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...

Scones are what got me into this mess.  They were like a gateway drug to gluten-free baking.  Now I can't stop.  Where will it end?  I'm up to long-ferment gluten-free sourdough bread. I have a feeling I will keep looking for more challenges.  But it all started with the simple scone.   The scones were so popular that I decided to sell a  scone mix .  It can be made with the traditional recipe, the vegan recipe, or the cream scone recipe. I ran across this Pinterest board on the topic the other day and thought it was genius.  In honor of the gluten-free scone I'd like to highlight a few scone recipes, old and new. Traditional scone recipe - gluten-free Scones: Vegan Scones: Citrus Glaze Savory Cheddar Scones from Gluten-free on a Shoestring Scones: Heart-shaped Cream Scones Scones from the Gluten-free Girl Scones: Whole-grain Blueberry Scones: Paleo Pumpkin Scones from Leigh Olson

What are scones?  In short, they are my favorite pastry.  I think of scones often, so I thought I'd share a little bit about them with you, my readers. Scones can be called a quick bread, a pastry, a tea cake.  However, they are most like a biscuit in structure.  The most traditional type of scone is made like a biscuit in that the fat - in this case butter - is cut into the flour to form chunks of fat in the dough.  When the scones are cooked the butter melts and leaves pockets of air in the scone.  This gives the little cakes a flakier texture. Scones can be sweet or savory and made with all sorts of different flour blends and liquids.  They originated in Scotland.  The traditional Scottish scone would be made with white flour, butter, sugar, salt, and cream.  They might also traditionally be made with barley flour or oat flour.  Baking powder and/or baking soda are usually added for leavening.  Currants are often used for ...

As many of you already know, I'm a big fan of scones.  I already have a collection of gluten-free scone recipes that I've adapted and created from scratch.  I also collect other peoples' scone recipes, and I even have a Pinterest Board dedicated to gluten-free scones.  While searching for all the best gluten-free scone recipes on Pinterest, I came across a paleo scone recipe that I thought sounded good.  I already had a recipe that sounded similar, but for friands .  I thought I'd adapt that friand recipe for making paleo scones.  They turned out amazing, with a nice savory/sweet balance. Gluten-free Scone Recipe, Paleo Style Makes 3-4 Scones - double the recipe for a full batch Pre-heat oven to 400 degrees F.  In a medium bowl, mix: 100g almond flour 18g tapioca flour a pinch of salt 15 raspberries, fresh or frozen In another bowl, warm until melted: 1 Tbsp lard 2T honey (or more for a sweeter scone) In another small bowl, whis...

I'm not one for buying a million different cookie cutters.  I like to think of myself as way more DIY than that .  I can cut my own heart-shaped scones!  And I'll waste less precious scone dough with my method, too.  I decided that this Valentine's day is going to bring some beautiful heart-shaped scones to my plate, and they should be topped with a raspberry glaze. To make heart-shaped scones, you can use a traditional scone recipe , my vegan recipe , or the recipe below, a quick and easy egg-free recipe which is another old traditional recipe I love called Cream Scones.  You can even use my Scone Mix .  If you're not into raspberries, you can use any kind of jam to top these or just brush them with cream and serve them plain.  I also have a recipe for a kumquat glaze which is really pretty. To shape the scones, first cut them out as usual.  Form the dough into a circle, then cut the circle into eight triangles. Carefully place the ...

These whole-grain scones are gluten-free and delicious.  Have them with your afternoon tea or for a hearty breakfast treat.  These scones are made with the traditional method and all the traditional ingredients - minus the gluten.  What is gluten anyway, except an impediment to soft, delicate scones?  With wheat flour you have to be careful not to manipulate pastries too much for fear the gluten will make them tough.  You don't have to worry about that with these gluten-free scones: they will come out soft and delicious. Whole-grain Blueberry Scone Recipe The secret to getting the right texture of scones is to keep everything cold while mixing.  Some people put the pastry cutter, butter, and bowl in the freezer for a few minutes before starting to keep everything cold enough. The coldness is necessary so the chunks of butter can form little pockets in the dough when they melt away in the oven.  This creates air space for the baking soda to do it...

A couple of weeks ago I was grilling a steak and making my roasted vegetables for a friend when he made a confession to me: his doctor suspected that he might have a wheat or gluten sensitivity and recommended that he go on a gluten-free diet. I was overjoyed. I have to admit that I get a sense of schadenfreude when my friends have to go on a gluten-free diet. Selfishly, I want more people to commiserate with. More importantly, I want people to do what I did: to figure out what is making them feel bad, and find an elegant solution to their problem. In honor of my friend, I immortalize a few of my tips for those who are just starting on the gluten-free diet. Find a gluten-free friend. They will know where the safe places are to eat in your area, the good products to buy at your local store, and the the stuff to stay away from. Take it easy at first. You may have to cut out additional foods - don' t let that get you down. You may be able to re-introduce them later. ...

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...

Among my friends, family, and co-workers I am famous for my scones. I get frequent requests for the recipe.   People are usually surprised to hear that it's wheat-free and gluten-free, it tastes so much like "regular."  Well here it is! The Best Gluten-free Scone Recipe Heat oven to 425 degrees. Mix together in a large bowl: 2 cups Gluten-free Pastry Flour 1/3 cup sugar 1 Tbsp baking powder (make sure it's GF) 1/4 tsp baking soda 1/2 tsp salt plus a pinch 1/4 tsp xanthan gum (if it's not included in your GF flour mix) Cut into pieces and drop in: 6 Tbsp cold unsalted butter Cut the butter in with a pastry blender or two knives, coating the pieces with flour as you go, until the largest pieces of butter are pea-sized. Keep this mixture cold, chilling it in the refrigerator if the butter starts to soften. Stir in: 1/2 cup chopped nuts (optional) and/or 1/2 cup dried fruit (optional) Whisk together in a separate bowl: 3/4 cup ...