The holidays can be an extra hard time for anyone with food sensitivities or allergies. It may feel overwhelming to try to tackle a gluten-free and/or dairy free Thanksgiving, but many options exist to help your meal come together.
Option one: keep all your favorite recipes and simply swap out regular flour for a tried and true GF flour substitute like Bob’s Redmill 1 to 1 Gluten-Free all purpose flour. Another good brand for making breads, biscuits, or pie crusts is Pamela’s GF bread mix. Both are useful to use as flour to thicken gravies. You can also use tapioca flour or arrowroot starch to thicken gravies.
Option Two: get creative and try to find multiple recipes that celebrate the autumn vegetable bounty without any bread type items, gravies, or cheeses.
Here are some recipe ideas that I have gathered from the inter webs and a few of my own.
Oh and if you need a vegetarian main course, check out either wild rice stuffed acorn squash or this pistachio, quinoa, and cranberry stuffed acorn squash.
Side dishes:
Autumn Salad varieties:
Roasted Delicate and Radicchio Salad from the NY Times
Curried Lime Butternut Squash Salad by Lindsey Thompson, not yet published on the blog
Ingredients:
- 1 butternut squash, peeled and cut into 1/2 inch cubes
- 1 T curry
- 1 tsp maple syrup
- 1 T olive oil
- 3-4 cups arugula or mesclun greens
- pumpkin seeds to garnish
Dressing
- 2 T olive oil
- 2 T champagne vinegar
- juice of 1/2 lime
- 1 tsp fresh thyme
- 1/4 tsp maple syrup
Instructions:
Preheat the oven to 375 degrees, and prepare the squash by peeling it, cutting it in half and removing the seeds. Next chop the squash into 1/2 inch cubes.
Toss the peeled cubes of butternut squash with the curry, maple syrup, and olive oil. Spread the seasoned squash evenly on a baking sheet, and roast for 30-40 minutes. Check at 30 minutes to see if the cubes are fork tender. If not, put the timer on for another 10 minutes.
Prepare the dressing by putting the oil, vinegar, lime juice, maple syrup, and thyme into a small bowl. Whisk to emulsify.
To serve, place a generous helping of arugula and/or mesclun greens into bowls, top with the roasted squash, dressing, and garnish with pumpkin seeds. Enjoy!
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Cinnamon roasted sweet potatoes:
- 4 sweet potatoes, peeled, and chopped into one inch size chunks
- 2 T honey or maple syrup
- 1 T cinnamon
- 2 T olive oil
Preheat oven to 375. Peel and chop the sweet potatoes. In a large mixing bowl, toss the sweet potatoes with the oil, honey or syrup, and cinnamon. Spread out on a large baking sheet. Roast for 25-30 minutes, or until the potatoes are easily pierced with a fork.
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Roasted Root Medley:
- 4-6 carrots
- 2 beets
- 3 parsnips
- 1 onion
- optional add one rutabaga and one turnip
- 2 springs rosemary
- 4-6 garlic cloves
- 1 spring thyme
- 1/4 cup olive oil
- pinch of salt and pepper
Preheat oven to 375. Peel and roughly chop all vegetables. Mince the rosemary, thyme, and garlic. In a large bowl coat the vegetables with olive oil, and toss with the rosemary, thyme, garlic, salt and pepper. Spread out on a baking sheet or roasting pan, and roast for 25-30 minutes. Check to see if vegetables are easily pierced with a fork. When fork tender, the vegetables are ready to serve.
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Mashed potatoes:
Mashed potatoes are inherently gluten free, so if you’re crowd enjoys dairy, stick to the usual recipe. Or for a dairy free alternative use a non-flavorful alternative milk like unsweetened oat, hazelnut, coconut or almond milk. Just triple check the box to make sure it is unflavored and unsweetened with a vegan butter.
Rolls:
Bon Appetite’s GF sweet potato biscuits
Desserts:
For a classic pumpkin pie, simply use the GF flours mentioned in the intro to make your pie crust, and follow your favorite pumpkin pie recipe from there. For a dairy free version, check out this recipe for a dairy free pumpkin pie.
Pumpkin Pie Pots De Creme (Can be made with coconut milk and coconut cream instead of dairy).
New York Times Cranberry Curd Tart
Stick Out Your Tongue 