Gluten-Free Recipes for the Conscious Cook: A Seasonal, Vegetarian Cookbook (18 page)

If you’re just getting started with green and gluten-free cooking, it may seem challenging at times. Between the seeming restrictions of a gluten-free diet and a perhaps daunting array of new and unusual ingredients, you could feel a bit overwhelmed. The recipes in this chapter will come to your rescue, helping you turn simple cooked grains and vegetables into special, irresistible meals. Toppings can play many roles, adding texture, flavor, balance, or visual beauty—or all of the above! They may be as simple and light as edible flowers or a sprig of parsley or cilantro, or as hearty and warming as a rich, creamy sauce.

In this chapter, you’ll find everything from salad dressings to pestos to tomato sauces, and more. To make the most of these sauces and toppings in gluten-free cooking, think outside the box. Sure, pestos and tomato sauces are typically served on pasta. You can certainly use them in that way on gluten-free pastas, and I encourage you to let them entice you to experiment with the wide array of
gluten-free pastas now available
. But consider taking your experimentation a step further to try new combinations. Why not ladle
Tomato Sauce with Fennel and Marinated Dried Tomatoes
over cooked grains, or toss roasted or steamed vegetables with a dollop of
Vegan Basil-Walnut Pesto
?

In these pages you’ll also find two wonderfully aromatic Asian-inspired sauces:
Creamy Cilantro Sauce with Ginger
and
Thai Peanut Sauce
. Both are perfect for tossing with gluten-free Asian pastas or drizzling over a stir-fry. I’ve also included a number of salad dressing recipes. I know you’ll enjoy them on green salads, but I hope you’ll also engage your imagination and your senses and use them to concoct your own main-dish salads. For example, you can use
Italian Dressing
to make a hearty main dish salad by tossing it with bite-size pieces of crisp-tender vegetables and warm, cooked grains or beans—or both. Or transform cooked quinoa into a dish with Southwestern flair by adding chopped green chiles, tomatoes, corn kernels, and cooked black beans and mixing it all together with some
Avocado Dressing with Garlic Scapes
.

All of the recipes in this chapter are terrific on pasta, whole grains, and vegetables. So check out what’s in season at the market, choose your favorite grains, and experiment to your heart’s content. The possibilities are endless.

  

Between the porcinis and the red wine, this luscious sauce adds a gourmet touch to any meal. It complements the
Red Lentil and Teff Loaf
beautifully, but it’s also perfectly at home atop humbler fare, such as mashed potatoes, steamed greens, or plain cooked grains.

Makes about 22 cups

½ cup dried porcini mushrooms

1 cup red wine

2 cups water

2 tablespoons chopped fresh marjoram

1 tablespoon chopped fresh rosemary

2 teaspoons fresh thyme leaves

2 teaspoons sea salt

½ teaspoon pepper

2 tablespoons arrowroot or kudzu powder

¼ cup cold water

Soak the porcinis in the wine for 20 to 30 minutes, until they soften.

Drain the mushrooms, pouring the wine through a coffee filter set over a bowl so you can save the wine to use in the sauce. Chop the mushrooms and put them in a small saucepan, along with the wine and the 2 cups of water. Bring to a boil over medium-high heat, then lower the heat to medium and stir in the marjoram, rosemary, thyme, salt, and pepper.

Dissolve the arrowroot powder in the ¼ cup of cold water. Stir the slurry into the pot and continue cooking and stirring for about 1 minute, until the sauce thickens. Taste and adjust the seasonings if desired.

This sauce is delicious over
Millet Croquettes
and also makes a nice topping for pasta, rice, or baked vegetables. Or try it as a gravy over mashed potatoes. You can make numerous variations by using different herbs. Here, I’ve used sage and rosemary. Rosemary and thyme makes a great combination for Thanksgiving and other holiday meals.

Makes about 3 cups

3 cups sliced criminis or white button mushrooms

1½ cups chopped leeks (white and tender green parts) or onion

1½ cups water

1 teaspoon sea salt

1 teaspoon dried sage

½ teaspoon fresh rosemary leaves

¼ teaspoon pepper

2 tablespoons arrowroot or kudzu powder

3 tablespoons cold water

Put the mushrooms, leeks, and the 1½ cups of water in a medium-size saucepan and simmer for about 10 minutes, until the aroma of mushrooms fills the air. Stir in the salt, sage, rosemary, and pepper.

Dissolve the arrowroot powder in the 3 tablespoons of cold water. Stir the slurry into the pot and continue cooking and stirring for about 1 minute, until the sauce thickens. Add salt to taste, then taste again and adjust the other seasonings if desired.

This is the ultimate pasta sauce to make use of summer’s bounty. It makes a lot, so you might want to enjoy some right away and store the rest in the freezer for a taste of sunshine in the middle of winter. It’s especially delicious with homemade
Marinated Dried Tomatoes
, but store-bought will do in a pinch. When you chop the fennel, taste a bit of the stems; if they’re tender, you can use them too. Try this sauce on any gluten-free pasta; brown rice spirals and rigatoni are especially fun shapes.

Makes about 8 cups

2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil

½ cup coarsely chopped onion

12 cups coarsely chopped plum tomatoes

½ cup chopped fresh fennel

¼ cup
Marinated Dried Tomatoes

2 cups fresh basil leaves, chopped

3 tablespoons fresh thyme leaves

3 tablespoons fresh oregano or marjoram

2 teaspoons sea salt

10 cloves garlic, pressed Heat the oil in a soup pot over medium heat. Add the onion and sauté for about 5 minutes, until it begins to soften. Stir in the tomatoes, fennel, and dried tomatoes and cook, stirring occasionally, until hot and bubbling. Lower the heat, cover, and simmer, stirring occasionally, for an hour or two, until the tomatoes practically dissolve and the sauce is as thick as you want.

Stir in the basil, thyme, oregano, and salt and continue to cook, stirring occasionally, for about 5 minutes, to blend in the flavors of the herbs. Stir in the garlic. Taste and adjust the seasonings if desired.

Variation

To cook this sauce in a pressure cooker, simply sauté the onions in the pressure cooker instead of a soup pot. After you add the tomatoes, fennel, and dried tomatoes, lock on the lid and bring the cooker up to pressure. Adjust the heat to maintain pressure and cook for 1 hour. Let the pressure come down naturally or run cold water over the cooker to speed the process. After the pressure is down, check the sauce, and if it’s as thick as you want, stir in the herbs, salt, and garlic. If not yet thick enough, replace the lid, bring the cooker back up to pressure, and cook for 15 to 20 minutes. Check again and, when the tomatoes are completely broken down and the sauce is as thick as you like, stir in the herbs, salt, and garlic. Taste and adjust the seasonings if desired.

Gluten-Free Pastas

Thankfully, a gluten-free diet doesn’t have to mean living without pasta. There’s an age-old tradition of making pastas from alternative grains, especially in Asia. In fact, some of the most ancient pasta known was a millennia-old millet pasta found in China. That tradition continues to this day, so you should definitely explore and experiment. Here are a few common varieties:

• Rice noodles.
  These come in array of widths and shapes, some broad and flat, and others as thin as vermicelli. The different shapes go by different names, from rice sticks to bifun. They don’t have a lot of flavor, so they’re great in saucy dishes, where they soak up liquids and become infused with the flavor of the dish.
  
• Soba.
  For a hearty, earthy flavor, try 100% buckwheat soba. (Read labels carefully, as soba is often made with some wheat.)
  
• Bean thread noodles.
  Also known as glass or cellophane noodles, these noodles are made from mung bean starch, and as their several names indicate, they’re thin and transparent when cooked. Like rice noodles, they’re fairly bland, so they’re best used in soups and saucy dishes.
  

Still, you may long for Italian-style pasta from time to time. Fortunately, there are a few great brands of gluten-free pasta available these days, and with all of the current interest in gluten-free eating, it’s likely that your choices will soon be multiplied. These days, the best options are made from brown rice or a blend of corn and quinoa, but who knows what the future may bring. Maybe we’ll come full circle and millet pasta will reenter the scene. Until then, here are my recommendations regarding Italian-style pastas.

• Tinkyada
  makes great rice pastas; their penne and spirals are especially good.
  
• Pastariso
  offers terrific lasagna noodles made with rice.
  
• Ancient Harvest
  makes pasta from a combination of corn and quinoa flour in a wide variety of shapes. For a rainbow of color, try their garden pagodas. Just be forewarned that you need to cook these pastas exactly as directed. Also, any leftovers will harden, so you’ll need to reheat them in water (or just mix them with sauce when freshly cooked, and reheat them in their sauce).
  
• Alb-Gold
  is a German company (see Resources) that makes wonderful pastas from rice or a combination of rice and corn.
  
• Eden
  offers 100 percent whole buckwheat pasta made with 100 percent buckwheat flour.