Pizza is a favorite to almost all kids. Our family loves pizza night, but being a completely gluten-free family, homemade pizza is both expensive and a little time consuming (and pre-made gluten free pizza…well, many resemble cardboard). So one of our favorite variations are zucchini pizza boats. These are quick, lighter than regular pizza and much more budget friendly. There are a million combinations of ingredients you can use for the toppings, but this recipe is my kids favorite and a much quicker option because you are using pepperoni and not having to prep any other meats.
Our basic ones we make are literally 4 ingredients: zucchini or yellow squash, pizza sauce, uncured pepperoni and mozzarella cheese. These are a great option for kids lunches, they are quick and easy and a much healthier alternative to regular pizza.
The trick to bulking up the filling is to use the inside of the zucchini that you carve out. I carve out my zucchini to less than an 1/4 inch thickness and then chop all the insides into small cubes, mix with pizza sauce and small diced pepperoni (or meat of choice) and then refill into the zucchini.
A Favorite Quick Lunch – Zucchini Pizza Boats (gluten-free)
Author: The Sprouted Life
Prep time:
Cook time:
Total time:
Ingredients
5 medium zucchini or yellow squash
1 can of organic pizza sauce (Muir Glen is our favorite)
1 package of uncured pepperoni (Applegate farms is our favorite)
8 oz mozzarella cheese
Instructions
Chop zucchini in half and trim of both ends.
With a knife carve out the inside of the zucchini leaving less than about a 1/4 inch thickness all the way around.
Remove insides of each zucchini and dice into small cubes and set aside in a bowl.
Chop pepperoni into small pieces and add into bowl of zucchini.
Mix in can of pizza sauce.
Spread each boat onto a cookie sheet and fill with mixed toppings and then top with mozzarella.
Bake for approximately 20 minutes at 375 degrees until cheese is melted and starting to brown.
As summer came to close, so did our fabulous season of zucchini. I decided I needed to create one last baked item with our remaining supply. Chocolate is always a favorite in our house and a cake sounded just perfect. This is a pretty quick and easy recipe, the steps can look like a lot, but they are easy to follow. This cake is pretty similar to a traditional Texas sheet cake, but it is altered to work with a gluten-free flour blend. I prefer King Arthur’s Gluten-free flour blend (I buy mine from our local Earth Fare), but most gluten-free blends will work. What I love about the combination of zucchini in this recipe, is that it helps keeps the cake moist, which can be a common problem with gluten free baked goods. This recipe also freezes really well.
We had a pile of fresh rhubarb and fresh strawberries in front of us and we knew we wanted a dessert, but a crisp didn’t sound good. I looked at my husband and told him to figure out a compote style layer with the fruit and I would figure out the other layers. I right away grabbed my spring form pan, lined it with parchment paper and whipped up a almond flour (which was on sale this week at EarthFare) and coconut flour crust (it’s a common recipe that floats around in the paleo baking world). While that was baking, I started tossing chocolate and coconut milk in a pan to cook to make a chocolate cream layer. I tossed in Grassfed gelatin into the chocolate layer and into the compote layer to help it thicken up. We use grassfed gelatin for it’s gut healing properties, but any type gelatin would work (our favorite is Vital Proteins, but I also like Great Lakes Brand).
Our first time making this, I just threw some gelatin into the cooking fruit. I know better, but I did it anyway, resulting in clumps of gelatin. So we threw the whole mixture into our blender to fix that. What I envisioned as a “compote” layer of cooked fruit, became more of a smooth gelatin like layer, which ended up working perfectly. Our last minute, randomly thrown together dessert, ended up being a wonderful combination of flavors and has been made more than once this summer and was even made for Fathers Day to share with my family.
8 oz dark chocolate chips (for dairy free, make sure you check them)
2 Tbsp. cocoa powder
2 Tbsp. grassfed gelatin
For the Strawberry Rhubarb Gelatin Layer:
4 cups strawberries, chopped
2 cups rhubarb, chopped
1 cup of water
2 Tbsp. maple syrup
2 Tbsp. grassfed gelatin
Instructions
Preheat oven to 350
combine almond flour, coconut, coconut oil, maple syrup and sea salt in a food processor and pulse together until it begins to clump.
press dough into a spring form pan that has the bottom lined with a piece of parchment paper.
Bake for 12 -15 minutes until the crust is slightly browned.
Remove from oven and let cool.
move on to making the chocolate layer, by warming the coconut milk up in a pan on medium heat.
When the milk is warm, whisk in the cocoa powder, maple syrup and the chocolate chips.
Remove from heat and sprinkle the surface with your gelatin, add it slowly and let it absorb in off the surface and whisk it in before adding more. *you do not want to just dump it in, or you will end up with clumps* **if you do get clumps, just run the chocolate mixer through your blender.**
Once the gelatin is incorporated, pour the chocolate layer into the crust and place in the fridge.
Then move on to the strawberry rhubarb layer.
On medium- low heat, start cooking down the strawberries, rhubarb, water and maple syrup.
I let it cook down for about 20 minutes, until the fruit was starting to break down.
slowly add in the gelatin and then pour entire mix into your blender and gently blend until mixture is smooth. I let cool for a about 15 minutes in the blender.
Pour fruit mixture on top of chocolate layer and place back into the fridge to set up. I let mine sit for at least 2 hours.
When it is chilled, release the spring form pan and cut into slices.
I have never been a huge fan of sloppy joes. I would make them occasionally, but if I had ground beef to use, it would rarely be my first choice. Now we make what we call “loaded sloppy joes” all the time. It started with me having some celery that need used up, so I diced a bunch and tossed it in, and the next time I added zuchinni, until slowly, our sloppy joes became about 3/4 veggies to a 1/4 meat. I am always looking for shortcuts, for one pot meals, and this is a simple way to get a lot of vegetables in the main course.
Last summer when farmers markets/and our garden produce was ample, I made sloppy joe veggie packets and froze them. So literally, I could just grab the vegetables out of the freezer, sautee, brown the meat and make a quick sauce….super simple dinner. Even though our garden isn’t producing yet, we were craving this simple meal this week and our EarthFare just had grass-fed beef on sale, so I had some on hand. The vegetable options are endless, but we typically use: onions, carrots, zuchinni, bell peppers, and celery.
You can also serve the finished dish in a variety of ways. Sometimes, I use gluten free bread, sometimes lettuce wraps, and other times, I serve it over rice. Use your imagination, there are a lot of ways to serve this quick, veggie loaded dish! I also use plain tomato sauce as my base, because I don’t like it super sweet, you can always substitute ketchup, but take that into account when you are adding your maple syrup in.
Loaded Sloppy Joes (an evolution in veggies) – gluten free
Recipe Type: Main Dish
Author: The Sprouted Life
Ingredients
1 medium onion, diced
2 cups chopped celery
2 cups chopped carrots
2-3 medium zucchini, diced
2 bell peppers, diced (we like red and yellow)
2 cloves of garlic, finely minced
1-2 Tablespoons of olive oil
1 – 2 lbs of ground beef (you can also use ground chicken, turkey or pork
1 – can of plain organic tomato sauce (15 oz)
2-3 Tablespoons of dijon mustard
2-3 Tablespoons of maple syrup (add more if want a sweeter dish)
salt & pepper to taste
Instructions
Dice all your vegetables into small chunks (if kids are picky, dicing smaller helps hide them in the sauce)
Sautee your vegetable combo, garlic and olive oil in a large skillet, until vegetables soften
Add in ground beef and brown
When beef is browened, drain off any extra grease
Add in tomato sauce, maple syrup and mustard (adjust maple syrup for desired sweetness)
Finally, winter is coming to an end finally here in Indiana! We are looking forward to garden fresh veggies and lots of grilling, but since we keep having cold weather spells randomly, soups are still in our regular recipe lineup. Potato soup is one of our family’s favorite. We have gone through periods in time when some of our household is dairy free and overall we keep our dairy intake pretty low. So I make my entire soup dairy free, and then people can choose whether or not they want to add cheese. It’s a simple alternative to the traditional dairy based potato soup, that is both hearty and filling and since organic potatoes have been on sale at our Earth Fare for less that $0.70/lb, it is pretty budget friendly.
I typically use my own homemade bone broth as my main base, but when I am out, I use Pacific brand (which is gluten free).
browned bacon, shredded cheese and chopped green onions as garnish
Instructions
Dice potatoes into little square chunks and boil until tender, but not mushy (I add a generous amount of celtic sea salt to water to help season the potatoes)
While potatoes are boiling, dice up celery and onion into little pieces and sautee in olive oil until tender.
When celery and onions are tender, pour chicken broth and water into the pot and bring to a simmer
Ladle out a few cups of celery/onion/broth and puree in a high speed blender to help thicken.
Return to pot and pour in drained potatoes and 2-3 cups of flax milk and heat for a few more minutes, while adding salt and pepper to taste.
Don’t over cook/boil or the potatoes will get mushy
Serve! and top with bacon, chopped green onions and shredded cheese if you want
I get asked a lot how we handle the holidays being gluten-free. Let’s face it, most holiday memories include big fat crescent rolls, sugar cookies, casseroles, pies and many more gluten filled items.
My new motto: simplicity.
I simply do not try to recreate all those items…I find that all that does is stress me out, leaves me in carb and sugar shock and a lot of the items will never compare to their gluten- filled counter parts. So instead, my husband and I came up with a simple holiday menu that included items that we could prep the night before.
I thought I would share what our Christmas day menu looked like. It was fresh and not over-loaded with carbs, but yet included items like a paleo date-pecan cinnamon roll that my three boys absolutely loved. We ate a late breakfast and an early dinner, cutting our meals down to two instead of three. And I ran out Christmas Eve afternoon to our local Earth Fare to get any remaining fresh ingredient. We has ordered their holiday deal that featured a beautiful cut of fresh standing rib roast, so we had to run in already to pick that up.
Breakfast was fully prepped on Christmas Eve and included a breakfast casserole and paleo cinnamon rolls.
Potato-Egg Breakfast Casserole:
The breakfast casserole was made with shredded potatoes, instead of bread. I first boiled the potatoes, chilled them and ran them through my food processor with the shredder blade. I layered the potatoes on the bottom of a 13 x 9 pan and topped with 12 whisked eggs, 1 cup of almond milk, 2 cups of shredded cheese, bacon pieces and chopped green onions. All I had to do Christmas morning was pop it into the oven at 350 for about 45-50 minutes.
this is what my youngest son, thought of the cinnamon rolls!
Paleo Date-Pecan Cinnamon Rolls:
*Recipe below.
We also made these the night before and had them on a baking sheet in the fridge ready to pop into the oven.
Dinner Menu:
Standing Rib Roast
Grilled Zucchini and Asparagus
Roasted potato wedges with Italian herbs
Sparkling cider just for fun
We have made it a tradition to buy a nice cut of meat; either steaks or prime rib and either grill veggies or roast them (depending on Indiana weather). It makes dinner, simple, yet full of flavor.
What a “gluten-free” holiday looks like in our house + paleo date-pecan cinnamon rolls
Recipe Type: Dessert/Pastry
Author: The Sprouted Life
Serves: 12
Ingredients
Dough:
2 cups of almond flour
¼ cup + 2 Tbsp. coconut flour
¼ cup coconut oil
¼ cup coconut sugar
2 Tbsp. honey or maple syrup
2 eggs
2 tsp. vanilla
1 tsp. cinnamon
1 tsp. baking soda
pinch of sea salt
Filling:
6-8 large Dates, Soaked in hot water for 30 minutes
½ cup finely chopped pecans
1 Tbsp. cinnamon
Instructions
Soak your dates in hot water for about 30 minutes.
Add hydrated dates a few teaspoons of date water and cinnamon to a mini food processor and puree. Set aside.
Whisk together the wet ingredients (egg, coconut oil & vanilla) in a medium bowl.
Add the combined dry ingredients (almond flour, coconut flour, cinnamon, baking soda and salt) and stir well to combine.
Roll out the dough on parchment paper and create a long rectangle.
Spread the date and cinnamon mixture evenly across the rolled out dough and sprinkle with finely chopped pecan pieces.
Using the parchment paper to help, carefully roll up the dough into a log.
Using a sharp knife cut 1-inch thick rolls.
Preheat oven to 325
Place sliced cinnamon rolls on a baking sheet covered in parchment paper.
Bake for about 15-18 minutes until begin to lightly brown*
Remove from oven and drizzle with glaze and more finely chopped pecans. (For the gaze, I just whisked a little almond milk with coconut sugar).
Best served warm!
*Our rolls took a little longer to bake, because I refrigerated them over-night and put them into the oven still cold.
**These will not rise and puff up like a traditional cinnamon roll.
Hi, I am Jennifer and I am a Functional Medicine Health Coach that is passionate about helping busy moms simplify their family & athletes’ health through clean eating & meal prep
