Freezing peaches

This summer's local bumper fruit crop has been peaches.  Week after week our CSA fruit share has contained beautiful, fragrant, delicious peaches.  July and much of August were too hot for me to even think about baking so they have been consumed fresh and in smoothies.  And we can't keep up!  (GFCF Kid and Red Sox Daddy are not fans of the fresh peach.)

So, this morning I got to work and washed, peeled, sliced, weighed, and bagged 8 lbs. of peaches (enough for four pies, yum).  More than once I thought about how American pioneer women kept themselves sane by doing what work they could do together, with each other.  I was a bit lonely, just me and the peaches.

Here is my go-to peach pie recipe.  I'm not sure when I will bake my next peach pie, but with the peaches ready to go, I know we'll be enjoying one sometime soon.   (BTW, I have followed the peeling method in this recipe in the past, but peeled by hand this morning because the peaches were so ripe the skins were practically falling off.)

Chocolate chip cookies

I felt very loved when Red Sox Daddy handed me this plate of cookies that were still warm from the oven.  I requested cold rice milk and it arrived in my favorite glass.  This classic American combo...it gives a wonderful lift to your day or night.

The recipe is from Living Without and can be found here (though I don't know for how long).  This is definitely one of those recipes that will have your gluten-consuming friends coming back for seconds claiming they taste like "regular" chocolate chip cookies.

Tomato salad

Our good friend Mike is stopping in for lunch today.  He is in the midst of a cross-country drive.  He always brings with him his big laugh, shining eyes and rat-a-tat chatter about topics far and wide.  We're all excited to see him.

We're slapping together sandwiches with cold cuts and picking up potato chips to go on the side.  I decided to attempt a recreation of Red Sox Daddy's tomato salad from the other night.  It's nothing revolutionary and this is not a "recipe" per se.

But, doesn't it look good?  I'm letting the flavors marry a little before I take a taste.  With these ingredients it's hard to go wrong.  I think it's going to be delicious.

Here's what I used this morning:

4 ripe tomatoes from the farm: 2 large red and 2 small orange, cut into chunks

5 very small cloves of garlic from the farm, pressed (RSD chopped his)

8-10 smallish leaves of basil from the farm, chopped

salt and black pepper, to taste

my very best olive oil (Falconero), a very generous drizzle

Wraps

It's been all about wraps, or, if we'd rather (because sometimes I would), breakfast burritos, for me in the mornings lately.

Scrambled pastured egg(s), veg and/or aromatic from the farm, Daiya cheese or mayo, seasonings, in some wonderful (and sometimes magical) combo rolled up in a brown rice tortilla.

My breakfast wraps are quick and easy.  I slap a tortilla on a cast iron griddle and heat it over medium to medium-high heat.  The tortilla is so thin I don't even bother turning it, it heats through right nice.

I then sauté/scramble whatever I'm having inside the wrap in a swirl of olive oil: sometimes thin crescents of onion, this week more often than not leftover braised cabbage, this morning it was just two lovely eggs.  (I like my eggs just this side of cooked, so I keep an eye on them so they don't hang out in the hot pan longer than necessary.)

If I'm having cheese, I sprinkle Daiya cheese onto the tortilla when I put it on the griddle.  Placing a lid to cover will help melt the cheese faster, but it's usually not necessary (the heat of whatever goes on top before wrapping always suffices to finish the melting process before the first bite reaches my mouth).

By the time the eggs are approaching ready, the tortilla is heated up and I slide it onto a big plate.  This morning, I spread some mayo on the tortilla, gently nestled the eggs on top of the mayo, and shook on some salt and black pepper (I've been kind of nuts for red pepper flakes the last few weeks, but didn't feel like it today).  Then I spooned on the sublime tomato salad Cap made, leftover from dinner last night.  (Tomatoes delivered from the farm yesterday, farm garlic, farm basil, olive oil.)  

These wraps are big and I've learned to be generous with the stuffing.  More tomato salad?  No problem.

I'm not fancy with my wrapping.  I roll it up and start eating.  As things fall out the end(s) I just eat them off my plate or stuff them back in with my fingers.

So good, so quick, so nice to look forward to every morning.

Farm fresh

We're knee deep in tomatoes from the farm and peaches form the orchard (the veggies in my lunch all came from our CSA share).  

For lunch today, I tossed together some leftover corn (sliced off the cob), cut up tomato, finely chopped onion, salt, pepper, balsamic vinegar and Falconero evoo.  Toasted up some Udi's multigrain sandwich bread, spread it with mayo, and had me an open-faced salad sandwich.  Summer had a party in my mouth :-)

Lull

GFCF Kid said to me yesterday: you haven't had much to post to the GFCF blog have you, you can't exactly put all the Rita's you've been having on there.

How's that for some truth.

Rita's, for those who don't know, serves up frozen custard and Italian ices. You can even get them combined, in a gelati (my fave is vanilla custard with mango ice), and it's killer.

Being GFCF has fallen by the wayside, as has cooking. Mostly, because I have many interests and I can be fickle. I've been reading more and my knitting has seen a big spike in activity lately. Partly, because of the weather. It was a very hot and humid July and even with a window AC unit in the kitchen, I have not been inspired to spend much time in there.

Falling off the GFCF wagon starts with stepping off. Usually it's a special occasion of some sort. Like going out to eat at Annisa with Bead Girl when she flew in from Oakland for a visit. But, it can also be a moment so benign, like an impromptu trip to Rita's, on a still-sultry-from-the-day summer evening, with the family.

Regardless, what happens next is always the same. I hear the keening whistle of the gluten and dairy express. It comes barreling towards me, swoops me up, barely slowing down, and there I am on the train. This train will not be making any local stops. I may as well sit down and enjoy the ride.

Initially my body is distinctly uncomfortable. My stomach hurts or burns in the morning when I wake up. My shit really does stink. I feel sluggish. I am irritable. But, then, my body adjusts and doesn't feel so bad. I bloat (which when you're used to being round and curvy is easier to not see) and my mind gets fuzzy. Edges soften and blur in a way that I don't even realize I am no longer feeling or experiencing clearly.

I used to feel bad about myself when the pendulum would inevitably make its swing. I would judge myself, deem myself lazy or idiotic or self-sabotaging.

Now, I am almost watching from outside my body. Not as harmful as getting down on myself, but I want to reconnect...reintegrate.

I'll be back here soon. No doubt.