Over the last 3-4 months I have had several friends begin to realize they need to go gluten-free.  Since I have been gluten-free for over a decade now, they have all asked me questions at some point in the process.  Great!  It’s always good to seek advice from someone in the ‘been there, done that’ camp.  I began to realize, though, that there were two key issues going on.  First, they were getting a LOT of misinformation from people.  Second, they needed more than I could explain in a quick couple of minutes after church or MOPs.  They needed a crash-course in gluten-free living!  After a lot of thinking and praying, I felt like God was calling me to offer this up for anyone interested.  So, this morning I taught my first ever Gluten-Free 101 class!

As I was preparing for the class and planning out the menu of things to taste and cook I checked with my guests about other food allergies and intolerances so I could ensure they could all happily eat (because what’s the fun in food sampling if you can’t sample it, right).  Two of the ladies couldn’t handle cow’s milk.  Since I was planning on making breakfast pizza, that could have easily interfered with my plans for a creamy Alfredo sauce.  Thanks to my stubborn nature not wanting to change my plans, I decided I would just make a dairy-free Alfredo sauce.  I mean, people who can’t handle cow’s milk like cream sauces, too!  And so my quest for gluten-free, dairy-free Alfredo sauce began.  My key problems were going to be that flour is used in a roux to thicken cream sauces, and, well, CREAM is used in cream sauces.  Flour and cream were going to be a big NO since this needed to be gluten-free and dairy-free  I knew it needed to be soy-free as well, because another guest couldn’t eat soy.  Hmm, this was getting tricky.  Thanks to The Chew I knew that a roux just needed to be equal parts fat and flour, so I just decided to substitute Better Batter Gluten-Free Flour for regular flour.  For the fat?  Well, you don’t get much tastier than bacon fat, and since I needed to cook up bacon pieces to use for a pizza topping anyway, I could just use the rendered fat for the roux.

Now the trickiest part, what to use for the for the cream?  I could use milk, but it’s not as thick as cream.  That makes it hard to get a good, thick, CREAMY sauce.  Normally I would use the lactose-free half and half by Organic Valley, but that isn’t free of cow’s milk.  As I wandered through New Seasons I stumbled upon this creamer.

Perfect!  So Delicious Coconut Creamer is gluten-free, dairy-free, AND soy-free!  BINGO!  Once I had that I had everything I needed to make some rockin’ sauce.  If you’re thinking to yourself, “but I don’t like coconut”, have no fear.  This doesn’t taste like coconut at all.  I HATE coconut.  Like, really, truly, deeply dislike it and I loved this sauce.  I couldn’t taste the coconut at all.  Since you have been kind enough to read through my ramblings, now you get to have the recipe, too!

Gluten-Free, Dairy-Free, Soy-Free Alfredo Sauce

Ingredients:

• 1/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons (liquid) bacon grease, divided
• 1 small onion, finely chopped
• 4 garlic cloves, minced
• 1 1/2 teaspoons salt, divided
• 1/4 teaspoon smoked paprika
• 1/4 cup gluten-free all purpose flour (I use Better Batter)
• 1 quart coconut creamer (be sure to get original flavor, vanilla Alfredo would be weird)

Instructions:

1. Cook up bacon pieces so that you have bacon fat to use for this.  Enjoy your bacon in/on whatever you please and save the bacon fat!
2. Heat 2 tablespoons of (liquid) bacon grease on medium-high in a large sauce pot.
3. Add chopped onion and sauté until onions are soft and beginning to get some color.
4. Add 1/2 teaspoon of salt and 1/4 teaspoon smoked paprika and stir to evenly distribute.  The smoked paprika serves to a) give it a wonderful earthiness and b) help balance out the slightly sweet nature of coconut milk.
5. Add minced garlic and cook for about a minute.
6. Pour onions and garlic into a bowl and set aside.
7. Heat 1/4 cup (liquid) bacon grease in the sauce pan.
8. When bacon grease is hot, add 1/4 cup gluten-free flour.  Whisk continuously until roux (that is the fat-flour mixture in your pan) takes on a light brown color.  You don’t want this white, but you also don’t want it dark brown.
9. Add the full quart of coconut creamer, whisking continuously as you pour.  This will sizzle.
10. Add the other 1 teaspoon of salt.
11. Keep stirring your sauce until it begins to thicken.  It’s going to take several minutes, so be patient.
12. When your sauce begins to thicken, add the onion-garlic mixture back to the pan and stir it in.
13. Once your sauce begins to simmer turn the heat down a little to keep it right at the edge of simmering and keep stirring to prevent scalding.
14. Cook sauce until it has reduced by about 1/3 and can coat the back of a spoon.  You’ll know it’s done when you can run your finger through the sauce on the back of a spoon and the line stays there.