December is just about here, which means that bakeries are beginning to roll out their annual holiday treats. Those of us with a gluten allergy don't have to sit idly by, watching as our friends and loved ones enjoy a bevy of baked goods -- we live in the Bay Area, where gluten-free bakeries are popping up in many major cities (along with pizza places!).

Take, for example, Zest Bakery, an independent shop that recently opened in San Carlos. Located right off of Laurel Avenue, this cheerful bakery was opened by Patrick Luke and Charissa Fleischer, two sweets-loving newlyweds. A true family affair, Zest also features gluten-free mini-cheesecakes made by Charissa's sister, Cynthia, the mastermind behind the the AntiCupcake Company (her motto is "Down with the Cupcake! Up with the Cheesecake!").

Here are just a few of the tasty holiday treats you'll find at Zest:

• Pies: pecan pie, pumpkin pie, berry pie, Dutch apple pie with dulce de leche - some pies can be made dairy-free as well
• Cheesecake: pumpkin pie cheesecake, vanilla bean cheesecake, cranberry congnac cheesecake, eggnog cheesecake, mini firehouse smores cheesecake
• Breads: white dinner rolls, multigrain rolls, cornbread rolls
• Gingerbread men
• A gluten-free holiday survival kit

Zest Bakery
1224 Arroyo
San Carlos, CA 94070
(650) 241-ZEST (9378)
Twitter: @zestbakery

Another gluten-free bakery to recently appear in the Bay Area is Oakland's Good Chemistry Baking. Started by Jane and Rick O'Hara and serving up espresso, baked goods, and a wide selection of deli offerings, Good Chemistry has become an everyday stop for the locals of the Grand Lake area. This holiday season Jane and Rick have packed their pastry cases with a great selection of holiday favorites:

• Gingerbread loaves and cookies
• Tea loaves: cranberry nut and lemon poppyseed
• Linzer torte cookies
• Dinner rolls and stuffing cubes
• Challah

Good Chemistry Baking
3249 Grand Avenue
Oakland, CA 94610
(510) 350-7190

It wouldn't be the holiday season without a stop at Mariposa Baking Company, located in Oakland on Telegraph Avenue. Now an East Bay mainstay, Mariposa Baking has been baking up some of the best gluten-free brownies, muffins, and pizza crusts since 2004. Owner Patti Furey Crane is known for her creative goodies, so you're sure to find a range of delicious offerings in her display case. If you're in the northern Peninsula, you can also get Mariposa Baking baked goods at San Bruno's Carrot's Coffee & Tea.

Worth mentioning: once you're done shopping at Mariposa, head next door to The Wine Mine, where owner David Sharp stocks a great selection of gluten-free beers to take the edge off after a day of holiday shopping.

Mariposa Baking Company
The Wine Mine
5427 Telegraph Ave
Oakland, CA 94609
(510) 595-0955

Zest bakery has generous shared one of their most popular recipes: cranberry-cognac bread pudding. This dessert is so simple, you won't even need a special gluten-free flour mix to make it. You can just use the loaf of gluten-free bread that's been sitting in your freezer for the past month, waiting to be eaten, or make some homemade bread just for this dish.

Holiday Cranberry-Cognac Bread Pudding (Gluten-Free)
Compliments of Zest Bakery in San Carlos

Makes: 12 servings

Ingredients:
1 1/2 cups fresh cranberries
1/4 cup cognac
3/4 cup water
2 tablespoons orange zest
3 cups granulated sugar, divided
3 cups cubed, stale gluten-free bread
6 large eggs, beaten
2 1/2 cups milk
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
2 teaspoons cinnamon
1 vanilla bean pod
4 tablespoons butter
Course sugar or turbinado sugar for sprinkling

Preparation:
1. Pour cranberries, cognac, water, orange zest and 1 cup of the granulated sugar into a small pot and simmer on low for 20 minutes. Stir occasionally to keep from burning. Turn off the heat and set aside.
2. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Grease a 13 x 9 x 2-inch pan.
3. Arrange cubed bread in a single layer in the pan and spoon dollops of the cranberries over the bread. Add the remaining cubes of bread and spread with a few more spoonfuls of cranberries.
4. Mix together eggs, milk, vanilla extract, cinnamon, and the remaining 2 cups of granulated sugar in a bowl. Split the vanilla bean pod lengthwise and use the tip of the spoon to scrape out the vanilla caviar. Add the vanilla caviar to the egg and milk mixture and whisk until combined. Pour mixture over cubed bread and let sit for 10 minutes.
5. Dot with butter and sprinkle with turbinado sugar. Bake for 35 to 45 minutes, or until set. Remove from oven and allow to cool.

The last turkey sandwiches and scraps of pumpkin pie are gone, the final breakfast of hot coffee and cold stuffing finished, and suddenly, another holiday is sending you back into the kitchen, this time to fry, fry, fry. Chanukah, the Jewish Festival of Lights, comes early this year, starting the evening of Wednesday, December 1st and ending 8 days later on December 9th.

Last year, I passed along all my must-have tips for latkes, the potato pancakes that are the festive centerpiece of family dinners during this holiday. Now, onto the borscht!

You wouldn't necessarily think, given how many people (Barack Obama included) shudder at the very thought of a beet, that a pot of beet-and-cabbage soup could best a platter of crispy, greasy, fried potatoes slathered in sour cream and applesauce, but I've seen it happen.

Every year at my annual Chanukah party, folks come for the latkes but stay for the borscht. Waiting for the next round of potato pancakes to come out of the frying pan, they drift over to the big pot of magenta soup at the back of the stove, scoop out a bowlful, dollop on the sour cream, and before I know it, they're at my elbow, demanding to know "what is in this soup??"

They don't really believe me when I tell them it's nothing but dowdy root vegetables like turnips and parsnips, dill, a little cider vinegar and a whole bunch of beets and cabbage. Inspired by the dreamy borscht served at the marvelously glamorous, original incarnation of the Russian Tea Room in New York City, my borscht has adapted over the years, to where there's hardly even a recipe to follow.

Onions, leeks, and garlic are sauteed to start with, then followed by a bowlful of whatever could survive a Russian winter, usually a combination of carrots, parsnips, turnips, celery root, and rutabaga, then chopped or grated beets and finely sliced red cabbage, all seasoned with plenty of salt, caraway seed, and a few twigs of sage or thyme. Because I usually make my borscht vegetarian, I add a big can of diced tomatoes (Muir Glen's fire-roasted tomatoes are particularly nice) to give body and a bit of acidity to all that root-vegetable sweetness. Water to make up however much liquid is needed, and then, the crucial splash of red-wine or apple-cider vinegar for tartness. A gentle simmer for 45 minutes or so, an adjustment of salt or vinegar, a hefty stir-in of chopped fresh dill, and the borscht is ready. Like every winter soup, it improves with age, and can be made a day or two ahead of time.

My Polish landlord has promised to have me over for borscht sometime this winter. The red borscht that I know, he says, is a specialty of eastern Poland and Ukraine. In western Poland, however, they make a white borscht with sausage, potatoes, and zur, a tart, cloudy liquid fermented from rye meal and rye-bread crusts. I haven't yet tried this kind, since it sounds like it needs a freezing-cold, months-long Eastern European winter to properly accompany it.

In my Jewish experience, there are two kinds of borscht: the cold kind, made only with beets, that you mix with sour cream to a lurid hot-pinkness and drink from a glass, and the belly-filling winter kind, chock full of cabbage, beets, and root vegetables, served with a dollop of sour cream on top, challah or rye bread on the side.

I generally make mine vegetarian, since I'm usually making borscht for a crowd, but many cooks make theirs with meat, chunks of fatty, tough but flavorful beef cooked on the bone to give body to the broth. A shot of vinegar keeps winter's appetite sharp, although now that everyone's madly pickling, you could add in some naturally fermented sauerkraut juice, perhaps and some sauerkraut, too, or a few diced pickled beets with their juice.

Winter Borscht
It's impossible to make a small amount of borscht. Anyway, why would you want to? It keeps well and can sustain you for days. The amounts listed here are approximate, since the amount of borscht you make should be constrained only by the size of the biggest pot you have.

Serves: 8

Ingredients:
2 tbsp oil or butter
1 large onion, peeled and chopped, and/or 1 large leek, trimmed and chopped
3 to 5 cloves garlic, chopped
2 carrots, chopped
1 parsnip, chopped
1 turnip, chopped
1 rutabaga, chopped (optional)
1 celery root, chopped
3 beets, peeled and chopped or grated
1/2 head of red cabbage, thinly sliced
1 cup cooked small white beans, optional
1 28-oz can diced tomatoes and juice
water as needed
1 - 2 tsp salt, to taste
2 tsp caraway seed
1 tsp dill seed (optional)
1 tsp dried thyme or several branches of fresh thyme or sage
2 tbsp apple-cider or red-wine vinegar, or to taste

Garnish:
1 small bunch fresh dill, minced
Sour cream--the real stuff, with no additives, and definitely NOT "lite" or nonfat. If you truly won't (or can't) bear the full-fatness, use non- or lowfat Greek yogurt instead.

Preparation:
1. Over medium heat, heat oil in a large, heavy soup pot. Reduce heat, add onions, leek, and garlic. Cook, stirring, until softened and translucent but not browned, 5 to 8 minutes.

2. Add chopped carrots, parsnips, turnip, celery root and rutabaga and cook, stirring, until vegetables are slightly softened, 8-10 minutes. Add beets and cabbage and cook for another few minutes.

3. Add salt, caraway, and thyme. Add tomatoes and juice, white beans if using, and enough water to cover vegetables. Add vinegar to taste. Bring to a simmer, then reduce heat to keep soup at a gentle simmer. Partially cover and let cook until vegetables are tender and flavors have blended, about 45 minutes.

4. Adjust salt and vinegar. To serve, top each bowlful with a generous sprinkle of fresh dill and a dollop of sour cream.

When it comes to latkes, a lot of quibbles come up before the first potato is even peeled. Thick and hefty, or crispy-lacy? Do you hand-grate the potato or process it to mush? Squeeze out the liquid or let it be? Par-boil the potatoes, or avoid the potato altogether and head for the untrammeled wilds of zucchini with parmesan or yams with ginger? Can bacon be involved?

But all of these questions are nothing compared to the Big One. Which is, of course, OMG these latkes are SO GOOD why don't you make them EVERY NIGHT???

This, of course, is a question for sages and Jewish mothers everywhere to contemplate. The answer may become clear in the aftermath of a good latke fry-up, when bits of shredded potato are shriveling to blackness all over the counter, and a fine mist of splattered oil surrounds the stove.

Right now, though, Chanukah has just begun, and latke enthusiasm is at its height. Why potato pancakes for Chanukah, you ask? First, there's the holiday's celebration of scrappiness trumping might, the humble potato standing in for the outnumbered, outpowered but triumphant Maccabees. Able to reclaim their desecrated temple, so the story goes, the Jews found only one day's worth of oil for light, with the nearest source of consecrated oil a week's journey away. Then the little miracle: the one day's worth of oil burned for 8 days, hence the 8 days of Chanukah, and the dictum to fry, fry, fry.

Anything fried will work, and Jews around the world fry up all kinds of different things. In Israel, the go-to Chanukah treat is soufganiot, jelly-filled doughnuts dusted with powdered sugar. In Eastern Europe, however, winter meant root vegetables, most likely fried in chicken or goose fat, served with applesauce for sweetness.

Here in the Bay Area, we can do a little of each: potatoes for cultural tradition, fried in olive oil for religious significance, or just because it's local and we use olive oil for everything, anyway. If you have chicken fat or goose fat or duck fat lying around looking for trouble, use it by all means, perhaps half-and-half with a mild vegetable oil like canola so that the simple potato taste isn't clobbered by poultry-ness.

Now, on to technique. Since I am not your mother, or (more importantly) your new Jewish husband's mother, nothing I tell you need influence your latke-making in the least if you already love your latkes,. But if, sadly, you've been relying all these years on those nasty frozen ones that taste like wadded-up flannel pajamas , or your children have suddenly reached latke-eating age and you feel compelled to hand down a little tradition, even if otherwise you order in pad thai, burritos or aloo gohbi every night of the week, here is everything you need to know.

First, if you're going to fry, fry for a crowd. Making latkes is a festive event, and the more people around, the less you'll notice what a giant mess all that spattering oil has made of your kitchen.

Once you start in with the latkes, you won't have the focus or energy for anything else. Since most people's appetite for potato pancakes is limitless, especially if they're only made once a year, you should put together some satisfying one-pot thing the night before, like hot beet borscht or a crock-pot brisket, with challah or rye bread on the side. This also gives you something to throw at your guests as they start circling the stove and eyeing your spatula like starving hyenas, drawn by the irresistible diner whiff of sizzling potatoes, onion, and grease.

Second, grate by hand. Like writing thank you notes or taking off your mascara before bed, this process looms much larger in the imagination than in actual minutes spent. Use the coarse holes on a big box grater, and you'll get perfect texture and minimal clean-up. No need to peel the potatoes, especially if you're using organic spuds.

Alternate onion and potato as you grate, since the onion juices will help keep the potato shreds from oxidizing into gray yuck as you go. Another thing: don't grate more than you can fry up in a few batches. If you're frying for a crowd, don't be tempted to grate up ahead of time. Liquid will seep, potatoes will blacken, and you'll end up with a bowl of unpleasant, gray-black soupy sludge that even frying cannot redeem. Instead, grate, mix, fry, repeat. (See "Why don't we have these every night?", above.)

Once your potatoes and onions are grated, scoop the shreds into a large colander set over a big bowl. Now, get your hands into that potato mound and act like you're wringing a pair of very wet socks. Squeeze and wring, squeeze and wring, releasing as much liquid as possible. Sex educator and cultural critic Susie Bright, a woman who knows how to find the right tool for the job, swears by a potato ricer for this; others load their taters into clean tea towels and wring away. Me, I'm a two-hands, no-equipment kind of lady, but follow your inclinations. When all the potatoes look well-wrung, step back and let the liquid collected in the bowl stand for a couple of minutes.

Meanwhile, separate your eggs, dropping the egg whites into a big bowl and putting the yolks aside. Hand the egg white to a helpful guest, and ask them to whisk them into stiff peaks. Here, technology helps; like natural childbirth, whisking egg whites with nothing but muscle tone and a whisk is admirable but achingly slow. If you don't have a hand-held electric mixer, just tell people to pass the whisk along when they tire out. Line a cookie sheet with paper towels and place it near (but not within catching-on-fire range of) the stove.

Lift up your colander of potatoes and onion. Underneath, you'll see a pool of brownish liquid with a squeaky layer of pinkish-tan potato starch at the bottom. Pour off the liquid, then dump the grated potato on top of the starch. Add the egg yolks, the matzoh meal or flour, and plenty of salt and pepper. Mix it all together, being sure to scrape up the extra starch from the bottom of the bowl. Track down that bowl of egg whites. Quickly, scoop the whites onto the potato mixture, and using a down-and-around motion, fold the whites into the grated potato.

Heat up a couple of wide, heavy frying pans (cast iron works best). Add about 1/2 inch of oil to each one, and get that oil really good and hot. (Buy a fresh bottle of oil for this endeavor. You'll need a lot more than you think.) When a shred of potato sputters and bubbles, slide as many large spoonfuls of potato as you can fit into the pan without crowding. Fry, turning once, until pancakes are a rich mahogany brown. Drain on paper towels, blotting off as much grease as possible so they'll stay crisp. If necessary, keep the first batch warm in a 250°F oven while you fry up another round.

As you fry, your friends and family will exhort you to come, sit down, eat. Ignore them. This is the martyrdom known to every latke maker: you must stand and work while others sit and enjoy. (See "Why don't we have these every night?", above.) Serve with sour cream and applesauce. You might think you could go all California and use salsa or fig chutney instead, but you would be wrong. Or not; maybe latkes are sensational with fig chutney. (Gravy, I've been told, is wonderful on matzoh balls.) But try trusting your inner grandmother first.

Latkes
This recipe makes thin, crispy latkes, more hash brown than hockey puck, because you can always make room for one more latke when they're light.

Ingredients:
2 1/2 lbs potatoes, well scrubbed
1 large yellow onion, peeled
2 eggs, separated
3 tablespoons flour or matzoh meal
1 tsp salt, or to taste
freshly ground pepper
Vegetable oil, for frying, or whatever fat you want (Yes, I'm sure bacon fat would be delicious, but really, must you?)
Sour cream and applesauce, for serving

Preparation:
1. Grate potatoes and onion alternately. Scoop grated mixture into a large colander suspended over a large bowl.

2. Squeeze and wring excess liquid out of potato mixture. Let potato mixture drain for a few minutes. Lift up colander, and pour off excess liquid below, reserving the layer of potato starch at the bottom. Dump grated potatoes on top of potato starch, and mix in egg yolks, flour, salt, and pepper, making sure to scrape the layer of potato starch into the mixture.

3. Beat egg whites to stiff peaks. Fold egg whites into potato mixture.

4. Heat 1/2 inch of vegetable oil in a heavy frying pan. Drop in a shred of potato; when it sizzles and bubbles, slide in as many large spoonfuls of potato mixture as you can without crowding. Fry over medium-high heat, turning once, until pancakes are well-browned. Add more oil as necessary for subsequent batches, but make sure to get it good and hot before adding the potatoes.

5. Drain on paper towels and serve immediately with sour cream and applesauce.

Makes about 20 latkes.