The season is under way...

Hello everybody!

Yes, believe it or not, this is Levi finally writing a long over due blog post ;) If you've been following our blog closely you might think that all I do out here is eat the great food that Maura cooks, but I have been pretty busy playing ball too! We've now had 8 preseason games and 2 regular season games. We've dropped our first two games but it's no time to panic. We are starting to gel more as a team and have had some great practices in preparation for our next game this coming Sunday in Radom (8-10 hour bus ride!). We hope to come out with great energy and play how we are capable of playing. I have really enjoyed getting to know my teammates more and more as the season progresses, and there will be plenty more team bonding time in the coming weeks due to our long bus rides across Poland. We always travel the day before the game and leave in the morning (depending on how far the trip is) and travel back to Slupsk through the night after the game. For the most part, Poland doesn't have great highway systems from city to city so much of the multi-hour trips are spent winding through foresty areas on bumpy roads and driving through small towns along the way. Right now everything is still really green and Poland is actually a really beautiful country. It has been really rainy and windy over the past week and temperatures are starting to drop with highs in the 50's and lows close to freezing. We had our first home game last week and our fans are awesome! Our gym gets really loud and its a fun atmosphere to play in. Maura and I are getting excited for visitors to come stay with us over the next month. First Maura's parents will come for 9 days and will get to watch one away game and one home game, and then Levi's parents will come for 11 days in November and will get to see 3 home games! We are soooo blessed and lucky to have family come, and we're excited for them to get a taste of our Polish lifestyle and overseas basketball experience too. Hopefully I'll be posting again very soon with some good news about our team's performance in our next two games, both of which are on the road. Hope everyone is doing great and talk to you all soon!

Levi

Chocolate Crinkle Cookies...with Coconut Flour!

The more gluten free baking I do, the more random ingredients I come across.  Coconut flour is kind of exotic and honestly, without Celiacs, I probably never would have used it. However, coconut flour is awesome! First, it's really absorbent so you use WAY less flour than a normal recipe. I've made a batch of cupcakes with only 1/2 cup of flour. Second, it makes the most light and fluffy baked goods ever. And it's pretty healthy! Gluten free or not, you should try some recipes with coconut flour. 

Oh, and conveniently, I am going to give you one. Chocolate Crinkle Cookies! These are so good. The fudgy cookies that are covered in powdered sugar and then when you bake them they get all cracked. I think people make them around Christmas time but I make them whenever I want. I made them for the team a couple weeks ago and they were a hit.

I've adapted this recipe slightly from the one on tropicaltraditions.com. They have all kinds of recipes using coconut flour and they also sell coconut flour that is really good quality. Their recipe creates a gluten free flour blend but since I already have an all-purpose flour, I changed it a bit.


Gluten Free Chocolate Crinkle Cookies
Servings: 3 dozen cookies
Prep: 1 hr and 20 min

4 oz bittersweet chocolate, melted
1/2 cup melted butter, coconut oil, or shortening (I used shortening)
1 cup sugar
3 eggs, at room temperature
2 tsp vanilla extract
1-3/4 cup all-purpose gluten free flour
3-1/2 tbsp coconut flour
1 tsp xanthan gum (I use guar gum, it's cheaper and works the same)
1/4 tsp salt
1 tsp baking powder
powdered sugar

1. Melt chocolate in bowl the microwave. Be careful not to burn the chocolate. Microwave on high for 30 seconds at a time, stirring well in between until it's all melted.
2. Whisk in oil and sugar. Then mix in the eggs, one at a time. Then add the vanilla extract. The mixture should be thick.
3. Then mix in all the dry ingredients (flours, xanthan gum, salt, & baking powder). The batter will look like brownie batter.
4. Refrigerate for an hour or more, until the batter is firm.
5. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (180 degrees C).
6. Put powdered sugar in a small bowl. Take a tablespoon of the batter and roll it into a ball and then roll in the powdered sugar.
7. Place 1 inch apart on a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper. Bake for 10-12 minutes until the cookies look set. Let cool for 3 minutes before moving to a wire rack.

That's it! Really make sure the dough is cold so that the rolling process is easier. You will have sticky hands but that's ok :) My batch made about 32 cookies. They are meant to be kinda small, only about 2 inches wide. They are soooooooo good! You will need to find a reason to give them away or you'll probably end up eating the whole batch...


Maura