Bayou Biscotti

About 2 1/2 years ago, I began experiencing numbness and tingling in my fingers during the night followed by pain and stiffness the next day.  I knew that if I went to a doctor, I'd most probably be told I had rheumatoid arthritis and be given a prescription.  I was in NO visiting with my dad and one of his friends and was explaining my symptoms to him, when he looked at her, and she looked at me and said, "I have the same thing."  I knew then that it wasn't environmental and was probably something we were both doing.  The only thing we both were eating was waffles.  So, I promptly quit and the pain went away for awhile.  When it came back, it was on a different side of my hands, so I began monitoring what I ate and when I had the pain.  After connecting that my hands hurt after I ate wheat products, I mentioned this to my dad, and he reminded me of my English/Irish ancestry and that I was probably gluten intolerant. 

I had lived in England for a bit and so was familiar with the condition and eating gluten free, so it wasn't too much of a issue for me to eliminate gluten from my diet.  My mom, however, had a more difficult time as she was already on a pretty limited diet. We both had problems with the commercial mixes as they contained various starches and flours that caused allergic reactions.  So, in response to a self made facebook post challenge, a desire to have products that didn't contain binders, starches, or fillers, and a love for cooking, I started working on baking a gluten free biscotti that was tasty and had an acceptable texture.  I found a recipe that was pretty simple and with a few tweaks and experiments, came up with a delicious recipe for biscotti, the twice baked cookie, that is sooo delicious dunked in coffee, hot chocolate, and as I later learned, wine, the original beverage for which biscotti was created.

A year and a half later, my company, Bayou Biscotti, has added coffee cake, chex mix, doughnut holes, pancakes, and biscuits to the offerings, and has branched out into the paleo diet world with sugar free, grain free cupcakes and sweet breads and grain free cake balls.

Check out our page on facebook.   www.facebook.com/BayouBiscotti

Also, check out the calendar page on this website for dates where we'll be selling at the local farmers markets and the Sola Cafe.