We have a few things in the schedule for the next couple of days, and I suddenly realized that we hadn’t a single Thanksgiving post.

Sacrébleu!

Hopefully by now you have your menu straight and you’ve either talked with your host or your guests about what having a gluten-free Thanksgiving entails (whether for one person or the whole table). If not, though, the Internet is absolutely awash in Thanksgiving ideas for you to feast upon. The following is a bit of a meta-roundup, if you will. The favorite tasty morsels from my favorite Internet celebrities,  for your reading/cooking/eating pleasure.
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This is my first Halloween in Pittsburgh since college. I’m excited. I’m dressing up as Carmen Sandiego, if I can just find the right red hat.

I’m also going to a friend’s for dinner and the handing-out of candy to neighborhood children. Pretty psyched for that, especially because it’s on me to bring dessert.

At the table: a vegan, a picky eater, gluten-free me (and a few omnivores). Instantly, baked apples came to mind. I love baked apples not just because they’re gluten-free, but because you can make them as decadent or as healthy as you want, you can make one or ten, they’re already portioned out, and they taste like fall.
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Zombie Pumpkins, or kids on a sugar high?

Halloween! It’s almost here. Are you dressing up? Are your kids?

On the surface, Halloween can be a tough time to be gluten-free — but as our numbers grow, so do the resources available for creating a safe, happy Halloween.

First and foremost: gluten-free candy. Thanks to Heidi for posting a list of lists on Adventures of a Gluten Free Mom. Some of those lists include spooky lunchbox ideas and other fun goodies, so be sure to give a read.

Even if you have a list from last year, take a minute to go through these; ingredients can change — for better or for worse — and taking 5 minutes now will get your trick-or-treaters 5 minutes closer to chowing down in a few weeks.
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When I saw the title of the article in the San Francisco Chronicle, I really thought it was a joke. Someone making fun of the trend towards eating “new” strange things.

Acorns? Puh-leeze.

Except, it wasn’t a joke. Anywhere where oak trees grow, people really do eat acorns; they gather them, process them, dry them, cook with them. It seems like a lot of work, but acorns are gluten-free so I’d be remiss if I didn’t share the info.
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Not just for roasting on an open fire...

So, OK, I know researchers aren’t hard at work developing gluten-free flour solely for the joy of it. There’s money involved too (about $2.6 billion worth).

But I still get a kick out of the lengths scientists are going to in order to feed me delicious things. Well, not just me. You too.

Today’s study focuses on chestnut flour, which is of course made from naturally gluten-free chestnuts. Researchers in Spain have busted out the heavy machinery in order to figure out exactly how to tweak chestnut flour into a gluten-free baking substitute.

Their answer? Guar gum.
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I guess it’s fall.

I’ve been fighting it, but alas: summer is over, at least in Pittsburgh.

The down comforter is back on my bed (and, OK, so is the electric mattress pad). The windows at home? Most of the time, they’re mostly closed. The peaches and nectarines are fighting for shelf space with apples and pears.

Ah yes. Apples and pears. At least there’s fall food to look forward to.

For today, let’s focus on apple cider. Not only will you be hard-pressed to find a cider that isn’t gluten-free (get it?! Pressed!!), but cider’s got lots of antioxidants, it’s often easy to find a local variety, and it’s delicious.
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You know what I love?

Yes, yes, OK. You’re right, I DO love puppies, rainbows, and ice cream. But I also love shiny new words – especially when they just dress up something I’m already kind of familiar with.

So you can imagine my delight when I learned the word tian. Huh? According to Slashfood, a tian is a, “layered, baked vegetable dish that originated in Provence but is also common to city kitchens…Unlike a gratin, a tian does not include bread crumbs or cheese, which allows the juices in the vegetables to evaporate in the oven’s dry heat, concentrating their flavors.”

Some sources disagree with Slashfood’s ban on bread crumbs and cheese, others say it’s simply a cognate of the word tagine, and others still add eggs – in any event, tian is a fancy word for gluten-free, delicious veggies.
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The other day I saw a recipe for gluten-free tabouli, and I was intrigued. I used to quite like the stuff – a refreshing salad with parsley, mint, lemon juice, tomatoes, onion, olive oil, and kryptonite. I mean, erm, cracked bulger wheat.

I am almost positive I’ve not had tabouli in 8 years; it’s not something you often see modified for the gluten-free diet. So I was curious – what would the recipe use to replace the wheat?

My guess was quinoa, but instead it was hempseed. Interesting! A new grain! Turns out hemp seed is gluten-free, edible, and really healthy.
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Maybe the silveriest lining of having a restricted diet is that it forces a person to try out new tastes and flavors, to make up for what they can no longer have.

It turns out, there’s a lot of stuff out there that we can eat — but sometimes we just don’t know where to look. One place I’ve been looking lately? To raw food.

What is the raw diet? Well, it’s sort of exactly what it sounds like. The fundamental belief is that heating foods past a certain point makes them less wholesome (115°F-118°F depending on who’s talking). Generally speaking, the raw diet focuses on fruits, veggies, nuts, seaweed, sprouted grains and seeds, and beans. It’s also normally vegan (no dairy/eggs/meat, not even uncooked meats like sushi or steak tartare), and frowns on alcohol/caffeine/processed sugar.

I can’t speak to the health properties of the raw lifestyle — it’s not for me — but some of it, sometimes, is healthy and tasty. And, more importantly, it’s largely gluten-free.
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Have you ever eaten jackfruit?

I hadn’t, until my favorite adventurous vegan cooked up some gluten-free jackfruit barbeque back in the spring. I know I know, it’s practically fall, but hopefully you’ll forgive me the delay: this stuff is worth looking into, regardless of the season.

There aren’t too many gluten-free, vegan meat alternatives. Tofu, of course, but I know that many of us try to avoid eating too much soy (and many more of us avoid it altogether).

Enter the jackfruit. You can find it canned, frozen and/or dried in any Asian grocery (and some ‘regular’ groceries as well, and occasionally fresh). It’s a good source of fiber and has a smattering of other helpful components: vitamins A, C, and B6; magnesium, potassium, calcium, iron, etc.

But what to do with it?
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