This morning I woke up to Dan staring me straight in the eyes. When I opened mine, he grinned and started cooing. It was completely adorable. A great way to start the morning. I also got up before Jude this morning which is a rare occurrence in this house. It was so nice to drink my coffee and collect my thoughts for a few moments before he got up. I made banana bread for the sleeping boys and gazed out the window at the overcast sky. I wanted it to rain. It would give me an excuse for the lazy feeling that had come over me. And more importantly, it would give me a chance to clean the high chair. I would love to just throw the thing out in the pouring down rain and let nature clean it instead of me. No such luck today. Obviously, the high chair product development team at Chicco has not seen Jude eat or they would not have made all those little crevices for me to clean. I don’t think they have met a gluten-free toddler either! The mess and crumbs have gotten worse since he went gluten-free because gluten-free things tend to be crumbly and the xanthan gum added to them can superglue things to a variety of surfaces such as hardwood floors, cabinets, and furniture. I am sure no one has a kid as messy as Jude though. My mom says he is worse than the five of us were combined. Eek. I didn’t want to agree with her until Jude smeared refried beans on his chest like war paint. Now I believe her. There is much parenting to do here. Gluten-free parenting.
Here is the recipe for the cookies I made tonight. I know everyone has been madly making oatmeal cookies since oatmeal has been returned to the gluten-free community, but we can’t forget quinoa cookies!
APPLE QUINOA COOKIES WITH DATES AND WALNUTS
1/2 cup sorghum flour
1/2 cup rice flour
1/2 cup tapioca flour
1 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice
3/4 teaspoon of xanthan gum
3 cups quinoa flakes
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
8 oz. dried dates, chopped
1 cup walnuts, chopped
1 cup apple, chopped fine (I used my mini-prep food processor)
1 1/2 cups brown sugar
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 cup butter (2 sticks)
2 large eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
Directions:
Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. In a med. bowl, beat the butter until fluffy and then add the brown sugar and the granulated sugar- beat for a few more minutes. Add the eggs one at a time and then add the vanilla. In a separate bowl, sift together all the dry ingredients. Slowly add to butter mixture- mix until combined. Mix in the apples, dates, and walnuts. Spoon on to cookie sheets lined with parchment paper. Make the cookies big- maybe a little more than 2 Tablespoons worth of dough. Leave about 2 inches between the cookies. Bake for about 19 minutes. Do not brown the cookies, but take them out when the edges begin to get a little brown.
2.5 dozen big cookies
Note: These are sweet. So if you don’t like your cookies to be sweet, you might be able to reduce the sugar by 1/4 cup. If you do reduce the sugar, let me know what the results were.
Posted on October 2nd, 2007 by Natalie
Filed under: GF Living, Holidays, Baked Goods, Desserts, Gluten Free, Celiac, Cookies, Easy
So, Jude’s a mess, huh? Mom tells us that in Texas when Christopher was born all the ladies kept saying “He’s such a mess!” …meaning he was adorable, a pumpkin or any other cute-ism you can think of. I’ll just have to imagine that in the South, a mess does actually mean cute. I can’t imagine a nephew who’d do such things as war paint with refried beans! Oh, wait, he’s my brother’s son, that casts a different light! Anyway, just want to congratulate you on how well your blog is doing. I’m impressed with your recipes and happy to know I have a place to go when trying to cook for you and Jude!
Love, love, love.
Big Sis Steph
Those look delicious.
And, hey, more than once I’ve been thinking that refried bean-war paint would be the perfect accoutrement to any outfit: from survival gear (built in food-staples) to hipster-artist (never more than a heartbeat away from trendsetting).
Maybe Jude just resonates on a higher plane than the rest of us who dream of comfy blue jeans.
=)
Kate
The cookies are perfect for this kind of weather. Thanks for the WONDERFUL recipes.
You can take your highchair to the local self-serve car wash. The pressure from the water rinses all the crevices and it even gets the gunk out of the textured parts too! and around here you can do it for $.25 which is MUCH better than scrubbing. I know several DH’s who willingly do this job
I love the addition of dates in here!!!! So yummy. what a great idea. I think I might make these on Friday with my son, we bake every Friday together.
Ahhh, the high chair cleaning. I really didn’t like that either, ugh!, the simpler the chair the better. And, I never thought about the gluten free thing! How different that would be.
Getting up earlier than the children is great. With my daughter going to school so early this year, I have yet to accomplish it!
I love this post! I need to make these cookies as well! With you and Kate making all these cookies… I need to get creative and join the crew!
These look delicious! I will have to try them. I was disappointed with the M&M cookies I made last night. They didn’t turn out nearly as luscious looking as yours did! I have a finicky oven and the temp wasn’t as high as it probably should have been. I also used an all purpose gluten-free mix from GF Pantry, which may not have had the same ingredients at Pamela’s! I will have to definitely try these apple quinoa cookies though! I can’t go wrong with those flours! Thanks so much for sharing!
I love the refried bean warpaint! I’ll have to give that tip to my husband Michael who enjoys paintball. That sounds like it would be a great camouflage!
Kate- LOL. He is certainly hilarious (as are YOU :), but I don’t know about a higher plane!
Carrie and SM- These cookies were really good, but I would love to hear the results of getting them a little less sweet. When I tried to add less sugar, they didn’t turn out as well and of course, then I don’t think Jude would eat them. Let me know. They are crumbly like a lot of oatmeal cookies, but I kinda felt like that is how they should be- so I am going to keep working on this one a little bit. Maybe you guys can help
It was too good otherwise not to go ahead and post it.
Carrie- You know, everyone has said that about those cookies who has made it with a different mix. I really think that because they are egg-less, Pamela’s does something magical. Anyway, because of that I have stopped using a mix because it is too hard to tell what went wrong. However, those cookies are awesome. I am going to work on them using a flour mixture and post an alternative since not everyone uses Pamelas. I never knew that one would be confusing like that…it is a learning curve I guess. Oh, and I really do think we should meet sometime since we live so close, don’t you think? After all, we could blog about it? lol
Natalie, where do you find Quinoa flakes? I have looked everywhere and haven’t been able to find them locally. Sounds like another great recipe I can’t wait to try! Thanks, Melanie