Hold the Wheat, Please! Enjoy Holidays Gluten-Free

With the holiday season comes an abundance of festive foods like Christmas stollen, Sufganiyah (Hanukkah doughnuts), and bouche de noel. 

But many of these popular treats are made with wheat flour, and those who live with Celiac disease or are on a gluten-free diet end up missing out on these holiday staples. Fortunately, Rye and its surrounding area offer an array of restaurants and bakeries that serve gluten-free provisions so you can celebrate without worrying about the wheat.    

If you're looking for a place to chow down, Halstead Avenue Bistro in Harrison offers an extensive gluten-free menu, including spare ribs risotto and horseradish-crusted tilapia.  Plus, all of their pasta dishes can be substituted for a corn-based pasta imported from Italy. For a casual night out, Aldente Pizzeria in Rye, T & J's Pizzeria in Port Chester, and Bellizzi in Larchmont all make their pizza crust with the gluten-free brand Still Riding Pizza dough, made with bean and rice flour.  In the mood for Chinese? Ray's Café in Rye Brook is famous for its gluten-free pot stickers. 

For those with a sweet tooth, Three Dogs in Briarcliff Manor is Westchester's only gluten-free bakery, selling a wide variety of breads, muffins, cookies, cakes, and cupcakes.  If you wish to indulge in pastries without the drive to Briarcliff, Patisserie Salzburg in Rye makes a gluten-free opera cake, flourless chocolate cake, and an assortment of flourless macaroons.  

Partaking in holiday revelries can be tricky for beer drinkers since the majority of lagers are brewed from wheat.  However, there are a slew of U.S. breweries that produce gluten-free beers such as Anheuser-Busch, Ramapo Valley Brewery, and Lake Front Brewery (a list of all gluten-free beers can be found at www.wheat-free.org).  For parties that are BYOB, you can buy Bard's Tale Beer from Balducci's in Scarsdale and Green's beer from Whole Foods in White Plains.

And finally, below is my gluten-free gingerbread cookie recipe.  Enjoy your holidays without gluten or wheat!

Gluten-Free Gingerbread Cookies 

Ingredients

1⁄2 cup butter 

1⁄2 cup brown sugar

2 1/2 cups Arrowhead Mills Gluten-free All-Purpose Baking Mix*

1⁄2 tsp. ginger

1/4 tsp. cloves

1⁄4 tsp. cinnamon

1⁄2 tsp. cream of tartar

1/8 tsp. salt

1⁄2 tsp. baking soda

1 egg

1⁄2 cup gluten-free molasses

Directions

Cream butter and sugar in a large mixing bowl. Add in egg and molasses. In a medium bowl, sift together flour, ginger, cloves, cinnamon, cream of tartar, salt, and baking soda. Add dry ingredients to former mixture and combine thoroughly. Roll dough to ¼ inch thick on a board sprinkled with All-Purpose Baking Mix.  Cut out shapes with a cookie cutter and bake at 375 degrees for 10 minutes. Cool on a wire wrack. Makes about two-dozen cookies.

*Contains organic whole grain brown rice flour, organic potato starch, rice starch, organic potato starch, rice starch, organic whole grain sorghum flour, baking powder, and sea salt.