Vegan and Gluten Free Carrot and Zucchini Muffins

My son is almost 2 years old and goes to daycare full time. The daycare is very good about feeding my son separately from other kids and watching him so he doesn't eat anything he is not suppose to. My heart breaks thinking that all the kids eat together and my baby has to sit by himself at a separate table. At least once a week I try to send in a snack for the whole class so my son can sit with everyone else. This week I made carrot and zucchini muffins for the whole class to eat. I adopted a regular carrot cake recipe for this, substituted half of the carrots in the recipe with shredded zucchini and veganized the rest of the ingredients. The muffins came out extremely moist, fluffy and all the kids were happy with them. When I came to pick up my son there was only one muffin left and my older son just scooped it up and stuffed as fast as he could into his mouth.

Ingredients:
1 cup all-purpose GF flour
1 teaspoon xanthan gum (if GF flour doesn't include it)
3/4 cup of mix of multigrain flours (I used 1/4 sourghum, 1/4 millet and 1/4 quinoa flakes)
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup vegetable or canola oil
1/2 cup brown sugar
2 tablespoons of honey
3 tablespoons ground flax seed + 9 tablespoons of water ( this is to substitute eggs)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup shredded zucchini
1 cup shredded carrots

1. Heat oven to 350F and brush muffin pan with oil
2. Mix flax seed with water and set aside
3. Whisk flours, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, and salt
4. Whisk oil, sugar, honey, flax seed mixture and vanilla until smooth
5. Stir in zucchini and carrots
6. Fold in flour with rubber spatula and mix until batter is just combined. Don't over mix.
7. Spoon the mixture into the muffin pan
8. Bake for 20-30 minutes until the center of each muffin is firm to touch.

Please note that flax seed can be easilly substituted with apple sauce of pureed banana.

Poached Meatballs

This is a gluten free version of my mother in law's tefteli. The bread and the egg are replaced with potato. The meatballs are cooked without any oil and work really well when the kiddies have stomach problems and can't eat heavy foods. Also if these meatballs work really well in soups like Italian Wedding soup. My kids really like them because they have tender and fluffy texture. I like them because they are super simple to make and require only 4 ingredients.

Ingredients:
2 Chicken Breasts
1 large potato
1/2 of medium onion
salt to taste

1. Place a large pot of a heavy lidded pan of water on the stove to boil.
2. Grind in the meat grinder chicken, potato, onion
3. Mix the ingredients an salt to taste
4. When the water starts boiling, salt the water, and form meatballs with wet hands and drop them into the boiling water. There should be enough water to fully cover the meatballs. It helps to have hands wetted in water when shaping the meatballs so the meat doesn't get stuck to your hands.
5. After the water comes to a boil lower the flame to medium and cook the meatballs until they are cooked inside, approximately 20-25 minutes depending on the size. Cut one meatball in half to see if they are white all the way through.