Our first gluten free Christmas

We recently discovered that both Ryann (oldest daughter) and I are gluten intolerant.  Which kinda sucks considering that gluten based products made up about 95% of our diet.  But, I was feeling really run down and tired, scatter brained and just completely not right.  I decided it was time to make some changes.  After reading an  article  about gluten intolerance I thought maybe the first change to take place should be to rid myself of gluten.   I decided to do a trial run and go two weeks gluten free, Ryann came along for moral support.  Within three days we both agreed that we could breath easier and our appetites had decreased.  By the end of the first week we had both lost a few pounds, our skin looked and felt better and we both just generally felt better - a lot better.  By the end of the second week we were both hooked.  Our digestion was better, our thinking was clearer - everything was better.  I won't lie, gluten free veganism isn't exactly easy.  It takes some effort, only because almost all premade vegan products are loaded with vital wheat gluten.  On long days of filling orders I can't just run to the grocery store and pick up some quick Amy's dairy free burritos, or vegan Boca burgers (which I did all to often.)  We're making  almost everything from scratch, but it helps  force us to premake meals so there's a lot less grabbing quick prepackaged foods; which is a very good thing.  Keep in mind that neither of us are severely allergic to gluten, there's no anaphylactic shock or anything drastic going on here.  There's just this mild yet constant discomfort, just enough to make life stink but not enough to let you know something's going wrong.  If you feel like somethings off, or maybe that you could use a dietary change I strongly recommend taking a break from gluten.  It may prove to be life changing.  It was for me.

There are seven of us, the Mister and I plus five kids.  Only two of us have noticed a distinct positive change since going gluten free.  The rest are clinging to their seitan, and other gluteny foods for dear life.  I've been preparing two meals each night to accommodate everyone.  For Christmas dinner I decided to make all of our holiday favorites gluten free and refused to cook two meals.  We had stuffed peppers, Sicilian rice balls, brussels sprouts with roasted pine nuts and red peppers and a tossed garden salad.  For St. Nick we left out gluten free oatmeal chocolate chip & walnut cookies  and oatmeal raisin cookies.

I stuffed the peppers with roasted chick peas, cashews, brown rice couscous and a pepper and small onion that were diced and sauteed in olive oil.  I topped the stuffed peppers with mozzarella style daiya and an Italian topping made from Almond meal, lemon juice, oregano, S&P, garlic powder and onion powder.  I tossed the chick peas in olive oil and smoked paprika before roasting them for about 40mins at 400 degrees.  Roasted Chickpeas are good enough to eat by themselves.  If you haven't tried them yet you should get to it!

Brussels Sprouts with pine nuts and red peppers is one of my all time favorite dishes to make.  I like mine extra garlicky.  First I blanch two pounds of brussels sprouts for about 5 mins. I drain and set them aside.   I saute about 5 cloves of garlic thinly sliced in some olive oil just until they start to turn golden brown.  I throw in about a cup of pine nuts  and saute for another minute or two.  I add about a cup of thinly sliced red peppers and cook for another two minutes.  I add a bit of lemon juice (about 1/3 of a cup) then add the blanched brussels sprouts and freshly ground sea salt and pepper and cook for a little bit more.  You can transfer everything to a baking dish and roast for a bit in the oven until the brussels sprouts are crispy, but I don't.  I serve it right from the pan. Crusty bread is the next task for me to tackle.  The grocery stores around here carry packaged gluten free breads but they all suck.  I serve the Brussels sprouts with brown rice and brown rice couscous, but it pairs really well with a good bread.  If you have any tips for making an excellent  vegan and gluten free multigrain loaf of bread please, please. please pass it on.  I'm desperate!

Nobody seemed to notice the lack of wheat in their Christmas dinner.  St. Nick definitely didn't pass up the cookies our youngest left out for him.  I think my days of cooking duel meals are numbered.  

For the new year I'll have to figure out how to make a vegan and gluten free buffalo wing.

Labels makeovers and sachets

A few of our original candle labels recently got a makeover.

I'm really happy with the new labels, especially Red Hot.  Hope you like them too!  All of the made over candles are available in both shops http://www.tattooedgeek.etsy.com/ and http://www.tattooedgeek.etsy.com/.  I'll be adding a Red Hot lip balm this week.  An Apple Of My Eye and Tough Cookie lip balm will be added soon too.  Sachets are also in the Etsy shop now, they'll be up on the website sometime this week.

The sachets are great in the car, or the office, they're great anywhere the air could use some scenting.  Hope you are enjoying the summer.

Dear Etsy, I'm back!

I am really happy to announce that we are back on Etsy.  I really underestimated how much I'd miss having my own little corner of Etsy, how much I'd miss convo's and hearts and all the other good stuff Etsy has to offer.   

I won't be using the Mrs. Tattooedgeek shop though.  I've decided to neaten things up a bit for branding purposes.  From now on  you can find us at http://www.tattooedgeek.etsy.com/.   I've got the new Etsy shop stocked up with candles, lip balms and solid fragrance balms.  I'll be added extra large pocket mirrors in the next day or so, and 1inch pin sets.  I've also added a few new products, like the Little Red Candle and the Dill Pickle lip balm seen below.

I'm still keeping the website active, for those without an Etsy account.  http://www.tattooedgeek.com/ In the future I may add a few exclusives to both of the shops, but for now you can get the same products in either shop. 



Snow day.

We had our second snow storm of the season yesterday.  The kids had the day off from school.  Fridays and Mondays are always the best days for a snow day, don't you think.  I was able to finish up some label art for one of this years Valentines Day candles.  I can't wait to share this one. I expect to have pictures here early this week and the candles in the shop by mid week.  I'll also be added extra large pocket mirrors to the shop this week.

Happy New Year 2011, and other holiday stuff.

Happy 2011 Everybody!

If you ask me the best thing about 2010 is that it came on quick and left ever quicker! Well there's that and the fact that  Melisser Elliott included me and Tattooed Geek in her super awesome book The Vegan Girl's Guide To Life.  Ooh, and that the powers that be  at The Style Network brought us the hot mess that is Jerseylicious.

Now on to Christmas.  The best Christmas present was delivered on December 23, Mike had his follow up body scan and was given a clean bill of health - he's completely cancer free!  We expected as much but it was still great to hear.  We kept Christmas very low key this year, but we did try a few new recipes that I wanted to share.  

I made Kittee's Buckeye Balls, http://www.pakupaku.info/sweets/buckeye_balls.shtml.  What drew me to this recipe was how quick and easy they seemed to make. It's true, they were  really easy and took just a few  minutes to prepare.  Buckeye Balls are more of  candy than a cookie - but who cares, they were delicious.  Every one of us gave Kittee's Buckeye Balls two thumbs up.

 

Nanny (my mother in law) came for Christmas baring jars and jars of fresh marinated artichokes, roasted red peppers, olives, sun dried tomatoes with garlic and a ton of Eggplant Caponata (sometimes called Eggplant appetizer). Eggplant Caponata is a thick Italian eggplant stew/spread. It's naturally vegan and is perfect served at room temperature with lots of crusty bread.  My kids go wild for it.  You can find it canned or jarred in the Italian sections of most grocery stores.  However it's much cheaper to make your own.  Caponata is the perfect addition to  Antipasto platters (especially vegan ones.)

Eggplant Caponata

(recipe originally found in Fresh From The Vegetarian Slow Cooker by Robin Robertson)

2 tablespoons olive oil

1 medium-sized yellow onion, chopped

1 celery rib, minced

1 large eggplant, peeled and diced

1 medium-sized red or green bell pepper, seeded and chopped

1 tablespoon tomato paste

2 tablespoons red wine vinegar

1 tablespoon sugar

1/2 teaspoon dried basil

1/4 teaspoon dried oregano

1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes, or to taste

Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

1/3 cup black olives, drained pitted and sliced

1 tablespoon capers, drained and chopped

1 tablespoon minced fresh parsley leaves

1.  Heat the oil in a large skillet over medium heat.   Add the onion and celery, cover, and cook until softened.Add the eggplant, cover and cook, stirring occasionally, until the eggplant begins to soften, about 5 more minutes.

2. Transfer the mixture to a 4-quart slow cooker. Add the bell pepper, garlic, tomatoes, tomato paste, vinegar, sugar, basil, oregano and red pepper flakes.  season with salt and pepper. cover and cook on low until the vegetables are soft but still hold some shape. (in the slow cooker about 6 hours.)

3. When the vegetables are cooked, stir in the olives, capers and parsley.  Taste, adjust seasonings. Transfer the caponata to a bowl and let cool.  Serve at room temperature. If not serving right away cover and refrigerate until needed.

I've made this recipe without a slow cooker. I cooked it all in one large pot, instead of transferring the sauteed onion, celery and eggplant to a slow cooker just lower the temperature to medium and continue the recipe as listed.  Stir often.  Caponata is much better the next day. I recommend always preparing it a  day in advance

Nanny also very graciously occupied the kids with gingerbread baking and decorating while Mike and I slipped away for some last minute Christmas shopping.

Mike planned Christmas dinner Cajun style. He made a vegan jambalaya, gumbo and (my favorite) Cajun Seitan.  As it turns out I'm not a gumbo person, and maybe not a jambalaya person either. I am definitely a Cajun seitan person though. 

All of our Christmas decorations are getting packed up as I type. Usually it makes me sad to stuff our wooden soldiers into their plastic sarcophagus  for another year.  Not so much this time though.  Maybe I'm still in a food induced stupor, but this time I'm glad to be packing in all the holiday hoopla.  I'd rather focus on the new year ahead of us.

New shop location.

By popular demand, the shop is opened for the holidays!  You can find us at http://www.tattooedgeek.com/.  Several new candles have been added with more to come soon. Solid fragrances, fragrance oils, lip balms and pocket mirrors are being added throughout the coming week.  The Etsy shop remains closed for now.  I was reluctant to change the shop location from Etsy to Big Cartel, but I have to say I am really loving the design freedom  Big Cartel offers. I still absolutely love Etsy.  But from a shop owners perspective with Etsy it always seems like "Etsy" comes first, with Big Cartel my shop comes first -if that makes any sense. Check it out and you'll understand what I mean.  Your purchases still go through paypal and are subject to all of the protection paypal offers.  The holiday candles will be available through New Years.  Any outstanding Etsy business will of course be honored.  I'm still catching up so wholesale orders are on hold until after the new year.  As always, please feel free to contact me at anytime about anything.

Not only did our shop move,  we moved too.  We got the keys to the new place 3 days before Mike's surgery.  With Mike not well and surgery looming, moving wasn't exactly on our agenda at the time.  With all of the doctor co pays,  missed work  and the online shop closure (after several screwed up orders I had to close the online shop until things settled down) we had a moving budget of exactly; zero!  Plus, Mike was soon tied up healing from his neck dissection and thyroidectomy. The actual physical "move" was left to the kids and I.  We spent the next two weeks moving like the  band of white trash Gypsies that we are; we loaded all of our belongings into dozens of black garbage bags and piled up the minivan (cause we're classy like that!)  It took about three thousand round trips but we got it done.  It was during that hectic chaos that I realized how truly blessed I am.  The children worked their butts off helping me move.  It's not right to expect people so young to do so much, but they did it without even so much as a whimper.  I probably would have ended up in the loony bin if it wasn't for them.  Thankfully we walked away from the toxic house that we were living in, which by the way still sits empty.  Since moving I found out that the family before us also left that house due to health concerns.  Our landlord knew about the mold and the problems it caused and never informed us, bastard!  That will never happen again.  We went to the local building inspector and gave him a copy of the air quality report. The building inspector issued a citation so the landlord would have to have the house properly and professionally cleaned up.  No more sick families-woohoo!

There was one little unfortunate mishap during the move.  On a  late Sunday night moving spree we hit a deer with the van.  Actually the deer hit us I swear.  After hitting us the deer ran away fine.   Our van on the other hand was a different story. That deer left our van a mess -he left us a mess too!  It had to be one of the worst experiences of my life. I never hit an animal before, it's been hard to shake off emotionally and financially.  I'm pretty sure there's over a thousand dollars worth of damage. Fiberglass and Styrofoam do not hold up well against a 200lbs+ deer.  I'm not kidding when I say that behind my broken fiberglass bumper was a big block of black Styrofoam.   How is Styrofoam suppose to protect people?  Dodge sucks.

Cancer update: Mike has his radiation appointments this coming week.  He'll get a shot on Tuesday, a shot on Wednesday and a radioactive iodine pill on Thursday.  On December 23 he'll have a full body scan, he should be completely cancer free.  By Christmas we'll most likely be able to put all of this behind us -fingers crossed.

Thyroids, mold, moving and lumps.

Sadly, this holiday season Tattooedgeek and I will not be at this years Bust Magazine's Holiday Craftacular.  The Bust Craftacular is by far my most favorite vending event of the holiday season, unfortunately we didn't apply this year.  Actually we won't be vending at any holiday events this year at all. 

As I mentioned in previous posts the last few months have been a little rough on our family and subsequently  Tattooedgeek.  Several simultaneous events brought our whole world to a complete halt.  Most importantly; after being sick for a large part of the summer Michael (Mr. Tattooedgeek) was diagnosed with thyroid cancer. Secondly, our landlord put the house that we were renting on the market without informing us.  We found out on a Tuesday morning in July when a team of Realtors showed up at our door at 9:00 am demanding a walk through.  The next 6 weeks were a literal whirled wind of doctor appointments and Realtors. At one point Michael was seeing 7 different doctors. The exact day Michael was diagnosed with thyroid cancer we were informed that our house had a buyer and the buyer had scheduled an inspection for the following weekend. 

The house our family had lived in for almost 2 years drastically failed it's inspection.  The buyer quickly backed out of the sale.  Afterward the inspector came to Michael and I and asked if any of our family were ill.  We told him what Mike was going through.  The inspector said that the house had a serious mold infestation in the basement and the air quality was seriously compromised because of it.  He insisted that everything, even the thyroid cancer, was a direct result of poor indoor air quality in the home.  He strongly suggested that we have an air quality test preformed.  We did and the results were off the charts.  While an average home has about 500-1000 airborne mold spores at any given time, our basement had a whopping 36,000!  Mike's office/studio had 9,600 and our bedroom had 5,700.   We forwarded copies of the air quality report to all of Michael's doctors. None of the doctors would confirm that the mold caused Michael to become sick but every single one of them said to move A.S.A.P.  So we did.

Whether or not mold spores and poor indoor air quality were the cause of the thyroid cancer we're still not certain.  On October 11, 2010 Mike had a complete Thyroidectomy and 19 lymph nodes removed from his throat.  What started out as a small lump in late July had quadrupled by October.  The right lobe of the thyroid had been completely replaced with a malignant tumor.  10 of the 19 lymph nodes removed had also turned malignant.  The second week of December Michael will have radiation  treatments   We'll find out after the radiation treatments how successful the surgery was.  Thankfully NO tattoos were harmed during the thyroidectomy and Mike handled the surgery amazingly.  He was already making faces and joking about going home in the recovery room.

Moving 7 people 3 cats and a Great Dane is no small task.  Fortunately we found a place that allowed the animals while keeping the kids in the same schools fairly quickly.  We started to move 2 days before Mike's surgery.  Unfortunately the place is less then half the size of our last home and now half of our stuff is in storage.  The actual move itself was a completely different traumatic experience that I'll save for another day.  "Didn't you know about the mold?" is the question most people ask us.  No, we truly  didn't. The largest source of the mold was in the basement behind a closed door in a room we didn't have access to.  Living in the house we didn't notice any moldy odors.  After we moved though we noticed that everything we owned smelled like mold.  What couldn't be washed was thrown out.

With Mike's surgery complete and our family moved into a nice mold free home I thought the only thing left to do was settle in and set up my work space.  However within days of moving into the new place I started to notice the base of my neck was feeling somewhat different.  A routine sonogram for a pre existing condition  confirmed that my thyroid had grown a little.  The growth was very little and my Endocrinologist wasn't concerned.  But then earlier this week I felt like maybe there was somewhat of a lump forming at the base of my neck.  A sonogram this Tuesday confirmed that there is indeed a new small little lump (nodule) on the right side of my thyroid that was not present just a few weeks ago.  What that means I don't know.  I am seeing a new, highly recommended Endocrinologist in a few weeks. Hopefully she'll have some answers for us.  So far all we've been hearing is that the odds of two people in one family experiencing significant thyroid growth at the same time are none.  But yet here we are,  both of us with thyroid growths at the same time.

The purpose of this blog post was to explain why we didn't apply to this years Craftacular.  Some of you have been kind enough to ask.   Even though we won't be there this year  many of our favorite shops and good friends will be.  A list of New York vendors can be found here: http://www.bust.com/craftacular/vendors-nyc.html   Be sure to stop by the RockLove, Pulp Sushi and My Zoetrope booths!