On Mothers Day I was kicked out of the Kitchen!

On Mother's Day I was spoilt rotten and evicted from my own kitchen - not that I minded one single bit! I woke up to breakfast in bed, delivered to me by my darling husband and the girls. Poached eggs and bacon on gluten free toast and a cup of tea, just the way I like it. Yum!

Chris doesn’t cook very often as he travels so much for work but what he does cook he does very well. Last year after being inspired by an episode of Master Chef (he was totally addicted!!!) he asked me to teach him how to poach an egg. After a few attempts, he absolutely nailed it and now is our household’s resident egg poacher. He is the poaching master and I am quite happy to hand over the kitchen to him for this purpose.

Hmmm... All I need now is to teach one of the girls how to make Hollandaise sauce to drizzle on top...

The day before hubby had given me an early Mother’s Day present, in the form of a Dymock’s gift voucher and the girls and I had a lovely time working out how to spend it that afternoon.

I bought cookbooks of course! I did try my best to look at the other books, but there was nothing that really grabbed my interest. I love reading fiction but I am quite a quick reader so I prefer to swap books with friends or borrow from the library, rather than buy them. Cookbooks on the other hand are great to have as a resource I return to, time and time again.

The two books I chose were ‘1000 Gluten Free Recipes’ by Carol Fenster and ‘The Conscious Cook’ by Tal Ronnen. I choose the first because it is an encyclopedia of gluten free cooking with 172 breakfast recipes, 205 main courses and 377 recipes for cakes, cookies and desserts. I will be trying many of them out over the next few months and will publish the results.

The second book is by Tal Ronnen, who is an award winning vegan chef. This wouldn’t normally be my kind of cookbook, as I can’t live without meat, but I saw this chef on Oprah recently and I was very impressed. Tal has worked really hard to make Vegan food of a five star quality and to bust many myths people have about Vegan food. I relate to his philosophy as in many ways the challenges of going Vegan are similar to the challenges faced by those on restricted diets due to food intolerances – how do you make delicious food that is nutritious and doesn’t make you feel you are living in constant denial?

I picked up this book and wanted to cook and eat everything I saw. It’s all so fresh and healthy but mouthwatering. Many of the recipes are gluten free or very easily converted to GF. Quinoa and other alternative grains are showcased too. I am still a bit naive when it comes to exactly what to do with these other grains. Who better to learn from the one of the world’s best? There is even a recipe for Nori Rolls using Quinoa instead of rice – I am excited to give that recipe a try this week.

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After a lazy day spent reading my new books I wasn’t allowed back in the kitchen. The family had evicted me and I was forced to watch in exile from the stool on the other side of the kitchen bench as they all busily worked away. Chris was making his delicious spaghetti bolognaise for dinner and the girls had decided to make some sweets for that night and for school lunches. Libby wanted to make Banana Cake. Cate chose to make her favourite Choc Caramel Slice.

Sadly our bananas were just too far gone and Libby had to improvise halfway through making the cake. Using the recipe already posted here, she turned it into an apple cake with a bit of coaching from mum on the side. I don’t mind handing over the kitchen to her, as I know Libby faces the rest of her life avoiding gluten. I have made it one of my missions to make sure she can cook herself great food, and make good quality food choices, so that she won’t struggle too much when she finally leaves the nest.

Libby substituted the bananas for half a large can of pie apples and added 1 teaspoon of cinnamon to the mix. The rest of the pie apples were placed on top of the cake mix before it was baked and she sprinkled brown sugar all over the top to create a nice glaze. Here was the beautiful result... Libby's Gluten Free Apple Cake

Cate made Gluten Free Choc Caramel Slice and she rationed it across the next few days, which took lots of will power. This slice freezes really well so you can make a large batch, store out of sight in the freezer and just pop out a few squares when you need an indulgence.

Gluten Free Choc Caramel Slice

2/3 cup rice flour

1/3 cup maize flour

1 cup brown sugar

1 cup desiccated coconut

125 g butter, melted

395 g can sweetened condensed milk

2 tbsp golden syrup

30 g butter, extra

1 cup (150g) gluten free dark cooking chocolate, melted

1. Preheat oven to 180°C/160°C fan forced. Grease and line an 18cm x 28cm lamington pan.

2. Combine flour, sugar, coconut and butter, mix well. Press into base of prepared pan; bake 10 minutes.

3. Meanwhile, combine sweetened condensed milk, golden syrup and extra butter in a saucepan; stir constantly over medium heat until almost boiling. Reduce heat and cook for 5 minutes, stirring constantly.

4. Pour caramel over base and bake a further 10 minutes; cool.

5. Spread Caramel Slice with melted chocolate; refrigerate until set. Serve cut into pieces. Makes about 24 squares.

Notes – I love to mix the maize flour in with the rice flour. It adds a lovely yellow colour and rich flavour to the mix. It’s one of my favourite flours for using in cakes and sauces such as Béchamel for lasagna.