn’s disease flare. I do occasionally splurge, but when you’re not used to eating the stuff, a splurge tastes good at the eatin’, but doesn’t feel too good during the digestin’. So come tomorrow, I’ll be avoiding the stuff completely for a full month. In fact, I had some breaded chicken strips a couple of days ago, and … blargh.

This also means no beer. Although the Whole Foods has a couple of gluten-free beers, they’re pricey. Maybe I should just make 2011 a beer-free year as well.

Anyhoo, anyone else out there doing GFJ? A couple of my Seattle friends on the Facebook say they’re going to take part. If you’re a low-carber, this does mean that certain convenience items like low-carb tortillas and breads are off limits. But on the plus side, there are a ton of gluten-free products out there, some of which are not bad. And all pre-packaged products have to list wheat as an allergen if it’s included.

I have a number of gluten-free items in my low carb category of posts. And I just got some Bob’s Red Mill gluten-free baking flour; it’s only slightly less carby then regular wheat flour, but I don’t plan on using much at a time. It’s mainly to adjust the texture of stuff made with my old favorite, coconut flour.

This isn’t the first time I’ve tried peanut butter cookies. There was a semi-failure a while back, in which I tried the “amazing” flourless peanut butter cookie recipe that’s all over the internets. Well, they weren’t bad, but they weren’t great either. Not moist, not chewy. More crumbly and powdery than anything.

So when I asked a coworker if he wanted something baked for his birthday, and he asked for peanut butter cookies, I figured it was the perfect time to adjust, experiment, and cobble together something better.

Please note, I didn’t put “low carb” in the title of this recipe. It is a reduced-sugar recipe; however, it has more carbs per serving than my usual experimental baking. If you’re in maintenance, these should be fine, but be warned that there’s actual brown sugar in these.

Ingredients!
8 oz peanut butter
1/4 cup brown sugar
1/3 cup Splenda (9 packets) or 1/3 cup granulated sugar
2 tsp vanilla extract
2 eggs
1 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 cup coconut flour
2 Tbsp softened butter (1/4 stick)
2 Tbsp whey protein powder (plain vanilla flavor)

Let’s talk about these ingredients. Almost every recipe out there demands a cup of peanut butter. But I find it a challenge to measure peanut butter into a cup, then get it all out. So sticky! Instead, I put my mixing bowl on my food scale, and plopped spoonfuls in until it hit 8 ounces. Much easier. Although my use of “plopped” is probably another example of why Scott says I should never write catalog copy for foods.

I split the sweetener between regular and brown, because brown is supposed to make a softer cookie. Because it has a little moisture (molasses) in it. I used coconut flour to bulk up the batter, and protein powder to … well, add protein. Which is apparently also supposed to help make a moister, softer cookie. This is the job that the protein gluten usually does with wheat flour. If you don’t have whey protein powder, no worries, just add a little more coconut flour. Or you could make up the 2 Tbsp in almond flour. Whatever floats your boat!

After dumping everything in the bowl and using the hand mixer on it, I threw on a pair of gloves (I have a huge box of latex-free rubbery gloves, good for everything from hair coloring to jalapeno chopping) and made balls of dough. I flattened them with my hands, then pressed them to an even height with a fork. Because peanut butter cookies without the fork marks are like Florida without sunshine.

Bake on a silicon sheet or parchment paper at 350° for 10-12 minutes.

On the advice of my lawyer the internets, I also put these on a brown paper bag when I took them off the baking sheet. Supposed to absorb as well as paper towels, but not make the cookies soggy.

But the big questions: how do they taste? And are they moist? Well, they taste GREAT. As for the texture, they’re not the weird, light, powdery consistency of the other ones. These are almost more cake-like. Fluffy and light. Definitely a better cookie than previous attempts.

I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to make a truly moist and chewy low-carb cookie. So much of the chewiness comes from the wheat flour. But I’ll keep trying. And I’ll definitely eat my fair share of these.

Nutrition stats, per cookie, for a batch of 20 cookies (approx 2″ across):

100 calories
7g fat
5.5g carb
1.5g fiber (for 4g net carbs)
4g protein

A lot of workplaces lately are offering discounts or bonuses on health insurance based on biometric screenings. I went and had mine today, even though I think the whole thing is … well, if not a complete pile of bull, then a bunch of somewhat-wrongs wrapped up in a bow.

The screening consisted of several parts. Here’s why they all suck:

1. BMI: First, they measured my height and weight, and used a chart to show my BMI, or body mass index. Now, for someone of my average height (5-foot-4) and build, the BMI scale is relatively accurate-ish. However, if you venture much below 5’2″ or above 5’8″ or so, the numbers start getting crappy — the taller you get, the more scrawny you have to be to fit within the numbers (and conversely, the really short can be much heavier and still be considered “fit”). That’s because BMI was developed almost 200 years ago by a Belgian mathematician as a quick and rough way to assess trends in large groups, NOT as a tool to measure individuals. It came into favor in the ’70s thanks to Ancel Keys, the same guy who convinced the government to get behind a high-carb diet for health.

A better measure would be body fat percentage, but they certainly don’t have the time, money, or manpower to dunk us all in the tank. I’d also like to see waist measurements and waist-to-hip ratios instead of BMI. Funny thing, the pamphlet they sent us away with mentions both of those waist-related things, but we didn’t get measured for them.

2. Glucose: Yes, it’s good to know your blood glucose numbers. They can certainly be an indicator of diabetes, hyperglycemia, or other issues. However, these screenings don’t require you to have fasted for over 10 hours. They also don’t take into account when you last ate, or what you last ate. So we’re comparing the glucose of people who just ate a sandwich and chips an hour ago to people who haven’t eaten since the night before.

If we can’t count on everyone to fast beforehand, maybe we should be looking at the HbA1c, which is more of a snapshot of how blood glucose has been over the previous 3 months. Or even better, a full glucose tolerance test — fasting beforehand, drinking a measured amount of glucose, then charting of the resulting blood sugars over several hours.

Overall, the glucose doesn’t suck as much as the other biometrics, since at least it’s not based on inaccurate formulas. Still, it doesn’t tell you much of anything.

3. Cholesterol: Several problems here. Just like with glucose, fasting matters in a cholesterol screening. If you had something sugary an hour ago, especially something with fructose, your triglycerides will show as way too high. That’s not a fair way to be judged. Also, this test was done with a quickie fingerstick instead of a venous draw. The machine measures total cholesterol, HDL, and triglycerides, then calculates the LDL using something called the Friedewald formula. In a perfect world, LDL would be measured directly, and would also be divided into large LDL particles (actually good for you) and small LDL particles (the actual bad stuff).

(Yes, I fasted for these numbers. I knew they’d be more accurate that way.)

As you can see, the Friedewald formula failed me, because my triglycerides are too good. They’re lower then 45 mg/dL, which is below the threshold of the machine, so the formula (which is TC – [HDL + Tri/5]) can’t be applied.

There are a couple of boxes checked on the left side of this picture. That means I’m supposed to follow up with my doctor, because of my low triglycerides (that’s right, the stuff they want you to get as low as possible) and my nonexistent LDL (which is actually represented in a fair-ish manner by the “non-HDL” reading).

I had a cholesterol test less than a month ago, when I was in the hospital. My triglycerides were 43, and my LDL was directly measured (not calculated) at 74. Which an actual cardiologist raved about. So I won’t be rushing out anytime soon to get followed up on these bad numbers.

4. Personal Health Assessment: Last up is a big ol’ quiz we have to take through WebMD. There are a ton of questions about stress, habits, exercise, nutrition, and miscellaneous other factors. Then you get a score on the 100 scale.

I was completely honest about food. And this was frustrating. They group fruits and vegetables together as one item — for this survey, a glass of fruit juice is equivalent in health to a serving of broccoli. Which is absoulte bull. Also, saturated fats and trans fats are considered the same thing here. I eat a LOT of natural saturated animal fat, and NO trans fats. Still, I was totally honest with my answers.

I was shocked to score as high as 84, especially since I got a 72 last time I took this thing. I think I improved on stress, and my cholesterol numbers were slightly better. Just for giggles, I plugged in fake numbers for my foods — 6 servings of fruit/veg, 6 servings of grain, and zero servings of high-fat foods. What a surprise, my number jumped up to 93.

So yeah, my biometrics are all good. But I feel bad for everyone who’s going to fail these tests (and either not get a bonus [or worse, have their premiums raised]) because they’re using outdated formulas, inaccurate calculations, and ideas about health that are the fads that just won’t die.

When I was growing up, my folks used to make a huge batch of spaghetti sauce every now and again. Seems like we always had some in the freezer, and it was always freakin’ delicious. I learned to make it, and just threw down a batch the other day. It works as spaghetti sauce. It works in a lasagna. And if you chuck a can of beans and some cumin into it, it’s an awesome chili.

I say “easy” in that it is indeed easy, but this is a simmered sauce. It takes time. So this is the perfect project for a weekend day when you’re just kicking around the house.

First, brown two pounds of ground beef. I used 93/7 beef for two reasons: it was on sale, and with that small amount of fat, you don’t have to drain the fat. If you don’t want to. You can still drain the fat if you’re on one of those crazy low-fat fad diets, but you don’t need to.

Look here, I drained the fat so you can see how little there was:

See? Not even half of a small almond can. Which I’d cleaned out first. Because I poured the fat back into the pot. This draining was for demonstration purposes only. I really don’t recommend it. It adds flavor, and all of the healthful benefits of natural animal fat.

Have I made my opinions of meat fat clear? Good. Fat returned to pot, and it’s time for the first wave of additions.

One onion, diced. Eight or so stalks of celery, diced. You could also dice up a couple of bell peppers, if they float your boat. Can’t stand the things myself. Next: a couple of tablespoons of chopped garlic (yes, I used the stuff in the jar). I eyeballed the spices, but it’s approximately 1/2 teaspoon of salt, 1/2 teaspoon of black pepper, 1/2 teaspoon of garlic powder, and a tablespoon or so of chili powder. I likes me the chili powder.

You don’t need to sauté the vegetables; they’re about to spend hours simmering, which will get them plenty soft. See? Easy! Now for the next additions:

1 can of diced tomatoes (I like the “petite diced” for the size. You’re welcome to use bigger chunks if that floats your boat). And here’s where I hope you used a large pot, because this recipe calls for two jugs/cans of tomato juice. My folks used to use the big-ass metal cans of Campbell’s juice; this time around, I got two 46-oz bottles (again, because that’s what was available).

Why juice, and not sauce or puree or paste? There’s just something magcial about how the juice reduces down over a few hours. I guess if you want to be really adventurous, you could substitute one of the cans/jugs of juice with V8. Me, I’m not that ballsy.

Dump in. Mix. Bring it to a simmer, reduce heat to medium-low.

Now put the lid on, half-cocked so steam can escape. And let it simmer gently for … let’s say 6 hours. Because that’s how long I let this particular batch simmer. Stir it every half-hour or so, or whenever you get up to go do something else. Look at how much it’s reduced:

Dark. Rich. Tasty. BUT WAIT! Sure, you could serve it up now, but it’s not as good as it could be at this point. This sauce really requires some time in the freezer. I can’t explain what happens; I don’t have the math for it. But it’s good, good stuff.

Let this cool a bit on the stove. Portion it out to suit your family — for the two of us, I put it in two-cup containers. Back in my youth, the family-of-four servings would be frozen in old Cool-Whip containers. I put them in the fridge first, since our freezer is kind of full, and I didn’t want all that warmth in there. After they cooled down, I stacked them in the freezer.

When you want to eat it, no need to pre-thaw (although you can toss one in the fridge the night before if you want to). What we’d do in days of olde was throw the frozen block of sauce in a saucepan and add in one of those little 8-ounce cans of tomato sauce. Along with a dash of chili powder, garlic powder, and black pepper. Heat until the frozen block is demolished and it’s all bubbly.

Serve it on spaghetti. Or spaghetti squash. Layer it in a lasagna. We’re going to try to make noodles from zucchini, like Alton Brown did on Good Eats recntly. Or you can throw in a can of drained beans and some cumin when it’s thawed, and it becomes chili! Sometimes I’ll put some in a dish, add some frozen meatballs, and take it to work. A quick blast in the microwave, a sprinkling of parmesan, and that’s some damned tasty lunch.

It’s a baking time of year, and I’m not about to let low-carb or gluten-free get in my way. Also, it’s a pumpkin time of year, and Scott loves pumpkin pie. I figured this would be the best of all worlds.

As a note, I don’t think I’ve ever had pumpkin pie before. Sure, my parents made one every Thanksgiving. But I wasn’t all that big on Thanksgiving foods in general — I ate Spaghetti-O’s or macaroni and cheese throughout my childhood, because absolutely nothing on the Thanksgiving table sounded edible at all. So it’s certainly possible that this will be my first taste of a baked good based on pumpkin.

For a base, I looked back to my coconut cheesecakes. I figured I’d still do the cupcake versions, since I don’t have a springform pan. Also, the cupcake-sized cakes make it easier to not take too large a slice. You always know what one serving is.

I researched pumpkin pie spice, and also looked at little jars of it at the grocery store. Since it was made from a blend of spices I have on hand, I decided to throw together my own.

THE CRUST
2 Tbsp melted butter
1/2 cup almond meal
1/4 cup coconut flour
2 Tbsp (3 packets) Splenda (or the sweetener of your choice)
1/4 tsp cinnamon

Smoosh the crust ingredients together (I put on a rubber glove and did it by hand). This was exactly enough crust mix for 12 cupcake cups; the problem was that the recipe I whipped up made way more cheesecake filling. So:

THE REVISED CRUST
3 Tbsp melted butter
2/3 cup almond meal
1/3 cup coconut flour
2 Tbsp (3 packets) Splenda (or blah blah choice)
1/4 tsp cinnamon

Split the mix up among 12 cupcake cups (18, if revised), and press it down into the bottoms of the cups. I then opted to pre-bake the crust for 5 minutes before putting in the filling. I don’t know that it made all that much difference, but it felt fancy.

THE FILLING
2 packages (8-oz. each) full-fat cream cheese
1 can (15-oz) pumpkin (make sure it’s purely pumpkin, not some sort of “pie filling”)
3 eggs
2 tsp vanilla extract
1/4 cup Splenda (or … you know)
2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp cloves
1/2 tsp allspice
1/4 tsp ginger
1/4 tsp nutmeg
1/4 tsp salt

I wasn’t especially delicate here — I dumped everything into the bowl, then blended it with my hand mixer. All of the spices are ground. I went heavier on the cloves (initially I only wrote down 1/4 tsp) because whenever I open up the little can, I remember how much I absolutely love the smell and taste of ground cloves.

Mix it all up, then pour it into your cupcake cups. This is enough filling for 18 cups. I only made enough crust for 12, plus I only own one 12-cup cupcake pan. So this is what I did with the remaining filling:

Bake them at 350° for 25-35 minutes. I started checking at 20 minutes, set five a couple more times, and took them out at the 30-minute mark. Your oven may vary.

How about the nutrition facts? I ran the numbers with the increased amount of crust, so this is based on a batch of 18 cupcake cheesecakes, all with crust.

PER CUPCAKE CHEESECAKE
160 calories
14g fat
5g carbohydrate
1.5g dietary fiber (for a net carb count of 3.5)
4.5g protein

And! The bulk of the carbs are coming from pumpkin. So hey, vegetables! (Or culinary vegetables that are botanically gourds, or squash, or fruit, depending on how obstinate you want to be.)

As usual, these go in the fridge after they’ve cooled a bit. It helps the butter in the crust hold together better, and gives a nice, dense texture to the filling. I likes my cheesecakes heavy.

I’ve had this recipe card in my file for about 15 years. I really should make this stuff more often. If you’ve ever been to Duke’s in Seattle, you know how great their chowder is. Their take-home recipe isn’t quite there, but it’s really good anyway. I’ve also made a few small adjustments of my own.

2 slices diced bacon
1 Tbsp butter
1/2 onion, diced
2 stalks celery, diced
pinch of chopped fresh garlic

1 tsp thyme
1/2 tsp marjoram
1/2 tsp Italian seasoning
1/4 tsp black pepper
1/4 tsp basil
1/8 tsp dill
2 bay leaves
pinch of salt
pinch of cayenne pepper

1/4 tsp xanthan gum

2 cups heavy cream
4 oz (1/2 bottle) clam juice

8 oz. diced potatoes (steamed or canned)
1 can (6.5 oz) chopped clams

Starting from the top: dice two strips of bacon, then cook until brown and it gives off yummy bacon fat. Add the butter, onions, celery, garlic, and all of the dry spices. Cook until tender.

Add the xanthan gum (the original recipe calls for 1/3 cup flour at this stage) for thickening. Stir until smooth. Add the cream, clam juice, and any liquid in the can of chopped clams. Bring to a simmer, but not a boil (boiling is bad for cream).

Add the clams and potatoes, bring back to a simmer. Ready, set, eat!

Now, here are my quirks: first off, I used canned potatoes. I just don’t have the patience to cook them for this. I got whole potatoes and chopped them up, but you may also be able to find sliced or chopped potatoes in a can. Also, this could be a totally low-carb dish if you omit the potatoes entirely. Since I’m on maintenance, a little of the ol’ deadly nightshade is fine for me.

Next, I used my stick blender, but just a little bit. I still wanted lots of big chunks, but I also wanted some smaller chunks to help make a thicker texture. I think I got it just right; I probably stick-blended for 30 seconds total, popping in and out in order to get some big chunks under the blade. OH, and — take out the bay leaves before stick blending. Those aren’t good eatin’.

Lastly, I left out the original recipe’s listing of half-and-half (It would have been a quarter-cup, what’s the point?) and chopped fresh parsley. (Garnish, who needs it.) I also completely overlooked the a pinch of cayenne pepper, which probably would have jazzed this up a little bit. I’ll definitely add it next time, and I included it in the list above. I used more thyme than the original recipe called for, because thyme is my A-number-1 go-to favorite spice. You can adjust the seasonings accordingly to your liking.

It’s not surprising that I left something off; the original recipe card has the ingredients in a baffling order, instead of the more sensible order-you-cook-them-in. So I’ve put them in an order I like up above, spaced apart according to the various steps. Now I can put the card away and use a computer instead. Ah, the future. The future of chowder!

I’m enjoying the ongoing coconut flour experiments. This time, I went for a classic: chocolate chip cookies. Please bear in mind, these aren’t specifically low-carb chocolate chip cookies. I used actual sugar and actual chocolate chips in this one. Although if they’re going to just be a treat, and if you’re on maintenance, they can certainly fit into a low-carb lifestyle.

There are two main problems with using the coconut flour. One is that the cookies don’t flatten and spread like wheat flour cookies do. They stayed in virtually the same shapes in which I plopped them on the baking sheets. The other issue is that they don’t get crispy on the edges, which may also be a product of wheat.

Nevertheless, these are good little cookies. They taste like regular chocolate chip cookies, and they have a pretty good texture (although there’s always room for improvement). They’re more soft and crumbly than gooey, which is always the goal for a good CCC.

Ingredients:

1/2 cup butter (1 stick), softened
1/3 cup dark brown sugar
1/3 cup Splenda
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
2 eggs
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
3/4 cup coconut flour
1/4 cup almond meal/flour
2 Tbsp heavy cream
1/2 cup semisweet chocolate chips

Mix the wet stuff, then add the dry stuff in shifts until it’s all combined. Stir in the chips by hand last. (If you’ve ever made CCCs before, this is the standard M.O.) Bake at 400° for 10-12 minutes. Makes 25 cookies.

All right, so. I made this recipe from a combination of various online sources and the classic Toll House recipe on the bag of chips. I used a mix of brown sugar and Splenda, to cut down on some of the carbs. I used dark brown sugar because that’s what was in the house (Scott uses a little bit in his rub when he does baby-back ribs).

The original Toll House recipe calls for baking soda, but the only baking soda in my house is in an open container in the fridge. I don’t think the stuff that absorbs fridge odors should go in the cookies, so I used baking powder instead. One of the ingredients in baking powder is baking soda, so it got in there in a way.

The cream was a last-minute addition, since the batter looked a little thick. I’m glad I added it, and may add a bit more last time to make the cookies even moister. Is moister a word? Well, it is now. Wait, more moist?

Anyhoo. Good flavor, so now future tweaks will include trying to figure out moistness and outer crispitude. And yes, crispitude is definitely a word.

OH, also! Note that one cookie looks more like a Chips Ahoy. You know how when you make CCCs, there’s always the last bit of dough that doesn’t have any chips in it? Yeah, so I just took some chips by hand and studded them in that last sad dough. I think next time, I’ll do that with all of the cookies. It makes them flatter and more uniformly round, gives you a nice even dispersal of chips, and probably uses less chips per cookie than the random stir-in method.

Nutrition: 87 calories / 6.5g fat / 6g carb / 1.5g carbohydrate / 1.5g protein (per cookie, 25-cookie batch)

Scott’s been speaking lately of shortbread. Although in a Disney household like ours, we frequently refer to it as “shorts-bread”. If you’ve had the shorts-shaped shortbreads (Say that 5 times fast!) from the Disney parks, you’ll know the deliciousness to which I refer.

I have this coconut flour, which is really cool stuff. So I figured I’d try my hand at something at least resembling shortbread. And while I’m in the same city as shortbread, and perhaps in the next neighborhood over, these didn’t quite make it. Although they’re pretty darned tasty.

As usual, I cobbled together a recipe based on various things found online. And based on what I have in my own kitchen.

First I mixed the dry ingredients: coconut flour, almond meal, whey powder, salt, baking powder, and a little xanthan gum. A lot of the online recipes have more than one flour in there — in addition to the coconut flour, I’ve seen wheat flour, rice flour, millet flour, barley flour, quinoa flour, and even teff flour. What the what is teff flour? There’s the wikipedia entry. I’d prefer to call it lovegrass flour. But alas, I don’t have any of those other flours. So I used what I had.

Both the coconut flour and the almond meal are from Bob’s Red Mill. I also got a bag of coconut flour from the oddly-named Let’s Do…Organic!, which I haven’t cracked open yet. The LDO is a noticeably coarser grain than the Bob’s — a little finer than my almond meal, while the Bob’s is powdery like real flour.

I added both whey powder and xanthan gum because they both have emulsifying properties, which are helpful when you’re not using gluten. You could totes leave either one out. Or both. Whatevs.

I don’t own a sifting device. My colanders all have holes way to big to sift with. So I just mixed the dry stuff up with a fork, and smashed the really obvious lumps. I’m a totally cautious baker, yo.

Next step: wet stuff. I creamed the butter, sweetener (Splenda), and vanilla extract. Man, that vanilla had the Splenda dissolving right away. It kind of hissed and bubbled. Disturbing, but cool.

Add the eggs to the creamed butter/sweet/nilla goo. I think I was probably supposed to add them one at a time, but I just tossed all three in together and blended it up. Did I say I was cautious? Oh yeah.

Some recipes would have you roll out your dough. This stuff was too sticky. And I was too impatient (and cautious) to chill the dough in the fridge, like you would with a butter cookie. So instead, I gave it the peanut butter cookie treatment — rolled it into balls with my hands, then smooshed them down flat.

I tried a row without the rolling, just slopping a wad of dough onto the baking sheet and flattening. Hey, this is a test batch. Best to try all possible methods, to find the laziest most cautious method possible.

Oh, and hey — I tried to smoosh them flat with a drinking glass. The dough stuck. Drinking glass with plastic wrap on it, covered in butter? Likewise stuck. So I used my good ol’ hands. My veiny, tendon-rific hands. I never though I’d lose so much weight in my hands. Weird.

And there they are, little cookies! Two dozen, approximately 2″ across. They didn’t spread much at all, they just rose a little bit. So smooshing was definitely the way to go. As you can see, some of these are a slightly different color — I did 16 cookies normally, then added some cinnamon and allspice to the rest of the dough. So 8 of them are sort of spiced. But I didn’t use quite enough spice.

Recipe time!
1/2 cup coconut flour
1/2 cup almond meal
1/2 tsp salt
1-1/2 tsp baking powder
2 Tbsp whey protein powder (about a half-scoop)
1/4 tsp xanthan gum

1/2 cup butter, softened (1 stick)
1/2 cup sweetener (sugar/Splenda/whatevs)
3 eggs
2 tsp vanilla extract

(Optional spices: 1 Tbsp cinnamon [or a mix of cinnamon, allspice, cloves, and so on that adds up to a tablespoon] and/or some extract or other flavoring. If I were doing an all-cinnamon batch, I’d probably use 2 tsp cinnamon, 1 tsp allspice, and 1 tsp liquid cinnamon flavoring.)

Mix the first 6 ingredients (the dry stuff). Then cream the butter, sweetener, and vanilla together (remember, sugar is a “wet” ingredient). Add the eggs, mix. Then gradually add the dry mix to the wet stuff (I did it in 3 parts).

Roll into balls (or not, depending on your personal caution level) and smash down to 1/4-inch high or so. Use a non-stick baking sheet, or parchment paper, or a silicon pad. These are buttery, but I still worry about stickitude.

Bake for 12-15 minutes at 350° F.

So they’re softer than shortbread — fairly cakey for cookies. In fact, one might even call them snickerdoodleish. But they’re really tasty. And I bet they’d be even tastier with the cream cheese frosting I used in my cookie sandwiches. Because everything’s better with frosting! OR, you could embrace the snickerdoodleishness, and roll them in some cinnamon/sweetener mix before baking. NOM.