Dairy and Wheat Free Ground Turkey Kheema

  Kheema (also spelled Qeema) is a South Asian curry dish usually made with ground lamb. It's also often cooked in ghee, which is clarified butter, and sometimes has yogurt mixed in. Of course we did none of that, and it still came out very tasty! Even the boys ate a ton of it, thank goodness. Sometimes I wonder how they survive on what little they eat. On that note, they had their very first grilled cheese sandwiches today on white rye (since Jack is not gluten intolerant but rather just allergic to wheat) and with Daiya cheddar cheese shreds and soy free Earth Balance. Man, were they goo-oood, but I'm really off topic! Back to the recipe!

Turkey Kheema 

1 lb ground turkey
1 large onion, diced
3 cloves garlic, minced
2 medium tomatoes, finely chopped
2-3 small green thai chilies, split lengthwise
  (for the tomatoes and chilies, I just used a can of hot Ro-tel tomatoes)
1 Tbl garam marsala
2 Tbl ground cumin
1 tsp coriander powder
1 large tsp tumeric
1 tsp red chili powder
2-3 tsp tomato paste
1/2 cup water
1 cup green peas
3 Tbl olive oil
Salt and pepper to taste (I added about 3 tsp sea salt and just a dash of pepper)

In a large skillet, heat olive oil over medium heat. Add onion and saute a few minutes, until slightly browned. Add ginger, garlic, and chilies and fry 2-3 minutes. Add in spices. I added a few tablespoons of water at this point as it was very dry and looked like it might burn to the pan. Saute 3 minutes. Add turkey and mix well. Stir until meat is broken up and cooked through. Add tomatoes, tomato paste, and water. Reduce heat to low, cover, cook 5-6 minutes. Stir in peas and serve.

We had ours over cooked quinoa. I found two or three wheat free vegan naan recipes (naan is the traditional flat bread that you would scoop this up with) but they contained rice flour and I'm not confident enough to start trying to substitute flours. Hopefully I will get the hang of it!

Dairy Free Ground Turkey and Chickpea Curry with "Yogurt"

  I found a recipe on Kalyn's Kitchen for ground turkey curry tonight that, with a little tweaking, was allergy friendly and super yummy!

Apparently this was already adapted from a Rachel Ray recipe, but here is my final product:

Ground Turkey and Chickpea Curry

1 Tbs + 1 tsp olive oil
1lb ground turkey
1 large onion, chopped
3 Tbs curry powder (we used half sweet, half hot)
1 can petite diced tomatoes with juice
1 can chickpeas (garbonzo beans), drained
12oz sour cream substitute (we used Tofutti Sour Supreme)*
S&P to taste

Heat 1 Tbs olive oil in a large skillet over medium heat and add turkey. Break apart meat and lightly brown, about 7 minutes, drain if necessary. Push the turkey to one side of the pan and in the other side, heat 1 tsp oilive oil. Once hot, add onion and saute about 3-4 minutes. Sprinkle onions wiht curry powder and cook about 2 more minutes (I actually added about 1/2 Tbs of water to the onion-curry mixture as it was just dry powder stuck to onions and I was afraid it would burn). Stir onion and turkey together until well blended. Add tomatoes with juice and chickpeas and bring to a boil, then turn heat to low and simmer about 5 minutes. With heat still on low, stir in sour cream sub and simmer about 3-5 minutes. Season with salt and pepper to taste.
Serve hot over cooked brown rice or quinoa, or eat it all by itself as a stew! Yum!

It's not the prettiest dish I've ever made, but I take what I can get!

Jack and Ben both really liked this, which is really rare, but so did Chris and my dad which I don't think has ever happened before... Score!

* UPDATED: Now that we are also soy free, we use a soy free (and actually tastier, I think) sour cream substitute that is made with cashews. The recipe can be found here.

Chicken, sweet potato and cauliflower vindaloo

  I was quickly leafing through the latest issue of Family Circle, because I feel obligated to at least look at it even though 9 times out of 10 I find absolutely nothing in it which interests me. Well I found a recipe for chicken sweet potato (Jack's listening...) and cauliflower vindaloo, and the recipe already was wheat, dairy, egg, and mammal meat free PLUS we already had everything to make it!
  We made it last night and it was good, but a bit too spicy for Chrissy's condition and Jack wasn't real excited about any parts other than the sweet potato chunks and quinoa, but that's ok. I think we will be making this, with a few tweaks, again.

Chicken, sweet potato and cauliflower vindaloo

2 Tbs olive oil
1 lb boneless skinless chicken thighs, cut into 1 inch peices
1/2 tsp salt
1 lb sweet potatoes, peeled and cut into 1/2 inch cubes
1 large onion, chopped
1 medium cauliflower, cut into small florets
2 tsp curry powder
1/2 tsp cayenne powder
1 can (14.5 oz) dairy free gluten free chicken broth
1 can diced tomatoes (we omitted this)
1/2 cup mint, coarsley chopped
2 cups cooked quinoa
(I also used about 1/2 Tbs cornstarch mixed with a small amount of water to thicken up the sauce)

Heat 1 Tbs oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Season chicken with 1/4 tsp salt and cook for 7 to 8 minutes. Remove to a plate.
Add remaining Tbs of oil, sweet potatoes and onion to skillet and stir fry for 5 minutes. Add caluiflower and cook an additional 3 minutes. Add broth and tomatoes, if using, and then stir in curry, cayenne, and remaining salt and cook 5-6 more minutes.
Add chicken and heat through. (This is where I added cornstarch as there was still alot of liquid) Stir in mint and serve over cooked quinoa.

I forgot to take a picture, but it actually was pretty looking.