Gluten Free Coconut Chip Coffee Cake

This is the recipe for the gluten free cake I made for Haws' birthday. If you don't need to eat gluten free, just use all-purpose flour in place of the GF baking mix.

Coconut Chip Coffee Cake

1/4c butter

1/3c apple sauce

2 eggs

1 tsp vanilla

2 cups gluten free baking mix (I use arrowhead mills)

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp baking soda

1/4 tsp salt

1c light sour cream

Filling/topping:

1/2c sugar

1/2c flaked unsweetened coconut

1/2c semisweet chocolate chips

1/3c chopped walnuts

In mixing bowl, cream butter, sugar and then adds in eggs one at a time. Beat in vanilla. Combine baking mix (flour), baking powder, baking soda and salt in separate bowl. Add dry mix and sour cream alternately to creamed mixture.

Spoon in layers, half topping/filling into greased bundt pan, followed by half of mixture, the rest of filling and the rest of the mixture.

Bake at 350 for 45-50 minutes. Cool for 10 min before removing from pan.

makes 12-16 servings

HAPPY BIRTHDAY HAWS!

Today my wonderful husband turned 33. I am not going to go on and on about how great he is, cause if you know him, I don't have to convince you of anything :)

I love this man!

I always say he has a hard time multi-tasking, but look at him go! Talking on the phone and still controlling the remote!

We went out to dinner last night to The Clay Oven in Irvine for Indian food (one of Haws' favorites). This place was soooo good! We highly recommend it. Then we went to the district in Tustin and saw a movie, came home and had the cake I made. It was really good and gluten free! It was my first try converting a normal cake recipe into a gluten free recipe and it turned out good. I will post the recipe once I get it back from my mom :)

A few more additions...

We have a niece! This is a first on both sides of our families. Bronwyn Mae aka Winnie, made her entrance into this world on Aug 16th. Everything went well and we are so happy for Jared, Sarah and Thor. I can't get over how much blond hair she has! I have never seen a baby with that much hair that wasn't black.

Here is little Thor helping his sister with his pacifier. We can't wait to see them all next month for the baby blessing.

Also, this month we put Haws' trusty old '95 4 Runner to rest. It was pretty close to kicking the bucket. This baby had almost 300,000 miles on it!!!! The young men in our ward would affectionately refer to it as "The Dirt Limo". May the dirt limo rest in peace (although Haws is hoping someone will buy it and it can live on...).

So he finally became a part of the Dodge family and bought a 1500 Ram Quad Cab!

He was a little nervous about buying a new car since he has never paid more than $2,000 for a vehicle, but he loves his new truck! He will sometimes ask me if there is anywhere we need to go just so he can drive it around! He had probably the best sales experience ever thanks to Brad and John over at Glenn E Thomas Dodge. It helps to be related :)

I wanted to post this shot for my dad. Three GET vehicles all in a row! There is even a caliber down the row, but I couldn't get it in the shot. Here we are representing!

Our next addition is a new microwave. Our "old" one was a wedding gift from Haws' brother Wade. It was really nice, but after only two years, it exploded! So we had to buy a new one and here it is :)

Montana 2009

I have taken such a long time to post about our trip to Montana. I just wanted to put some time into, but realized that is never going to happen. So here it is... a bunch of pictures from our vacation, not any special order, just pure randomness. We had so much fun while we were there and hope that the Bendheim's will have us back again sometime. They were the best hosts and we fell in love with their place. Haws and I have both said that we would love to move to Montana. We would have to live in whitefish on the lake of course :)

Peter and Brad in the boat. Peter was an amazing driver and he got everyone out of the water on the wake board or the skies.

I actually tried out wake boarding this time around. It was a lot of fun, but I am still a water ski lover.

Brooke and John announced that they are having a baby girl! We are all so excited for them to have a girl in their family. She is due in January.

Taking a walk through Glacier Park

Playing phase ten on the deck during some down time. Nice view of the lake, huh?

We were so happy to see Dana and Chase. We miss having them around all the time. Can't wait for Thanksgiving!

Even with a bum shoulder, my dad hit the water.

Haws didn't get to wakeboard the last time we were in Montana due to his knee surgery. So this year he was determined to get out there and he did awesome!

Debra wore a drysuit to ski. It was hilarious watching her when she was in the water. The suit would blow up with air and she looked like the marshmallow man!

SO COLD!!!

We flew up with Brad, Kori and Tanner. Tanner was such a good little traveler!

Haws rekindled his "bromance" with Redge. It was a sweet reunion.

The new addition to the Fam

When Haws and I got married, we bought each other beach cruisers as wedding gifts. They didn't get a ton of use that first year, but recently I have been loving my beach cruiser! I will just take it out for a 30 min spin whenever I have time and enjoy soaking up some vitamin D while the summer days are so nice. My girlfriend and I are big fans of the farmers market on Fridays down at the beach and decided to ride our bikes down. The first time we did it, we had to ride with our bags full of fruit for the hour long ride home. It was not the easiest task. Since then, I have really wanted a basket so that I could hop on my bike to go pick up a few things at the store or use it when I go for my farmers market ride. Yesterday I went and bought a basket. These things are not as easy to find as I thought. But I stumbled upon a bike store that actually had a great selection. I went with the basic silver basket and I even put it on myself! Well, I put on the top part and Haws figured out the right way to attach it to the wheel. So today I set out for the long ride to the farmers market with my friend and it was a success!!! I got all the fruit in the basket and had no problems handling the load... except for when I stopped for a drink of water, let go of the handle bars, and my bike feel over spilling strawberries onto the ground. Yes, I picked them up and put them right back. I even installed it myself! Well, sort of. into the basket, no harm done. Now I know not to ever go hands free with a loaded basket.

I am excited about the adventures I will take with my new basket :)

summer peach cake

I was at Trader Joe's the other day and they had a case of organic peaches on sale for $6.99! I couldn't pass it up, but then got home wondering what we were going to do with all these peaches! I can only eat so many in one day and they always go ripe at the same time. So I looked on my trusted gluten free website, Karina's Kitchen, and found a recipe for peach cake. It did not disappoint. I was so good I had to tell myself just because it's gluten free, doesn't mean it is calorie free, it is a cake still after all! As I started cooking, I realized I would have to make some modifications since my usual gluten free flour blend had gone bad. (have you ever seen those little bugs in your flour??? gross! I am glad I caught it before I started mixing it in!) To try the original, vegan recipe, check out Karina's website. I am going to share how I made it :)

Before baking

Brown sugar crumb top

Baked to perfection! It only took 20 min longer than the recipe called for!

Gluten Free Summer Peach Cake

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Lightly grease and dust a 8 or 9-inch round cake pan with gluten-free flour. I use a 9-inch spring pan.

First, you'll need:

2 cups sliced organic peaches. Set aside.

Whisk together the dry ingredients

1 cup rice flour and 1 cup GF pizza crust mix (authentic foods)
2 teaspoons xanthan gum
1/2 teaspoon fine sea salt
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
1 teaspoon cinnamon

Beat to combine:

1/3 cup light olive oil or Spectrum Organic Shortening

1/3 cup all natural apple sauce
3/4 cup organic light brown sugar
1/4 cup pure agave nectar
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
3/4 cup organic greek yogurt, vanilla

1/4 unsweetened vanilla almond milk

Add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredient mix and beat to combine.

1 egg

2 egg whites

Whisk till frothy.

Add to the batter and gently combine.

Scoop the cake batter into the pan and spread evenly.

Place the peach slices into the batter in a concentric pattern (or any pattern you prefer).

Make a cinnamon brown sugar topping:

4 tablespoons organic brown sugar
2 tablespoons gluten-free rice flour
1 tablespoons Spectrum Organic Shortening
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

Rub these ingredients together till a crumbly mixture forms. Sprinkle on top of the peaches.

Place the cake into the center of a preheated oven and bake until firm and golden, and a wooden pick inserted into the center emerges clean- about 30-40 minutes. ( mine was taking a while, check occasionally to know exact time)

Cool on a wire rack.

This cake was especially good warm, even better served with all natural vanilla ice cream. You can wrap leftover slices in foil and bag them to freeze for future treats.

mediterranean halibut

Mediterranean Halibut

This was delicious! I got the recipe from Womens Health Magazine and made a few modifications of course :)

Makes 4 servings Prep 10 min Bake at 400 for 1 hour

1 lb small white potatoes, cut into quarters

1 large red bell pepper cut into strips

1/2 med onion

1 tsp salt

1/2 tsp pepper

1 tsp crushed garlic

4 halibut fillets, about 5 oz each

1 can of artichoke hearts (trader joes)

1/2 c. cherry tomatoes cut in half

1/2 lemon

1 tsp Italian Seasoning

1. Heat oven to 400, spray a 2 quart casserole dish. Spread potatoes, onion and bell pepper in dish with half of salt and pepper. Bake at 400 for 35 min stirring occasionally until potatoes are tender.

2. Mix garlic into vegetables. Season fish with remaining salt and pepper and place on top of veggies. Distribute artichokes and tomatoes over casserole and squeeze lemon over fish. Sprinkle with Italian seasoning.

3. Bake at 400 for 25 min or until fish flakes easily when tested with a fork.