Happy Joy Cookies

Ram and I were able to get away to a Doxology conference for a couple of days last week. The theme of the conference was "JOY" and it was a wonderful theme for Ram and I to be reminded to thank God for our blessings during our time of transition. I hope to blog about this more, but my post today is a recipe.

On the way home from St. Louis we made a fast stop into the Hodgson Mill store in IL. I have bought their gluten free products the past few years. I did not know that their products were milled in IL and they had a store there right off the interstate. We are starting over on stocking our pantry and thankfully I have found lots of gluten free and Paleo ingredients at Aldi, but I had still not found coconut flour or almond flour at an affordable price. It was such a treat to go into this store and see all their products and receive the discount such as 99 cent pasta. It was close to their closing time and I didn't have a shopping list, but if we travel that way again, I will be prepared to shop there again.

As we were paying they had a few cookies for sale so I bought a few Happy Joy Cookies for a treat for our family. They had a copy of the recipe there. It is gluten free, but not Paleo, but it is acceptable to me as a treat for our family. It was so neat to me that on the way home from a conference on Joy I received a recipe for Happy Joy cookies. Whenever I make these cookies I will have memories of our St. Louis trip.

Happy Joy Cookies

From the Hodgson Mill Kitchen

1 1/2 c Almond Flour

2 1/2 c Coconut Flour

1 tsp baking soda

pinch sea salt

1/4 c butter softened

1/4 c brown sugar

1 egg

1 1/2 t vanilla

1/2 c sliced almonds

1/2 c semi sweet chocolate chips

1/2 c sweetened coconut flakes

Preheat oven to 350. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper.
In a large bowl combine almond flour, coconut flour, baking soda and salt. In a separate bowl use an electric mixer to blend together butter, brown sugar, egg and vanilla. Slowly stir in dry ingredients until evenly blended. Fold in sliced almonds, chocolate chips, and coconut flakes. Roll into one inch balls and place on parchment lined baking sheet. Lightly press down balls into a disc shape. Bake for 12 minutes.

Note: Their cookies were very small, the size of a quarter. They were packaged in groups of 6 for $1.50. I think this recipe would be a great one for bake sales to offer something gluten free. I have not made these yet, but I would sift the coconut flour. I would also experiment to make them a little larger. I will definitely try to make this recipe because what we bought in the store was happy joy!

Almost there

Ram's mom hosted us for Thanksgiving. She said that the day before we came she thought to herself one recipe down, 4 more to go, etc. until she made all the food. She prepared all the food before we got there so she could relax while we were there. She cooked everything from scratch so it would be Paleo so everyone in the family could eat it.

It is my turn to host Ram's parents for Christmas dinner. First I have thought one room down, 11 more to go, etc. until I cleaned the whole house. I didn't want to put up the Christmas tree until the living room was cleaned. (Full disclosure here: I deep cleaned the downstairs rooms and fast cleaned the upstairs rooms. I hope to deep clean upstairs after the holidays.) It took me the entire month of December to do all the cleaning. My house was very neglected in 2014 when Lamb 2 was in all his therapy and I think I finally got caught up.

Now it is my turn to make all the food from scratch and Paleo. I began with desserts. I chose 5 desserts because they are small and Ram's parents will be visiting us several days.  I have completed 4 of the desserts and will wait to make the 5th one until this weekend. The Paleo pecan bars were more complicated than I thought they were going to be, but I had a small sample and it was worth all the work! I am hoping to have one dessert each day they are here, but if Ram's dad hears about it he will probably request to sample all of them with Christmas dinner!

I did most of the grocery shopping on Saturday and the poor Lambs have had to ask before having fresh fruit and other snacks that are usually unlimited because they are for recipes. Today I went to a couple more stores and picked up the final ingredients for Christmas dinner. I still had money in my grocery budget and there were great items on clearance so I stocked up a little on a few more items.

Tomorrow the Lambs will put our Advent calendars away and they also have a few areas of the house to clean up their toys. I will tidy up and do a fast clean the bathrooms. I will make the sides to go with our ham too.

I am looking forward to going to 4 church services in the next 4 days. I am looking forward to several days of relaxing after working hard cleaning and baking. I am halfway done with Eternal Treasures and hope to finish. I am looking forward to playing card and board games with the Lambs. I have enjoyed reading Christmas cards we have received from friends and family. I plan to send New Year's cards this year.

Gluten and dairy free pumpkin pie

I have only made a dairy free pumpkin pie recipe since Lamb 1 was diagnosed with MSPI in 2004. We liked it so well that I continued to make it even after he outgrew MSPI. The recipe used orange juice instead of milk. I recently loaned my dairy free cookbooks to the Lambs' piano teacher as she is cooking dairy free for her second son.
Then I found out that Ram's parents are coming to our house for Thanksgiving this year. So I plan to do my best to have a complete Thanksgiving meal that is Paleo. So I decided to look for a new recipe.
I made this recipe last night. The Lambs were shocked I was making dessert and not taking it to church or some place-it was just for our family!
I used the alternative crust recipe and I think this crust would work well for a lot of pies. The Lambs did not like the crust, but I think it is as close to a gluten crust as I would ever get. They ate it even though they complained about it. Next time I will press the crust a little thinner for the Lambs. I think next time I will add a few more spices-we are used to lots of pumpkin pie spices in our favorite recipe.
Lamb 3's favorite pie is pumpkin pie. I will probably make this new recipe several times this fall.