Hello, Beautiful!

Meet my trillium. Or, you may know her as Wake Robin--because she's one of the first bloomers of the spring.. She's a Pacific Northwest native wildflower and I treasure her.

My neighbor gave her to me last year and I dutifully planted her somewhere in the garden. Now, I have an absent-minded professor's approach to the garden. I plant stuff and then forget where I planted them. Many of them are perennials that die back during the winter, so I have no idea where things are until they reappear in the spring. It's kind of fun, because it's like getting presents all spring and summer long. On the other hand, I sometimes think I've lost something, because I have no idea where they are planted and I can't see them. Also, the chickens can eat the plants on their romps around the garden--but I don't want to spend all my time freaking out over this because I also want my chickens to free range. Sigh.

Anyway, yesterday, while puttering in my garden, I saw my trillium. I'm so thrilled! Trilliums are somewhat rare and they are kind of fussy. So, I'm so please and honored that she decided to stay awhile.

And Now For a Different Kind of Yummy--Yarn!

I just received my Sundara Seasons Yarn Club yarn. I signed up for 3 seasons (colors)--Spring, Summer, and Autumn. Oh my. This yarn is amazing. So soft, I want to curl up and sleep in it. And so very pretty. They are:

Sweet Orange Blossom (Spring):


Wild Blueberries (Summer):


Viridescent (Autumn):


I have 600 yards of each. Any suggestions on what to knit with this amazing stuff??

Names Actually Will Hurt My Feelings

The other day I was chatting with some friends and acquaintances. The subject turned to food. I joked that having my family over for dinner was complicated because we have so many allergies and intolerances.

If you've been reading this blog for any amount of time, you know that I am gluten intolerant; have recently been diagnosed with a life-threatening allergy to wheat; my daughter has a life-threatening allergy to peanuts; my husband has an intolerance to many tree nuts; and now, it seems, to citrus. I also have Oral Allergy Syndrome to many raw fruits, nuts and vegetables.

Anyway, one of my acquaintances said, "Oh, I don't tolerate fussiness at my dinner parties. You eat what I give you or you're not invited." She said this jokingly, but she was also serious. As soon as she said this, all the energy went out of my body. I get so tired of the "allergies=fussiness" line. For those of us with allergies and intolerances, avoiding certain foods is a necessity--and sometimes a matter of life and death. This is not fussiness. It's self-preservation. Fussiness is a choice. Allergies are a handicap.

Now, I will admit to being fussy about lots of stuff. I will not eat many things, regardless of how yummy someone else thinks they are. My dad lived all over the world when I was young and always had stories of eating eyeballs and monkey brains. He tried to get us to eat these things. Unh, uh. So, you will not find me eating offal--brains, eyeballs, tripe, sweetbreads, brains, ooze from internal cavities, etc. I also will not eat bugs. Or spiders. Or weird parts of fish, like the fins. I know Judith Jones (Julia Child's editor) has no patience with this (at least according to her book, The Tenth Muse: My Life in Food), but I don't care. There are so many other things to eat that I don't feel like I'm missing out by not eating these things. Even if they tasted delicious, I doubt if I could choke them down, knowing what they are. So, if you invite me over for roasted spiders on a bed of monkey brains in liver sauce, sure, my fussy side will come out and I'll politely decline because I don't like these things. (and probably gag, too)

On the other hand, if you offer me and my family wheat-crusted pizza with peanut-sauce, with an almond-topped citrus salad on the side, my family will politely decline on the basis that these things could either kill us or make us severely ill for days. Is this fussiness? If I insisted that people eat a little arsenic when they came over to dinner and they declined, would you call them fussy?

Even though my family has many limitations to what we can eat, those things are not everything. If you follow me on Facebook or Twitter, you know we eat well. Many, many, many foodstuffs are left that we can eat and we eat these with relish. I will admit to being a foodie of sorts. I like good food, cooked well, preferably fresh and local. And I'm an avid baker. Give me some time to kill and chances are I'll head to the kitchen to bake something. Of course, I bake gluten-free, but everything I bake is delicious. Because life is too short to eat bad-tasting food.

So, why this persistence in thinking that people who are allergic are fussy? I think maybe it's because the action is the same--in this case, declining to eat something. But the reason is different. It's the same as someone requiring an elevator because they have to use a wheelchair vs. a perfectly-healthy person who wants to use the elevator because they don't want to walk down a flight of stairs. One is a necessity, one is truly a choice.

To be honest, I think that people should feel free to have their own tastes, and should be able to pick and choose what they will and won't eat. But, ultimately, I hate the fact that people don't recognize what my family and I go through as a hardship of sorts. It's often exhausting to be so alert about food all the time. It would be great to be able to walk into any restaurant, cafe, or coffee shop and just pick up something to go because it looked good, without having to worry about its ingredients. But, that's not a choice I have.

I guess, when it comes right down to it, I hate to be called names. Especially names that don't describe me. And "fussy" is a name with not so great connotations. It indicates that the name-caller has no respect for me and my choices--regardless of the necessity behind them.

I urge you to read Becky's rant on her Chef Reinvented blog about her experiences with the casual and sometimes dangerous attitude some restaurants take towards food allergies.

Scones and Friendship

It's Spring Break here at Four Chickens, although you'd think it was Winter Break by the looks of the weather. Yesterday it was raining so hard I thought Noah was going to come by and offer me a ride. Yikes. Girlfriend has been taking a circus arts camp, so she's been happy to be indoors, learning how to swing on the trapeze and to walk on a big ball.

Perfect stay-at-home-and-bake weather. We have several friends who are not only gluten-free (like me), but who are also dairy-free and egg-free. If you've ever had to bake with no egg, you know how hard it is to get things to taste and look "normal". Yesterday I was thinking about these friends and decided to figure out a scone recipe that I could make with or without dairy--so I could have something for them. And I decided on scones because they traditionally do not need eggs.

I succeeded, thanks to Dorie Greenspan and Julia Child--two of my baking goddesses! These scones work beautifully with or without dairy. The vinegar mixed with (soy) milk is a substitute for buttermilk--I have found that even if you can use dairy, regular buttermilk doesn't have enough "oomph" to help the baking powder/baking soda do their thing with gluten-free flour that it does with wheat flour. The vinegar helps things be fluffy. I give you:

(Non-)Buttermilk Scones
adapted from Baking With Julia, by Dorie Greenspan

Note: This recipe uses my gluten-free flour mix: Jeanne's Gluten-Free All-Purpose Flour Mix (mix together and store in fridge):
1 1/4 C. brown rice flour
1 1/4 C. white rice flour
1 C. tapioca flour
1 C. sweet rice flour (also known at Mochiko)
2 scant tsp. xanthan gum

Ingredients:
3 C. gluten-free flour mix (see below)
1/3 C. sugar
3 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. baking soda
3/4 tsp salt
6 oz cold butter (or dairy-free butter substitute--I used Earth Balance)
1 C. milk (or gluten-free soy milk) mixed with 4 T. vinegar--I used apple cider vinegar
tapioca flour for dipping the biscuit cutter in

Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Line baking sheet with parchment paper

In a medium bowl, stir together flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.

Add the cold butter pieces and using your fingers, a pastry blender, or two knives, work the butter into the flour until the mixture resembles coarse corn meal. Don't worry about the larger nubs of butter--these add to the scones' flakiness.

Slowly pour in the milk mixture--do this carefully, because you might not need it all. I used about 7/8s of the milk. The dough should be just barely wet. Use your hands to carefully mix in the last bits of flour. The dough should be extremely light and fluffy. Handle carefully.

Turn out only a floured board. Or a Silpat mat (a godsend for gluten-free bakers). I use tapioca flour to lightly flour the Silpat and the rolling pin. Lightly roll out until dough is about 1/2 inch thick (the dough is so light that you don't want to "squish" it while you roll it). It won't be that big. Using a biscuit cutter dipped into tapioca flour, carefully cut out rounds and place them on the parchment-lined baking sheet. It's important that the edges of the scones are squished as little as possible so the scones can rise as high as possible. The number of scones recipe makes will depend on the size of the cutter you use.

Bake the scones for 17-20 minutes. They are done when they are lightly golden on the top. Cool briefly (or as long as you can stand it before devouring them).

These turned out light and flaky and delicious! Peach preserves is a delightful spread if you want even more deliciousness...
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