Happy St. Patrick's Day! 

In honor of our Irish Ancestry, we wanted to do a St. Patrick's themed dinner.  The recipes may not all be authentically Irish, but they are delicious, and of course, gluten free. Erin Go Bragh!

Potato Cheese Soup

•  4 med. potatoes, diced
• 1 lg. onion, chopped
• 1 qt. water
• 1/4 c. butter 

• 2 tbs. potato starch 

• 1/2 c. milk
• 1-1/2 c. shredded sharp cheese
• 1 tsp. salt
• 1/4 tsp. seasoning salt
• 1/4 tsp. paprika
• 1/8 tsp. pepper
• Chopped chives

 Directions:
Combine potatoes, onion and water in heavy saucepan. Bring to boil, reduce heat and simmer until tender, about 20 minutes. Add butter. Mix potato starch into the milk and stir into the soup. Return to heat; cook and stir until thickened. Add cheese and seasonings.

Traditional Irish Soda Bread 

4 cups gf flour mix* 1 teaspoon xanthan gum 1 teaspoon baking soda 1 teaspoon salt 1 3/4 cups buttermilk (or 1 tablespoon plus 1/2 teaspoon apple cider vinegar (Our favorite ACV is Bragg) and 1 3/4 cups milk) * If you are going to sour regular milk instead of using buttermilk, start this process first. Add the vinegar to a large measuring cup and then add the milk. Let rest 5-15 minutes. Directions: Preheat oven to 425 degrees F. Lightly grease a 9-inch cake pan. Sift together the gf flour, xanthan gum, baking soda, and salt. Stir to combine. Create a well in the mix and add the buttermilk or sour milk gradually, stirring until all the flour has been gathered into a sticky dough. If you have extra floury flakes, you may need to add more milk. Mound the dough into the cake pan. Cut a cross into the top of the dough. Cover with another cake pan or pot of same size. If you don't have cake pans, you can cook the dough on a baking sheet. Bake for 30 minutes, then remove the upper pan and bake for another 15 minutes until crust is just beginning to turn golden. The bottom of the baked bread should have a hollow sound when tapped. Cover to keep bread warm. *Gluten free flour mix: 2 parts rice flour 2/3 part potato starch 1/3 tapioca flour

Easy Key Lime Pie
Filling

• 4 egg yolks, beaten 
• 2 (14 oz) cans sweetened condensed milk
• 1 cup Fresh Key Lime juice (Fresh is best, but bottled is good too. If you can't find Key Lime juice, use half lemon juice and half lime juice as a substitute) 
• 2 drops green food coloring (optional) 

Crust

• 1 1/2 cups finely ground gluten free shortbread cookies ( We use Schar) 
• 4 tbs butter, melted

* To get your cookies finely ground; put them in a gallon sized ziploc bag and crush them with a rolling pin, or, use a food processor

Directions: 

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. 

Mix cookie crumbs and melted butter until well blended. Press mixture into an 8 or 9 inch pie plate. Bake for 10 minutes (when you take out the crust it will have puffed up a little bit, I use a clean measuring cup to press it back down to really get that graham cracker crust texture)

Keep oven at 375 degrees F.

Combine the beaten eggs, sweetened condensed milk, and lime juice. Mix well. Pour into crust, and bake for 15-20 minutes, or until filling no longer jiggles.

Note: You will most likely have too much filling for one pie pan, and not enough for two pie pans.  We poured our extra filling into ramekins, and baked them at 375 degrees F. for 15 minutes in a shallow water bath (a 9 x 13 inch glass cake pan with an inch of water in it).  When they were cool, we sprinkled granulated sugar on top, and burned it to a golden brown with a torch (but similar results can be achieved by putting them under the broiler and watching them very, VERY closely).  This is our version of Key Lime Creme Brulee.