My Gluten-Free Week

Food-wise, this was a good week. I made some yummy, tummy warming meals that my family gobbled up. It's been very cold her in Upstate NY. It hardly reached above the teens all week. When the temperature dips this low, I love to cook. The down side is that it's very hard for me to diet at this time of year. I know, the New Year's Resolutions and all of that jazz, but I just can't eat cold salad on a cold night! This week's menu consisted of: Sunday - Goulash. Both GF and regular. I can't get my gluten-eating family to embrace rice pasta. So, I make the meat sauce in one skillet, GF elbows in another pot and wheat elbows in a third pot. I drain the pasta pots and add the meat sauce to each pot. Works out fine, but makes lots of dishes to wash! Monday - Breakfast for Dinner. Scrambled eggs, bacon, whole grain toast with cinnamon sugar for the gluten-eaters, GF bagel with butter for me. Delish. Tuesday - left-over goulash. Put both kinds in separate casserole dishes, added more tomato sauce and loads of shredded mozzarella. Baked in the oven until bubbly. Yum. Wednesday - Homemade Mac 'n Cheese with regular pasta for the family. Made in a skillet, started with a butter and flour roux, made a cream sauce with milk, added lots of sharp cheddar cheese, added cooked elbows and some cut-up spiral ham I had frozen, left over from Christmas Eve dinner...family said it was fantastic. I had frozen Amy's Rice Mac 'n Cheese...it's my favorite of the GF variety. Yes, I microwaved it first...it's no good frozen! Thursday - Rotisserie Chicken from local Price Chopper, boiled white potatoes, corn. I contacted Price Chopper and was told that the "plain" rotisserie chicken is GF and they even claim to roast it on the top of the oven so that the juices from the other chickens don't drip down and contaminate the plain ones. I don't know if I really believe that or not, but I haven't had any bad reactions to it yet... Friday - today. Pork chops with apples and onions, baked maple and brown sugar acorn squash. This recipe I got a long time ago from a cookbook that I probably don't even have anymore, but I remember the recipe. Cut up an onion (I like sweet onions) and put it in the bottom of a casserole dish. Sprinkle with salt and pepper. Add a few sliced up apples on top of the onions. Add a sprinkle of white sugar on top of the apples (yes, I know)...Add a few pork chops on top of the apples. Sprinkle with more salt and pepper. Finally, top with more sliced apples and a few pats of butter. Cover and bake for 1 to 1-1/2 hours in a 350 degree oven. As for the acorn squash, slice it in half, scoop out the seeds, put the halves in a casserole dish, fill the squash "bowls" with about a tablespoon of light brown sugar, a tablespoon of butter (yes, I know again) and a drizzle of REAL maple syrup. Cover with foil, bake right along with the pork chops. You can also do this in the microwave, minus the foil, on high for around 15 minutes or until you can flake the squash "meat" with a fork. My husband doesn't like pork chops or acorn squash, but will eat both of them made this way. I'm sorry that I don't have any pictures of my meals. I got a new camera for Christmas, but keep forgetting to take the pictures! I guess I'm just too hungry to take the time!!! I will try to do better next time! I'm also so excited that I bought two new Cuisinart stainless steel sauce pots last night. It was time to retire our 10-year old non-stick cookware we got for a gift the year we were engaged. The non-stick coating was starting to flake off into our food! That can't be a good thing. I can't wait to try the new pots!