It's almost New Years Eve, and you know what that means -- a lot of folks will be getting their drink on. If you have a gluten sensitivity, it doesn't mean you need to miss the revelry. A lot of hard alcohol is naturally gluten-free, and for those not into hitting the hard stuff, there are quite a lot of companies making gluten-free beer and cider.

Gluten-Free Liquor Selection
Most hard alcohols don't contain gluten, so if you prefer to make mixed drinks, you're in luck! Here is a list of alcohols that are generally gluten-free and safe to consume if you have a gluten sensitivity. Note: Product recipes can and do change, and some brands may add caramel coloring to their liquors, which may contain gluten. Be sure to check the label before imbibing! Only you can be responsible for your gluten intake.

• Absinthe
• Bourbon
• Brandy
• Cognac
• Gin
• Grand Marnier
• Grenadine
• Jägermeister
• Kahlua
• Mead
• Ouzo
• Rum
• Sherry
• Southern Comfort
• Tequila
• Triple Sec
• Vermouth
• Vodka
• Whisky

Gluten-Free Champagne
The traditional drink of the evening for New Years Eve is Champagne or sparkling white wine, but is it gluten-free? Traditionally, sparkling wines are not made with any gluten-y ingredients, so it is usually safe to consume. As with any food or beverage, you should still check with a manufacturer before buying a bottle to double-check that they haven't added any non-standard ingredients to their product.

Gluten-Free Beer
A great default drink if you're just looking to have a mellow night is beer. Anyone with a gluten sensitivity will tell you that beer is a sore point -- until recently, gluten-free beer options were few and far between. These days, there are almost too many varieties to count! Here are a few of the best gluten-free beers, at least a few of which you should be able to find in most large natural grocery stores:

• Green's
• New Grist
• Redbridge
• O'Brien
• Glutaner
• Bard's
• Rampano Valley
• Mission Amber

Gluten-Free Cider
Cider is a lot of people's drink of choice, since it's sweet and relatively low alcohol. Standard ciders often contain caramel coloring or other gluten-y additives, so it's important to check the label before drinking cider. The following brands are know to contain no gluten products, and have proven safe to drink in the past:

• Ace Cider
• Blackthorn
• Blue Mountain
• Cider Jack
• Fox Barrel
• Magner's
• Newton's Folly
• Original Sin
• Spire Mountain
• Strongbow
• Woodchuck Granny Smith
• Wyder's

Where Can You Buy Gluten-Free Beer and Cider?
Here in the Bay Area, we're lucky enough to be surrounded by shops that provide a huge selection of gluten-free products. Here are a handful of places you'll find a variety of gluten-free alcohol beverages. When you shop, be sure to let the manager know you appreciate the fact that they stock gluten-free products!

The Wine Mine
5427 Telegraph Ave, Ste D1
Oakland, CA 94609
(510) 547-9463

Mollie Stone's Market
Mollie Stone's supermarket has eight locations around the bay, and each location carries a good selection of gluten-free beer and cider.

Whole Foods Market
With locations all around the Bay Area, there is probably a Whole Foods near you.

Take Care!
No matter what you're drinking, don't forget to take care of yourself by eating a big meal early in the evening and drinking lots of water throughout the night. And if you wake up with the obligatory hangover on New Years Day, there are always hangover cures to help through.

Happy New Year!

Preparing Christmas dinner is already stressful, especially if you're cooking for a houseful of hungry holiday guests. If you add a gluten allergy to an already intimidating situation, it's enough to put a well-meaning home cook over the edge!

Take heart, dear reader. Cooking a gluten-free Christmas dinner is not difficult at all. With a few recipes and cooking tips in your arsenal, you can easily feed everyone at the table an impressive meal without sending your gluten-y guests running for the door.

Hors D'oeuvres
Gluten-free hors d'oeuvres are probably the easiest part of the meal. A platter full of fresh veggies with ranch dressing is always a hit, as is a plate with sliced cheese and Kalamata olives. Traditional baguettes with olive oil and balsamic are out, but your local gluten-free bakery may carry gluten-free French bread -- call to find out.

While veggies and cheese are great, what if you want to spruce up your early dishes with something special? Here are a few recipes that will liven up your pre-meal game.

• Smoked Paprika Almonds
• Fig Tapenade with Walnut Crackers
• Butter-toasted Hazelnut
• Crab Spread
• Turkey Meatballs with Cranberry Sauce
• Baked Brie

Sides
Side dishes are another easy part of a gluten-free holiday dinner. Stick to vegetable-based recipes and you'll find a lot of dishes that are gluten-free by default, requiring no doctoring or wheat analogues. If you really want to make something that involves bread crumbs or a crust, your local natural foods store will carry a selection of gluten-free options. For something more original, check out these wonderful sides by some of the internet's best gluten-free cooks.

• Green Bean Casserole
• Tassajara Warm Red Cabbage Salad
• Broccolini with Brown Butter and Cashews
• Pumpkin Potato Gratin & Mushroom Swiss Chard
• Wild Rice and Mushroom Bake Recipe
• And what's dinner without gluten-free dinner rolls?

Entrees
Christmas foods in the United States are much more free-form than traditional Thanksgiving fare, but a lot of folks still love their turkey or ham for dinner. Try thinking outside of the box when planning your holiday entree, taking a cue from these recipes.

• Make-Ahead Gravy
• Roasting the Perfect Turkey
• Corn and Bean Casserole
• Apricot Turkey
• Gluten-Free Coconut Chicken with Sunbutter Sauce
• Tiny Turkey Meatballs Atop Penne and Escarole
• CrockPot Maple Ham Recipe
• Are you a Honeybaked Ham lover? Then you're in luck, because the company's signature sweetened, cured ham is now gluten-free!

Dessert
For many, the best part of dinner comes after all the savory plates have been cleared. Many folks get tripped up when it comes to preparing gluten-free desserts, since baking with wheat flour is what we've all come to accept as the norm for American sweets. The following recipes are all gluten-free, but more importantly, they're incredible desserts that everyone at your table will love.

• Buy goodies from a gluten-free bakery
• Salted Caramel Hot Cocoa
• Gluten-Free Toffee Pecan Apple Streusel
• Make gluten-free gingerbread cookies
• Down Under Pavlova
• Pumpkin Pie
• Double Chocolate Mocha Cookies

Merry Christmas, everyone! I wish you all a drama and stress-free holiday dinner.

Gingerbread cookies are one of my favorite parts of the holiday season. I haven't made Christmas cookies since discovering I had a gluten sensitivity, a sad, sad situation that many gluten-free folks experience. Learning a new kind of baking is scary, and all it takes is one flop to make sure you never make another attempt.

For me, I just never tried. I figured I could never compete with my grandma's gingerbread recipe that I grew up with, and the idea of duplicating her perfectly tender recipe without using wheat flour threw me for a loop. This year, I got over myself. And guess what? The gingerbread cookies I made were nothing short of incredible.

There's a trick to working with gluten-free dough, since it's much stickier than doughs made with wheat flour. It needs to be kept chilled, and once it's been cut with cookie cutters, moving it from one place to another is nearly impossible because it likes to hang onto to everything it touches. The best way to work with gluten-free cookie doughs is to roll it out between two pieces of parchment and then stick it in the fridge for 30 minutes. Once it's chilled, you can cut out your shapes with cookie cutters.

At this point I recommend removing the excess dough to be re-rolled, and then cutting the parchment around the cookies with a pair of scissors. The cookies can then be moved without contorting into ridiculous shapes, and since they're on parchment, they won't stick to the cookie sheet after they're done baking. Once they're done, I move the baked cookies while they're still secured to the parchment, leaving them on the paper until they're completely cooled and not likely to break into pieces.

Also, I found the funniest cookie cutters I've seen in a long time: Fred & Friends Ninjabread Men Cookie Cutters. While you can buy them online, I got my ninjabread men at a local East Bay gift shop called Nathan & Co. This little shop carries a huge array of culinary gifts, and if you're looking for some last minute presents for the foodie in your life, I can't recommend this place enough. Another place to shop for gifts for the chef in your family is Urban Indigo, in Oakland.

Gluten-Free Gingerbread Cookies

Makes: About 2 dozen 3-inch cookies

Ingredients:
1/2 cup non-hydrogenated shortening
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 teaspoon xanthan gum
1/8 teaspoon guar gum
2 egg yolks
1/4 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1/3 cup blackstrap molasses
1 1/2 cups gluten-free flour mix
1/2 cup + 2 tablespoons sweet rice flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
1/4 teaspoon allspice
1/2 teaspoon salt
Icing and sprinkles for decorating

Recipe method:

1. With a stand mixer or electric hand beater, beat shortening, sugar, xanthan gum, and guar gum until well mixed. Add in egg yolks and beat for 1 minute, then add vanilla and molasses and mix until well incorporated.

2. Add gluten-free flour mix, sweet rice flour, baking soda, cinnamon, ginger, cloves, allspice, and salt. Beat until you've got a smooth dough. Roll dough out between two pieces of parchment until it is 1/2-inch thick and refrigerate for 1 hour.

3. Remove dough from fridge and cut with cookie cutters. Remove the excess dough from between the shapes and cut the parchment around the cookies with a pair of scissors. Gently move the cookies with their attached parchment to a cookie sheet and place the baking sheet in the refrigerator to keep the cookies chilled. Repeat until you've used up all the dough.

4. Once all the dough has been cut with cookie cutters and the shapes are arranged on a baking sheet, place the baking sheets in the refrigerator for 30 minutes. Preheat the oven to 350° while they are chilling.

5. Bake cookies for 7 minutes. Remove from oven and allow to cool on pan for 5 minutes before moving the cookies, with their attached piece of parchment, to a cooling rack. Allow to cool fully before decorating.

6. Decorate cookies by piping with your favorite decorating icing and then sprinkling with colorful sprinkles. The sky's the limit!

Looking for more gluten-free holiday cookies?
Gluten-Free Linzer Cookies
Gluten Free Gingerbread House
Gluten-Free Christmas Stars
Last-Minute Christmas Treats – Toffee and Ginger Chip Teff Cookies

Pizza is probably America's favorite default dinner, but it's a dish that a lot of people take for granted. When the average person is hungry, it's easy to call a favorite delivery place or walk down to a local pizzeria to grab a slice. Pizza is cheap, portable, incredibly savory, and seems to have an eternal half-life when left on a unrefrigerated countertop. It makes sense that it claims the position as America's favorite food.

But what if you can't eat the primary component of pizza, the part on which all savory toppings rely -- the crust? For decades, gluten-free folk were out of luck. Aside from making any number of pizza-like concoctions at home, it was all but impossible to order for delivery or find a sit-down place where you could enjoy a pie with your friends. Pizza, as heartbreaking as it sounds, was off limits. Serious fail.

GLUTEN-FREE PIZZA PLACES AROUND THE BAY AREA
I know I keep saying how lucky we are to live in the Bay Area, where a huge variety of gluten-free options are available to everyone. We live in a place where, on a moment's notice, anyone with a gluten-free constitution can get an allergy-friendly baguette at a local bakery and cupcakes at the supermarkets. So what about pizza? Thankfully, we have many awesome pizzerias around the San Francisco Bay that serve up a dish so good, so dripping with ooey-gooey mozzarella and fresh pepperoni, that you've never miss regular, gluten-laden pizza again. Here are a few of my favorite places.

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Moraga: Pennini's Ristorante Italiano
Pennini's Ristorante Italiano is tucked away in the Rheem Valley area of Moraga, a town hidden on the south side of Highway 24, halfway between Oakland and Concord. I visited Pannini's with a friend who used to live nearby. He claimed to have found the best gluten-free pizza on the face of the planet, and me being the suspicious foodie that I am, I scoffed. That night we visited the restaurant, and I was shocked to find a pizza crust that rivaled most regular pizzas that I've eaten in my life. The soft, thin crust was filled with a perfectly stretchy mozzarella cheese and a ton of spicy pepperoni. Suffice it to say, this has become one of my favorite pizza places. Note: Last I heard they were planning on carrying gluten-free beer, though I can't say for sure if they sell it at the moment.

Pennini's Ristorante Italiano
1375 Moraga Way, Suite D
Moraga, CA 94556
(925) 376-1515

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Oakland: Pizza Rustica
Pizza Rustica in Oakland is a favorite place of mine, mostly because they deliver gluten-free pizza right to my house. They use crusts made by Patti Furey Crane over at Oakland's Mariposa Baking Company, another East Bay gluten-free business. While Rustica offers your standard pizza flavors -- margherita, meat lovers, and straight cheese -- you'll also find a delightfully creative selection of pizzas that you've probably never tried before:

• Salsiccia: Fresh house-made Italian fennel sausage, garlic, house-made tomato sauce
• Capricciosa: Smoked lean ham, marinated artichoke hearts, roasted garlic, Kalamata olives, Roma tomatoes
• Hellenic: Tomatoes, roasted eggplant, Kalamata olives, feta and garlic
• Carnivore: Molinari Pepperoni, house-made Italian fennel sausage, pancetta, spicy cajun sausage, garlic and tomato sauce

Really, how could you go wrong with toppings like that?

Pizza Rustica
5422 College Ave
Oakland, CA 94618
(510) 654-1601

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San Francisco: Eagle Pizzeria
If you're in San Francisco and you're looking for a quaint little sit-down pizzeria, check out Eagle Pizzeria in the Sunset. A recent convert to the gluten-free army, the owners of Eagle are intent of offering some of the best gluten-free pizza in SF. With a solid lineup of toppings and a fanatical neighborhood following, Eagle Pizzeria is sure to sate that reptilian PIZZA-NOW urge that has become a huge part of American physiology.

Eagle Pizzeria
1712 Taraval Street
San Francisco, CA 94116
(415) 566-3113

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All Over: Amici's East Coast Pizzeria
Being a fan of paper-thin crust on my pizza, I always missed dining at Amici's Pizza once I learned that I was unable to eat gluten. Then, last year, a friend informed me that they started making a gluten-free pizza that very closely resembled their regular pie. I jumped at the chance and headed down to their Menlo Park location that very night, and was stoked to find that indeed, their gluten-free pizza was just as good as the regular Amici's offerings I'd grown to love.

With several locations throughout the Bay Area that span the South Bay, North Bay, East Bay, Peninsula, and San Francisco, there's no doubt that you live within a half-hour drive of one of their shops. While many of their locations already carry the gluten-free menu, some are still implementing the change -- so I recommend you call ahead of time to make sure your local Amici's can meet your dietary requirements.

Amici's East Coast Pizzeria Locations

• Cupertino
• Danville
• Dublin
• Menlo Park
• Mountain View
• Redwood Shores
• San Francisco
• San Jose
• San Mateo
• San Rafael
• Vacaville
• Complete list of Bay Area locations

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Make it at Home!
If you're interested in making your own gluten-free pizza at home, locals will tell you that the best prepared pizza crusts come from Oakland's Mariposa Baking Company. They sell crusts frozen in packs of two, and they slip easily into a freezer for future nomming. Mariposa Baking also sells pizza by the slice for lunch, with a wide variety of exciting configurations that change by the day. If you're in Oakland and miss those days when you could just pop into a pizza place for a quick slice, I highly recommend stopping by -- and grabbing a handful of the bakery's other goodies, such as brownies, cupcakes, and coconut lemon bars. It's gluten-free heaven, I tell ya!

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

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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

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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

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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.

Gluten-Free Dinner Rolls. Photo by Jeanne Sauvage

Thanksgiving, routinely a flour-heavy culinary event, is my favorite holiday -- so you can imagine what a bummer it was to learn that gluten was a key factor in the health problems I'd been battling for many years. While I was relieved to find the culprit in my health drama, I have to say that a lifetime of Thanksgivings sans pie, stuffing and dinner rolls made for a grim holiday season indeed.

I'm never one to back down from a challenge. Slowly, as I learned to bake using a completely new set of rules, I discovered that gluten-free baked goods can rival their wheaty counterparts. I learned how to make a gluten-free version of Thanksgiving stuffing, a fantastic butternut squash pie, and everything else that a normal person would sit down to enjoy with their loved ones. Sure, at first my family balked at my "weird" cornbread, but once they came around, they discovered that what I was making tasted good. Actually, I'd venture to say that my from-scratch versions tasted better than a lot of the prefab, processed stuff that my family normally layed out on the table during the holidays. But that's another post.

Somewhere out there, I know there's a person who's just gotten a diagnosis of celiac disease, or maybe someone they love has gotten the diagnosis. Either way, they're suddenly in a similar position as I was all those years ago, wondering what the hell to make for Thanksgiving dinner when you can't use white flour. Well, guess what? You're in luck! These days gluten-free resources are ripe for the picking, unlike a decade ago when they'd look at you funny if you walked into the grocery store and asked for brown rice flour and xanthan gum. Now, gluten-free blogs abound and bookstores have entire shelves dedicated to gluten-free cooking. To say we live in a time of gluten free bounty would be an understatement.

So what did I miss most about Thanksgiving once I learned I was gluten intolerant? What was the first thing I just had to recreate so that I could enjoy this holiday like a normal person? You might laugh at the simplicity of my needs, but I'll share anyways: it was the humble dinner roll. More than anything, I wanted a soft, warm roll that I could spread with a swath of sweet cream butter and soak up the pools of meaty gravy on my plate.

This year I found a gluten-free dinner roll recipe that puts mine to shame. This recipe comes from Jeanne Sauvage, an intrepid gluten-free baker who chronicles her adventures at The Art of Gluten-Free Baking. These light, airy rolls are perfect for soaking up any leftover turkey goodness, or for enjoying on their own whenever the carb fiend demands more than a bowl of rice.

Photo by Jeanne Sauvage

Gluten-Free Dinner Rolls for Thanksgiving
By Jeanne Sauvage of The Art of Gluten-Free Baking

Makes: about 20 rolls

Ingredients for Jeanne's gluten-free all-purpose flour mix:
1 1/4 cup brown rice flour
1 1/4 cup white rice flour
1 cup tapioca flour
1 cup sweet rice flour
2 scant teaspoons xanthan gum

Prepare the flour mix:

1. Sift ingredients together and store in the refrigerator.

Ingredients for dinner rolls:
Melted butter for pan and brushing tops of rolls
Tapioca flour for coating pan
1/4 cup sugar
2 cups warm (not hot) milk
2 tablespoons active dry yeast, such as Red Star
3 cups Jeanne's gluten-free all-purpose flour mix (recipe above)
1 tablespoon xanthan gum
4 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
2 large eggs
2 teaspoons apple cider vinegar
1/4 cup vegetable oil

Prepare the gluten-free dinner rolls:

1. Butter muffin tins well and dust with flour.

2. In a small bowl, whisk sugar into warm milk. Add yeast and whisk to dissolve. Set aside to allow the yeast time to proof -- you'll know this is happening when it starts to get foamy on top.

3. In a medium-sized bowl, mix together flour, xanthan gum, baking powder, and salt. Set aside.

4. In bowl of stand mixer, beat together eggs, apple cider vinegar and oil. Add yeast mixture, beat well, then add flour mixture, beating on high with paddle attachment for 3 minutes.

5. Spoon dough into prepared muffin tins, filling to 3/4 of each cup. With a butter knife that has been dipped in tapioca flour, cut a deep slash in the top of each roll. Don't worry if there's a little extra tapioca flour left on the rolls.

6. Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Put muffin tins on top of stove to rise in close proximity to warmth of the preheating stove. Let rise until they have just about doubled in bulk, about 40 minutes. Once rolls have risen, brush the top of each with melted butter and bake in preheated oven until the tops are a nice golden brown, about 20 minutes.

7. Remove rolls from tins and place them in a towel-lined basket to keep warm. These rolls keep well, although you'll probably eat them all the day you bake them!

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I'd like to share a few more recipes that I've grown to love over the years as I crafted the perfect gluten-free Thanksgiving dinner spread. These dishes are from people who truly love -- and live -- the art of gluten-free eating. You'll find them not only satisfying, but seductive, gratifying, and tantalizing to every centimeter of your palate.

• Pumpkin pie
• Acorn squash with cranberry apple stuffing
• Beef and mushroom rice bake with cranberries
• Green bean shallot salad & champagne vinaigrette

A few years ago Shauna, the blogger aka Gluten-Free Girl, wrote about Eating Gluten-Free in Italy. She was amazed at how many gluten-free products she found there. It turns out celiac disease is the most common genetic disease in Europe and in Italy about 1 in 250 people suffer from it.

Celiac disease is a digestive disease that damages the small intestine and interferes with the absorption of nutrients from food. Celiacs cannot tolerate a protein called gluten, commonly found in wheat, rye, barley, and possibly oats. The problem is, gluten can be very hard to avoid. It's not just in things made from flour but as an additive in things like bouillon, candy, cured meats, sauces, soups, soy sauce and even tortilla chips. The symptoms of celiac disease are many and include a whole host of gastrointestinal disorders, making it hard to diagnose.

Relatively few Americans are diagnosed with celiac disease, it's estimated most suffer unknowingly. Fortunately awareness is growing in no small part thanks to food blogs like Gluten-Free Girl, Karina's Kitchen and La Tartine Gourmande (mostly gluten-free). Each of these three blogs include plenty of recipes but are really about the love of food and how our experiences connect us all, written by passionate, funny women with unusually strong creative talents.

Celiac products are beginning to show up on shelves, and not surprisingly some of the best are from Italy like two newly introduced gluten-free organic pastas from Rustichella d'Abruzzo. One is made entirely from corn, the other from rice. If you are cooking for someone who is celiac, they are a great choice. Each are light and flavorful, but like conventional pasta they must not be overcooked or they become gummy. The rice noodles are particularly good with Asian style sauces and the corn noodles pair well with Southwestern flavors. Here are a couple more suggestions for how to use them, courtesy of Market Hall Foods, I think canned tomatoes would work in place of fresh too:

• Cook some loose Italian sausage with fresh tomatoes and garlic and toss with the Corn Fusili
• Stir together fresh tomatoes, black olives, feta cheese and fresh parsley and mint. Let marinate for a few hours and toss with the Rice Spaghetti

Two good books for celiacs include Shauna's book, Gluten-Free Girl How I Found the Food That Loves Me Back...And How You Can Too and 1000 Gluten-Free Recipe. Shauna's book will be an inspiration to anyone who wants to enjoy food, not just tolerate it. While Gluten-Free Girl has some recipes in it, the real bible is 1000 Gluten-Free Recipes. It's what the Joy of Cooking is for the rest of us, a place to find a recipe for almost everything under the sun.

In a few hours I will be attending the wedding of a friend who has Celiac Disease. Her wedding will be a gluten-free picnic and all the guests will bring something in this theme.

I know very little, almost nothing about what I call "alternative baking." Luckily for me crisp topping is not really considered baking. There are no eggs, no chemical leaveners, no attempt at expecting something to rise in the oven, no faerie-dust finesse needed in the mixer. I need to put a bunch of gluten free flours together with various sugars and spices and butter, and hopefully, voila! Crisp topping baked onto glorious Pacific Northwest berries galore.

"Alternative Baking" is tricky business. Little has been written about the properties of these new flours as they relate or translate to what we know of wheat flour. Although wheat has not always been a year-round crop, almost all American and European baked goods start with it.

Celiac Disease is not the only major food allergy gaining momentum today. With the prevalence of soy and corn and wheat in almost everything consume, whether we know it's there or not, we are developing allergies to ingredients we are eating far too much of. Baking, cooking and eating that is considered "alternative" today may well be considered normal/standard/conventional in a dozen years or less.

Books like Heidi Swanson's Super Natural Cooking have helped me to understand new flours like Mesquite, Teff, Sorghum. In her beginning chapters, she gently and thoroughly explains the nutritional, taste and baking properties of many of these almost mysterious new things.

But, like all new ingredients, one must experiment until one gets what tastes good to them. Because crisp topping has no dangerous raw ingredients you can taste it, and adjust according to taste when it looks ready.

Follow instructions for the crisp topping I made last year near this time. It is exactly the same.

Here is what I put together for today's gluten free challenge. I used a scale so I could check proportions better. And I wrote it all down as I went along, tasting a tiny bit of each flour first to check texture and flavor. All these flours are ground to a different consistency, so measuring them in cups would have been dangerous. Some are heavier than others. (All Purpose unbleached (white) wheat flour generally weighs 5-6 oz. per cup)

2.5 oz Teff flour
4 oz. Sorghum flour
5 oz. Sushi rice flour
1.25 oz. Tapioca flour
1.75 ounces Mesquite flour
2 teaspoons Kosher salt
1 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
2 1/2 teaspoons ground cardamon
1/2 teaspoon cardamon seeds*
1.75 sugar
3 oz. raw sugar
8 oz. Dark brown sugar
1 pound unsalted butter
*optional

All of these flours can be found at Rainbow Grocery. If you have a friend who is gluten-free, I hope you get the chance to make this for them!

I'm a bit of a skeptic when it comes to whole grains. You know the ones I mean: Amaranth. Millet. Quinoa. Teff. They sound faintly exotic, like semiprecious jewels or new colors from the Pottery Barn paint collection. But they also have a hippie-dippy air about them, and I like my food full of flavor (and my underarms shaved, thank-you-very-much).

With superstar bloggers like Heidi Swanson constantly singing their praises, though, lately I've started to waver. But something held me back. And then I went out and ate nine desserts in one sitting -- a feast so ridiculous even Dionysus himself would have surely chided me for it -- and I began looking about for ways to eat healthier. As luck would have it, The Wheat-Free Cook (William Morrow, $24.95) arrived in my mailbox during this moment of curiosity, and the first recipe to catch my eye was quinoa salad with cucumber, tomato, and mint.

Since that sounded like a dish for a warm, sunny day, I decided to call up the book's author while I waited for such a day to appear on San Francisco's foggy horizon. Jacqueline Mallorca is a local food writer who started her career by writing the first ever Williams-Sonoma catalog and later became an editorial assistant to James Beard and a San Francisco Chronicle food columnist. She now has more than 11 cookbooks to her name.

A little over ten years ago, Jackie was diagnosed with celiac disease. For Jackie and 1.5 million Americans, that means gluten, a protein found in wheat, barley, and rye, makes them sick. Like most newly diagnosed sufferers, she was taken aback by all the foods she could suddenly no longer eat -- bread, pancakes, crackers, cereal.

"Being a cook, a foodie from way back, I laughed heartily at the diet sheet I was handed, and said, 'Oh no, I can do better than that.' I started reinventing the way that I cook," Jackie told me over the phone.

That meant shifting to nut flours for cakes and cookies, rice flour for things like pasta or bread, and the aforementioned hippie-dippy grains I've been suspiciously eyeing for years. After spending a decade cooking gluten-free, she collected some of her favorite recipes in The Wheat-Free Cook.

Even though I can eat gluten, flipping through those recipes made my tummy rumble. They looked simple and sounded delicious: onion-Gruyere tart, Asian stick noodles with pork and asparagus, cornmeal and cheese shortbread.

Jackie says that her restrictions have actually made her cooking better. "A lot of the time, particularly if I'm making cookies and little petit fours and cakes with nut flours, they turn out much more delicious than the original versions because you're using such fine ingredients. Cakes made with ground almonds and the best quality [cocoa] powder and three or four eggs taste wonderful because they taste of the almonds and the good stuff," she reported.

I wanted to know more about all the funky grains that peppered the book, so I asked her what she couldn't do without, even if she could eat gluten again. "I'd never stop using quinoa because it cooks up very fluffy, and it makes the best grain salad because it doesn't go hard like rice does when it's chilled. I wouldn't give up on millet because it makes a really terrific pilaf. I wouldn't give up on teff flour because it makes the best brownies under the sun," she readily answered. "I find it's like cooking in color instead of cooking in black and white."

The sheer poetry of her answer inspired me to dig deeper into the cookbook. I went out and bought white rice flour to use for dredging sautéed foods in based on Jackie's observation that it's less gummy than flour. I dog-eared a recipe for peanut butter-chocolate chip cookies and another one for chocolate-hazelnut truffle cake (healthy eating having been long forgotten at this point). And yes, I bought some red quinoa.

A sunny day finally appeared, and I set to making the salad. I tossed in a bit of roasted chicken to make it a meal, subbed some spicy cayenne pepper for fresh ground black, and let it sit in the fridge so the flavors could introduce themselves. "Hiya," I imagined the cucumber saying. "How fresh!" would be the radish's sharp reply. But the quinoa just sat there, still and gentle, subtly flavorful, and down-to-earth. Yum.

Quinoa Salad with Cucumber, Tomato, and Mint
Serves 4-6

Recipe adapted and reprinted with permission from The Wheat-Free Cook by Jacqueline Mallorca, William Morrow, $24.95.

2 cups gluten-free vegetable broth
1 cup red or yellow quinoa, rinsed and drained
1 cup shredded roasted chicken
1 cucumber (about 8 ounces), peeled, seeded, and chopped
2 large, ripe tomatoes, finely chopped, preferably heirloom
4 green onions, thinly sliced
8 radishes, finely chopped
¼ cup chopped mint
½ cup chopped parsley
1/3 cup extra virgin olive oil
2 tablespoons red wine vinegar
Fine sea salt and cayenne pepper

1. Bring the broth to a boil over high heat. Add the quinoa, reduce the heat to low, cover, and simmer until the grains are tender and the liquid is absorbed, about 15 minutes. The grains will turn transparent, and the white germ ring will show. Transfer to a large bowl and let cool.

2. Add the chicken, cucumber, tomatoes, green onions, radishes, mint, and parsley. Whisk together the olive oil and vinegar, and season to taste with salt and cayenne pepper. Pour over the quinoa and vegetables, and mix gently but thoroughly. Taste for seasoning and adjust as needed. Serve at room temperature.

Shuna Lydon & Sherry Yard, both on team #1.

A number of months ago I received an email from an old pastry chef of mine, Stephen Durfee, who is now an instructor at The Culinary Institute of America, Greystone campus in Napa Valley. He was letting me know I would soon receive an invitation to The Fifth Annual Worlds of Flavor Baking & Pastry Arts Invitational Retreat.

But I thought I would have to respectfully decline, because I am not currently working for a specific establishment. The only name on my chef's jacket is my own. I could not be more grateful that Stephen talked me out of my no.

For 3 1/2 days at the end of April I breathed, thought, emoted, questioned, hypothesized, puzzled over, laughed about, informed, taught, learned, listened, typed, photographed, argued and dreamt pastry and dessert making. {I also "live-blogged" it. Find the blow-by-blow by clicking on this link.}

Notes from the Ideation Session before we went into the kitchen to start creating.

The dessert ideas and chef teams that were formed our team's Ideation Session.

From 8:30 am until near 8 pm every day our 70 plus pastry chef and industry representatives' gaggle went from demonstration, to lecture, to lunch, and then at night many of us went out to dine and commiserate. On the last day and a half we were broken up into 5 teams on the basis of various themes and asked to create 4 desserts each.

Team #1, my own, was themed "Health and Agriculture." In the one hour Ideation Session Sherry Yard and I threw out a lot of excited ideas, were reigned in, we all picked partners and then walked into the palatial kitchens that make up CIA's kitchen classroom. For the 'fruit dessert' my cohort/teammate was Master Bread Baker Mark Furstenberg from Washington DC.

The idea was we would showcase one ingredient, rhubarb. Although rhubarb is not a fruit, it's what's most in season right this minute, and I wanted to show off a special method I have of cooking/treating it, so as to preserve its original integrity, its rhubarb-ness. I like to hot-sugar poach the stalk in such a way as to keep it's crunchy, sour nature. {For a full explanation and recipe, order the Spring 2006 issue of Edible San Francisco, where I went into great detail about osmotic reciprocity and why rhubarb always turns into mushy, stringy baby food when it's introduced to heat.}

Verbena from the Julia Child Gardens at CIA, infused cream and rhubarb juice.

Mark made a slightly savory biscotti of cornmeal and toasted almonds, and besides the rhubarb I wanted something to mediate the textures and flavors of the rhubarb and cornmeal cookie. Plated dessert making is about balance. Pastry chefs are always thinking about texture, flavor, presentation, sweetness, acid, production, size, plating speed, accessibility, temperature, and the food you ate before eating our courses. The best desserts are the ones not made on autopilot. Don't get me wrong, I like my lemon bars, chocolate eclairs and creme brulee, but I want the pastry chef to be paying attention to all the ingredients to produce the best possible taste sensation.

Because of rhubarb's high acid content, it likes to be married with fat. I ate at Gary Danko recently and was not surprised to see rhubarb paired with foie gras. Rhubarb likes butter, cream, creme fraiche, and eggs. But the actual flavor of rhubarb is fairly subtle. If I want a diner to really taste it, I try and make pairings that are of complementary, not competitive flavors.

To this end, I made a light and aromatic, herbaceous sabayon. Instead of wine or alcohol, though, I juiced rhubarb raw through an extractor. If you have time for all these steps I can guarantee you an elegant and voluptuous, seasonal dessert.

David Winsberg of Happy Quail Farms said that he'll have rhubarb through 'til August, but Sabayon is a perfect foil for most fresh fruits, especially berries and stone fruit.

RHUBARB-VERBENA SABAYON

Large Egg Yolks 4-6 each
Sugar 1/4 cup
Honey 3 Tablespoons + (2 Tablespoons: later)
Sea or Kosher Salt Pinch

Rhubarb Juice 3/4 Cup

*Verbena, fresh The leaves from 3 stalks
Heavy Cream, not ultra pasteurized 2 Cups (I use Clover Organic.)

*Knoll Farms has some of the best Verbena available in the Bay Area.

1. Infuse cream and lightly crushed Verbena leaves and stems in a non-reactive pot by heating with low flame until hot. Shut off heat and let steep for at least one hour, preferably more. Do not allow mixture to boil. You can sprinkle in a little sugar to help with infusion.
2. After cream has steeped, turn flame to medium until hot to the touch and strain through a fine meshed sieve. Chill cream in ice batch until very cold. (This step may be done 1-2 days before making Sabayon.)
3. Combine first four ingredients in the bowl of a stand mixer. Whisk yolks to break apart before adding sugar and salt.
4. Set bowl over a pot of boiling water. Bottom of bowl should not touch water. The steam is what's cooking the Sabayon.
5. Whisk thoroughly and rapidly, without pause, and, using your other hand, pour rhubarb juice into yolks a little at a time, letting custard thicken a little before adding more. When all liquid has been added, whisk until mixture holds a visible "trail" and has become quite thick.
6. Place bowl on stand mixer fitted with a whisk attachment and set speed to medium. Add extra 2 Tablespoons of honey now. If it looks like honey spun to attach itself to the side of the bowl, stop mixer and scrape down Sabayon with a spatula to combine.
7. Increasing speed incrementally, whisk until custard is light and voluminous.
8. Whisk Verbena infused cream until soft peaks form.
9. When Sabayon is ready, transfer into a larger bowl.
10. Using the most pliable spatula in your kitchen, fold whipped cream into Sabayon in three distinctive additions. Fold intentionally, from the inside of the bowl to the outermost edge. Each stroke counts. If you over mix these two ingredients your Sabayon will deflate to the point of liquidization.

Rhubarb-Verbena Sabayon with Crunchy Poached Rhubarb, Corn-Almond Biscotti and Marshall Farms Star Thistle Honey. Pastry Chef Authors: Shuna Lydon & Mark Furstenberg.

Sabayon keeps, refrigerated, for 1 day, but it is best the day it is made.