What’s the quickest dinner I can make that’s healthy, easy, and gluten-free? That’s usually what I am asking myself on my way home from work every day, or I get a call from my kids asking, “what’s for dinner Mom?” Ugh…better think of something quick! Well, here are three easy gluten-free dinners when all you have is an hour.
I suppose I should start with a little more info about me. I have gluten intolerance and have been eating gluten-free for 11 years. I was tested for celiac disease when I first figured out that gluten was the reason I was feeling so bad, but the gastroenterologist could not definitely tell me one way or the other because I had already started my gluten-free diet and I finally felt better, so needless to say, I wasn’t going back to eating gluten just for a test, so I consider myself gluten intolerant and I’m on a strict gluten-free diet. Now, my family does not have to eat gluten-free but because I am the chef in the kitchen, that is what they get normally…quick gluten-free meals.
I look for easy gluten-free dinner ideas that can be completed within an hour or less. I also look for ways that I can shorten the time involved in preparing food to lessen my time in the kitchen every night. Now don’t get me wrong, I don’t hate the kitchen, in fact, it is my favorite place in the house because eating is something I am verrrry good at and love to do. It’s just in my situation, I am gone 10 hours a day for work so when I get home, I need to be as efficient as possible so I can have a little time in the evening to do whatever I want, like drinking a glass of wine and watching a movie…I’m a sucker for any Jane Austen flick – I just can’t help it.
So, without further ado, here are three easy gluten-free dinners I found online that give you a little variety and also can be completed in an hour or less (using only gluten-free foods and products).
#1 – Tilapia with Pineapple Avocado Salsa
Click here to see the original recipe. I use this recipe on the Weightwatchers.com website as a base and then provide ideas and products to offer gluten-free options.
Now before you say anything, yes this recipe is for chicken instead of fish but that is what I had available when I tried it (picture above) and my family didn’t complain one bit so you can use either for this recipe and all will be well.
Shortcuts For This Recipe –
Fresh lime juice – if you don’t have a lime on hand, use lime juice from a bottle. It’s only a few bucks and you can use it for lots of recipes.
Pineapple/pineapple juice – buy a couple of cans of chopped pineapple. That way you don’t have to cut a pineapple (although I have a tool that I use that makes cutting a pineapple super easy – I will show that to you another day) and you can use the pineapple juice for the recipe as well.
Now, this recipe calls for red onion, cilantro, and garlic. I have a quick fix that I use all the time, just buy a container of pre-made pico de gallo. It has all these ingredients, pre-cut, no fuss.
If you particularly like garlic though and want a little more (there is garlic in the pico de gallo), I love this quick shortcut for minced garlic. I use this in so many recipes.
Lastly, just a hint for the avocado. Choose an avocado from the store that is a brownish color, an example is below (not green). These are at the perfect ripeness and cut super easy.
Just cut the avocado lengthways, twist to open, scoop out the nut, and peel back the sides with a spoon or your finger to take off the shell. Then chop for this recipe.
Fish takes about 10-15 minutes to cook (I bought some Kroger frozen tilapia and thawed it for 10 minutes in water) and then it took about 10-15 minutes to make the salsa. I served it with a salad. Definitely under an hour and I love the smell of cilantro and lime in the house!
#2 – Primavera Stuffed Chicken
Click here to see the original recipe. I use this recipe on the Delish.com website as a base and then provide ideas and products to offer gluten-free options. They have a great video too which I always find much more helpful than just reading a recipe by itself.
This recipe just looked soooo good I couldn’t wait to try it. Very quick, low prep (with a few shortcuts), and it pretty much goes with anything! The recipe states it takes 40 minutes but with a few tweaks, you could get it done in even less time.
To start, if you just saw this and want to give it a try, you need some thawed chicken. My preference is to put some frozen chicken in the refrigerator the night before so it is mostly thawed by the time I would get home from work. Or, you can pick up (or have on hand in your refrigerator) some raw chicken (thawed) so there would be no prep at all.
Another option if you are planning to use this recipe on another day of the week, you could marinate the raw chicken the night before in some Italian dressing which adds a lot more flavor to the chicken and would go well with this recipe. Here is a bottle of Ken’s Steakhouse Italian Dressing which has the GF symbol right on the front label (more about this later).
Dump the whole bottle in a large quart-size Ziploc bag and add the chicken breast to soak for 24 hours.
Next, for the vegetables in the recipe, there are several options to speed your time up to get this completed sooner. You can buy pre-cut veggies at the store – they usually have these in the produce section of your local grocery. Or you can buy bags of frozen pre-cut vegetables. I buy these all the time for a quick stir-fry.
Or if you prefer, you can cut the vegetables yourself. It really doesn’t take too much time and I usually have a lot of vegetables on hand to make salads with anyway so fresh vegetables works for me!
Lastly, just cut the slits in the chicken, put the vegetables in the slits, cook, and as they say in the movie Ratatouille, “Follow zee recipe” (sounds better with a French accent).
Really quick, awesome flavor and you can serve with a salad, side dish or bread (or all of the above!).
#3 – Easy Gluten-Free Pasta Salad
Click here to see the original recipe. I use this recipe on the Allrecipes.com website as a base and then provide ideas and products to offer gluten-free options. They have a great video as well that breaks down this recipe step by step.
Sooo easy and perfect for picnics and those looking for a quick gluten free dinner. My gluten eaters in the family loved this recipe as well and didn’t even care that I made it gluten free! They couldn’t tell the difference.
Now, I have made this a ton of times and most of the time I just use whatever vegetables I have in the fridge, leftover veggies from another recipe, etc. so it is different every time, but use whatever vegetables you prefer or even maybe some pre-cut ones from the local grocery store you found on sale.
To start, you need a gluten-free pasta. Here is what I used for this recipe because this is what I had on hand:
But I also had these two Simple Truth brand gluten-free kinds of pasta as well I could have used:
The recipe suggests 16 ounces though of pasta so I would have had to use both these boxes and so I ended up going with the Ronzoni pasta even though it was only 12 ounces, but it worked out just fine.
So, start by making the pasta according to the directions on the box and then move on to cutting your vegetables (unless you bought pre-cut veggies at the store or had some cut already on hand, then you’re almost done!). Just a tip about making gluten-free pasta, it doesn’t hold up to overcooking very well, so you have to keep watching it because if it overcooks it will fall apart, unfortunately. It just has to do with the ingredients that have to be used for gluten-free pasta.
I had a lot of vegetables already cut up from the night before, so I used zucchini, yellow and orange peppers, red onion, tomato, and some cucumbers. But just use whatever you have, no need to be perfect at all!
Once the pasta is done, just combine all the vegetables and the pasta together in a very big bowl and add the Italian dressing. I use Ken’s Steakhouse Italian Dressing. I like Ken’s Steakhouse brand of dressings because they clearly mark ‘gluten-free’ on the label and their website also clearly states one way or the other if they are gluten-free.
Here is a link though I found that gives a good list of gluten-free salad dressings and what to look for on the labels. Click here.
Last is to mix the Italian seasoning and the Parmesan cheese together. Once combined then add to the bowl with the pasta and veggies and mix all together.
For the Italian Seasoning, that is a hard one. Most spices that are readily available to me in local stores do not label as gluten-free. Some like McCormick’s spices are more readily available and they do have some products that are gluten-free, but the majority of their spices are not tested for cross-contamination, so they do not label them gluten-free. I have found a brand that is labeled gluten-free, but it is not local to me, unfortunately. I can usually only get it if I go into a larger city and shop or I order online, but I feel better knowing that it is labeled gluten-free so that is what I normally do. It is a reasonable price as well really and you get a larger amount of it. The company’s name is Spicely Organics and to the left is a picture of their Italian Seasoning. They have a lot more spices and blends though as well.
Regarding the Parmesan cheese, I am always looking for something that is already grated but I want actual cheese too (not a fan of fake cheese). I have used Kroger Grated Parmesan cheese before because all of the ingredients are gluten-free, but it is not labeled gluten-free unfortunately. I recently found this great option that is labeled gluten-free and was available in my local Walmart too which is awesome. The brand of this Parmesan cheese is BelGioioso and their products are made in America and I think it was only $3.00 at Walmart so very affordable.
And that’s it! Mix together and eat, yum!
There you go, three quick gluten-free meals in no time at all! With just a few products on hand that can be used in multiple recipes, you can have a healthy dinner made from scratch that is entirely gluten-free. Have your gluten-eating friends taste these dishes, they will never know the difference!
For more great gluten-free dinner ideas, click here!