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Review: Kinnikinnick Graham Style Crumbs

Last Updated on by the Celiac-Disease.com Staff Leave a Comment

Several months ago I had the opportunity to review a gluten-free website. Part of the deal was that I got a gift voucher to use to buy whatever I wanted to from the site. One of the items I chose was graham cracker crumbs from Kinnikinnick called Graham Style Crumbs. When I needed such crumbs in the past, I used cookies and crushed them up myself in a large baggie and rolling pin.

The box of crumbs got pushed behind other things in my crowded (and poorly designed pantry) so I sort of forgot I had them. Finally, just before Christmas I whipped up some lemon bars and used the Kinnikinnick Graham Style Crumbs to make the crust for them. Even though I much prefer using a ginger cookie crumb crust for lemon bars, the graham cracker crumbs made a wonderful tasting crust. One box makes an 8” x 8” sized crust.

When I make my own crumbs using cookies, I don’t get them all crushed to a consistent texture. That method works fine and it’s not like I have half a cookie pressed into the pan, but they are not perfectly even. What I like about the Kinnikinnick product is that the crumbs are very fine as you would expect from a machine made crumb.

It’s simple to make up a crust with the Kinnikinnick crumbs. You just add a little melted butter to them and mix them up.  Then you press the mixture into whatever pan or dish you’re using just as you’d do with a gluten crumb crust. It’s that simple! There are instructions for making a baked or non-baked pie on the box. The crust tastes just like a gluten graham cracker crust and is good enough to fool even the most persnickety gluten eater you know.

In addition to being gluten-free, the Kinnikinnick Graham Style Crumbs are also suitable for people with other allergens as the product is also:

  • Tree Nut-free
  • Peanut-free
  • Dairy-free
  • Corn-free
  • Fish-free
  • Egg-free
  • Casein-free

Below is a list of the ingredients:

When I read the first ingredient on the box – pea starch – and then other ingredients like pea protein and pea fiber, my first thought was that the crumbs would have a grainy, bean flavor to them. Nothing could be farther from the truth. They taste pretty much like crumbs made with Honey Maid graham crackers. At least, they taste like what I remember those gluten crumbs tasting like.

The obvious dessert the Kinnikinnick crumbs will work for is cheesecake which is one dessert I don’t particularly care for. However, when warm weather rolls around this Spring I’m going to use this product to make a crust for this Peanut Butter Chocolate Pie. It is sinfully delicious and all it takes to make it gluten-free is changing the crust. To date, I’ve not been thrilled with any of the gluten-free crusts (all ready-made items) I’ve used to make it. The Kinnikinnick Graham Style Crumbs are just the ticket for that pie and any others that call for a graham cracker crust!

Recipe: Gluten-Free Lemon Meringues

Last Updated on by the Celiac-Disease.com Staff Leave a Comment

Last week I wrote a review of Roben Ryberg’s new cookbook – The Ultimate Gluten-Free Cookie Cookbook. I was literally drooling over this cookbook while writing my review, so I only thought it was fitting to dive right into making one of the recipes today when I was stuck inside during the snowstorm.  While I had my eye on some of the Girl Scout cookie replicas, I didn’t have all the ingredients that I needed.  I did, however, have all of the ingredients for the Lemon Meringues.  I immediately got to work mixing up the ingredients.

This cookie recipe only requires three ingredients.  It doesn’t get much more simple than this, folks.

Lemon Meringues

  • 2 egg whites
  • 1/3 cup sugar
  • 1 tsp. lemon extract
  1. Preheat the oven to 300 degrees.  Lightly grease a cookie sheet.
  2. In a medium-sized bowl, beat the egg whites and sugar until the whites form stiff peaks.  (This will take several minutes, depending upon the temperature of the egg whites and the strength of the mixer.  It takes longer for still peaks to form with the inclusion of sugar than if egg whites were beaten alone.)  The batter will look like marshmallow cream.  Beat in the lemon extract.  Do not under-beat, as the shape of the cookie relies upon the ability of the meringue to hold its shape.
  3. Using a piping bag with a large star tip, pipe a small star onto a prepared pan or just drop rounded teaspoonfuls of dough onto the pan.  Bake the cookies for 15 to 20 minutes, until the bottom edges just begin to brown and the tops look dry.  Let cool on wire racks before serving.

Beating the egg whites & sugar:

Ready to go into the oven (I dropped by teaspoonfuls onto the cookie sheet):

Ready to chow down:

Ryberg says in her description at the top of the page that these cookies taste like a lemon cloud.  After sampling numerous cookies, I have to agree!  They have a wonderful lemon flavor & a great crisp to them!  I did happen to eat one before it had cooled all the way and it had a softer, cloud-like texture.  So good!!

If you are looking for a quick and simple, yet impressive cookie to make, this is it!

30 Minute Gluten-Free Meals

Last Updated on by the Celiac-Disease.com Staff 5 Comments

If you’ve ever watched the Rachel Ray show “30 Minute Meals”, you know that many of her recipes can easily be modified to be gluten-free. There have been a few I’ve seen that are gluten-free without modifications and Rachel often mentions she uses a gluten-free chicken, beef or vegetable stock in her dishes. I think her new Stock-in-a-box products are labeled gluten-free but haven’t verified that yet since I have never seen them and the information doesn’t seem to be on the Rachel Ray website.

The other night, I realized I was overstocked on Italian red sauce, Classic Four Cheese in particular, as it was on sale at Super Target for less than $2 a jar recently. I also came across half a box of Ancient Harvest elbow pasta in the pantry and had ground turkey in the fridge. My dinner experiment didn’t begin as an effort to create a 30-minute meal – it just ended up turning out that way.

I browned the pound of ground turkey and added a little Alchemy Spice Italian Blend seasoning and kosher salt to it. While the meat was cooking, I boiled water for the pasta and cooked it for about 10 minutes as I like it more done than it gets when following the instructions on the box. When the pasta was ready, I drained it and set it aside. When the turkey was cooked through, I added most of the jar of Classico pasta sauce to it. Then I dumped the pasta into the skillet and stirred everything together and cooked for another five minutes.

The whole dish took about 25 minutes to make from start to finish. It wasn’t really a complete meal so I made green beans and a salad to round things out. The meat and pasta dish was unusually good considering I made it on the fly and we’d never tried that flavor of pasta sauce before. In fact, the Four Cheese is without question the best I’ve sampled from the Classico line. Any gluten-free pasta sauce can be used in this dish or you could make sauce from scratch, of course.

According to the company’s website, all of the red and white pasta sauces from Classico are presently gluten-free and are labeled as such. There is even a $1 off coupon you can download and print on the website right now. They retail for around $2 (or slightly more) here so using a coupon gives you about ½ off the regular retail price. Personally, I don’t download coupons from companies that ask for personal information in order to do so. Luckily, the Classico sauces are very reasonably priced and are sometimes offered at Publix on their 2-for-1 deal.

Review: Udi’s Gluten-Free Cinnamon Raisin Bagels

Last Updated on by the Celiac-Disease.com Staff 8 Comments

I finally got my paws on some of the highly talked about & sought-after cinnamon raisin bagels made by Udi’s. I have been stalking every local store that would carry them for the past month and I finally found one that carries them, but they were sold out!  Raisin Rack was kind enough to put my name on a package of bagels when the next order came and I picked them up this past weekend.

The cinnamon raisin bagels are just one of the new products added to Udi’s gluten-free product line.  The other new items include cinnamon raisin bread, whole grain bagels, and if you shop for your Udi’s products at Kroger, oatmeal raisin or chocolate chip cookies.

I love the combination of cinnamon and raisins, so it only makes sense that I am going to love cinnamon raisin bagels.  I remember eating cinnamon raisin bagels from Panera before I started the gluten-free diet.  Man, I have missed those!  I couldn’t decide if I wanted to try the bagels at room temperature or toasted. I love the plain version of Udi’s gluten-free Bagels untoasted as a base for sandwiches. I opted to toast the cinnamon raisin bagel and was not disappointed.

I spread a few apricots preserves over the top and sat down to enjoy my newfound love.  These bagels were just as good, if not better than I had imagined.  There were plenty of raisins throughout the bagel with a touch of cinnamon taste in the background.  I would say that they could maybe use a little more cinnamon, but I tend to like it more than most people do, so I can always add more at home. Udi’s has another hit with these bagels!

To see Udi’s gluten-free complete product line, click here.  Udi’s can be found nationwide in mainstream grocery stores, health food stores, and online.  There has even been word that some Trader Joe’s stores are carrying Udi’s!  If you are having trouble finding the products near you, click here.

Have you had a chance to try Udi’s Cinnamon Raisin Bagels?  What is your favorite Udi’s product?  Now I need to get my hands on the whole-grain bagels and cinnamon raisin bread!

Review: Carino’s Gluten-Free Menu

Last Updated on by the Celiac-Disease.com Staff 1 Comment

When I first heard that Carino’s had a gluten-free menu, I called the location near us to inquire about it. The first person I spoke to said they did not have a gluten-free menu (after I explained what that was). I asked for a manager who had barely heard of the words ‘gluten-free’ and he said that although corporate had something about that on the website, they didn’t actually have a gluten-free menu there. He was very nice and apologized for the confusion.

Recently, I called the same location of Carino’s again and without skipping a beat the person who answered the phone cheerfully said they had a gluten-free menu. Just because a place has a printed gluten-free menu doesn’t mean that the people working there understand what gluten is or how to safely serve gluten-free customers. The only way to find out how well a restaurant does with gluten-free service is to check it out. The knowledge level of the staff can vary from location to location which is why we tend not to dine out at large chains that often.

The gluten-free menu at Carino’s is pretty small, but the items on it are fairly interesting. There is even something that is not that easy to find when dining out – a gluten-free soup. After reviewing the menu, I knew immediately I had to order the Roasted Garlic Potato Soup. The Lemon Rosemary Chicken won out over the Grilled Citrus Balsamic Salmon for my entrée.

For some reason, the soup normally comes with croutons in (or on) it so you have to order no croutons when ordering the soup on the gluten-free menu at Carino’s. There are actually chunks of potato in the soup that are about the size of croutons so I paid  close attention when eating it in case a mistake was made it and croutons somehow made their way into the soup. The good news is that none did and the soup was absolutely delicious!

My entrée was very good and flavorful, but the soup was the star of the show for me. The next time I go, I’ll probably order a Caesar salad (sans croutons) and soup and call it a day. My husband ordered the Italian Pot Roast which was gluten-free and I tasted it. He loved it and I did not. I don’t like pot roast with a tomato flavor, but for those who do; this dish is a good option. The meat was super tender just as pot roast should be.

Carino’s worked with the Gluten Intolerance Group of North America to create their gluten-free menu. With so many places jumping on the gluten-free bandwagon lately, knowing a place has worked with GIG’s restaurant certification program (GFRAP) is much more important to me now than it used to be. From pizza places telling me they have gluten-free pizza, but they don’t know what toppings and sauces are gluten-free (or that those things could contain gluten) to dessert places telling me their key lime pie is gluten-free if I don’t eat the crust, it’s clear that safe gluten-free options are not clearly understood by many places that claim to have them.

Our meal at Carino’s was a decent value, coming in for around $40 for one soup, one salad, a glass of wine, two entrees and one dessert. For the record, the bread pudding didn’t impress my husband who I consider a bread pudding expert. The only gluten-free option was ice cream with chocolate syrup, caramel sauce or amarena cherries which I wasn’t even slightly tempted to order.