The Holiday Season is finally upon us, but it feels for us as though we have been in it for months. As you all know by now we have been planning, cooking, and photographing full menu spreads for special occasions for our new book, Gather The Art of Paleo Entertaining. This book has been an incredible challenge, but the success with how it has turned out has made the hard work more than worth it.

Bill and I have both been under a lot of stress lately, which is why you really haven’t seen much of us on here. We are working day and night to perfect this book, for which we have spent months begging friends and family to let us photograph our menus in their beautiful homes, and leading up to each shoot we spend weeks preparing the menus, prop shopping, and of course cooking. Then we pack our cars, and head off to wherever we may be shooting that week.  We are down to the wire, and unfortunately for us, our deadline falls at the same time as the Christmas season and the time we need to finish our wedding guest list and get our save-the-dates out. You can probably imagine that we haven’t been able to do much holiday shopping, or think one bit about our wedding right now.

This project has literally been back breaking work, that is sooo mentally taxing, but the feeling of success that sweeps over us as we finish each shoot and look back on the amazing photos, and remember the wonderful flavors, really keeps us inspired for the next one. It’s almost euphoric, the feeling. Although I have yet to have a baby and give birth, that is probably the closest example I can give to what this process has been like. Sweat, tears, and pain for hours and hours, and then when it’s all done the beauty of what we have created together makes us forget all the work that went into it so we are more than ready to go through it all again. Yes, that is exactly what this book has been like–child birth every single week for months. Okay maybe I have exaggerated slightly, but I’m not that far off. We have really enjoyed this project and we have a huge a attachment to our “new baby”.

Even though we are up to our eyeballs in work for this book (and the thought of holiday shopping and wedding save-the-dates are gnawing at me inside), we still wanted to celebrate the Holidays with all of you! We have perfected an oldie, but goodie, recipe for grain free gingerbread cookies. This recipe is two years old, and based off of Bill’s mom’s favorite gingerbread cookie recipe. The first time we made this recipe we baked the cookies in Bill’s parents home with his mom there and we were able to share them with her. It was a really nice moment. It’s sad to say, but we really haven’t made them since, so I was really looking forward to trying this recipe again with a few tweaks.

I have become very fond of a new baking ingredient since starting to work on Gather. Well, it’s not a “new” ingredient per se, but it was new to me. Arrowroot flour. I didn’t understand what it was before, and thought that if it wasn’t made from almond or coconut it was a Paleo sin. I have found a new love for arrowroot flour. It really adds something special to grain free baking, and seems to be that “magic ingredient” that takes an “okay” grain free baked good to the next level of “Oh Emm Gee this is like, totally the real deal!” I have always loved baking, not just because I love sweets (which I do), but because desserts are beautiful. I am a makeup artist. I love enhancing or creating beauty, and there is something absolutely exhilarating about creating a beautiful baked good. It takes time, effort, and skill, and when you can make something that special happen in your kitchen–WITHOUT gluten and conventional ingredients it’s that much more rewarding.

Now here is were we really take a walk on the wild side. A week or so ago I was staring at the wall of baking ingredients in Whole Foods. I think I have touched on this before, but I can be horrible to shop with because I will just stare off into retail space not really knowing what I want, just kind of soaking things in. Often I do the whole “get in and get out” with groceries, but sometimes I just have to stand there and look. I’m always looking for new ingredients to play with for grain free baking, and sometimes I will look even though I know I’m not going to find anything new and “safe” to cook with. We have really taken an approach to writing Gather that it is a book for people who love food, and want to enjoy food with friends and family. It’s not your typical 3o day challenge book, it’s a lifestyle book. (And we have NOTHING against doing a month of strict paleo – we’re even writing our next cookbook around that very concept!) With life comes celebrations and dessert, and our feelings on this is that as long as ingredients are ones that you can purchase with integrity, and stay grain free, then it’s all good. A grain free dessert is NOT Paleo, and is never going to be a health food. It is always going to be a dessert, so if you think you are really doing your body a good service by munching down on some “Paleo” brownies, you are fooling yourself. Grain free treats need to be treated as such, and eaten in serious moderation, and in our minds, they are best left as celebratory treats with friends and family. We never make grain free cookies at home just so we can eat them. We only ever bake for a holiday, party, event, or work. But that’s what makes it so special.

My reasoning for this explanation is to now tell you that I purchased powdered sugar at Whole Foods. I know, stop the presses! But wait… I picked up the bag, in hopes of some miracle that would tell me I could make real homemade frosting for some grain free desserts, and well, the ingredients were “cane sugar” and “tapioca starch.” …I’ll take it! Sugar is sugar people, whether it’s honey, maple syrup, coconut sugar, coconut syrup, or unrefined cane sugar. It’s all sugar! Tapioca starch is derived from cassava, which is a great starch source, and is often sold in whole food form and known as Yuca, a root vegetable that is similar in flavor and texture to white potatoes. Cane sugar and yuca…that’s all I needed to see to know that I was going to purchase that ingredient and make some real deal grass fed buttercream frosting, and last night that is exactly what I did. I whipped up a homemade buttercream frosting in our KitchenAid mixer, and once our cute little gingerbread people cooled down enough, I decorated their outfits with piped frosting. YAY!

I had a great time baking these cookies. It was fun, relaxing, rewarding, and delicious. The new recipe is simpler than our original one, and makes an easy-to-cut cookie batter. No gooey, runny dough that is tough to move around for baking. This dough was firm, yet mobile enough to roll out, and baked up beautifully. When I had used all the dough except the last little bit which wasn’t worth rolling out for more cut outs, I made a few little gingersnap cookies. The gingersnap cookies are a great alternative for this cookie dough if you do not have cookie cutters on hand but want to make a festive cookie for a Holiday party.

Gingerbread Cookies – Revised

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Serves: 12

Serves: 12

Ingredients

• 2 cup 2 cup 2 cup Blanched Almond Flour
• 2/3 cup 2/3 cup 2/3 cup Arrowroot Flour, plus more for dusting
• 1/2 tsp 1/2 tsp 1/2 tsp Salt
• 1/2 tsp 1/2 tsp 1/2 tsp Baking Soda
• 1/2 tsp 1/2 tsp 1/2 tsp Cloves, ground
• 1/2 tsp 1/2 tsp 1/2 tsp Cinnamon, ground
• 1/2 tsp 1/2 tsp 1/2 tsp Nutmeg, ground
• 1/2 tsp 1/2 tsp 1/2 tsp Ginger, ground
• 4 Tbsp 4 Tbsp 4 Tbsp Maple Sugar
• 1/2 cup 1/2 cup 1/2 cup Molasses
• 3 Tbsp 3 Tbsp 3 Tbsp Coconut Oil, Organic

Process

Note, these instructions are written assuming the standard serving size, since you have modified the number of servings, these steps may need to be modified for best results

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. In a large mixing bowl, combine blanched almond flour, arrowroot flour, salt, baking soda, cloves, cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger, and maple sugar. Stir ingredients with a wooden spoon to combine.
3. In a small sauce pan, bring molasses to a boil over medium heat.
4. Add coconut oil to the sauce pan, and stir until combined with the molasses.
5. Remove sauce pan from heat and pour into the dry ingredients.
6. Mix batter with a wooden spoon until you have formed a dark golden cookie dough, and all the dry ingredients are combined withe the molasses and coconut oil.
7. Place a sheet of parchment paper onto a flat cooking surface, and dust parchment with arrowroot flour.
8. Form dough into a ball, and place on the parchment paper. Lightly press dough down to flatten, and sprinkle with a small amount of arrowroot flour. Place another sheet of parchment paper on top of the dough, and roll into a thin sheet with a rolling pin (about 1/4 inch thick).
9. Sprinkle arrowroot on a small plate, and place cookie cutters into the arrowroot to coat the bottom for cutting. This will keep the cookie dough from sticking to the batter for an easy release after cutting.
10. Once you have made cuts throughout the entire sheet of cookie dough, carefully peel away the excess dough, and lightly transfer the cut out cookies to a parchment lined baking sheet. Form dough into another ball, and roll out again to repeat until all the dough is used.
11. Bake gingerbread people at 350 degrees for 10 minutes. Remove from oven and cool on a cookie rack before frosting.

Notes

** Maple sure is a tough ingredient to find. We often find it at our local Whole foods. If you cannot find maple sugar near you, you can use granulated coconut sugar in the same amount, or you can use maple syrup added to the molasses in the sauce pan instead of to the dry ingredients. ** If you do not want to make cut out cookies, or if you do not have cookie cutters, you can alternately form dough into 1 inch balls, and press flat with the palm of your hand on a parchment lined baking sheet, and bake for 15 minutes to make gingersnap cookies.

Vanilla Buttercream Frosting

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Serves: 12

Serves: 12

Ingredients

• 1 cup 1 cup 1 cup Butter, Unsalted
• 1 tsp 1 tsp 1 tsp Pure Vanilla Extract
• 3 Tbsp 3 Tbsp 3 Tbsp Heavy Whipping Cream, Organic
• 2 cup 2 cup 2 cup Powdered Sugar, 365 Organic, sifted

Process

Note, these instructions are written assuming the standard serving size, since you have modified the number of servings, these steps may need to be modified for best results

1. Add softened grass fed butter to the bowl of a standing mixer, and using the beater attachment, whip the butter for 5 minutes.
2. Add the vanilla extract and heavy cream, and continue to whip until incorporated.
3. Add the powdered sugar, a little bit at a time, beating the sugar into the butter after each addition. Whip until light and fluffy.
4. You can use the buttercream like this, or add natural food coloring or cocoa powder (to make chocolate frosting) as variations for decorative cupcakes and cakes.
5. Serve immediately or refrigerate until use.