Gluten-free Gourmand

Last year, my mom asked me to recreate a scone recipe that she liked from a local gluten free bakery.  They made a walnut raspberry scone recipe she just loved and missed after they closed down. I tried several iterations, adding more and more walnuts until the recipe was 50% walnuts.  It never really tasted nutty.  Much later she was able to get the recipe from the owners of the bakery.  It turned out that the secret to walnutty scones is to toast the walnuts. This really brings the flavor forward.  Mom, we lost you before I could make these for you again.  Happy Valentine’s Day. Here is my interpretation of walnut raspberry scones.  Recipe for Walnut Raspberry Scones To toast the walnuts, preheat the oven to 350 degrees f.  Place a little over 1/3 cup walnuts in a single layer on a baking sheet.  Bake in the preheated oven for 5 minutes  remove from the oven, stir/turn over, and bake another 5 minutes.  Remove from the oven and co...

Growing up, my dad would bake a loaf of sourdough every weekend. I loved that bread. It was nice and tart.  When we’d take trips to San Fransisco we’d get some local bread and compare to my dad’s.  The sourness level was comparable. Of course I was biased, but I thought my dad’s bread was just as good. About 12 years ago I started trying to recreate my dad’s recipe in a gluten free version. I’ve done a lot of research on the topic of sourness in sourdough in order to reverse-engineer my dad's San Fransisco style sourdough recipe to make it gluten free. There is more info out there about wheaten/rye baking so that became the basis of most of my research. There are a lot of factors in the flavor of your home-baked sourdough product: the starter, the method, and the ingredients. Starter You don’t necessarily have to create a special starter for sour bread.  However, there are a few things that might help. Use the starter after peak, even well after its optimal window for yea...