Friday, March 20, 2015

Gluten Free, High Protein, Low Glycemic Cookies, Kale Chips

Last night they had a gathering for newcomers to Lake Tapps Community Church. Kathy and I are not newcomers, but since we live in two states and used to travel a lot we do not have the roots one would like to have. Kathy asked the Coracks is we could come and they said yes.

It was not necessary to bring something, they put out quite the spread, but I wanted to. And it turned out at least one person other than Kathy was on a gluten free diet. I have been experimenting with nut flours instead of grains.

I used equal portions of almond flour, dried powdered peanut butter, coconut flour and whole oats as the base. If it was just Kathy and I there would be no added sugar, or very little. However, other people expect cookies to be sweet. I added dried dates, shredded sweetened coconut, chocolate chips and a teaspoon of turbinado sugar. For the liquid I mostly used egg whites, but some coconut milk as well. Cinnamon and vanilla extract served as the flavor enhancers. 350 degrees worked well.

More and more, when I bring food to a party, I try to use a recycled container so that I do not have to remember to take it home. We had finished all the whole kale chips from a Costco organic two pack*, so we used the crumbs to enhance our salad at lunch and packed the cookies in that. There were only four remaining when we left and I saw at least one person come back for seconds.

In the coming weeks I want to experiment with almond flour, dried powdered peanut butter, coconut flour and whole oats that have been blended so they handle like a flour for pasta. My first attempt to duplicate the Wild Sage Almond Flour Ravioli tasted good, but it lacked presentation because it did not handle well.

* Kathy and I both enjoy Kale chips. We usually use olive oil from a misto to help the sea salt stick. However, I have never come close to anything as good as Costco's Pacific Superfood chips. They are dried at 112 degrees so they count as raw foods and they package says the ingredients are cashews, nutritional yeast, olives, olive oil and sea salt. However, they are fairly expensive, I think the use of dried olives drives the price up. Perhaps my Google fu is lacking, but while I could find dried olives, they tend to be sold in 5 - 7 oz jars ranging from 15 -19 dollars.

No comments:

Post a Comment