Farm Fresh Egg, Spinach, and Basil Bake

Through my church, I am participating in a Food Faith and Substantibility small group.  This week's focus was on Food and the Environment.  For our potluck style meeting, we were asked to bring something made with local ingredients and I volunteered to cook an entree.  On Sunday, at the last minute, I saw my uncle at a graduation party.  He had four dozen eggs in the fridge for the taking.  He said I could have some - his chickens lay five eggs a day and he has plenty.  Eggs don't get any more farm fresh than ones from an uncle's backyard farm in Wisconsin!

I took a vacation day off from work in order to explore some new farmers markets throughout the city.  (Some people use vacation days to visit the beach; I use it to drool over fresh veggies.)  Today, I visited the Lincoln Square Farmers Market, which is literally steps off the Western brown line stop.  It is open on Tuesdays from 7am to 1pm.  There was a great selection of plants (edible and non), baked goods (for gluten loving folks), fruits and green veggies.  I bought some asparagus for $3.00 and a bunch of basil for $1.50 for my entree.

For cheese, since every recipe involving eggs seems to require cheese, I used Teeze Vegan Mozzarella "cheese" from Chicago Vegan Foods (sold in Whole Foods).  I love the product and support the company's core values: veganism (sorry for using eggs with your product!), environmental responsibility and commitment to customers.  This dairy-free cheese melts, grates well, and is a breeze to substitute for dairy cheeses.

With the help from Uncle Mike's Farm Fresh Eggs, a visit to a nearby Farmers Market, and vegan cheese, I created this Egg and Spinach bake. Even if you do not have your own uncle with chickens, I hope you try some cage free eggs for this recipe!  (You'll get hooked.)  As written, the only top 8 allergens the recipe contains are soy and egg; it is naturally gluten-free.  This recipe is easy enough to substitute in other herbs or cooked veggies for endless varieties!  I got a lot of compliments from my group (unofficial taste testers) - everyone really enjoyed this "crustless quiche".  It pairs quite deliciously with other local foods! (Such as quinoa with beans and corn, corn on the cob, strawberry salad, rice with green beans...)

Farm Fresh Egg, Spinach and Basil Bake

1 bunch of spinach, washed, with large stems removed
2 T olive oil
Cooking spray
2 cups basil (loosely packed when measuring) then thinly sliced
1 package (10oz) of Teeze - Mozzarella vegan cheese
10 cage free eggs

Salt and pepper to taste


Preheat oven to 375 degrees.  Spray a casserole pan with cooking spray.

Heat oil in a pan.  Add the spinach, tossing it around to coat the spinach leaves with oil.  Cover and let cook until it is wilted for about two minutes.

Add the spinach to the casserole pan.  Add basil.  Grate Teeze one top.

Add salt and pepper (to taste) to the eggs and beat.  Pour the egg mixture into the casserole pan and give it a quick stir.

Bake uncovered for 30-40 minutes or until the mixture is set and a knife inserted in the middle comes out clean.  Let cool before cutting.

What do you do to eat locally?  What farmers markets do you visit?

Soup for (under) a buck

Can you feed a group of 15 on a buck?  Total.

This was the challenge presented to my Food, Faith and Sustainability group last week.  Our homework was to bring food for our group potluck.  Majority of us were given a dollar budget.  Only $1.00 to feed a group of 15.  A few people were given larger sums ($3.00 and $5.00) while one person could spend as much as she liked.

The easy way out as one of the $1.00 folks would have been to go to the Dollar Tree, pick up some snack food, and call it a day.  But I can't eat most packaged food (and if I can, it is triple the price of its wheat and milk bearing cousins) and I would like to eat, too.  I toyed with a few ideas (the ever popular rice, beans, and lentils; the ever tasty meringues; the super easy scrambled eggs and/or fries) before deciding on soup.  If I used homemade broth that has been hanging out in my freezer, the cost would be free!  I made my broth when cooking a whole chicken, so any ingredients that went into that were for flavoring the chicken and were already consumed.  The water was saved from being poured down the drain, so I should get a few gold stars for rescuing something so tasty.

I am financially fortunate and blessed that none of my meals require me to measure out how much this will cost (carrots were going to make an appearance, but at 4 cents each, they were passed up for the super pricey (all things considered) lime for a dime).  My ingredients come from a total of four grocery stores.  I live in a fantastic neighborhood - the Asian grocery stores have dirt cheap prices on things that are naturally gluten free (CARTS full of food there can cost around $100.00 - includes lots of protein).  A nearby market that sells limes for a dime each - and other produce and protein for rock bottom prices.  And then there is Dominicks - my source for everything else, including items that need to carry the gluten free label, where my dollar does not go too far.

This recipe was more of a math equation than I am used to.  I would have loved to add some carrots, mung beans, and cilantro, but then I would have had to sacrifice the noodles, which is pretty much my favorite part.  

Is it doable?  More importantly, does it taste good?

I did it for 98 cents.  It tasted delicious.  It did not feel like soup for a buck, but it was a great way to stretch a dollar on a restricted diet, eat healthy empty out my freezer from all my stock, introduce people to some new foods, and flex my math skills in the kitchen.  The lemon grass and fish sauce, although only appearing in small amounts, make their presence known, marrying the flavors together.

In college, I learned about this triangle.  It carries over in a lot of decision making in my everyday life.  If you want something to be cheap, it can be either good or fast.  You can never have all three.  Since I wanted good and cheap for my soup, I had to sacrifice fast by shopping around, carefully planning and cooking the soup myself.  Worth it?  Yes!

Lemon Grass Chicken Soup with Rice Vermicelli

Makes an impressive 15 servings.

11 cups homemade chicken broth

2 ribs of celery, thinly sliced

1 stalk of lemon grass, bruised

2 teaspoons of fish sauce

Salt and pepper to taste

9 oz rice vermicelli

1 lime

1 green onion, thinly sliced for garnish

Heat a nonstick pan and add 1/3 cup chicken stock.  Add celery and stir until softened (about 5 minutes), adding additional stock as necessary. 

Add remainder of chicken stock to a large pot.  Bring to boil.  Add celery, lemon grass, and fish sauce.  Add salt and pepper to taste.  Bring to boil then reduce heat, simmering uncovered for about 10 minutes. 

Add water in a large pot.  Bring to boil.  Add rice vermicelli and cook for 4-5 minutes (or per package directions).  Rinse with cool water.  Set aside.

Spoon rice vermicelli into bowls, then add soup (discarding the lemon grass).  Add green onions as garnish.  Zest the lime over the soup and add a squeeze of the juice to the soup.

Here was my cost breakdown.  Salt, pepper, and chicken broth were my freebies.

How far do you stretch your dollar?

Gluten Free Communion

One of the few times when I don't want to panic about gluten or dairy sneaking its way into my food is during communion.  When I first started attending Urban Village Church in Chicago, I always had a mini panic attack.  What if they didn't have gf communion?  Are they handling it correctly?  Is it really gluten free or does it have minute traces of wheat like wafers from the Catholic Church? (I will not take communion at a Catholic service after reading articles like this and this where the answer to "Is it safe?" is "Probably".)  Every week, with eagle eyes, I would silently watch the celebrant and make sure he or she did not break the wheat bread over the gluten free wafers.  After a year, one day, the unthinkable happened: while walking to the serving station, someone realized he had too much to carry (half a loaf of wheat bread, a cup, and a plate of gf wafers) and he put the wheat bread on top of the wafers.  As he passed me, we both realized what happened.  I rushed to the serving station and said that the wafers were no longer gluten free.  I sat out from communion that day and prayed, thanking God that I narrowly escaped a gluten reaction.

The innocent action (who can blame him?) opened up a new conversation about how we literally handle the gluten free communion.  We decided that the next week, I would make one loaf for the church: gluten free, vegan, and top 8 allergen free.  I had a recipe in mind and made one of my favorites: the house bread from Flying Apron Bakery's book.  I made it with pumpkin, a perfect fall bread.  The bread was a little difficult to tear in half, but the real difficulty came when breaking off pieces for people.  Growing up, I always had wafers.  The whole tear-off-bread-while-people-wait was new to me.  And after mixing that with a dense bread, there were crumbs everywhere on the floor!  Thankfully our church regularly declares that communion is messy - you will bump into other people - there will be crumbs.  Many people were thankfully goodhearted over the bread - they had no idea what to expect from a wheat free bread - but I knew that there was a better fit out there.

I was determined to find a recipe that worked.  As much as I love the idea of everyone sharing one loaf, the cost and difficulty for me to make a loaf a week was too much. I searched the Internet until I found a recipe that met my needs.  Brittany Angell of RealSustenance.com has a super easy gluten free and vegan quick bread formula.  She says it has endless flavor possibilities and she is right!  The formula was there, I just followed it with foods that worked for me and my needs and out came communion bread!  The below recipe is top eight allergen free (wheat free, dairy free, soy free, egg free, tree nut free, peanut free, shellfish free, fish free) and vegan.  Surprisingly, the most challenging allergen for me to avoid was soy.  All of my cooking sprays had soy and I needed the dough to actually leave the pan in one piece.  A quick snip of parchment paper to line the loaf pan did the trick!

The recipe below makes four loaves of bread, perfect for a month of communion.  The bread freezes exceptionally well.  Before baking, I always switch over to clean kitchen towels and make sure there are no nuts or peanuts around (I already have a dedicated gluten and dairy free kitchen).  I bought my mini loaf pans from Michaels during an after Christmas sale.  They are exclusively used for communion bread.  I make sure when I run my dishwasher that no peanut or nut dishes are in the same load, for extra precaution.

The bread itself is quite tasty and breaks apart easily and does not crumble to pieces when dipped in grape juice.  I've enjoyed it outside of church, too!

The mini loaves are at the Urban Village Andersonville location whenever I am there. (1602 W Ainslie St at 10:30am on Sundays)  Other Sundays, they use wafers from Ener-G.  I've previously made Namaste Food's sugar free muffin mix for communion as well with great results.

Gluten Free, Top 8 Allergen Free, Vegan Communion Bread

Makes enough communion bread for 4 weeks.

2 cups gluten free all purpose flour (I use Bob's Red Mill GF All Purpose Baking Flour)
1 t baking powder
1 t baking soda
1/2 t salt
1 t of xanthan gum or guar gum
3/4 c sugar

1/3 c vegetable oil
3/4 c of rice milk or coconut milk + 1 t apple cider vinegar
1 1/4 c unsweetened applesauce
1 t vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 330 degrees.  Line four mini loaf pans with parchment paper.
Whisk together all the dry ingredients.
Add in the wet ingredients and mix with a hand mixer.
Pour in the mini loaf pans and bake for 35-45 minutes (or until a toothpick comes out clean).
Let rest in pan for 5 minutes, then transfer to a cooling rack.  Once completely cool, individually wrap the loaves in tin foil and place in a freezer bag, squeezing all the air out first, then storing in the freezer.

To defrost:
The night before, take a mini loaf from the freezer and store in the refrigerator in a sealed plastic container or bag.  In the morning, move from the refrigerator to the counter.  The loaf will be perfect in time for service!  (Assuming about 2 hours passes from rolling out of bed and communion time.)

Some tips on avoiding cross contamination when handling gluten free communion:

• The standard definition for gluten free is less than 20 parts per million.  Imagine a million grains of rice.  Now imagine that 20 of them are red.  How tiny is that amount!
• Do not handle wheat bread and then handle gf bread!  Make sure your hands are clean (I'm a huge fan of soap and water - it gets any residual crumbs off the hands).
• Have a dedicated gf cup and plate.  It is especially helpful to have separate storage containers and towels.
• If your church literally breaks bread (tears it in half), keep the gf elements out of the "crumb zone".
• When serving, offer the plate to the recipient and have them tear off their own piece.
• Everyone's sensitivities are different.  Just because one person who is gluten free since it helps them feel great does not have an issue with cross contamination does not mean that the next person has the same sensitivity level.  Err on the side of caution: always assume a super sensitive person.
• Now for the hardest one: if despite best intentions, something went wrong and the gf communion was cross contaminated: say something.  Example: someone dips wheat bread in the gf cup.  Not safe for those who need a gf diet.  I'd rather have someone say "no, you can't have that" rather than go home, feel sick, take a nap and take the next day off of work because I'm mysteriously sick.  (It has happened: all of my sick days this past year occurred on Monday after Sunday reactions.)

Every week, I've turned around and caught glances of strangers taking part in the communion celebration with the gluten free loaf.  It seems like every week, one or two new faces try the loaf, and not just because they are curious about gluten free breads!  One thing that brings me great joy is nourishing others through food.  To see so many people being able to participate in something that was previously forbidden due to dietary restrictions really fills me up with such happiness.  This is my contribution to bringing our church community together and growing even stronger as we move through the journey together.

Two great entries from a gf pastor's perspective at GlutenFreeJesusFreak include what to offer for communion and a few different ways of offering gf communion. 

What does your church do?  Do you have any more tips to add on serving gf communion?