Chi Cake
http://www.chicake.com/
Vegan, gluten-free, organic cheesecake
Vegan Choice Foods, Inc., Contact: Alan Munro
Unit 14 – 7621 Vantage Way
Delta, BC V4G 1A6 Canada
Phone:  778-88VEGAN (778-888-3426)
E-Mail:  questions@chicake.com

The good news is, it’s delicious.  The bad news…it’s only available in the Vancouver area.  It’s also pricey: $20 for a 19 oz (540g) cake.

We had the New York Style lemon.  It wasn’t really New York style, which is dense and rich.  This was light and melted in your mouth.  So doesn’t quite hit all my cheesecake satisfaction buttons (I’m a NY style girl) but it was really quite good.

Given that I can’t get this at home, I wonder if I can duplicate it.  It seems fairly simple.  The filling is a soy-based cream cheese (the Follow Your Heart brand is very good and may be similar to what they use, if not the same) with tofu (I assume silken) and then they add sugar, lemon juice, salt, and an egg replacer (theirs is various starches).

The crust is cornmeal, puffed millet, sugar, grape juice, coconut flour, Earth Balance margarine, and ginger.

Maybe when I return home…

©2012 Norwitz Notions. All Rights Reserved.

“Using masa harina [masa flour] is like making mashed potatoes from a box.”

So says Karen Waikiki, owner of Primavera, the Sonoma company that makes masa, tortillas, and tamales from organic stoneground corn. And she has a point. Though the tortillas I made from masa harina were way better than the store-bought tortillas I’ve had and were definitely worth making as an alternative to them (a million times cheaper too).

I’ve used Primavera masa before. I got it from the Berkeley Farmer’s Market and froze it because the guy at the booth said I could to preserve it. Karen says no no don’t freeze it. I chronicled my adventures using the defrosted masa when I made tortilla pie. The short version is: they still tasted great and worked in larger applications, but I couldn’t make tortillas that didn’t fall apart.

I’ve been trying to find Primavera masa to try this again with the fresh stuff. But no store carries it. I can find the tortillas and tamales easily enough though. So I called Primavera and Karen called me back. Because the masa is more perishable than the finished products, it’s not currently sold in stores. My choices were to go to Farmer’s Markets in Berkeley, San Francisco (Ferry Building), or Sonoma, or to their shop in Sonoma (the closest but still about 40 mins each way).

Or I could special order it. I decided to have them send a bag to the Petaluma Whole Foods. Karen sweetly offered to comp it for me, since I told her I had blogged about them. I said I wanted to get it regularly so I didn’t mind paying.

I went to Whole Foods and ordered it and, a few days later, they called me to say it was in. And there was a big “no charge” label on it. I went to pick it up that afternoon and oh my God, the shock when I saw the bag.

10 lbs of Primavera Masa

That’s with some already used up. We’re talking 10 lbs of masa. Not the 2 or so lbs I had gotten before. What on earth was I going to do with it?

Well, over the next week I made some pupusas.

Pupusas

I made some tortillas and tortilla pie.

Hand-shaped tortilla pie stuffed with veggie burger and vegetables

And I generally tried to just use it up. But I was barely making a dent. So, finally, I decided to do a giant batch of pupusas. I made 16 of them (that’s 32 tortillas) and was too tired to go on (4 for our tummies and 12 for the freezer). But the bag isn’t empty yet.

Pupusas cooking on the griddle

With all that, the masa is holding up incredibly well. In the beginning, I only used clean spoons to pull out masa, not my hands. So it would last a long time. And it has. It’s been 10 days since I bought it and it’s still fresh.

In the first few days, the masa was like heaven. It rolled out into perfect discs with either a press or my hands. It never stuck to anything. Now it has dried out ever so slightly and the tortillas are starting to stick and crack a bit. I added some water which helped but nothing brings back the super freshness I started with. Even so, it’s amazing stuff. Puts that powdered business to shame.

Next time though, I’m going to specify the small bags.

Foods I’ve made with masa (fresh or flour):

1. Tortillas
2. Omelet stuffed tortilla pie frittata
3. Pupusas
4. Cornbread Challah
5. Corn Dogs

©2012 Norwitz Notions. All Rights Reserved.

Primavera
17070 Sonoma Hwy. (Hwy. 12)
Agua Caliente, CA
(707) 939-9350

Some good articles:
Tortillas a mano
Rancho tamales are a family affair
Primavera in the San Francisco Ferry Plaza Farmers Market
Tortilla Spat: How Mexico’s iconic flatbread went industrial and lost its flavor

The seller told me it would keep in the fridge for a few days but I could freeze it too. I didn’t get to it right away, so I stuck it in the freezer. Between then and now, I had my tortilla-making adventures using masa harina (flour you mix with water). I defrosted the Primavera masa about a week ago.

Various articles I’ve seen talk about how it freezes well (both the dough in general and Primavera’s in particular), but mine didn’t fare as well. When I tried to form it, it was both soggy and dry. Tortillas made with it came out tasting good, with decent texture, but they are very thick (not a bad thing!) and fall apart.

I had better luck adding a bit of water and kneading the dough for a minute or two, as if it were being made from flour. Then letting it sit for a couple minutes. It still sticks to the tortilla press (despite using plastic covers) and falls apart, but not as badly.

So, tonight, I came up with a different plan. I added water to the rest of the masa, kneaded it, and set it aside. Then I divided it in two for top and bottom. The idea? a giant pupusa.

First, I sauteed some sliced onions (on a mandolin) in olive oil. My original idea for the filling was to saute onions and also fry up some tofu bits with curry. But I forgot and was too tired, so it was just onions.

Next, I put oil, then some cornmeal, in a hot cast iron pan, and plopped in half the dough, flattening it the best I could with the spatula.

Topped it all with a healthy dollop of onions.

Then added the rest of the dough on top, spreading it out first with the spatula, then with my fingers.

As I took pictures, I kept thinking that I should post it all anyway, as an example of failed meals. I get ideas in my head and, trust me, sometimes they come out pretty awful. I was sure this was another of those times.

Then I realized I needed to turn the pie over. I cut it in quarters (chop hard to get through the onions) and flipped them one at a time, adding more olive oil underneath. I stood back and looked and knew I had made something good.

Yep, these taste as good as they look. You can use any filling you want. The plain onions were a bit bland, though savory. Cheese would be amazing, if you eat it. You could make this a main dish by adding meat or tofu or another protein.

Serve it for breakfast…for the first time in 2 years, I felt like I could have omelets again. This is the closest I have come without actually eating eggs. It would be fabulous brunch food too. But I enjoyed it for dinner, with a big salad.

©2012 Norwitz Notions. All Rights Reserved.

I’m not sure what to make of them. They’re billed as sports supplements (even the kids version) but what they really are is candy. I don’t eat much candy (a couple pieces a year) so it’s hard for me to categorize them, but they are like gummy bears or gumdrops. They’re quite chewy but I don’t know if those others are too.

“Sharkies are fun shaped, chewable source of carbohydrates and electrolytes – your body’s preferred source of fuel during activities…Although children can and will consume Sharkies as a ‘better for you’ candy, none of the sugars in Sharkies are refined and half the product is rice syrup giving it complex carbohydrates for sustained energy.”

In other words…sugar. “Fun” is a matter of opinion, but they are cute little sharks. They are definitely chewable. And the carbs, well, each 45 gram package contains a whopping 35 grams of usable carbs (36 total minus 1 gram fiber).

But what are they referring to when they say “electrolytes.” Each package has 110 mg of sodium, which isn’t enough to replenish salts if you’re sweating. And 30 mg of potassium, which is, what? 1% of the daily requirement? No other electrolyte is mentioned (except calcium is at 0% RDA). They say: “The naturally occurring electrolytes in Sharkies come from the potassium in the fruit juice and the sodium in the rice and water.”

So I can do without their misleading marketing. They’re candy. Let’s accept that and move on to the rest of the review.

The good news is they are gluten-free, soy-free, corn-free (except for citric acid, which is usually grown on corn and can be a problem for exceptionally sensitive folks), canola-free, vegan, and certified organic. They also taste pretty decent. They are so-so when you start eating them, but grow on you as you chew (they last about 30 seconds), and the aftertaste is good. I tried the watermelon.

For someone looking for an all-natural candy, free of several major allergens, they’re a good find.

The bad allergy news is they are pulling the “natural flavors” bit so it can be hard to know what is in what. They do list the flavor combos on the front of the package though, and I just hope they are accurate. The watermelon doesn’t mention oranges and it didn’t make Miriam sick, so I’m pretty confident it doesn’t have oranges in it. The Fruit Splash has tangerine, so Michael took those away. Citrus Squeeze doesn’t say which citrus. I will have to call them.

Sharkies, Inc.
10556 Combie Rd., Suite 6672
Auburn, CA 95602
Toll-Free Phone: 877.666.5377
Fax: 530.268.8010
email: Dwight@sgnllc.com

©2012 Norwitz Notions. All Rights Reserved.

French Meadow Bakery’s gluten-free tortillas are in that category. I eat them about 5 days a week for lunch (as wraps/burritos). They have two: Healthy Hemp and Women’s. Both are organic, vegan, lowcarb, and high protein. And they taste good too. The Healthy Hemp are also soy-free.

Except that they had two gluten-free tortillas. They are gone.

The problem was quality. They tended to spoil quickly (they shipped them to stores frozen but most stores wouldn’t sell them frozen; they’d put them in the fridge), they stuck together, and they’d sometimes fall apart during use (microwaving worked better than toasting or heating on the stove). I didn’t have these issues (except for spoilage) with the Women’s, just with the Healthy Hemp, but French Meadow told me they got complaints about both.

I emailed them in February, and got this reply:

Subject: Re: What happened to your tortillas!!!?!?!?
Date: Mon, 25 Feb 2008 16:57:00 -0500
From: Dingmann, Emily <edingmann@frenchmeadow.com>

Hello Cyndi,
Thank you very much for your feedback, it truly is something we value here at French Meadow Bakery. I am sorry that these were some of your favorite tortillas, unfortunately they were not a top-seller, there were some quality issues and we are coming out with improved tortillas.

We have discontinued the Woman’s Tortilla and Hemp Tortilla but we are currently working on new tortillas:
- Improved Gluten Free Tortilla
- Improved Hemp Tortilla (this will have gluten in it)

These should be out sometime this spring; we are aiming to have them ready at Expo, so hopefully you will have the opportunity to sample our new Gluten Free tortilla.

Please feel free to contact me with any other questions.
Thank you for Supporting French Meadow Bakery,
Emily
Emily Dingmann
Sales Coordinator, French Meadow Bakery
2604 Lyndale Avenue South, Minneapolis, MN 55408
Phone: 612-870-4740 x 17; Fax: 612-870-0907
www.frenchmeadow.com

So I stopped by their booth the other week at Expo West and spoke to them again. The tortillas weren’t ready and there were no samples. It sounded like they hadn’t worked through the reformulations.Unfortunately, they seemed to have no commitment at all to gluten-free. One woman told me that the old tortillas stuck together so they “had to add some wheat.” In the same tone that you might tell someone you added some tapioca starch. I don’t think they realize the market they have. The gluten-free community didn’t really know about their tortillas, but the people I told thought they were great. Yes, the quality suffered and I’m glad they’re fixing it. But adding a bit of wheat means the world to someone who can’t have the slightest trace.

I explained to them that they had the only gluten-free tortilla on the market that wasn’t filled with carbs. Lowcarb tortillas exist but they use wheat gluten. Corn tortillas are easy enough to find, but not everyone can have corn and they have a lot of starch and no protein (and they’re small). There are rice tortillas but they are pure starch and taste horrible too.

I begged them to keep making gluten-free, lowcarb, vegan, organic tortillas. I also explained that, while I can eat soy, a lot of food restricted people can’t, and the Healthy Hemp tortillas were the only alternative for a lot of folks.

So what was their response? they proudly trotted out their new gluten-free products. Cookies and brownies. Oh boy. Don’t they understand that gluten-free cookies are a dime a dozen but real food is what we have trouble finding? Not that some folks won’t appreciate a new source of gluten-free treats, after all, theirs are dairy-free and soy-free too (but contain eggs and aren’t organic).

If you share my opinion of the matter, please contact French Meadow Bakery and politely ask them to reformulate their gluten-free tortillas to continue to be vegan, organic, and low in carbs (and soy-free, if that is important to you). Make sure they know there is a gluten-free customer base that loves their products and wants more.

2604 Lyndale Avenue South
Minneapolis, MN 55408
bread@frenchmeadow.com
612-870-4740 or 1-877-No-Yeast
Fax: 612-870-0907

©2012 Norwitz Notions. All Rights Reserved.

She writes: “The olive bread is just Pamela’s Amazing Wheat-Free Bread Mix, using the egg-free instructions, with the flax meal egg sub, and adding about 1/2 cup of oil-cured olives, very coarsely chopped. I used the bread maker instead of the stand mixer, but just had it ‘knead’ for 10 minutes (instead of mixing for 2 minutes in a stand mixer) then rest for an hour and bake for 60 minutes. I used olive oil for the vegetable oil called for on the package.”

Pamela’s Amazing Wheat-Free Bread Mix
INGREDIENTS: Sorghum Flour, Tapioca Flour, Sweet Rice Flour, Brown Rice Flour, Organic Natural Evaporated Cane Sugar, Chicory Root, White Rice Flour, Millet Flour, Honey and Molasses; Rice Bran, Sea Salt, Xanthan Gum, Yeast Packet.
1 slice of bread (1/16th of loaf) has 25 usable grams of carbs (29 total minus 4 fiber).

I didn’t get to see the bread made, but I pulled it out of the bread maker. Never having seen it before, I thought it was worth a picture. Here’s the bottom:

And here’s the same bread from the top:

This stuff was amazing. I swear, I still have fantasies about it. If it weren’t so carby, I’d run out and buy a bread maker and a case of mix. It was a very moist and soft bread. I’m not sure how it would hold up in a sandwich, though part of that may be that we ate it while it was still warm. It went very well with Jessica’s curry.

©2012 Norwitz Notions. All Rights Reserved.

Sylvan Border Farm
Gluten-Free Products
Lemon Cake Mix
1 lb, 10.7 oz (762.6 g)
Mendocino Gluten-Free Products, Inc.
P.O. Box 277, Willits, CA 95490
(800) 297-5399; Fax: (707) 459-1834
http://www.sylvanborderfarm.com/

INGREDIENTS: Sugar, Potato Starch, White Rice Flour, Brown Rice Flour*, Aluminum-free Baking Powder, Amaranth Flour, Quinoa Flour*, Xanthan Gum, Lemon Juice Powder, White Cornmeal*, Garbanzo Bean Flour*, Soy Flour*, Salt. *Organically Grown

The mix cost me a mere 99 cents, because it was being discontinued from the store where I got it. I finally used it the other day.

We made it for Miriam, as a cake to bring to other children’s birthday parties. It’s really hard on her to watch everyone else eat cake (and pizza and other special treats) and not be able to have any herself. So we bring her lunch and a sweet treat. We used this cake at her cousin’s birthday party and I froze the rest in single servings for future parties.

The recipe couldn’t be simpler: 1 bag mix, 3/4 cup orange juice (we used jarred lemon juice), 3/4 cup oil (we used sunflower), and 4 eggs (we used 4 tablespoons flaxseed meal nuked in 1 1/3 cups of water). Then you beat the heck out of it for two minutes. They recommend a big mixer with a dough hook but we don’t have one, so I used a stick blender with a whisk attachment, which worked well.

The mix includes a recipe for a lemon glaze but I made a cherry one instead, boiling sugar, cherry juice, dark cherries (chopped), and a pinch of salt. As recommended, we poured it hot over the hot finished cake (with some holes poked in it) and let it cool. The cake soaked up the sauce.

The cake is extremely dense. I don’t know if my not using eggs was a factor, or that we didn’t beat it with the recommended equipment. Or maybe it’s supposed to be that dense. It was good though, despite the fact that it was so carby (the mix prepared as suggested has 15 servings and each has a whopping 42 grams of carbs , with virtually no fiber) it made my teeth hurt. Miriam doesn’t eat much of it at a time, but she was satisfied with it. I think it would make a good base for an ice cream cake.

©2012 Norwitz Notions. All Rights Reserved.

Stem Ginger Cookies
Sunstart Bakery
“Cookies made from ingredients naturally free from gluten and wheat”
“Sunstart Bakery is a dedicated wheat-free facility located in the beautiful glens of Antrim in Northern Ireland. Sunstart Bakery is accredited with the higher British retail council award and is the recipient of the British Bakery award for innovation. Sunstart Bakery USA was established in 2004 and our USA facility is centrally located near Chicago.”
$4.20 per 7 oz (10 cookie) box or $3.00 each if you buy a case of 12.

They have several flavors:

Chocolate Chip
Coconut
Raspberry
Stem Ginger
Chocolate & Orange

I’ve only tasted the ginger.

Ingredients: Flour base (brown rice flakes, millet flakes, soya flour, corn starch, xanthan gum), desiccated coconut, naturally evaporated cane sugar, stem ginger, molasses, monounsaturated safflower oil, rice syrup, sea salt.

For all of the cookies, they state they are free of wheat, gluten, eggs, nuts, potato, vege (don’t know what that is), and transfats. For the following, they list them as things the cookies are not free of: dairy, corn, soy.

But the ingredients do not mention dairy at all. The box does say “contains milk & soya.” I am not sensitive enough to dairy to be able to tell if there are trace amounts there. They are definitely and totally gluten-free from what I can tell, not just their ingredients but Codex compliance and a dedicated facility.

Okay, here’s the fun part, the nice people at the booth last year gave me a whole box to take home. We made them last. They are some of the best boxed cookies I’ve ever had. They are flaky and melt in your mouth with intense flavor. They are big and substantial enough that one is a dessert. Miriam loves them too and considered a cookie to be adequate compensation for not getting cake at a friend’s birthday party.

Although they are hardly lowcarb (though not terrible at 10 grams usable carbs (12-2 fiber) per 20 gram cookie), I’m seriously considering ordering a case.

©2012 Norwitz Notions. All Rights Reserved.