My Bread Experiment - gluten-free, wheat-free, dairy-free, egg-free, soy-free, corn-free

I eliminated yeast from my diet last October and have not tried to bring it back...until now. You see, my girls still like to have sandwiches for lunch, and because they are on a very similar diet to my own, I've been buying those bricks that masquerade as loaves of gluten-free bread in the freezer section of the grocery store. (And they cost almost as much as a gold brick.) Well, this weekend we happened to run out of bread and money at the same time, so I decided to finally attempt the recipe I had purchased the ingredients for months ago but had yet to make:  this Everyday Sandwich Bread that is gluten-free, wheat-free, dairy-free, egg-free, corn-free and soy-free. I was literally scared to try it, mainly because it does have yeast in it. I don't have much experience baking with yeast and for some reason that intimidated me to my core. I had to  have one of those out-loud pep talks with myself just to get up the guts to try it...mainly because of my fear of failure! Finally my husband - ever the voice of reason - reminded me that the worst that could happen is I'd have to throw it away and start over. Oh...so you mean...the sky won't fall on me? Okay.

So I made it.

And Oh. My. Word. I mean, seriously. I have not had bread since October. So, you might imagine I was going nuts as I could smell this bread baking in my own house. Then I pull it out of the oven and it. is. perfect.

So, I decided at that moment: "Hmm, today seems like a really good day to re-introduce yeast into my diet and see if my body has an intolerance to it." (After doing an elimination diet, if you choose to try and re-introduce a food into your system, you eat it three days in a row.)

I HIGHLY ENJOYED this delicious bread.

My body, alas, did not.

Oh, the PAIN. I finally (after only two days of eating a little of this bread) had to wave the white flag and surrender. Yeast is not for me. Sigh. Double sigh. Triple sigh. Because this bread is GOOD.

But honestly, there is a part of me that's okay with it. You know why? Bread was a food that I always over-indulged on in the past. Knowing what I do now about the little fact that it was making me so ILL kind of helps with my self-control. I mean, I need to have self-control anyway, but...I have a history of not regulating myself when it comes to portion control. You want a piece of bread? Great! You want three or four pieces? Okay! With butter and cinnamon and sugar on top? Why not! But now, I can officially scratch "yeast" off the list of foods that are okay for me to eat.

So while I wipe away a little tear (figuratively), I also do a little happy dance. Because yeast is a slippery slope that leads to bread, which leads to lots of bread, which leads to being sick and overweight and miserable.

And I don't want to go there again.

P.S. And since baking this bread for my family earned me their coveted "best mother on the planet" title, I will now have to torture myself by making the afore-mentioned bread once a week for my children. Ah, a mother's love. Wish me luck. ;-)

P.P.S. please like Whole & Free on Facebook! :-)

Miracle at Whole Foods & Kale Chips Recipe

roasted kale chips

A couple of weeks ago I was standing in the produce section at Whole Foods. Two ladies came up next to me and were clearly new to the store...or at least the produce section. One of them said,
"We need kale....what IS kale, exactly? What does it LOOK like?"

Since I was standing right next to them (and in front of the kale!) I couldn't resist helping them out:
"Here it is...this is the green kale and this is the purple kale."

But this didn't end their confusion. "Which one's better...the green or purple?"

I told them they both taste the same to me, and both have the same nutritional content, so it was just a matter of personal preference.

Their questions weren't done. "So how do YOU cook kale?" (I am now the resident kale expert, apparently.)

I told them about a couple of different ways I like to prepare kale...making kale chips and braising it with garlic and onions for a while. I gave them specifics on oven temps and cooking times, and they were most grateful. Off they went to bravely face cooking kale for the first time.

This whole scenario was a complete miracle. Why, you ask?

Because less than six months ago, that was ME. I was the one who bravely entered the organic section of a grocery store for the very first time and had to humble myself and ASK someone "What in the world is kale?". I desperately wanted to SEEM like I knew, but of course I did not. In fact, the first time I even shopped at a Whole Foods I felt like a complete fish out of water. There I was...one of very few overweight people in the whole store...in a produce section bigger than my house...purchasing all kinds of veggies I'd only ever seen before on the Food Network.

Fast forward six months, and not only have I cooked kale...a lot...but I LIKE it. And I can make it a few different ways without so much as a recipe. Oh. My. Word. Who is this person???

It just goes to show. Miracles can still happen. Even at the grocery store.

To celebrate, here's a simple recipe for kale chips. These are now like potato chips at my house. They look TERRIBLE but taste AWESOME and are quite addictive. But it's okay because they are a complete superfood. So go ahead, have some more!

BASIC KALE CHIPS

1-2 bunches kale (any variety)
olive oil to drizzle (maybe about 2 tablespoons or so?)
coarse sea salt (fine works too)
freshly ground black pepper

Wash, rinse, and dry kale. Make sure you get the kale REALLY dry. Remove the leaves from the stems (which are kind of woody and hard to chew). Chop the kale into smaller pieces (I do rough squares/rectangles, a couple of inches across.) Lay them out in a single layer on a parchment-lined baking sheet. (Or not, if you don't have parchment paper...that just helps them not stick to the pan.) Drizzle with olive oil, sprinkle to taste with sea salt (I like the coarse stuff) and fresh ground black pepper. The biggest mistake I always used to make when cooking is that I was very timid when seasoning things, and therefore they often seemed tasteless. Depending on what kind of diet you're on, perhaps you can handle salt or perhaps not. If you need a lower salt recipe, perhaps add a liberal amount of garlic powder and black pepper in place of the salt.

Bake them at 325 degrees for about 15 minutes. They will be the ugliest little things, but SO tasty! You can modify this recipe with whatever spices you have on hand that sound good...cumin and chili powder with some red pepper flakes would be a nice spicy version!