Gluten-free Gourmand

My last post on the Best Gluten-free Sandwich Bread Ever generated a flurry of interest and responses. All of them were about wanting to try the recipe.  Most of them, however, were from people who couldn't.  They really, really wanted to.  However, they can't get the unique Gluten-free Gourmand No. 7 Bread Flour .  It's not their fault!  It's just that due to things like food regulations and exorbitant shipping prices I only ship my specialty baking mixes within the United States.  What's a gluten-free baker to do if she lives in Australia (or Canada, or New Zealand)? Now, I'm all about promoting my beautiful, artisan flours that are lovingly tested in small batches to make sure they have fewer than 10 ppm gluten.  I'm also very dedicated to bringing my customers more recipes to enjoy.  However, my blog didn't start out to sell flour.  I started blogging to share what I know about gluten-free baking, about how rewarding it can be to make ...

If you've looked online for a gluten-free recipe, you've probably run into this dilemma:  you want to make something now, but you don't have - or can't get - one of the flours your delicious-looking recipe calls for.  This quick guide is a reference for what kind of flour to substitute for what you're missing. Keep in mind a few things when you substitute flours in a recipe: first, do it by weight if that is possible.  A digital kitchen scale will make your life so much easier!  Different flours measure very differently in measuring cups sometimes.  Second, any substitution will change the texture and density of the dough.  Thirdly, if you don't see the flour here that you want to substitute, try thinking of something with a similar fiber content and texture, and experiment.  Starches can almost always be subbed out for other starches, and whole grain flours can replace each other, but don't sub a starch for a whole grain.  Then let m...

When I first started out with gluten-free baking, I did a lot of experimenting with different gluten-free flours to see what worked and what didn't.  Here is a quick guide to what you should buy to try out at the start, and what you should avoid.  To read more about what these flours contribute to your mix read this post. Brown Rice Flour White Rice Flour Sorghum Flour Teff flour Potato Flour or Potato Starch Tapioca Flour Xanthan Gum Here are a few things you can pass up on, and the reasons why: Bean flours - Don't do it!  They taste and smell like beans.  If you need more disincentive, they are often difficult to digest and they spoil quickly. Amaranth flour - Overrated!  It's very delicate, it goes bad quickly, and sorghum tastes better anyway.  Plus, it's expensive. Quinoa flour - It has a distinctive flavor and a dry texture like corn flour.  I only use it in a few select recipes, including this pancake recipe .  While I like ...

I'm going to classify my Eggplant Parmesan (Eggplant Parmigiano) Recipe as kind of traditional and sort of easy. Here are the ways that I make this fairly labor-intensive dish easier: 1) I don't salt or otherwise prep the eggplant in any way. I just buy a fresh, firm-fleshed one and slice it just before battering. 2) I don't use bread crumbs; I just use flour. I was surprised to learn that this is how Italians do it. 3) I use jarred tomato sauce. Classico is my favorite. If I have frozen leftovers, I use some of my own marinara sauce. 4) I don't mix anything for the cheese filling. I just use mozzerella, usually fresh. My former roommate who is from Naples made this for me once, and her boyfriend at the time (now her husband) also made me a gluten-free version. Both came out rather well. Paolo made his with rice flour, which was very crispy and light. For some reason I've found that gluten-free flour mixes don't work very well for deep-fryin...

  I have been struggling to fine-tune these pancakes for several weeks now. I had never used quinoa flour before, and wanted to feature it in a new recipe creation. I also wanted to give people who read my blog a taste of how I mix flours together for general-purpose mixes. These pancakes come out pretty thick and fluffy with a moist and tender yet resilient texture. The quinoa flour lived up to its reputation of having a slightly bitter flavor. I used Ancient Harvest brand. Does anyone have any tips for another brand to try? I thought the best way to work with this flavor was to use buttermilk instead of or in addition to milk. The sourness of buttermilk counteracts the bitterness of the quinoa. Update: I've made these pancakes several times since I posted this recipe and they have never failed.  I serve them to people who normally eat wheat with good results.   I have my flour arranged in my cupboard now so it's easy to mix everything together. ...

I have been spending the last several weeks working on a few new recipes: gluten-free vegan scones and gluten-free pancakes. I have now produced a scone recipe that I can't wait to share. This recipe is incredibly simple. I was resistant to the idea of vegan scones until I found a few recipes for cream scones, which don't take butter or egg. Therefore there is only one dairy product to substitute: the cream. In a cream scone recipe, the fat in the cream is the substitute for the fat in the butter that has been omitted. Therefore I couldn't use a low-fat substitute like rice milk. I have found that coconut cream is the best vegan substitute for regular cream, especially in cooking. I love coconut soup, coconut curry, coconut everything. It's the only non-dairy cream I've found that has somewhere close to the right fat content to substitute for cream. To make sure the coconut cream was really rich, I first scooped the dense part out from the top of the c...

I had a good weekend. Saturday morning I went to the Portland Farmer's Market , where I scored some great lamb steaks from SuDan Farm , ate some habanero caramel chocolates from Alma Chocolate , and bought some vegetable starts for my garden. Then I went to the Gluten-free Food Fair, which I heard about through the Gluten-free Portland website. New Cascadia Traditional was there, as well as numerous other vendors. The highlight was sampling the gluten-free pizza from Mississippi Pizza Pub , which I hadn't tried before. The crust was really good, kind of like an herby foccacia bread, but not too thick. I'll have to go down there and do a full review of the place soon. I hear they also serve GF beer there. After the fair I went to Bob's Red Mill for the first time. They have a good selection of GF pastas and other products in the store. I bought some Ener-G White Rice Spaghetti that I'm excited to try, as well as some Tinkyada spinach spaghetti that look...

I'm not into gimmicks when it comes to scones. I like my scones simple and straight-forward, and I like to be able to taste the flavor of the grains in my four mix. This recipe is none of these things. Nonetheless, it is my finest scone recipe to date. This recipe gives you a very tart, flavorful, citrus-scented scone. It's not even difficult. Simply combine in a small saucepan: 6-8 kumquats, sliced, with the seeds removed the juice of one lemon 1 Tbsp water 3 Tbsp sugar Boil for 5 minutes, adjust the flavors to taste, then simmer until you are ready to top the scones. Use my scone recipe , opting for the lemon zest in the liquid component. You can go even heavier on the zest if you would like; the kumquat glaze will be very strong and will not be overpowered by the lemon zest. I made mini scones this time, which gives you a higher number of scones for the same recipe. I topped the scones with 1-2 kumquat slices per scone, then dripped a few drops of the glaze o...

Last month I wrote a post about basic gluten-free flours : their properties, their uses, their virtues, and their downsides. Here is the promised extension to that original post, which hopes to shed some light on some other more specialized GF grains. Amaranth flour (also known as Inca wheat or quihuicha): This flour behaves quite a bit like sorghum flour, and has a lot of flavor. It is a grain high in protein and very nutritious. A dough made with amaranth is very delicate, wet, and tricky to handle. I only use a small portion of this flour in my all-purpose mixes for the flavor it adds. Buckwheat flour : a close relation to rhubarb, this grain is in no way related to the wheat family. It is a very dark flour with a strong, distinctive and pleasant nutty flavor. The flour has a very fine grit, and can be used in making whole-grain products. It does not behave well on its own, producing very dry and brittle product unless it is mixed with other flours. I usually recommend s...

The first time I tried to make scones with a GF flour mix the dough smelled like salty beans. I looked at the ingredients on the store-bought package only to find - sure enough - garbanzo bean flour. After trying a few other pre-made mixes with similarly disastrous results, I decided I could do better on my own. Over the last year or two I've been experimenting with making my own gluten-free flour mixes. While I'm not quite ready to share this secret concoction with the world, I do want share what I've learned about the properties of some basic gluten-free flours. Brown rice flour : It gives your product lots of texture and flavor. However, it is not pliable enough to be used by itself in most recipes, and it produces a dense, heavy, whole-grain feel. White rice flour : This gives you a somewhat lighter and more pliable dough than brown rice flour, but without the benefit of the flavor of the whole grain. It is made from raw white rice. Glutinous rice flour (or stick...