LunaKnit

Here's a few of my favourite things: hamburgers, brownies and chocolate chip cookies. I've been looking for the perfect recipe for each one of the above mentioned for years and even though I have tried at least tens of different recipes that have been promoted as "the best" I still haven't quite found what I'm looking for.  After my wheat allergy diagnosis a couple years ago I needed to start the whole process again from scratch. Not only did I have to try all my favourite recipes again to see if they still work, but I also had to learn a whole new technique of baking and find the perfect flour combination for each one of the recipes. Too often have I noticed that my once tried-tested-and approved recipes just didn't work when substituting wheat with the likes of rice and corn flour: the dough often becomes either too loose and sticky or hard and brittle to bake in the normal fashion. I've mastered most dishes but often with quite unconvention...

It starts to look like I should rename this blog "pie and knit"-blog. But I like pie. There, I said it. Now I don’t have to make any more excuses for posting yet another pie recipe. I was so overjoyed about finally mastering the wheat and gluten free pie crust that I just had to make some more. Just think of something you really love, finding out that you are allergic to it and spending 1.5 years before finally finding a decent substitute for it. That’s how it was for me with the wheat allergy. This time I made a pie with anchovy and red onions. It reminds me of the French onion pie, pissaladière . The saltiness of the anchovy and olives is balanced by the caramelized red onions and balsamic vinegar. It is full of taste and gets even better if made the day before serving. A small note: It’s weird but I get a serious craving for anchovy once or twice a month. My favorite pizza toppings are anchovy, garlic and capers. The obsession and love for anchovy runs in ou...

Being allergic to wheat and other cereals means that I have to check very carefully every ingredient list in every product I buy from the grocery store. Most of the items including wheat are clear: no bread, no biscuits, no pasta, and so on, but even many of the candies, ice creams and yoghurts have it in their ingredient lists. I once bought a jar of jam and got really bad stomach cramps after eating it: wheat! I never thought they would but wheat in jam but apparently they do. Checking the ingredients has made me realize how many e-codes, preservatives and other additives our food contains. It is quite unappealing and unappetizing. If the only thing in candy I can recognize is sugar and the rest of the list is different codes and chemical names (thickening agents, colors, man-made flavors, citric acids and carnauba wax) I’m not quite sure if I want to put it in my mouth. The same applies to potato chips and other snacks. For example Pringles has onl...

H ere's a little something I made yesterday to celebrate, well, just a normal Friday night. We went for a long walk enjoying the warmth of summer evening and after that sat down for a longer dinner than we usually have time for on week days. Perfect way to start the weekend! The pie was so good that I wanted to share the recipe with you, so here we  go !  Gluten free recipe for amazingly delicious pie, enjoy! Chanterelle and Ham Pie with Fresh Basil and Goat Cheese Pie crust 250 g gluten free flour (about 3-4 dl) * 100 g butter (softened, but not melted) 1 tsp salt 1 large egg Filling 2.5 dl milk 100 g cream cheese, room temperature (I used one with chanterelle flavor) 2 eggs Also 25 g dried chanterelle mushrooms (or a couple of dl of fresh ones if you can get some. You can use other mushrooms as well) 150 g ham 1 red onion 100 g fresh cherry tomatoes half a red bell pepper 1 dl fresh basil (chopped) 1 dl grated pecorino che...

I eat a lot of fruit, but still it often happens that there are overripe fruit in our kitchen. I don’t want to throw them away so I try to use them when I cook. Slightly too ripe or battered fruit often work in smoothies, but if they are much more overripe they can often still be used in baking or other warm dishes that require fruit, for example mango-curry. I try to minimize the house hold waste and if I see a product that has its “best before” –date coming to close, I try to use it immediately. Yesterday I realized we had some milk that was going old and two almost brown bananas: what else is there to do than use them as an excuse to make banana muffins? We had all the other ingredients already at home, but I had to do a quick run to the little grocery store downstairs to get some chocolate. For some reason there is never a surplus of chocolate reaching the end of its self-life at our home, I wonder why… Banana muffins are really easy and quick to make: you jus...

Toscakaka  (or  toscakakku  in Finnish) is a dear childhood memory of mine, but sadly after the invasion of American style baking with cookies, super-rich-brownies and over-the-top-cupcakes this traditional part of  fika  (which means to have a coffee break with a sweet treat) has been almost forgotten. I can’t even remember the last time I was served this cake. Toscakaka along with marble cake (which we called  tiikerikakku , translating to “tiger cake”) was probably the most common cake baked for guests when I was young and it was everyone’s favourite. Last week after getting nostalgic with the buttermilk cake I got a craving for toscakaka, and with a small caution decided to bake it again. I was a bit afraid that, as with many childhood favourites, maybe the cake would not be as good as my memory of the amazing taste of it, and would be disappointed. After calling for my mother for the recipe and making a mess in the kitchen, I found out that...

Not being able to eat wheat or oats has left a big hole in my diet. I had never even thought of how grain based our eating habits are, until I had to start to manage without. Daily life is starting go fine after 1.5 years of getting used to and gaining confidence in kitchen, but parties are always a bit hard. I can see the stress and the confused " what am I going to serve her?! "-look in people's eyes when the reply to allergies is wheat, rye, barley and oats. I guess lactose intolerance and celiac disease are nowadays quite popular and you can buy low-lactose and gluten free products even from smaller grocery stores, but it's not quite that simple with me as gluten free does not necessarily mean wheat or oat free. One thing I haven't been able to buy is muesli or granola that doesn't contain any of the ingredients I listed above in my allergies. So I started to make my own. This is also a good way to reduce sugar (as store-bought granola...

It's raining outside so I'm spending my day in watching ice-hockey on TV (Finland is playing against Kazakhstan), knitting and baking bread. I was going to go for a run today as it's almost been a week since my last time, but the rainy weather and distant thunder made me stay home. Maybe I'll do some yoga exercises tonight instead... Yesterday I made a buttermilk cake and added some zucchini to make it a bit healthier. Buttermilk cake was something I made often as a child as it's such an easy recipe, as it doesn't require any whisking of eggs or butter or sugar or other more complicated steps. It was actually the first real baking I have ever done by myself. (Hmm.. either this or pancakes, I'm not sure...) The original recipe is from my mother, but I modified it a bit to make it gluten and wheat free (as well as the additional zucchini I mentioned earlier). You can substitute the flours with normal all purpose flour and leave the...

This is one of my favorite foods at the moment. I just absolutely love fresh cilantro and love trying new recipes that has it. That's why we often eat Mexican and Asian food.  The Banh mi sandwiches have everything. I love bread, meatballs, spices, and the freshness of cilantro and the pickled carrots makes these sandwiches the perfect combination of flavours.  I first had these over the new year and I just had to get the recipe. After that we have made these quite a few times and we still think they are one of the best foods ever.  Banh mi Pickled carrots:   3 carrots 2 spring onions 1 dl rice vinegar 0.5 dl sugar 3 tbsp. hot chilli sauce Meatballs: 500 g ground beef 3 spring onions 2 red chilis 1 dl fresh basil  1 tbsp. sugar 3 tbsp. potato or corn starch 2 tbsp. squid sauce 1 tsp ground black pepper 1 tsp salt Also Jalopenos Mayonnaise Chopped fresh cilantro 2 baguettes Grate the carrots coarsely and chop up the onions. Mix all the other ...