Amy's Kitchen's *new* non-dairy rice macaroni & Cheese

Yes, we have found the holy grail of pre-packaged, frozen gluten & dairy free macaroni and cheese. It is the one pictured above. Amy's Kitchen rice macaroni with non-dairy cheese. The "cheese" is actually from a company, called Daiya Foods, They have the single-most, best-tasting non-dairy cheese that we've ever tried! We haven't actually tried the cheese itself yet, but mainly because I haven't bitten the bullet and ordered any. As of yet, it's (Daiya) not available locally in any stores, although I keep hoping and am keeping my fingers crossed. If this product is any indication, I can tell that we will LOVE the plain Daiya cheese. It comes in two flavors.... cheddar and mozzarella. I'm excited to get the mozzarella as I'm sure it will be quite delicious on pizzas or even shredded up on some spaghetti for Ashton!

Now that is what I find completely amazing ..... my younger son took one look at his brother's bowl of macaroni & cheese, and asked me if I had given him the wrong one!! You see, Holden wanted a bowl of macaroni and cheese too, so I made him some Kraft macaroni and cheese (you know, that gluten/casein-laden kind.... the kind that WILL cause Ashton to have some serious bathroom issues).

So, which one do you think is the Amy's Kitchen and which one is the Kraft? Other than the noodles of one of them being a bit fatter, they basically look the same, don't ya think? They both looked, smelled and somewhat tasted the same. I have NEVER EVER found a GFCF macaroni and cheese that looked, smelled and tasted so close to the real thing. No wonder Ashton loves this stuff! 

If you're wondering..... 

the bowl on the left is the Kraft mac and cheese and the 

one on the right is the Amy's Kitchen mac and cheese.

As you can see from the picture, Ashton was thoroughly enjoying his dinner. A bit perturbed that mommy was interrupting him to take pictures (how dare I!) and yes, that is a can of Pepsi throwback he's drinking. (hey, at least there's not HFCS - high fructose corn syrup - in it!)

So there you have it ....... delicious macaroni and cheese ... AND it's safe for him to eat!! Now I'm on a mission to get a more local store to carry it. Right now, I've only found it at Navan Foods, which is a local (Virginia Beach) allergy-friendly food store. He's already eaten the four boxes of this that I've bought, so I need to get back out there and get some more. I do believe it's his new, favorite food.

Thanks for looking!

GFCF Mac & Cheese!!!

Doesn't this creamy-looking dish look delicious?! Would you have guessed that it was gluten-free & casein-free? If I hadn't been the one to make it last night, I'm not sure that I would have known!! :)

What kid doesn't love a creamy, warm, satisfying bowl of macaroni & cheese once in a while? But for some children (my older son, Ashton, included) having that satisfying bowl of creamy macaroni & cheese can make them seriously ill, or even lead to a severe allergic reaction! I will let this lead me to say that prior to going on the gluten-free, casein-free diet, my son was the lover of all things macaroni & cheese. If it looked like macaroni & cheese, he'd eat it! But when, on a whim, we decided to try the gluten-free, casein-free (otherwise known as GFCF) diet for him, he could no longer have this creamy, yellow goodness! I found lots of substitutes (every one of which, Ashton would eat) but I found them to be less than stellar and some, downright disgusting! Some even smelled like dirty socks out of the package, YUCK! I was determined to find SOMETHING that I could feed to my son that didn't leave me gagging or with the desire to throw it in the trash before he dug in. So that leads me to last night.....

Well, this delicious looking bowl of creamy goodness came pretty close and was a HUGE hit with Ashton last night! I had went to Navan Foods earlier this week and saw that they now carried both the mozzarella and cheddar forms of the Teese cheese substitutes. I, being the adventurous soul that I am, decided to try the cheddar form and use it to make my son some macaroni & cheese. As I've previously said, I find that most mac & cheese subs just look nasty and smell even worse and I have no clue how they taste because I will NOT taste them, AT ALL. In one word, I find that most are N.A.S.T.Y! Well, I knew I had the pasta at home and wasn't really sure what I would use to make it but I set off with a mission in hand; to make my son a delicious bowl of mac & cheese that wasn't gross and that *I* didn't mind looking at!

So, last night was the night I decided to make it.....

I set out my ingredients

Andean Dream Quinoa Macaroni, Teese cheddar style, Earth Balance spread and Pacific chicken broth

And then I set out to make my son the most

yunmiest mac & cheese *EVER*! :)

Here is the recipe I used (I followed a tip from a fellow GFCF mom and used the broth instead of a dairy-free milk substitute .. that helped, A LOT, in regards to taste I think!)

1 box of Andean Dream quinoa pasta

1 roll of Teese (cheddar style)

2oz Pacific Organic Free-Range Chicken Broth

2 TB of Earth Balance Soy-free spread

sea salt, ground black pepper, onion powder and garlic powder (season to taste)

At this point, you get cooking! ;) I boiled the pasta according to the directions on the box. While waiting for the pasta to finish, I cut up the teese (which by the way, doesn't smell all that awful straight from the package like I was fearing it would) into small chunks and placed them in a smaller sauce pan. I then mixed in the earth balance spread as well as the chicken broth and let them simmer until the cheese was melted. Once melted, I added in the sea salt, pepper and garlic and onion powders and let it all simmer while the pasta finished.

cheddar sauce once melted .... it looks pretty runny, right?

Admittedly, I was a bit perplexed at how this watery cheese sauce was going to properly cover the pasta to give my son the macaroni & cheese I was envisioning for him.

But alas, once the pasta was drained (and I rinsed it just a tiny bit) and then mixed with the the cheese sauce, I had my beautiful looking mac & cheese!! Can you believe it?!

I WAS SHOCKED!!!!

It LOOKED like normal, gluten & casein laden, processed macaroni & cheese from a box! And even better, *I* could tolerate the smell of it! It didn't smell like Kraft, but it certainly did not smell horrible either. I even tasted the sauce (that's how impressed I was, I NEVER would taste most of the subs) and I was quite impressed! It had a creamy texture/flavor and it tasted pretty good! Sure, I like my Kraft or Velveeta mac & cheese anytime, but for my son who can't have those, this was certainly what *I* considered to be a suitable replacement!

Here, you can see, that he's enjoying his macaroni & cheese! He wouldn't smile for me because well, he was too busy eating and was getting mad that I was making him look at me! LOL!

Anyways, I hope this recipe helps any that are looking for a good recipe for some good-tasting and good-looking macaroni & cheese. Since I made the entire box of pasta and the whole roll of teese, he's got plenty for leftovers and is asking to eat more of it for today's lunch, which I will let him indulge in. Now I am anxious to try the mozzarella teese for pizza and as a topping for spaghetti, yummy!!! Thanks for looking and stopping by! :)