amck, an easy non-expensive appetizer is always the T&T block of cream cheese at room temperature with a jalapeno or spicy/savory jelly poured over, served with crackers. It goes so well with wine & liquor & always disappears. I'm making it at Thanksgiving with a spicy cranberry sauce (see following). I like lowspark's suggestion of brownies & lemon bars. For decorating, a couple of potted mums & maybe some fall-colored leaves would be nice & not elaborate. Have fun! CRANBERRY JEZEBEL SAUCE Yield: 2 1/2 cups Can be made ahead 1 cup water 1/2 cup sugar 1/2 cup firmly packed brown sugar 1 (12 oz) bag fresh or frozen cranberries 3 Tbsp prepared horseradish 1 Tbsp Dijon mustard Combine first 3 ingredients in a medium saucepan; bring to a boil over medium heat. Add cranberries, and return to a boil. Reduce heat, and simmer 10 minutes, stirring occasionally. Let cool to room temp. Stir in horseradish and mustard; cover and chill. Garnish, if desired. Serve with beef or pork; or spoon over cream cheese, and serve with crackers. Sauce may be stored in an airtight container in the refrigerator up to two weeks.

I have a small farm with a gluten free bakery and sell at the local farmers market. Nothing I make has corn syrup, artificial flavors or colors, or weird chemicals. I estimate that of all the visitors we get at the market, 20% buy from me and they are not all celiacs or have a true wheat allergy. Some of my customers have jumped on the bandwagon, so to speak, of the GF fad. They include those with autistic children, or arthritis, cirrhosis, IBS, lupus, or chemotherapy reactions. Many have other allergies that I also create tasty treats without - dairy, eggs, soy, tree nuts, peanuts. Others just say they feel better and I do agree that they are probably looking at what junk they have been eating and are making changes overall to their diet. That is a good thing and we little local farmers are benefiting from that - not the conglomerates. Some people just buy from me because it all tastes good, and don't care if it is GF or not. As for the GF stuff on the shelves that the major food mfg are producing they are using just different chemicals than their regular chemically enhanced wheat based stuff. Truly most are awful. But, having been working on baking GF for 5 years, I have developed quite a few treats that taste good and are equivalent to their wheat counterparts. Because I can eat wheat, what I make has to taste like it does and believe me I have thrown out lots of inedible GF baked goods. However, white GF bread will never, ever taste like Wonder Bread, but there are good tasting white breads while the sourdough and quasi-rye GF breads do taste quite similar to wheat/rye breads and waffles and pancakes are very close, especially when you add pecans. There are also many treats that have been out there for many years that never had wheat in them anyway and are just now being labeled as GF - Pavlova and meringues, Brazilian butter cookies (Maizena), and all candy and fudge. etc. I have a theory that the wheat I ate as a kid in the 40's and 50's was not what is growing in the fields today. Hybridization, chemical fertilization, tinkering with GMO's, and a raft of questionable long term effects of pesticides and herbicides have produced a wheat that is not at all what it once was and genetically has been proven to be just that - not "wheat". Something I tell people who ask what gluten free means is, "All those lovely vegetables, fruits, meats, eggs, and cheese you are buying at the farmers market do not contain gluten so you are already buying gluten free without knowing it. But, when you add bread, cupcakes, muffins, pizza, pasta, sub rolls, beer, and the famous Southern biscuits with breaded fried chicken, you are consuming wheat and that contains the gluten that some people are avoiding by eating gluten-free." I do hope people are becoming more conscious of gluten free eating, if nothing more than to be aware of how much junk is on the grocery shelves and in the restaurant's and fast foods' meals. Gluten free eating out is impossible as there is a lot of cross contamination with wheat in restaurant kitchens - residual on pans and in bowls, and even floating in the air, so it is just not safe for those with celiac disease. Nancy Annie - you will never have a good brownie that is made from black beans. It is just not a good substitute and beans belong in soup and tacos, not treats. My recipe uses cornstarch instead of wheat or beans so try this - GF Fudgey Brownie Recipe Altered from the recipe in the book Ready for Dessert by David Lebovitz Line 8"sq pan with sprayed foil or parchment with overhang on both sides to lift out. Micro 6Tblsp butter with 12oz chocolate chips for 2 min, stir with wooden spoon and micro another 1 or 2 min until partially melted. Stir with spoon to complete the melting - do not over micro or it will be stiff and off tasting. Stir in 3/4 C sugar, 1tsp vanilla extract. Then, beat in 3 eggs just to incorporated. In a bowl mix together 1/3C cornstarch, 1/4C unsweetened cocoa powder, 1/2tsp cinnamon, 1/2tsp salt. (I also add a couple shakes of fine black pepper because I like that tang with all my chocolate treats.) Stir dry ingredients into wet, about 2 minutes, using a wooden spoon not a hand mixer. Option: Add 1C coarsely chopped pecans or walnuts. Bake 350F 20 minutes and check with toothpick - if it looks wet continue baking checking at 5 min intervals until toothpick is mostly dry but don't over bake or they will be hard. Touching the top with fingertips to test does not work with this recipe as it is not springy like cake. Let cool in pan on a rack, then lift out to cool completely before cutting (using a pizza cutter makes nicer edges than a knife). Nancy

My cats never cat the treats. We were gone for a couple days and the neighbor took care of the cats and dog. The treats must have arrived Saturday and our neighbor put them on the counter with the rest of the mail. I have no idea how they were packaged but apparently not dog-safe. When we got home that night the only evidence of them was a bunch of chewed on plastic baggies and a few shreds of cardboard.

I wonder if the link to the restaurant you posted above might be to a different one with the same name? The map link from your link points to a spot somewhere in the middle of Rio, pretty far from anything. A good guess would be that that location would be about an hour of driving from Sugarloaf, and looking more closely at that spot on the map shows that seems to be inside a large shopping mall, in a slightly questionable neighborhood. Another restaurant with the same name and logo is located on the edge of Barra da Tijuca where much of the new building for the Olympics took place. Do you remember if the front of the restaurant looked like this? and the view from outside included this dramatic bridge and the distinctive mountain in the background. If you will be only posting food-related photos here can you at least post a link here to you postings in other forums so interested Cooking forum can find them and follow along? I never went to either of the museums you mentioned, so I'd love to see pictures of what I missed. I have been in that area and saw the Municipal Theater, the National Library, the Metropolitan Cathedral of Rio de Janeiro, the Carioca Aqueduct and rode the trolley across it to Santa Teresa, and on my last trip found Selaron's Stairs, which were created over many years by a local artist I didn't go up the stairs because a couple people warned me that my large camera would make me an inviting target. After reviewing the photos later I discovered that it I had gone up the stairs, I could have met the artist who was sitting there surrounded be a group of people.