Gluten-free Cheese Souffle. On-line Floricanto. Interview with

The Gluten-free Chicano Bakes Cheese Souffle
Michael Sedano

Served with a crisp Caesar Salad, gluten-free cheese soufflé makes an elegant meal suitable for company or a special occasion. Gluten-free cheese soufflé is easily enough made that you can have cheese soufflé any day of the week.

There's no secret to a beautiful souffle. A good oven, a strong wrist, and an idea of what you're doing, all go together with good ingredients to produce satisfying results every time, from the first to the next.

Ingredients
King Arthur gluten-free flour ¾ cup
4 eggs
Extra sharp cheddar cheese – grated, 2 loosely-packed cups
Parmesan cheese dried – ¼ cup
Butter – 1 cube
Milk – 1 ½ cups
Cayenne powder
Salt
Coarsely ground black pepper
olive oil - dash

King Arthur brand has become my most relied-upon gluten-free baking mix. It's ground to fine powder, lacks the graininess of some other flours, and tastes good. Any commercial blend should be satisfactory, though for roux-making avoid any with xanthan or guar gums.

Round soufflé pan. This foto series uses a small rectangular straight-sided glass pan. When The Gluten-free Chicano grew dismayed at the possibility of a gluten-free soufflé, he gave away his glass soufflé pans.

Heat oven to 375º

Separate 4 eggs, the whites into a large mixing bowl.

Whip or beat the whites to a stiff foam. The foam holds its shape when you mound it.

Beat in the yolks with a pinch of cayenne, salt, coarsely ground black pepper.

Set aside.

Spray the baking dish with non-stick spray.

Put ¼ cup of dried parmesan in the bottom. Turn and shake to coat all four sides and bottom.
Place in a convenient place to receive the batter.

Grate cheese to make two loose-packed cups. Use a mix of flavorful cheeses for extra special dishes. Notice the thin slices in the mix. You can chop the cheese, thin slice it, or grate it. It needs to melt quickly in the near-boiling white sauce.

Make a roux cheese sauce. You want to make a volume that ¾ fills your baking dish. The cheese sauce is wonderful on steamed vegetables and baked potatoes, or diluted with cream to make a soup base. It's easy to increase quantities and make extra for later.

Put a dash of olive oil in the quart sauce pan and melt a cube of butter. It will acquire a rich brown color. Sprinkle cayenne pepper into the melted butter.

Add the ¾ cup of King Arthur gluten-free flour and a pinch of black pepper to the butter and stir until the flour completely mixes with the butter and forms a boiling foamy liquid.

Add a little milk and a thick paste forms. Keeping stirring in milk until all the roux is dissolved into the pan and the sauce is a thin, hot liquid.

Over medium flame keep stirring the pot vigorously until the sauce begins to coat the whisk and visibly thicken. If it gets too thick--it should flow easily and not clump--add more milk a splash at a time. Make enough volume to half fill the baking dish (unless you want sauce for later). Adding cheese increases the volume.

Once the sauce has thickened to pea soup consistency, add grated cheese. Stir in the cheese until it fully mixes with the roux sauce.

Stir the sauce into the beaten eggs. Work quickly to fold the whites into the thick sauce that pools in  the bottom of the bowl. Work faster. When the mixture has uniform color and consistency, pour it into the prepared baking dish.

Dust the surface lightly with parmesan cheese. In the foto, The Gluten-free Chicano spotted a stray slice of cheese and dropped it onto the batter before dusting the top. See if you can spot it on the finished crust.

Set the timer to 45 minutes and don't peek until 45 minutes.

Put the baking dish on a cookie sheet in event of a spill-over (next time, fill a bit less), slide into the middle rack of the oven, close the door and make the caesar salad, set the table, rinse utensils and bowls, have a seat and read the paper.

After 45 minutes in the hot oven, the cheese crust forms on the puffed up (souffle) flavorful and spongy body. When first out of the oven the souffle will jiggle. Let it rest a few minutes to set up.

Prepare yourself to see the puffy beauty fast deflate. Such is the nature of the souffle. Even wheat souffle collapses shortly after leaving the oven. 

The night The Gluten-free Chicano made this cheese souffle the cupboard was bare of anchovies, so a caesar salad was impossible. He served fresh tomato slices for a simple but ideal accompaniment on a small plate.

Left-over gluten-free cheese soufflé is wondrous in the morning for breakfast. Microwave on high for one minute and test the underside. Flip it if still cold and micro another half minute.

If your souffle comes out runny in the middle, put it in the microwave for two minutes and that should cook the center quickly. Otherwise, back into the oven another 15 minutes and it will be fine. Next time use a hotter oven and a higher rack.

If serving wine, champagne makes the perfect beverage. The bubbles in the wine, the air pockets in the souffle, all you need is agua con gas to finish off the metaphor. The Gluten-free Chicano has been enjoying La Croix flavored water con gas lately and it made the meal all the more delightful.

This gluten-free cheese souffle tastes as good as a wheat-bearing dish and even wheat-eaters won't know they're wolfing down seconds of this fabulous gluten-free meal.



June On-line Floricanto
Lara Gularte, Nancy Green, Martina Robles Gallegos, Sandra García Rivera, Arnoldo García

“Hanging On” By Lara Gularte
“MADRE MÍA” Por Nancy Green
“LOOK AT OUR CHILDREN” / “MIREMOS A NUESTROS NIÑOS” By Martina Robles Gallegos
“Opiate–” By Sandra García Rivera
“Quetzalcóatl, la revolución emplumada [excerpts]” By Arnoldo García


Hanging On
By Lara Gularte

The house leans toward the road.
She waits for someone to open the door
to the place where her mother was born.
No one at the window waves.

The old homestead settles in her chest.
This is where they lived,
set boundary fences, planted posts.
The well dry now, the creek diverted.
Clouds darken her memories.

She remembers where the oak tree stood,
tugs at the stump,
pulls on long roots and dank echoes.

With seeds in her pockets,
she smells the hope of rain,
and counts the seconds
between lightning and thunder,
distance narrowing.

Light strikes her and splits a sudden sky.
Rain flows through a hole inside herself,
memory glitters into clarity.

First published in “The Bitter Oleander, Vol. 20, Number 2, Autumn 2014.”

MADRE MÍA
Por Nancy Green

Nunca te olvido
Mi camino se funde con el tuyo

Tus memorias se mezclan con las mías
Tu aliento me llena de vida

Entre la noche y el día
encuentro tu sonrisa en el espejo,

en el rocio que refrezca lo vivido,
en las nubes que lloran tu partida

Me esperas con paciencia
Me cuidas de la cruel oscuridad

Me guías hacia la luz divina
Te enternece mi humilde gratitud

Me abrazas como acabada de nacer,
y así nos quedamos para siempre, Mamá



LOOK AT OUR CHILDREN
By Martina Robles Gallegos

When they look at the sky,
can they still see the moon?
Is the sun still healthy,
or will it be their demise?
Is the air that they breathe
a hello or goodbye?
Do gray clouds carry water,
or are they filled with disease?
Can they still swim in the ocean,
or will they be sentenced to death?
Are they still safe eating fruit
from the fat of the land?
Will a trip to the fields
be the last one they take?
Can they still enjoy parks
or be cut by a slide?
Are the vicious cartoons
Still poisoning their minds?
Can they trust in our leaders
or be silenced for life?
We must look at the future
we are sowing for them.

MIREMOS A NUESTROS NIÑOS
Por Martina Robles Gallegos

¿Cuando miran hacia el cielo,
aún pueden ver la luna?
¿Es saludable el sol o será el
veneno de nuestros niños?
¿Cargan agua las nubes grises
o están llenas de enfermedad?
¿Pueden nuestros niños nadar en el mar,
o serán sentenciados a muerte?
¿Pueden comer fruta aún de los campos?
¿Será una excursión a los campos
la última que toman?
¿Pueden aún gozar de los parques
sin que los corte una resbaladiza?
¿Las caricaturas violentas aún
envenenan sus mentes?
¿Pueden confiar en nuestros líderes
o serán callados por vida?
Debemos mirar el futuro
que estamos sembrando para ellos.

First published by Poets Responding to SB1070, May 19, 2017.

Opiate–
By Sandra García Rivera

a sinkhole
between fear and truth,
a short cut on a long detour
away from creation,
a distraction from hard work,
the loneliest road on a path of
self-destruction,
a frayed and withered rope bridge
dangling and destined
to dissolve,
to deter spirit from arriving
at the greatest love,
the mystery at the center
of each atom
each fingernail
in all matter light and dark,
present in all of us,
in each of us,
right now.




Quetzalcóatl, la revolución emplumada [excerpts]
By Arnoldo García

I
Quetzalcóatl
regresó
este año
de turista
y se le expiró la visa
ahora es considerado
terrorista.
500 años sin
serpientes emplumadas
500s sin cielo
terrenal
Ahora sí tenemos
un quetzalcóatl
que es una bomba Sagrada
que sólo quema
semillas
serpientes verdes
gusanitos
flores
y no humanos
ofrendas
de paz
y amor
entre los pueblos desarmados.

II
Quetzalcóatl
nació
en un hospital
sin esperar
a la partera
emergió
de su mamá
y luego luego
exigió
que cesara
el tiempo
porque ya llegó
el nuevo sol

III
Quetzalcóatl
pregunta
qué ritmo escogemos?
octubre
noviembre
cipactli
olin
ce atl
katún
qué raíz estiramos
qué color pintamos
dónde estea el centro
de la tierra
el downtown de la naturaleza
la X de xoxipili
el machete lunar
el ombligo sembrado
la esperanza
la semilla
para todas y
todos
o se marchita
nuestro tiempo?

IV
Quetzalcóatl
dice:
dónde están
los elotes explosivos
los frijoles fanáticos
el chile que chilla: "Organícense!"
los jacales de la ternura
la milpa ancestral
la montaña de agua
las malinches
verdes
aztlán guadalupana
dónde están
mis plumajes
mis lenguajes
guerrilleros
dónde
mis pueblos emplumados?

V
Quetzalcóatl
pregunta:
quién puso zapatos sobre la tierra?
quién construye un ataud de cemento
sobre las labores, la naturaleza?
quién bebe el agua de la vida
de los que no han nacido?
quién usa
los huesos,
las pieles,
las hojas
ancestrales
para gasolina?
y quién contamina las venas
con las penas industriales?
quién cortó las venas de la naturaleza
que inundaron y ahogaron
los pueblos lenguajes
las comunidades de lenguas
que con sus manos
pulieron troncos
para travesar mares estrellales.
O Aztlán, punto migrante
en la gran migración cósmica
de echar raíces
para crear tierras amplias
como corazones el tamaño de soles
ahora nosotras y nosotros
las y los que nacimos del movimiento terrenal
la comuna hecha de tierras y cielos
encontramos una tierra movil, migrante
para un pueblo migrante, cósmico
para un reino ingobernable
porque es inalterable
porque somos inalterables
el reino de la naturaleza
para desatarnos del ombligo lunar,
las cavernas del ser
el lugar de las garzas blanquísimas como el lodo
banderas móviles del viento
los corazones emplumados
con maizales

VI
Quetzalcóatl dice:
no todos los días aparezco
Hay semanas, sazones y generaciones enteras
que soy invisible
nadie me ve nadie me reconoce nadie me busca
mi existencia no califica
ni de colador de vientos
pero cuando llego a la frontera
me piden documentación
para verificar que existo
y que no soy invisible, ilegal
aparecido
mojado por la ciudadanía imperial
desplumado
deportado
desplazado
desnudo
destituido
desarmado
desesperado
nunca
derrotado
debilitado
desparramado
despachado
Quetzalcóatl
hoy es indio
vendedor ambulante
jornalero
trabajadora doméstica
madre soltera
zapatista
mam
pandillero
pistolero
preso
drogadicto
maestra de escuela secundaria
campesino
tatuajista
jaranero
migrante muerto en la frontera
todas y todos
somos
Quetzalcóatl...



Poets of Today's On-line Floricanto
“Hanging On” By Lara Gularte
“MADRE MÍA” Por Nancy Green
“LOOK AT OUR CHILDREN” / “MIREMOS A NUESTROS NIÑOS” By Martina Robles Gallegos
“Opiate–” By Sandra García Rivera
“Quetzalcóatl, la revolución emplumada [excerpts]” By Arnoldo García

Lara Gularte was featured with an interview and 18 poems in the Autumn 2014 issue of The Bitter Oleander. Her poetic work depicting her Azorean heritage is included in a book of essays called "Imaginários Luso-Americanos e Açorianos" by Vamberto Freitas. Her work can be found in The Gávea-Brown Book of Portuguese-American Poetry. Her poems have appeared in such journals as The Bitter Oleander, California Quarterly, The Clackamas Review, Evansville Review, Permafrost, The Monserrat Review, The Water-Stone Review, The Fourth River, The Santa Clara Review, and she has been published by many national and regional anthologies. Her manuscript “Kissing the Bee,” will be published by The Bitter Oleander Press in 2017. She is an assistant editor for Narrative Magazine.

Nancy  Lorenza  Green is an Afro-Chicana teaching, performing and recording artist from El Paso, Texas and Cd. Juárez, Chihuahua who uses music, creative writing, photography andpm spoken word as mediums of communication and cultural education.

Ms. Gallegos came from Mexico as a teenager and lived in Altadena and Pasadena through high school. She then moved to Oxnard and attended community college and university, getting her teaching credential.She graduated with her M.A. June 2015 after a severe stroke.Works have ap-peared in Altadena Review, Hometown Pasadena, Silver Birch Press, Spectrum, Somos en escri-to, Spirit Fire Review, Lummox, and Basta! She was named San Gabriel Valley and Altadena Anthology: Poetry Review 2017 Top Poet.
https://poetry309.wordpress.com

foto:SGR by Malia Connor

Sandra García Rivera is an award winning Nuyorican poet-chanteuse, who has captured audiences throughout the U.S., Puerto Rico, Cuba, and the U.K. as a spoken word performer and alongside Latin Jazz and Caribbean roots music legends. She has self-published two chapbooks: Divination of the Mistress, and Shoulder High, and her work has been widely published in journals, magazines, and academic publications. SGR is the Curator and Host of Lunada Literary Lounge at Galeria de la Raza in SF, and she performs regularly throughout the Bay Area as a poet, and as a vocalist-percussionist with La Mixta Criolla.

Arnoldo García is a poet, writer & revolutionary for life. After a stints as a migrant farmworker and nomadic cultural worker, he is now based in Oakland, California, where he lives with his family and works on a restorative justice initiative in Oakland public schools. Arnoldo's poem is an excerpt of a manuscript, "La revolución emplumada," on the struggles for the land, the people and the earth. Arnoldo's blog: https://artofthecommune.wordpress.com

mailbag, from San Jose, CA
Excerpt from an Interview With Suzanna Guzman About Bless Me, Ultima

Héctor Armienta's new opera Bless Me Ultima has received national press. Why do you think this project has created such interest?
Bless Me Ultima based on the masterwork by Rudolfo Anaya is the first Mexican American opera. The text, the landscape, the actors, are so recognizable to us in the Latino community. It is affirming and engaging to see, at last, ourselves on the stage singing magnificent music that tells OUR story.


What is particularly exciting in the upcoming workshop reading for Bless Me Ultima on June 17th?
Honestly it is like seeing the ultrasound of the baby! Or the trailer to next season's Game of Thrones. Or the smell of the Thanksgiving turkey in the oven! To hear this music, see the characters, be given a taste of what is to come is tantalizing and thrilling! Plus the music and purity of the young boy, Antonio, sung by a young boy, TEN years old! fills my heart so much. I can't wait!

Click here for tickets to the workshop performance in San Jose, CA