Nearly No Dairy Casserole

I have a problem in my household and that is that my son can't have much in the way of dairy. He's still a little guy, and I'm hoping he'll grow out of it, but it used to give him hives, and now he doesn't get hives, he jut wakes up in the middle of the night screaming because of an upset tummy. So, since I don't like giving my kid hives, and I don't like missing out on my sleep, I don't give him dairy. Which means that I have to completely relearn how to cook. And like 97.6% of all casserole recipes aren't useful to me now. So today when I had a couple chicken breasts that needed to be used and our garden gave us our first two little zucchinis I figured it was time to make myself a non-dairy casserole. So I winged it. And I like it. Quite a bit actually.

Nearly No Dairy Casserole

3 cups cooked brown rice*
1 can whole kernel corn
1 can olives, sliced
1 large can (or 1qt jar if you can your own) tomatoes, mostly drained
1 can corn, drained
2 chicken breasts, cooked and cubed
2 small zucchini sliced into half coins
1-2 tsp each of thyme and oregano
salt and pepper to taste
about 1.5-2 c grated cheddar cheese (I used extra sharp and it was superb)

It's a casserole, so really, you just throw it all together (except the cheese), put it in a large casserole dish (I used a 13x11, but a 9x13 would work too, it would just come up higher) and put the cheese on top. Cover it tightly with foil and bake at 350 F for 30 minutes. Give the zucchini a poke with a fork to make sure it's tender, if it isn't give it some more time with the foil on. If it is, take the foil off, and let it bake for 10 more minutes. Take it out, let it cool a bit, eat it. Hope for leftovers for lunch tomorrow. It serves 6-8.

*you could probably use white rice, leave it uncooked, add the tomato liquid and probably the corn liquid too, and let it steam in the oven, but that's not what I did, so I can't make any guarantees.

Pumkin Ginger Muffins

2/3 C vegetable oil
2/3 C honey
4 eggs
2 tsp vanilla
2 C pumpkin (either canned or cooked and mashed)
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp allspice
1/2 tsp ginger
1/4-1/2 tsp nutmeg
3 1/2 C whole wheat flour
1 tsp salt
2 tsp baking soda
1/2 C hot water
1 C chopped nuts (optional)

Preheat oven to 325 degrees F. and grease a 9x5 loaf pan
Mix oil, honey, eggs, vanilla, pumpkin and spices (cinnamon allspice, ginger, nutmeg) until well mixed.
Stir in flour and salt until just combined
Mix baking soda and hot water together, then add this mix to batter. Blend in nuts if desired.
Spread batter in pan (sprinkle the top with nuts if desired) and bake for 55-60 minutes. Cool on a wire rack for 15 minutes before slicing.

But wait! That's not muffins. That's bread.

Well yeah. But the recipe is actually enough to make one loaf of bread and something like 48 mini muffins. I have no idea how many regular muffins that makes.

Oh wait, google informs me that it is roughly 16 muffins. So that means that one recipe makes one of the following:

1 loaf of bread and 16 muffins
1 loaf of bread and 48 mini muffins
16 muffins and 48 mini muffins
96 mini muffins
32 muffins
2 loafs of bread

It's up to you.

Now, you may have noticed that in the picture there aren't any nuts. Nothing against nuts, but I prefer to have nuts on top of my bread and if you are making mini muffins there isn't much room on top. (although it would be pretty cute...hmmm. maybe next time) So I thought I'd try a glaze.

Maple Ginger Glaze

1 C water
1/2 tsp mapeleine (this is maple flavoring)
1/4-1/2 tsp ginger (depends on how gingery you want your glaze. I started with 1/4 and it was pretty mild.)
3 C powdered sugar
dash of salt

Mix this all together over heat. Let it come to a boil then turn the heat down. The cornstarch in the powdered sugar will make it thicken into a consistency similar to store bought syrup. This makes for sticky muffin tops (which you could easily take advantage of to stick nuts to or some coarse sugar) but if you don't want sticky then you could always decrease the amount of water.

Note: however much water you use will be roughly how much glaze you have. 1 Cup was way too much for my 48 mini muffins, but it is delightful on pancakes. Just store the extra in the fridge till you are ready for it and you are good to go.

Basic Whole Wheat Scones

This recipe is super adaptable. Add in all kinds of stuff. Zest some citrus fruits, add nuts, throw in some berries. Do what you want.

1.5-2 C Whole Wheat Flour
3 Tbs Sugar
1 Tbs Baking Powder
.5 tsp Salt
5 Tbs Chilled Butter
1 C Heavy Cream or Half and Half or Whole Milk

*Preheat oven to 450 degrees.
*Sift or whisk the dry ingredients together.
*Cut pats of butter into the dry ingredients and cut in. You want it fairly well mixed with only a few large lumps of butter.
*Add any add in's now.
*Add cream and stir till dough starts to hold together.
*Knead on counter to incorporate any flour that still hasn't mixed in. You want a slightly sticky ball.
*Form into scones by patting it into a square or circle roughly 8 or 9 inches and cut into 8 pieces.
*Place on ungreased cookie sheet and bake for 11-13 minutes until tops are light brown.
*Cool for 10 minutes before you dig in.