Let's go to the MOOVIES!!!

I, like so many, many, other people, am a HUGE Harry Potter fan. Really REALLY huge. So I have now seen it twice. In less than five days. This, of course, means, that I have been in a Movie Theatre twice recently.
That got me thinking about popcorn, (you know), because in Movie Theatres there is lots of popcorn EVERYWHERE. :)
I was just wondering how you guys go about eating at Cinemas. Do you buy candy, or bring your own Popcorn?

(Sorry about the very short and incoherent post, I got about 5 hours of sleep last night, and still have to pack for two weeks of vacation...)

C.C.

Are they Cupcakes? Or are they Brownies?

A few months ago, I ran across this recipe while in a waiting room somewhere, and loved it immediately.
I was planning on making them for Father's Day, as the article suggests, but I forgot (of course!), and so I created them on Independence Day.

Here are a few things I learned:

Its best to make the brownie/cupcakes the day before you plan on serving them, just don't decorate until the day of. This way, they have a chance to cool, and you won't spend a good portion of the day in the kitchen.

GREASE THE BAKING CUPS. This seems obvious, and I am sure all you experienced bakers would do this anyway, but I skipped this step because the baking cups told me I did not have to. I DID HAVE TO, as it turns out. :)

Skip the dying of the icing and sticking it in a bag and all that. I tried that, made a huge mess, and it still did not work. On the second batch, I used black piping gel (it had sparkles, an added bonus for the "grill") that we picked up at the grocery store for like 3 dollars. Way easier, because not only does it use less ingredients, it has easier clean up, and is VERY easy to put on the cupcakes.

Make a glaze of confectioners sugar and water to brush on the cupcakes before you sprinkle on the sugar crystals for "embers". Otherwise, the crystals just fall off. I believe the recipe calls for putting the "grates" on and then the "embers", but that is just silly because embers on a real grill are below the grates, and the glaze is easy to assemble, as well as being clear.

I could not find any orange sugar crystals, so I used a combination of red and yellow. It seemed to work just as well, so no problem there...

Okay I think that is it :)

I did have one problem which is that I could not find and caramel-cream candies that were GF!! So i just used the non-GF kind, had my sister stick them on, and did not eat those brownies.

The Whole Batch:

 The "Hot Dogs":

 The "Kabobs":

A GF Fourth!!

First of all, let me start out by saying Happy Birthday America!! (Also, Happy Canada Day, even though that was a while back...)

Second, I hope you all had a nice Fourth of July, I know I did!!

This year was way easier food-wise than last year. For starters, we had less people over, and some of my friends that came were GF too, so that helped, but mainly it was just that I have been GF for over two years now, and this was my THIRD GF 4th of July, so I just am more comfortable. It also helped that my mom made all the food, and she is really good about cooking GF.

So I ate potato chips and a hot dog, and peppers. I made some really cute brownie-cupcakes (details posted soon), which were verrryy verryyy yummy). And after the fireworks, 2 friends and I split a pint of Ben and Jerry's Coffee Heath Bar Crunch ice cream. Needless to say, that kept us up for a good long time, far later than was probably healthy. :)

What did you all do for Independence Day?

C.C.

Summer is officially here, and has been for a few days now, which means we are back to calling up the various ice cream vendors, and chip companies, and salad dressing-makers to see what products are GF, which are not, and which products were once GF, but are not any more.
I have no problem with Customer Service people, and they are always really very nice and helpful, but I have to say, waiting on hold for up to 15 minutes just so they can go find an ingredient list is really very annoying, and I wish that the lists were just handy and right there. I mean, I cannot be the only one calling to ask what "natural flavorings" they use, right?

Are there any GF/Celiac related things you guys do at the start of every summer?

C.C.

Rice Krispies FTW!!!

I had my first bowl of GF Rice Krispies today, and they were...okay. I am pretty dissapointed, I hate to say. While MILES ahead of the other GF crispy puffed rice cereals out there, they still were not very good. The cereal got mushy pretty quickly, and it did not have much flavor. Overall, good-ish, which is a bummer. Oh well.

C.C.

The Best GF Foods on SHINE

There I was. Scrolling through Yahoo. (Did you know that Bradley Cooper speaks fluent french?) (And have you seen that video of the skiving marriage proposal?) To sum it up, I was procrastinating. I am very, very good at procrastinating. I saw this article on Yahoo's SHINE and, obviously, clicked on it.
There are a few opinions of mine I would like to share.
The best GF cereal? Corn Chex, or Honey Nut Chex. Not Rice Chex, I do not think they have enough flavor when plain, and they get mushy a lot faster in milk than other cereals.
The best GF dry pasta? Mrs. Leeper's Brown Rice Pasta or Jovial or Bionaturae, depending on what shape of noodle you want. The Quinoa pasta they feature just does not reheat very well.

I also wonder if the author, Karen Ansel, has Celiac...
Hmm....

What are your favorite GF foods? Do you agree with the article?

GF: True or False?

There is an ice cream place in my town, and out front they have a sign telling people about their GF items!

That is great, and wonderful that GF is becoming more mainstream, but THESE PRODUCTS ARE NOT GF!!! I bet some of the ice cream itself is probably GF, but the scooper's they use to scoop it? Nope. The gloves handling the icecream that just make a grilled cheese for someone? Nope. The sprinkles that all the cookie dough ice cream has been rolled in? Nope.

And that really bothers me. I feel like, unless you are certified GF, (and this place is not), you should not GF in the advertising. It just feels wrong, and what about the people you go in there to get Ice Cream thats GF, eat it, and get really really really sick?

What you do guys think?

C.C.