Gluten Free Bagels and Freezer Meals

You want to eat these!

I went to Wal-Mart in a different town today and found GLUTEN-FREE BAGELS! I have been craving bagels since.. um.. always, so this was wonderful news for me. I actually had a regular bagel a few weeks ago and it was NOT worth it. Every now and then I get this genius idea that maybe I can start eating gluten again and I will be fine, it never goes well for me. Anyway, this Wal-Mart didn't have a dry gluten free section (I was looking for granola bars) but oddly enough, they had a small section of gluten free foods in the freezer aisle. Neither Branson Wal-Mart has anything like this, in fact I have never seen one in any Wal-Mart in the area. I don't shop at Wal-Mart very often.. I am hoping it is a new thing and will catch on. The Bagel's are Udi's brand. Udi's also has really yummy cinnamon rolls and double chocolate muffins, but sadly my grocery store rarely has them in stock. If you eat gluten free and can get your hands on some of these bagels, DO IT. I wouldn't call them healthy or cheap, but they are delicious! Udi's website even has a handy dandy store located here, so you can find a location near you that sells their products. Their bread is also pretty good.

I may have eaten four bagels today (yes, four.. don't judge me, there is one left!) but I also did something productive. I have decided to try making crock pot freezer meals. I use my crock pot all the time, but it seems so much easier to spend a couple of hours once a week prepping all of the meals. Some you can cook before hand and just re-heat, but most of what I did isn't cooked yet. This is what I made today:

Chili (cooked in the CrockPot, I will freeze half for later)
Taco meat (browned before freezing, made with home-made taco seasoning)
Hamburgers (not pre-cooked)
Orange Chicken
Brocolli chicken alfredo
Beef Stew
Marinated Steak
Chicken and Steak Farjitas

I will make another post in the next few days with ingredients and recipes. All recipes are gluten free. I am also working on eliminating GMO soy and corn, which means buying organic or non-GMO certified. I need to get some kind of system together, but ideally I would like to do this once a week or every two weeks. I think that the entire prep time took less than two hours. I had to run to the grocery store in the middle of prepping (ran out of freezer bags) so I didn't really time myself. I am pretty bad about following recipes and taking measurements, so I will need to figure all of that out before the next blog post. The only things that I pre-cooked were the chili and taco meat. If you make freezer meals ahead of time, I would love to hear about how you do it! Feel free to leave some recipes in the comments!

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Gluten Free Beef Stew

Don't mind the cell phone picture. :)

This is another Crock-Pot recipe that I make pretty often. It tastes good, requires minimal effort, and everyone loves it. I am a decent cook, at best, so minimal effort is important to me. :) It is really simple to make a gluten free beef stew. Simply skip the breading of the meat entirely, or use tapioca starch (or cornstarch) instead. When I use frozen stew meat, I don't thaw it or "bread" it at all. I just throw it in the crock pot as is. Today I did (using tapioca starch) because I had stew meat that wasn't frozen.

Ingredients:

Beef stew meat (I used just over a pound, I usually make more)
Potatoes, Carrots, Celery, etc.
Tapioca starch
Garlic, minced onion
Parsley, Bay leaves, salt, pepper
Chicken or beef broth

Slow cooker (I think mine is 4 quarts)

Coat the stew meat in tapioca starch (you'll need less than 1/2 cup) and brown in a pan on the stove. Don't worry about "cooking" it, just brown it a little. Put it directly in the slow cooker, chop up your veggies and add them too. I used 5 regular carrots and 5 small yellow potatoes. I use more veggies if I have more meat. Use 1-2 boxes of chicken or beef broth, depending on how much you are cooking. I used one today, but with two pounds of stew meat I use two. I didn't put much broth in my bowl, but there was plenty in the Crock pot. The picture just doesn't show much! I always use chicken broth. I buy an organic store brand chicken broth, and I feel like it has a lot less "crap" in it than beef broth. The beef will cook in the broth all day, I promise it will taste like beef! Add your seasonings. I use a lot of garlic, some minced onion, parsley, bay leaves, salt, and pepper. I try to cook on low all day (6 hours minimum, more for frozen meat) but you can cook on high for a shorter time, just check the meat. Today, I cooked it for about 10 hours on low.


 
Just a side note, make sure that your broth does not contain gluten if avoiding gluten is important to you! Some of them do. 

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Gluten Free Chicken and Rice Soup

This is one of our favorite meals. Everyone in my family likes it a lot. I have been making this for quite a while and sometimes I do slight variations but I make this soup almost once a week! It makes enough for leftovers (unless you have a large family) and it is fairly healthy and inexpensive. If you can't have chicken noodle soup, this is a really great alternative. I am not a huge fan of most gluten free noodles, so I prefer the rice. Here is what you need:

• About 2 lbs of chicken. I typically use boneless chicken breasts but you can use whatever you have one hand.
• 1 1/2 - 2 boxes of chicken broth. I use store brand organic, but you could use homemade with a little extra salt (1 box = 1 quart)
• Fresh or frozen veggies, whatever you have on hand, I normally use carrots and celery
• 1 cup of brown rice
• Spices
• Lemon (optional)

Put your chicken in the Slow Cooker. I have used both fresh and frozen. Throw your veggies (1-2 cups) in a blender, add some chicken broth. I like to make somewhat of a puree, to make the broth thicker. You can do this or you can just chop it up. You could also chop them up yourself and just throw it in if you don't mind a very thin broth. You can also puree half and chop the other half. Dump the veggies into the slow cooker and cover with the remaining chicken broth. If you have a smaller amount of veggies, use only 1 1/2 boxes of chicken broth, use more for more veggies. Add one cup of brown rice. I used white rice once, it doesn't make a difference. Season however you like your soup. Check that all spice blends are gluten free (they should be.) I always use parsley, but I usually throw a few others in too. I will occasionally add the juice of a lemon or two, which gives it a different (but nice) flavor. You will definitely need to add salt if you are using home made chicken stock. Cook on low for as long as possible, I usually leave mine on all day. Use a fork to shred the chicken before serving. The rice tends to "explode" after being cooked all day. I really don't have a problem with this and neither does anyone in my family. If that is something that would bother you, I wouldn't advise making any kind of rice soup in a slow cooker. I think it makes the soup better! Like any soup, this one is even better the next day! My kids both love this, I hope you family loves it too!

  

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