Gluten free frog eye salad, part 2

The other day I made a second attempt at gluten free frog eye salad. This one was almost, but not quite, perfect, and I learned a few more things.

The reason it wasn't perfect was because it was too salty. This was due to transcription error, more than anything. Mr. M's mom gave him the recipe for the custard over the phone, but she was guessing on the exact amount of salt- she eyeballs an amount in her palm and throws it in. The guesstimate measure turned out to be a bit too much, so I just need to decrease the amount of salt next time, and it should taste fine.

Some things I learned:

Beat the eggs really well before mixing into the rest of the custard base. Otherwise you end up with bits of cooked egg in your custard.

Use a really fine sieve when rinsing the tapioca pearls, otherwise you'll lose a bunch done the drain.

the two sieves I've used to rinse my tapioca- the left one has mesh that is too far apart

close-up of the larger mesh sieve

the smaller mesh sieve- works great, but the whole sieve is a bit small for rinsing large amounts of anything

I'll post the recipe next time, after I've tried it one more time and made sure it tastes good.

Gluten Free Frog Eye Salad, Part 1

Gluten Free Frog Eye Salad Recipe with Egg Free Option

Gluten free frog eye salad, part 1

The other day, Mr M and I were bemoaning the fact that I couldn't make frog eye salad ever again. Frog eye salad is made with acini de pepe, which is a pasta that is formed into tiny balls. While the gluten free manufacturing companies have come a long way in expanding their product lines, I have yet to find gluten free acini de pepe.

Then we randomly started talking about tapioca, how Mr M loves it and how as a kid I hated it because the only time I'd had it was the one time I was in the hospital overnight, which was not a great experience, and I thought all tapioca tasted as gross as it had that time. I've since realized that it's not all that bad, and can actually be quite good.

In the midst of all this, Mr M said "why not try tapioca pearls in the frog eye salad? They're about the same size and texture, maybe it'll work out."

So,  the next time we went shopping we bought a box of tapioca pearls. I followed the directions on the box for cooking (boil water, then whisk the pearls in, let cook for 17 minutes, then wing it from there). Ok, not really, the only directions they had were for making tapioca pudding, so I used the first few steps and then made it up as I went. After the 17 minute point, I think I cooked it a little bit longer till the pearls were mostly clear. Then I dumped them in a wire sieve and ran warm water over them to rinse the gel off.

I let them drain for awhile, then stirred in some cool whip.

The texture looked right, so I added some drained, crushed pineapple and a handful of marshmallows

and mixed it all together.

We had it for dinner, and we discussed the results as we ate it. It was good, but not quite the same as what we remembered frog eye salad tasting like. I had made this without a recipe because I couldn't find it, and it turns out I'd forgotten the custard. Mr M called his mother and got the recipe so I can try it again.

While the overall taste wasn't quite the same because of the lack of custard, the texture was pretty close. Tapioca is a bit chewier than acini de pepe, but when you're eating it with a spoonful of other stuff (marshmallows, fruit, etc), it's not noticeable. We noticed because we were analyzing the results. The next step is to make it again, this time with the custard.

Gluten Free Frog Eye Salad, Part 2

Gluten Free Frog Eye Salad Recipe with Egg Free Option

Gluten free eating thwarted again

Today we went to Wendy's for lunch while we were out running errands, and I had a rude surprise. They've changed their salad menu, taking out the old ones and introducing four new salads. I understand the need to keep the menu fresh, exciting, blah, blah, blah, but as near as I can tell, none of these are reliably gluten free.

The changes must be really new, since I can't find them on Wendy's website. I thought I'd be able to use the site to confirm everything, but since I can't, here goes my faulty memory:
1. Grilled chicken with apple, bacon, and bleu cheese
2. Grilled chicken with something and bleu cheese
3. Breaded chicken with something
4. Taco type salad with tortilla strips

From what I've read, some bleu cheese is gluten free, some isn't, I'd rather err on the side of caution and not eat it at all (plus, I don't like the flavor of bleu cheese anyway). Since the first two come with the bleu cheese already on the salad, those are a no-go. The breaded chicken in the third one is an automatic red flag. The tortilla strips on the fourth one are the bad guys. Admittedly, the tortilla strips might be packaged separately on this one, I didn't ask- I don't like taco salads, so I didn't even bother with it.

I will keep checking the website to see what the nutrition info says, but I'm not holding out any hope. I'm disappointed because I liked the mandarin chicken salad and it was a good standby if I needed to eat and couldn't find a Chipotle's nearby. Until I find out otherwise, if I eat at Wendy's again I'll be sticking to the baked potato and the mandarin oranges.