This Week's Menu (Nov. 26th - Nov. 30th) and a Simple Sour Cream Cornbread

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving! I can't believe that November is almost over! I hope the holiday was relaxing for you and you enjoyed the food and the company you were with! I love holidays and I love the anticipation that builds up weeks before. It seems like for several weeks before Thanksgiving, my adrenaline just runs on the wonderful anticipation of the joy that big day brings!

I also love the downtime after the holiday. The time when my body slowly adjusts back to "life as normal" which seems miraculously quiet and uneventful. The time I can indulge in a good book or two and not feel guilty about it. The time when cleaning the bathroom can wait, while you and your better half snuggle under warm blankets on the couch with a good movie. I haven't always found joy in the "everyday-ness" of life. But this week I choose too! I hope you will too.

A gorgeous little fall leaf at my great-grandma's house.

Natalie at Gluten-Free Mommy is hosting this week's menu swap. The ingredient of the week is ginger! As you already know... ginger is one of my favorite spices!! Now, I will have a good excuse to add ginger to several of the meals I'll be making this week! Thanks Nat!

This Week's Menu


Monday
Wild Rice and (Leftover) Turkey Casserole
Broccoli with Cheesy Mustard Sauce


Tuesday
Simple Baked Potatoes with Carol's Chili
Mixed Salad


Wednesday
Michael's Favorite Stir-fry with Beef
Fried Brown Rice


Thursday
Gypsy Sweet Potato Soup
Toasted GF Cheese Bread


Friday
Amy's Pecan Chicken
Green Beans with Almonds
Mashed Sweet Potatoes


Baked Goodies
Cranberry-Banana Nut Muffins
Eric B's Preacher Cookies
Sara's Baked Oatmeal
Spicy Ginger Lemon Shortbread

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Since I was traveling at Thanksgiving I decided that for several of my recipes I would go ahead and place all the dry ingredients in zip lock bags. That way all I would have to do at Grandma's was add the wet ingredients and bake. This worked really well. It worked so well that I forgot about some of the items I was going to make!

Last night I prepared a simple ground beef and fresh vegetable soup for dinner. At the last minute, I remembered I had a zip-lock bag of dry ingredients for Sour Cream Cornbread. I thought it would be a perfect accompaniment to the soup!

Michael (who, normally is very portion-conscious) ate four, YES four pieces of this awesome corn bread! This recipe was so easy to prepare since I had already packaged the dry ingredients, that I think in the future I will do this on a regular basis. I also think this would be a GREAT gift for any gluten-free friends you have! Pre-package the dry ingredients of a favorite recipe, place it in layers in a pretty jar and add the recipe as a label. I love fast easy gift ideas!

My great-great grandma's iron skillet

Sour Cream (or Yogurt) Cornbread

• 3 Tbsp. room temperature butter

• 3 Tbsp. granulated sugar

• 2 eggs

• 1/2 cup sour cream (or low fat plain yogurt -- I used yogurt because I had it on hand)

• 1/2 cup milk (I used fat-free)

• 1/3 cup sorghum flour

• 1/3 cup tapioca flour

• 1/3 cup brown rice flour

• 2/3 cup yellow cornmeal

• 1/2 tsp. xanthan gum

• 2 tsp. baking powder

• 1/2 tsp. salt

Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Grease an oven-safe skillet (my great-grandma's iron skillet worked wonderfully!) with butter or GF baking spray. In a medium-sized bowl mix together flours, cornmeal, xanthan gum, salt, and baking powder. In another medium-sized bowl, cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add eggs, sour cream, and milk. Mix thoroughly. Slowly add flour mixture to wet ingredients. Pour into greased oven safe skillet or muffin tin (will probably make around 10-12 muffins). Bake for 18-20 minutes until golden brown and a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean. This makes a very light, moist, and fluffy cornbread!!

For a printer friendly version of this recipe click here.

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