A Valuable Lesson Learned!

Good Morning! Would you believe that it is 0900 and I am just waking up? We went to a great party last night at our friends’ house and stayed out much too late! It was great fun though.  We laughed and talked and had dinner. After dinner, I got to watch as everyone sang Karaoke in Hindi!  Wow! I have some talented friends!

This morning is not so much fun however….

 Dinner was potluck and everyone brought something.  My friends Carol and Hetal brought appetizers. Carol (thank you so much) brought organic corn chips with salsa and guacamole and Hetal brought a wonderful Indian dish made from chickpea flour called Dhokla.  I was safe and happy for appetizers.

Dinner was pizza….. oh how I love pizza.  However, you would have been proud of me, I abstained!!!! Of course it helped that I was stuffed on the fantastic appetizers!  I do think that from now on though I will call ahead of time and ask what the main course is for potluck because I could have brought my own pizza. I make great gluten free pizza with sheep cheese!

I was my own undoing. I brought the dessert. I guess that I have not fully accepted my new status in life. When I volunteered, I did not think about the fact that all of my desserts contain gluten and/or dairy. I got ready to make what I had planned and realized that it would not work with my life style.  Well, at this late stage of the game, I began to try and figure this out. The cake that I was making called for graham cracker crumbs in place of flour….. no fixing that unless I made gluten free graham crackers and then crushed them into crumbs. Poor planning on my part, not enough time in the day. So…. I made my favorite cake knowing that I could not even taste it.

 Then the other dessert that I was taking is a strawberry trifle. I had enough time to make the gluten free cake but I was afraid to take something with filling and whipped cream from a revamped recipe that I had never tried. So I used cow dairy instead. The desserts were a hit and I was trying to abstain. However, I caved! I decided to go for what I thought was the safest recipe, the Trifle. I thought that the cow dairy would be less harmful than the gluten. I also decided to have just a TINY bit! So I had ONE spoonful.

Fast forward to this morning. My rings won’t come off of my fingers, I have CANKLES( for those of you unfamiliar with this term it means that my legs are the same size from my calves to my feet, no ankles at all), I ache all over, my knees and wrists are painful, and my head is pounding. I feel like I am in a fog! Lesson learned! Next weekend, I am going to either find gluten free graham cracker crumbs on the Internet and order them or make some to put in the freezer. I am also going to call Vanessa and get her recommendations for the filling for my trifle. I already have a great recipe for coconut whipped cream, but did not use it since the rest of the filling had cow dairy. I am including the whipped cream recipe below!

I really have enjoyed this vegan whipped cream recipe ( I can't believe the words enjoy and vegan just came out of my mouth in the same sentence). I saw it originally on Pinterest and I am including the blog site so that you can check out the step by step pictures with the recipe! The only change that I have made is that Trader Joes sells coconut cream which cuts out the step of putting the coconut milk in the fridge overnight! Hope you enjoy!

http://ohsheglows.com/2012/08/30/coconut-whipped-cream-a-step-by-step-photo-tutorial/

Have a great day. Talk to you soon!