A Surprise Recipe (gluten free)

Monday through Wednesday, our friend Shane who is also the Worship Arts pastor invited all of the Creative Team and their families on a fun trip to Hocking Hills.

We pulled up to a beautiful, large cabin in the woods and were welcomed with smiling faces from our newest friends. :)

Due to sickness, the time didn't go as planned but I felt nothing but relaxation, good community and quality time being spent with people who love Jesus and are a joy to be around.

This was also our last "hurrah" before going officially gluten free.  So, to say the least, I went all out eating the candy that was so loverly displayed on the counter those three days.  Mmm, mmm, good.

Then, Wednesday night hit and I started to stress out about the diet change but pulled myself together to cook asparagus and salmon.  I LOVE asparagus so that was easy for me but it literally took me 1 hour to eat my 1/3 portion of salmon.  Here are the tweets I shared so I could feel like I was doing it with people and not just pouting by myself in the basement. :

Salmon Tweet #1 :Eating salmon bc I made Eisley (the only one to fight it) and it's healthy. #butbarf #growupbreena

Salmon Tweet #2 (11 minutes later):  "Get the behind me salmon!" To me, Salmon=Satan. Fact.

Salmon Tweet #3 (a half hour after my first tweet) "Okay I'm doooooone!' Says the momma of four, like a teenager ;")

Thankfully, everyone else loved it, again excluding Eisley and I.  But tonight, Oh tonight!  We had chicken and mashed potatoes...or did we?

I started out by asking Andy to take the kids downstairs so I could at least start dinner and because I had a surprise, which I totally did.  But what I really meant was take the kids downstairs so I can hide what I was really making.

Guys!  Those are NOT mashed potatoes.  Thems is cauliflowers.  And my husband is going to point at me and say, "YOU!  YOU ARE BAD!" after reading this!  hahahah!  But you loved them, babe!  You.Loved.Them.

Cyrus says, "This is the BEST DINNER EVER!!!!" and I smilled making sure he'd already taken a bite of the chicken AND the "mashed potatoes".

Eisley says, "Huh.  This tastes like cauliflower." and I let out a little laugh, then I froze and looked up seeing no one had caught on to her loud-mouth-of-an-opinion.  ;)

Andy says, "This is seriously so good, babe."

The chicken was slathered in olive oil and then pressed into Almond Flour.  Simple.  Easy.  Then sprinkled with salt and thrown in the oven at 375 for abount 35 minutes.

I put two heads of cauliflower in a pot 1/4 filled of water, put the lid on and put the burner on medium heat.  It took about 25 minutes to finish.

While that was boiling, I pulled out my "surprise" and made fried bacon to sprinkle on top.

I made everyone go back downstairs (he.he.he) and took a fork to the cauliflower.  I then took some whole, plain yogurt and added it along with some salt and pepper.  I used my hand mixer and blended everything until the cauliflower resembled mashed potatoes.  And it did.

I was seriously freaking out wondering who would notice first but, other than Eisley, no one noticed!

I had to keep from laughing so many times, tonight!  It was as if myself and I had all these silly, inside jokes and it was lonely but now I get to share them with all of you!!!

Bonus joke: Andy has been, to say the least, not.excited.about.this.diet.change. so we've had our sweet little tiffs about it so when he sat down, ever so sweetly tonight and said, "Babe, it really meant a lot to me that you made dinner so good and healthy.  I felt like with the surprise bacon, you showed us love.  And I felt really loved because you know how much I love mashed potatoes.  They were really good.  So, thank you."

MY MISCHIEVOUS  SMILE BECAME THAT OF SHAME...I really do love you, babe!  And I really did make this all for you but...it wasn't what you thought.

Can I laugh now?!  Can I freakin' let it all out because it was such a GREAT DINNER NIGHT FOR THIS MOMMA CHALK ONE UP FOR ME I WIN I'M THE WINNER YAY.

I feel that.good.  I did it!  and I can do this...I can make healthy food that is also really yummy.  I've learned that showing the kids the yummy foods that they can eat is so much more helpful than telling them what they cannot have anymore...I'll leave that to them ;)

On the menu the rest of this weekend/week?  Stuffed peppers, burgers with feta and another chicken dish.  Bring it, gluten-free lifestyle.  I'm going to raise you one and not feed my family a bunch of starchy foods just because they are gluten free.  I will feed my family healthy and whole (and get myself gluten free candy bars sometimes) because they.are.worth.it. 

Have you ever done the cauliflower for mashed potato switch-a-roo?!  Have any other ideas to share?!

Off to eat Dove Dark chocolate and watch our shows ;)